A Special Message from Dr. Harsh K. Luthar on 9/11/2001

In America, especially on the East Coast, many of us have been personally touched by events that occurred on September 11, 2001. Thousands of people were killed or injured due to the attack on New York and Washington. The resulting suffering has been enormous and heartbreaking to watch.

On September 13, 2001, two days after the attack, we had an Interfaith candle light vigil for the two Bryant College alumni, Shawn Nassaney and Lynn Goodchild who were on flight 175 from Boston and lost their lives when it was forced to crash into the World Trade Center. Lynn was a former student of mine. Before the vigil, I was for some time looking at her printed name on my copy of the official grade roster and at the grade I had given her. With my fingers, I touched her name and then traced it to the grade she had received. She was a good student.

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About HarshaSatsangh

Harsha

HarshaSatsangh is dedicated to the joy of fellowship in Ahimsa as exemplified in the purest Advaitic teachings of the Jnani Sage of Arunachala, Sri Ramana Maharshi. We emphasize the universality of the doctrine of nonviolence and the teachings of compassion as these themes are found in all major spiritual traditions and religions of both the East and the West. Ramana Maharshi taught that if one realizes that the same Self (consciousness) is in all and all are in the same Self (consciousness) only, one will not want to harm another! It would be like harming oneself. In Jainism, the religion of my teacher Chitrabhanuji, nonviolence is considered the cardinal principle. Chitrabhanuji taught me that a feeling of amity and nonviolence towards all living beings, when it is carried to an extreme is as powerful as any technique or method of Yoga and naturally leads to Self-Realization.

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A Letter from Harsha (2001)

My Dear and Wonderful friends,

Spiritual methods are useful to an extent and they are prescribed according to the inclinations of people. They are meant to help you accept your own Beauty. Spiritual practices are meant to make you aware of your overwhelming beauty seeping out everywhere.

The final barrier to seeing the Seer, or being the Seer, is an extremely subtle one. Grace allows for self-surrender to the Divine and this bridge is crossed. The Seer, The Seen, and the Process of Seeing merge Here and the Self-Existent, Ever Present Reality Dominates in all its Nakedness. The ancients called this Self-Knowing, Sat-Chit-Ananda. Existence-Knowledge-Bliss. It is Existence Knowing It Self in Pure Bliss.

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An Interview with Harsh K. Luthar, Ph.D.: Questions by Teegee

Q: Where were you born, and what religion were you born into?

Harsha: I was born in Amritsar, Punjab, India, in a Hindu family.

Q: Anything interesting about Amritsar?

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Nirvikalpa Samadhi and Self-Knowledge: By Dr. Harsh K. Luthar

You are the Self

Sometimes people say that Nirvikalpa Samadhi is a state where there is no knower and known. That is really a half-truth. To capture the essence of Nirvikalpa Samadhi, it is better to say that in Nirvikalpa the KNOWER and the KNOWN are IDENTICAL. It is only pure consciousness that by its very nature is self-revealing and self-knowing.

Nirvikalpa in Sanskrit means “without thought or doubt or mental modification”. It is the absence of mental modification and presence of fullness of consciousness in Nirvikalpa Samadhi which allows for the clear recognition of the Self.

Self is both the Knower and the Known, the Seer and the Seen, without any duality.  Self, being one without a second, is always self-knowing. There is no “other” for it to know. That is why we refer to the Self as Nirvikalpa. The reference to Nirvikalpa implies the nondual nature of the Self.

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