The cutting edge of discrimination ()
The devotional quest rests on the ability to see the substance beyond the surface, the spiritual underlying the material. This ability comes from viveka or “discriminative vision”, which is the intellectual sharpness to cut through at right angles the surface of illusion and access the substance of reality. This metaphysical rationality is missing in worldly rationalists whose logic mistakes the surface of reality to be the whole of reality. Those with discrimination can cut through both the façade of material pleasure to see the misery latent in it and the façade of spiritual austerity to see the joy dormant in it.
Unlike the cutting edge of technology that comes by innovation, the cutting edge of discrimination comes by rejuvenation, by refreshing our devotional convictions with daily spiritual practice, regular philosophical study and periodic devotional analysis.