Shankara: Part 2

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Blindness, short-sightedness and sharp eyesight are simply due to the

healthiness or defectiveness of the eye, just as such states as

deafness and dumbness are conditions of the ear etc., not of the

self, the knower. 101

 

Breathing in and out, yawning, sneezing and bodily secretions are

described by experts as functions depending on the Inner Energy,

while hunger and thirst for truth are functions of the Inner Energy

direct. 102

 

The mind, as a reflection of Light, resides in the body with its

senses, the eyes etc., through identifying itself with them. 103

 

The sense of responsibility is what feels itself as the doer and

bearer of the consequences, and in together with the three

Attributes, purity etc., undergoes the three states (of sleeping,

dreaming and waking). 104

 

When the senses are favourable it is happy, and when they are not it

is unhappy. So happiness and suffering are its attributes, and not

those of the ever blissful self. 105

 

The senses are enjoyable only for the sake of oneself, not for

themselves. The self is the most dear of everything, and consequently

the self is ever blissful, and never experiences suffering. 106

 

That we experience the bliss of the self free from the senses in deep

sleep is verified by the scriptures, by direct experience, by

tradition and by deduction. 107

 

The so-called Inexpressible, the Lord's power, is the ultimate,

beginningless ignorance made up of the three qualities (gunas), the

pure Maya knowable through its effects, out of which this whole world

is produced. 108

 

It cannot be said to either exist or not exist, to be divisible or

indivisible, composite or unitary or both. It is amazing and

indescribable. 109

 

It can be overcome by the realisation of the pure non-dual God, like

the false idea of a snake through the recognition of the rope. It is

composed of the three qualities (gunas) of passion, dullness and

purity, recognised by their effects. 110

 

The distracting power of passion is by nature active, and from it the

primeval emanation of activity has taken place. The mental states

like desire and pain continually arise from it as well. 111

 

Lust, anger, greed, pride, envy, self-importance and jealousy - these

are the awful effects produced by passion. Consequently this passion

quality is the cause of bondage. 112

 

The veiling effect of the dullness quality is the power that distorts

the appearance of things. It is the cause of samsara in man, and what

leads to the activation of the distracting power (of passion). 113

 

Even a wise and learned man and an adept in the knowledge of the

extremely subtle self can be overcome by dullness, and fail to

realise it, even when demonstrated it in many different ways. What is

presented by delusion he looks on as good, and grasps at its

qualities. Such, alas, is the strength of the great veiling power of

this awful dullness quality! 114

 

Lack of sense or distorted understanding, lack of judgement, and

bewilderment - these never leave him who is caught in this delusion,

and the distracting power torments him continually. 115

Ignorance, laziness, drowsiness, sleep, carelessness, stupidity and

so on are the effects of the dullness quality. One stuck in these

does not understand anything, but remains as if asleep, like a wooden

post. 116

 

Clear purity is like water, but combined with these other qualities

it leads to samsara, though in this purity the nature of the self is

reflected, like the disk of the sun illuminating the whole world. 117

 

In purity mixed with the other qualities virtues such as humility,

restraint, truthfulness, faith, devotion, desire for liberation,

spiritual tendencies and freedom from entanglement occur. 118

 

In real purity however the qualities which occur are contentment,

self-understanding, supreme peace, fulfilment, joy and abiding in

one's supreme self, through which one experiences real bliss. 119

 

This Inexpressible, described as made up of the three qualities

(gunas), is the active body of the self. Deep sleep is a special

condition of it, in which the activity of all functions of awareness

cease. 120

 

Deep sleep is the cessation of all forms of awareness, and the

reversion of consciousness to a latent form of the self. "I knew

nothing" is the universal experience. 121

 

The body, its functions, vital energies, the thinking mind, etc., and

all forms, objects, enjoyment, etc. the physical elements such as the

ether, in fact everything up to this Inexpressible are not one's true

nature. 122

 

Everything is the creation of Maya from space itself down to the

individual body. Look on it all as a desert mirage, unreal and not

yourself. 123

 

Now I will instruct you in the true nature of your supreme self, by

understanding which a man is freed from his bonds and achieves final

fulfilment. 124

 

There IS something your own, unchanging, the "I", the substratum, the

basis, which is the triple observer, distinct from the five sheaths.

