Atmavidya by which one can become aware of the Infinite Eternal Absolute Self has to be pursued by everyone. Education must result in this discovery, or else it does not deserve the name. (SSS Vol.8, p. 96)
(S.S.S. Vol. 8 -p.96)
Atmavidya is the only Vidya that can save and sustain, when man is tossed about on the sea of life. The art of living should help to attain liberation. (SSS Vol.7, p. 22)
Students should realise the supremacy of Atmavidya (the culture of the Self). It is the key to all knowledge. What is the use of all the secular knowledge, which is concerned with acquiring a mess of pottage? The great scientist, Einstein, regretted in his last years that his scientific findings had led to the production of the atom bomb. Sir Isaac Newton ended his life in a hospital with a mental affliction. True knowledge must secure mental peace and enduring joy. For this, contemplation of God is essential. Academic education has its uses. But it is not the summum-bonum of life. Adore the light of the Divine within you. Each student is like a petromax light. This light has to be kept burning by pumping kerosene from time to time. The soot has to be cleaned by a pin now and then. It needs kerosene. Only when all the three are present, the light will burn brightly. Your Shraddha (earnest devotion) is the kerosene. Your love is the pin. Your spirit of sacrifice is the pump. In addition, a wick is needed. That wick is the Lord’s name. With the aid of the three accessories, when you chant the Lord’s name, your devotion will shine effulgently. This effulgence is the light of the Divine within you.
You proceed from peacelessness to Paramjyoti (the light divine in the heart) through peace and an illumined mind. The heart of everyone is the seat of the Lord. In this way students should cultivate the discriminating faculty through education, cherish humility and foster faith in the Divine. This is the royal road to realisation of oneness with the Divine. (SSS Vol.27, pp. 61-62)
(Yama teaches Nachiketa Atmavidya)
Nachiketa, son of Vajashravas, prayed to the Lord Yama to teach him Atmavidya . Then, Lord Yama said, ‘Oh, the son of immortality! Listen. First establish your link with the source from which you have come into the world’. He also advised Nachiketa that since the body was perishable like a water bubble and the mind was fickle and unstable, he should transcend both and realise the fundamental truth. ‘Nachiketa! You need not search for Lord Ishvara for He is very much present in you’, said Lord Yama. (SSS Vol.37, p. 70)
Atmavidya (science of the Self) alone can fix the mind in Dharma. The students here will be given a glimpse of that Atma- vidya; they will develop a keen desire to know about it--- knowledge and desire that will stand them in good stead, when they encounter the problems of life. The war of Kurukshetra, for which the Mahabharata is the background and the stage, lasted for eighteen days; other wars have lasted longer, seven years’ thirty years and even a hundred years! But, however long, they ended! They had a finish, some time! But the battle between Jiva and Maya, the individual and the fascinating, deluding wiles of the really unreal Nature with its enticing multi-fariousness---this battle is continuous; the earliest man got entangled in it; the last man on earth will have to fight it. It can bring victory to the Jiva (individual) only when, like Arjuna, he chooses the Lord as his charioteer and surrenders his judgement, his desires, to Him. Maya can be conquered only by allying yourselves with the Master of Maya, Madhava. This is the lesson that Atmavidya teaches, this is the lesson that children in India have a right to imbibe; children from all over the world can benefit immensely from it. (SSS Vol. 6, pp. 204-205)