Leela is the nature of Supreme Consciousness, playful nature. The phenomenal world is manifested Leela. The play is beginningless - as well as endless.

Leela is the great adventure and the great discovery. Again, and again, and again, and again - without any loss and without any gain - this endless game is played. Those who realize the "play" in the game are not caught by the game-board, and know it as the Leela (Divine game) of Leela-Dhar (Cosmic Consciousness). Those who identify with the squares and planes of the game-board are played by the game-board; and the game-board becomes maya (illusion), the great veiling power that binds the mind.

It is maya which creates the phenomenal world. It is Leela that makes it a great adventure. Tamas brings the player to maya - and boundless love and spiritual devotion to Cosmic Consciousness. Spiritual devotion (bhakti loka) is the great discovery of Leela, created by maya of Supreme Consciousness in order to enjoy Himself - to play hide and seek with Himself. There is no purpose and no responsibility in Leela.

In the words of Maharishi Raman: "The ideas of purpose and responsibility are purely social in nature and are created by mind to exhort Ego. God is above all such ideas. If God is immanent in all and there is no one except him, who is responsible for whom? Creation is expression of inherent laws in the source of creation."

This inherent law is the playful nature of the Divine, which is Leela.

Extracted, synthesized and added to by Sangeetha Johari on the basis of "Leela - the game of Consciousness", by Harish Johari. Click here for all extracts from this book.