125

 

The awareness that knows everything whether waking, dreaming or in

deed sleep, and whether or not there is movement in the mind, that is

the "I". 126

 

It is that which experiences everything, but which nothing else can

experience, which thinks through the intelligence etc., but which

nothing else can think. - 127

 

It is that by which all this is filled, but which nothing else can

fill, and which, in shining, makes all this shines as well. 128

 

It is that whose mere presence makes the body, bodily senses, and

mind etc. keep to their appropriate functions like servants. 129

 

It is that by which everything from the ego function down to the body

is known like an earthen vessel, for its very nature is everlasting

consciousness. 130

 

This is one's inmost nature, the eternal Person, whose very essence

is unbroken awareness of happiness, who is ever unchanging and pure

consciousness, and in obedience to whom the various bodily function

continue. 131

 

In one of pure nature, the morning light of the Unmanifest shines

even here in the cave of the mind, illuminating all this with its

glory, like the sun up there in space. 132

 

That which knows the thinking mind and ego functions takes its form

from the body with its senses and other functions, like fire does in

a ball of iron, but it neither acts nor changes in any way. 133

 

It is never born, never dies, grows, decays, or changes. Even when

the body is destroyed it does not cease to be, like the space in an

earthen vessel. 134

 

The true self, of the nature of pure consciousness, and separate from

the productions of nature, illuminates all this, real and unreal,

without itself changing. It plays in the states of waking and so on,

as the foundation sense of 'I exist', as the awareness, witness of

all experience. 135

 

By means of a trained mind, and thanks to your faculty of

understanding, experience in practice the true self of this 'I exist'

in yourself, cross the ocean of Samsara's waves of birth and death,

and established in the nature of God, and achieve the goal (of life).

136

 

Seeing 'This is me' in what is not really oneself, this is man's

bondage, the result of ignorance and the cause of the descent into

the pain of birth and death. It is because of this that one sees this

unreal body as real, and identifying oneself with it, feeds it and

cares for it with the senses, like a grub in its cocoon. 137

 

One who is confused by lack of clarity sees something which is not

there, like a man mistaking a rope for a snake through lack of

understanding, and experiencing great pain etc. from mistakenly

taking hold of it. So, my friend, hear this - Bondage is thinking

that something non-existent exists. 138

 

This obscuring power conceals the infinite glory of one's true self

which radiates with its indivisible, eternal and unified power of

understanding, like an eclipse obscures the sun's disk, and creates

darkness. 139

 

When he has lost sight of his true self, immaculate and resplendent,

a man identifies himself with his body out of ignorance. Then the

great so-called dispersive power torments him with its fetters of

continuous desire, hatred etc. 140

 

When a man has fallen to the state of being swallowed up by the great

shark of ignorance, he assumes to himself the various states

superimposed upon him, and in a pitiful state wanders rising and

sinking in the great ocean of Samsara. 141

 

Just as cloud formations, arising from the suns rays, obscure the sun

and fill the sky, so the sense of self-identity, arising from one's

true nature, obscures the existence of the true self and itself fills

experience. 142

 

Just as the thick clouds covering the sun on a bad day are buffeted

by cold, howling blasts of wind, so, when one's true nature is

obscured by deep ignorance, the strong dispersive power torments the

confused understanding with many afflictions. 143

 

It is from these powers that man's bondage has arisen. Confused by

them, he mistakes the body for himself and wanders in error. 144

 

The seed of the Samsara tree is ignorance, identification with the

body is its shoot, desire is its first leaves, activity its water,

the bodily frame its trunk, the vital forces its branches, the

faculties its twigs, the senses its flowers, the manifold pains

arising from various actions its fruit, and the bird on it is the

individual experiencing them. 145

 

Ignorance is the root of this bondage to what is not one's true

nature, a bondage which is called beginningless and endless. It gives

rise to the long course of suffering - birth, death, sickness, old

age, etc. 146

 

It cannot be destroyed by weapons, wind or fire, nor even by

countless actions - by nothing, in fact, except by the wonderful

sword of wisdom, sharpened by God's grace. 147

 

He who is devoted to the authority of the scriptures achieves

steadiness in his religious life, and that brings inner purity. The

man of pure understanding comes to the experience of his true nature,

and by this Samsara is destroyed, root and all. 148

 

