Avoidable confusions and misperceptions

[Guest guest]

........

Om Namo Bhagavathe Sri Ramanaaya

 

Sir,

 

The author himself is confused, and doubtless confusing others!

 

1) The matters of ‘self’ and ‘Self’ are often extremely subtle matters, which

the western mind-set struggles hard to comprehend. The existence of upper and

lower-case letters in our alphabet is a helpful aid in indicating what we are

attempting to say — however we need to be aware that there is no upper or

lower-case, in either Tamil or Sanskrit. Students of Sri Bhagavan’s Tamil may

find, after soaking themselves in the words, that light begins to dawn on these

matters on its own.

 

2)

RE:

 

>> >>Sat = Existence. We say, Chair is, book is etc. The common denominator in

all these statements is 'is' or >>existence.

 

>>chit = Awareness. We know. How can we know unless there was this awaremess? So

awareness is the >>next incontrovertible word to describe It.

 

>>ananthA = infinity. There is nothing else but this existence-awareness. So it

is infinity. Infinity is lack of >>limitation and that is the state of

happiness or Ananda.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

 

The bold underlined section shows where the misunderstanding lies:

 

This is what has happened. (The following are in Tamil. The same vowel length

applies in Sanskrit, but the consonants will vary):

 

aNtam = end, death

 

when you negate this (show the opposite), you have: anaNtam = without end.

 

aanaNtam = Bliss (NB: aanaNtam is an entirely different word to anaNtam !)

 

We are indeed fortunate that we have a supreme lesson in both of these words,

along with their meanings, from Sri Bhagavan Himself. Here is verse 28 of the

joyful song Upadesa Undiyar:

 

 

tanaat’iyal yaat’ena taanReri kiRpin

nanaati yanaNtasat t’uNtii paRa

akan>da sitaanaNta muNtii paRa

 

This is the Tamil poetic form which is highly contracted, so let us spell it out

in full and write the English equivalents underneath:

 

tanaatu iyal yaatu ena taan terikil, pin

one's nature what? { } indeed if one knows, thereafter

 

anaati anaNta sattu uNtii paRabeginningless endless Being

...uNtii paRa

 

akan>da sitaanaNtam uNtii paRa

unbroken Consciousness—Bliss uNtii paRa

 

Maharshi is a superb linguist, and a careful study of these lines explains everything.

 

John

 

Grateful acknowledgments to Robert Butler, who has brought such light in his

work with this wonderful poem.

 

 

-

S Venkatraman

RamanaMaharshi

Friday, May 27, 2005 7:07 AM

Re: [RamanaMaharshi] Avoidable confusions

Sundar,

 

'i' and 'self' stand for the body-mind complex that is normally referred to in

day-to-day conversations.

 

'I' and the 'Self' stand for the one without the second. If it is one without a

second then we cannot talk about it at all. But on lists such as this we still

try and talk about it. So we have to use words for describing the 'untalkable'

which should nevertheless not be mistaken for the 'talkables' to denote which

the words were created in the first place. Hence the use of capital 'I' and

'S'.

 

If we have to talk about something which by definition is untalkable, we have to

use absolutely minimum words and those words though not reaching that untalkable

thing, should still be able to take us as close to it as possible. hence the use

of a few incontrovertible words such as:

 

Sat = Existence. We say, Chair is, book is etc. The common denominator in all

these statements is 'is' or existence.

 

chit = Awareness. We know. How can we know unless there was this awaremess? So

awareness is the next incontrovertible word to describe It.

 

ananthA = infinity. There is nothing else but this existence-awareness. So it is

infinity. Infinity is lack of limitation and that is the state of happiness or

Ananda.

 

.........................

Regards,

Venkat