Is super-consciousness the same as Krishna consciousness?

Transcript

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Hare Krishna. Question.
Is superconsciousness the same as Krishna consciousness? Answer. It depends on with what context and with what intent and what context the word superconsciousness is used. It’s an English word and there is no direct equivalent of superconsciousness.
There can be, we can say parachetana. But that is only a rough approximation. Now Sri Prabhupada also uses this word superconsciousness several times and he uses it in two broad senses.
One is he uses it to refer to the spiritual consciousness of the soul. So he says material consciousness is the soul’s consciousness rooted through the material body and then that consciousness is contaminated consciousness and entangled consciousness. The superconsciousness is that is perceived through the supra mind which perceives the spiritual reality.
That is pure consciousness. The superconsciousness in that sense will be spiritual consciousness or transcendental consciousness wherein we perceive the spiritual reality and of course we perceive Krishna as the highest spiritual reality. So in that sense when superconsciousness if we say that there are that the consciousness at present is limited because it is rooted through a body and it is attached to the body and so the soul as of now can’t perceive anything independent of the body and although the soul has the capacity to perceive independently of the body also but that capacity is presently lost.
So when that capacity becomes unleashed, unlocked and the soul is able to perceive that with using its own spiritual perception and it perceives spiritual reality and that can be called as superconsciousness. So then in that case superconsciousness is Krishna consciousness. Now in another sense Prabhupada uses the word superconsciousness to refer to Paramatma and the Paramatma’s consciousness.
So Aishwarya Prabhupada says that superconsciousness refers to the guidance of the Paramatma by which we get intelligence to do the right thing and this superconsciousness knows everything. So that is basically the word superconsciousness can also be used to refer to the consciousness of the super being or the supreme being that is God. So now Prabhupada coined this usage Paramatma Prabhupada translated that as super soul.
So correspondingly the consciousness of the super soul can be called as superconsciousness. So in that sense the usage is also fine but in that case it will not be Krishna consciousness it will be Krishna’s consciousness. Now there is a third sense in which superconsciousness is quite often used where it is used in the impersonal sense where it is said that we become conscious that we are the supreme being, that we are the center of the universe, that we are the highest reality.
So the impersonalist thing that some spiritualists hold the idea that when we become conscious that we are the supreme being then we achieve superconsciousness. However, that is a misunderstanding because we never become supreme. Supreme never becomes supreme.
Supreme doesn’t even have to realize that one is supreme because the very fact that he is supreme is at a time where there is a condition where the supreme is not realizing one’s supremacy. That means there is something superior to the supposed supreme who is covering that supreme’s awareness of being supreme and that something can cover the supreme means that the person who claims to be supreme is not supreme. So of course this is an elaborate subject the reputation of the idea that we are God but essentially superconsciousness is used in that sense to refer to the consciousness that we are God then that is definitely not Krishna consciousness that is actually the consciousness which is induced by maya and it is a complete misconception.
Now superconsciousness, sometimes it is also used in a fourth sense where the consciousness of the soul goes through four different stages there is current stage is jagruti which is the stage of wakefulness, then there is dream, then there is the stage of deep dream and then there is the stage of spiritual awareness which is called as turiya or samadhi so this fourth stage is also specifically referred to as superconsciousness at times so when the soul’s consciousness is rooted through the mind, through the body to the external world that is jagruti stage the soul’s consciousness is rooted only to the body but doesn’t come out to the body, comes to the mind but not to the body that is swapna when the soul’s consciousness is not expressed at all neither the subtle body nor the gross body that is sushupti and the soul’s consciousness expresses itself on the spiritual level and becomes aware of spiritual reality that is the turiya or samadhi stage and that in the technical sense so all the other states of consciousness jagruti, swapna, sushupti are inferior and the samadhi stage turiya stage is the superconscious stage so in this way superconsciousness the only way in which superconsciousness is possible for us is by Krishna consciousness so in that sense, superconsciousness Krishna consciousness is same as superconsciousness but there are different contexts in which the word will be used and with different intents and we have to see in which context it is being used to understand what is being said and whether it is right or wrong thank you Hare Krishna