One's true nature does not shine out when covered by the five

sheaths, material and otherwise, although they are the product of its

own power, like the water in a pool, covered with algae. 149

On removing the algae, the clean, thirst-quenching and joy-inducing

water is revealed to a man. 150

 

When the five sheaths have been removed, the supreme light shines

forth, pure, eternally blissful, single in essence, and within. 151

 

To be free from bondage the wise man must practise discrimination

between self and non-self. By that alone he will become full of joy,

recognising himself as Being, Consciousness and Bliss. 152

 

Just as one separates a blade of grass from its sheaths, so by

discriminating one's true nature as internal, unattached and free

from action, and abandoning all else, one is free and identified only

with one's true self. 153

 

This body is the product of food, and constitutes the material

sheath. It depends on food and dies without it. It is a mass of skin,

flesh, blood, bones and uncleanness. It is not fit to see as oneself,

who is ever pure. 154

 

The body did not exist before birth, nor will it exist after death.

It is born for a moment, its qualities are momentary, and it is

inherently changing. It is not a single thing, but inert, and should

be viewed like an earthen pot. How could it be one's true self, which

is the observer of changing phenomena? 155

 

Made up of arms and legs and so on, the body cannot be one's true

self as it can live on without various limbs, and other faculties

persist without them. What is controlled cannot be the controller. 156

 

While the body of the observer is of a specific nature, behaviour and

situation, it is clear that the nature of one's true self is devoid

of characteristics. 157

 

How could the body, which is a heap of bones, covered with flesh,

full of filth and highly impure, be oneself, the featureless

observer? 158

 

The deluded man makes the assumption that he is the mass of skin,

flesh, fat bones and filth, while the man who is strong in

discrimination knows himself as devoid of characteristics, the innate

supreme Reality. 159

 

'I am the body' is the opinion of the fool. 'I am body and soul' is

the view of the scholar, while for the great-souled, discriminating

man, his inner knowledge is 'I am God'. 160

 

Get rid of the opinion of yourself as this mass of skin, flesh, fat,

bones and filth, foolish one, and make yourself instead the self of

everything, the God beyond all thought, and enjoy supreme peace. 161

 

While the scholar does not overcome his sense of 'I am this' in the

body and its faculties, there is no liberation for him, however much

he may be learned in religion and philosophy. 162

 

Just as you have no self identification with your shadow-body,

reflection-body, dream-body or imagination-body, so you should not

have with the living body either. 163

 

Identification of oneself with the body is the seed of the pain of

birth etc. in people attached to the unreal, so get rid of it with

care. When this thought is eliminated, there is no more desire for

rebirth. 164

 

The vital energy joined to the five activities forms the vitality

sheath, by which the material sheath is filled, and engages in all

these activities. 165

 

The Breath, being a product of the vital energy, is not one's true

nature either. Like the air, it enters and leaves the body, and knows

neither its own or other people's good or bad, dependent as it is on

something else. 166

 

The faculty of knowledge and the mind itself constitute the mind-made

sheath, the cause of such distinctions as 'me' and 'mine'. It is

strong and has the faculty of creating distinctions of perception

etc., and works itself through the vitality sheath. 167

 

The mind-made fire burns the multiplicity of experience in the fuel

of numerous desires of the senses presented as oblations in the form

of sense objects by the five senses like five priests. 168

 

There is no such thing as ignorance beyond the thinking mind. Thought

is itself ignorance, the cause of the bondage of becoming. When

thought is eliminated, everything else is eliminated. When thought

increases everything else increases. 169

 

In sleep which is devoid of actual experience, it is the mind alone

which produces everything, the experiencer and everything else, by

its own power, and in the waking state there is no difference. All

this is the product of the mind. 170

 

In deep sleep when the thinking mind has gone into abeyance there is

nothing, by every one's experience, so man's Samsara is a mind

creation, and has no real existence. 171

 

Cloud is gathered by the wind, and is driven away by it too. Bondage

is imagined by the mind, and liberation is imagined by it too. 172

 

By dwelling with desire on the body and other senses the mind binds a

man like an animal with a rope, and the same mind liberates him from

the bond by creating simple distaste for the senses as if they were

poison. 173

 

