Through spiritual practice and inner quest
When we enter into the third way of acquiring knowledge, which is called sabda, we see it confirmed that there is knowledge of great importance, which cannot be verified with pratyaksa nor with anumana. Such type of knowledge can be received and realized only through faith and spiritual practice and it can be further established by prayer or inner conversation with the Master within all of us.
On the platform of anumana we tend to speculate a little bit about everything. Eventually in the end we cannot develop a real determination or strong faith of any kind. We tend to see everything in relative terms, and to such a degree that even our theoretical knowledge of positive religious and moral principles is of no avail to situate us in a healthy harmonious situation.
Sabda on the contrary is the divine revelation as documented in the holy Vedic scriptures. Every principle of truth is announced therein. Receiving sabda from the appropriate source brings about a growth of awareness and allows us to do as much additional research into transcendence as we like, or until we are satisfied with the result.
We can see that there are tremendous differences of awareness of reality in accordance with the faith we have, and resulting from that, differences in the system in acquiring knowledge we use. By helping to expand another person’s awareness, we can help them to solve problems. One may be dreaming of a lion and being scared, but as soon as the person wakes up, they will realize that that there is no reason to be afraid.
In the same way by expanding our awareness towards the understanding of the all-good and all-meaningful purpose of life and existence we can overcome the difficulties of our present situation.
By understanding the different levels of individual consciousness and how this consciousness is being formed by
different social circumstances of life, and at the same time how it influences and forms the social environment, we learn how to help people allow positive influences to enter their lives and how to help them to protect themselves from destructive influences.
No environment in this world is absolutely good or bad. We have only to find out how to adjust properly. In other words there is no perfect world, as long as we do not rise to a perfect level of awareness and appropriate action.
In India we can see, for example, how the specific ritualism, popular teachers and popular interpretations of teachings impress people. They impress them so much that sometimes apparently ridiculous ideas, which contradict the very same sacred revelations they are based upon, are deeply ingrained into the faulty behavior of individuals.
For example the Vedas state very clearly that the human being should be considered exclusively for their personal qualities and by their work, not by their birth. The very so-called preachers of Vedic wisdom, the Brahmins, have a strong current insisting to the contrary. They claim that only by being born in a Brahmin family, one gets entitled to act as a Brahmin in society.
It is mainly the interest for name, fame and money which spoils the social atmosphere and which creates all the disturbances on an individual as well as on a collective level. These lower interests appear sometimes as materialistic concepts and sometimes they hide themselves behind the banner of religion. Our environment is loaded with preconceived faulty notions of the past, and all of them are the basis for the faulty assumptions and teachings of the present.