Fighting with Bhishma

A Metaphorical Interpretation of the Mahabharata 's Famous Episode

By Paramahamsa Hariharananda

You are forgetting Him at the top. Don't forget. If you remember Him and touch Him at the fontanel with every breath, this is your liberation. You all are Arjuna, so remain with Krishna at the top in die chariot-cranium, and follow His directions.

You know Bhishma? He never liked Krishna. Bhisma means "firm determination." He was a relative of the Pandavas—their grand-uncle. He was the most formidable warrior of the whole Kuru party. On the day of the fight between Bhishma and Arjuna (Krishna was driving Arjuna's chariot), Bhishma's chariot got stuck in the mud in the middle of the battlefield, so he climbed down to try to lift out the wheel. Then Krishna told Arjuna: "This is the time, go and throw your arrows at him. Pierce him with arrow after arrow in his whole body." So Arjuna threw arrow after arrow, non-stop,and Bhishma fell down on the ground laying on a bed of arrows. Krishna came down from the chariot and walked towards Bhishma with extreme sadness at seeing Bhishma killed. Arjuna was following behind, crying, because Bhishma was his relative. Krishna looked back and told Arjuna "You see, his head is still touching the ground. If you do not throw more arrows to lift his head off the ground, he will never die." So Arjuna threw more arrows to form a cradle under Bhishma's head, and then Bhishma's body was completely above the ground.

He laid there for a short period. Then his mother came. Bhishma had still full consciousness. She said: "Don't you recognize me? You are my eighth issue. I took your seven brothers' with me, but your father King Shantanu did not allow me to bring you. So at present I have come to take you." His mother was Ganga—the Ganges river. There are diree sacred rivers in India—Ganga, Saraswati and Jamuna. Correspondingly, there are three main nadis or astral canals in the human body—the sushumna (Saraswati), ida (Ganga) and pingala (Yamuna). This correspondence is beautifully illustrated in the Jnana Sankalini Tantra verses 11 and 12:

Ida bhagavati ganga pingala yamuna nadi ida pingalayormadhye sushumna ca saraswati

Ida is the divine Ganga river Pingala is the Yamuna In between Ida and Pingala Sushumna is the river Saraswati

Trivent sangamo yatra Tlrtha rajah sa ucyate Tatra sndna prakurvita Sarva papaih pramucyate

The meeting place of these three rivers Is called the holiest place. If one takes a dip there he is free from all sins.

So Ganga took her son on her lap (there was no arrows in the front of his body), and Bhishma became merged with the Ganga.

In each human being there are two bodies—Ham and Sa. Ham is full of delusion, illusion, maya and vanity. Everyone thinks "I am very intelligent." Everyone is saying "There is no God." These are the qualities of Bhishma. The death of Bhishma is the death of the human ego. From top to bottom, the human body is full of delusion, illusion and maya. If you do not throw arrow after arrow whenever you get delusion, your maya and vanity (i.e. Bhishma) will never disappear. Everyone in this world is Bhishma, full of vanity.

Many are teaching many things in the material world for God-Realization. Their body is full of maya and delusion. They speak high of Him. They say "Jesus is coming to me, Ramakrishna is coming to me." It is all propaganda, falsehood, only for name and fame. They have extreme evil in their body—money, sex, food, vanity, ego and yet are claiming "Lahiri Baba is coming to me, Paramahamsa Hariharananda is speaking through me." This is their falsehood. They should practice Kriya Yoga in a lonely place and kill all their negatives, because they are jumping from the frying pan into the fire. They tell many lies to many people, and these people are allured by this big talk. But for God-Realization there is no talk, no sound, no touch sensation, no vanity, no ego, no food, no money.

Your breath is just like an arrow. In every breath if you can touch your Soul, then you are alive. If the breath is not going and touching the seventh story in the fontanel—the Supreme Almighty Father, the real Sun, the real Gayatri, the life of every human being—you are dead. In the Gayatri invocation bhur is in the money centre, bhuvah in the sex centre, svah in the food centre, maha in the heart centre, jana in the throat center, tapa in the pituitary and satya in the fontanel.
You have seven suns in seven centers, and all are activated by the breath. If that type of rogue full of ego practices Kriya Yoga in seclusion in the corner of his own room, and touches the Almighty Father with every breath, his whole body will be free from delusion. There is delusion in Bhishma's whole body; it is why Arjuna is throwing arrow after arrow at him.
If by the practice of Kriya Yoga, without talk, without thought, you can remain in the fontanel and touch Him with a short breath, all your delusions and Bhishma-like ego will disappear. You will feel extreme calmness which is Godliness. You will only perceive the milk-white light and white-horse light and hear the divine sound and God-movement sensation at the top and in the fontanel. It is written in the Bhagavad Gita 1:14. You will see white light all around (the four white horses). The chariot is not on the ground but in the fontanel, where the Almighty Father abides. You are Arjuna, and you too are there. You will feel the God-movement pulsation and get extreme calmness which gives divine sound, Om sound, conch-blowing sound. This is the death of Bhishma. Every egotistical human being is Bhishma.
So you are to throw arrows of breath at your negative qualities.
Anytime a negative comes, throw one short feeble breath to the fon-
tanel, one short breath after another. That you will be victorious over
your negatives, over Bhishma. Your whole body is filled with the army
of the Kauravas—all negatives. So you are to remain near Krishna in
the chariot in the cranium and fight, fight, fight. Don't come down,
always remain on top, on truth, in the fontanel.

1 Ganga's eight sons were the eight Vasus (Celestial Beings, Illuminations): Apa, Dhruva, Soma, Anala, Anila, Dhara, Pratyusa. The latter was also known as Devavrata ("Divine Vow") or Satyavrata ("Vow of Truth"), and later became known as Bhishma