Thus the mind is the cause of a man's finding both bondage and

liberation. When soiled with the attribute of desire it is the cause

of bondage, and when clear of desire and ignorance it is the cause of

liberation. 174

 

By achieving the purity of an habitual discrimination and dispassion,

the mind is inclined to liberation, so the wise seeker after

liberation should first develop these. 175

 

A great tiger known as the mind lives in the forest of the senses, so

pious seekers after liberation should not go there. 176

 

The mind continually presents endless coarse or subtle sense

experiences for a person -- all the differences of physique, caste,

state and birth, and the fruits resulting from attributes and

actions. 177

 

The mind continually confuses that which is by nature unattached,

binding it with the fetters of body, senses and faculties so that it

thinks in terms of 'me' and 'mine' in the experiences he is

achieving. 178

 

Man's Samsara is due to the error of additions (to his true nature),

and it is from the mind's imagination that the bondage of these

additions comes. This is the cause of the pain of birth and so on for

the man without discrimination who is filled with desire and

ignorance. 179

 

That is why the wise who have experienced reality call the mind

ignorance, for it is by that that everything is driven, like a mass

of clouds by the wind. 180

 

So the mind must be earnestly purified by the seeker after

liberation. Once it is purified, the fruit of liberation comes easily

to hand. 181

 

Completely rooting out desire for the senses and abandoning all

activity by one-pointed devotion to liberation, he who is established

with true faith in study etc., purges away the passion from his

understanding. 182

 

What is mind-made cannot be one's true nature, because it is

changeable, having a beginning and an end, because it is subject to

pain, and because it is itself an object. The knower cannot be seen

as an object of consciousness. 183

 

The intellect along with its faculties, its activities and its

characteristic of seeing itself as the agent, constitutes the

knowledge sheath which is the cause of man's samsara. 184

 

Intellectual knowledge which as a function is a distant reflection of

pure consciousness, is a natural faculty. It continually creates the

awareness 'I exist', and strongly identifies itself with the body,

its faculties and so on. 185

 

This sense of self is from beginningless time. As the person it is

the agent of all relative occupations. Through its proclivities from

the past it performs good and bad actions, and bears their fruit. 186

 

After experiencing them it is born in all sorts of different wombs,

and progresses up and down in life, the experiencer of the knowledge-

created states of waking, sleeping etc., and of pleasure and pain. 187

 

It always sees as its own such things as the body, and its

circumstances, states, duties, actions and functions. The knowledge

sheath is very impressive owing to its inherent affinity to the

supreme self, which, identifying itself with the superimposition,

experiences samsara because of this illusion. 188

 

This knowledge-created light shines among the faculties of the heart,

and the true self, although itself motionless, becomes the actor and

the experiencer while identified with this superimposition. 189

 

Allied to the intellect, just a part of itself, although the true

self of everything, and beyond the limitations of such an existence,

it identifies itself with this illusory self - as if clay were to

identify itself with earthen jars. 190

 

In conjunction with such additional qualities, the supreme self seems

to manifest the same characteristics, just as the undifferentiated

fire seems to take on the qualities of the iron it heats. 191

 

The disciple

Whether it is by mistake or for some other reason that the supreme

self has become a living being, the identification is beginningless,

and there can be no end to what has no beginning. 192

 

So the state of a living being is going to be a continual samsara,

and there can be no liberation for it. Can you explain this to me? 193

 

The teacher

You have asked the right question, wise one, so now listen. The

mistaken imagination of illusion is not a reality. 194

 

Outside of illusion no attachment can come about for what is by

nature unattached, actionless and formless, as in the case of

blueness and space (the sky). 195

 

Existence as a living being, due to the mistaken intellect

identifying itself with its own light, the inner joy of

understanding, beyond qualities and beyond activity does not really

exist, so when the illusion ceases, it does too, having no real

existence of its own. 196

 

So long as the illusion exists, it too has existence, created by the

confusion of misunderstanding, in the same way that a rope seems to

be a snake so long as the illusion persists. When the illusion comes

to an end, so does the snake. 197

 

Ignorance and its effects are seen as beginningless until with the

arising of insight, ignorance and its effects are destroyed along

with its root, even if beginningless, like dreams on awaking from

sleep. Even if beginningless this world of appearances is not

eternal - like something originally non-existent. 198, 199