The Sleep of the Awakened - Part 2 of 6

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(continued from Part 1)

 

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Why do we sleep?

 

 

There are times when a rare awareness about Sleep

suddenly dawns on us; and when it does we seem

convinced:

 

 

n Sleep is indeed a fascinating and complex

experience, and more than a mere biological act we are

programmed to carry out as daily, mechanical routine;

 

 

n Sleep is not just a "physiological response" of our

body which medical science might explain away as

nothing but a "nature call";

 

 

n Sleep is such a wondrous, near-mystic experience it

moves even poets to reflect upon it -- as Wordsworth

did calling it "blessed barrier between day and

day"...

 

 

When such awareness dawns, it then occurs to us to ask

some deeply philosophical questions:

 

 

(1) Why do we sleep? What happens to us during sleep?

 

 

(2) What is it really that we experience in sleep

which enables us to awaken fully re-energized?

 

 

(3) What is this mysterious state of sleep we all pass

through every night almost half our lifetimes

("...pAdhi-yUmm urangipOgum ninradir padhinai-Andu..",

said saint Tondaradip-podi referring to slumbering

humanity)... and yet seem to know almost nothing about

its real nature or cause?

 

 

(4) Why should the source of so much of our vitality

and wellbeing be Sleep? If sleep is a reservoir of

energy to be used daily in "re-charging" ourselves,

wherefrom does the reservoir itself draw its kinetic

supply?

 

 

(5) Might there perhaps be another state-of-being

beyond Sleep somewhere? Someplace where one might

discover Sleep's own fountainhead: a primal

well-spring of mysterious life-energy from which much

more could possibly be drawn than what we know we now

do, in fits and starts, through our daily ration of

5-6 hours sleep?

 

 

(6) Where might Sleep's own power-source lie? Is it

possible to directly tap into that original

powerhouse, if there should be one?

 

 

It is these and other profound questions that get

aroused in our minds when we read the great Upanishad

called ...the "mAndUkya".

 

 

 

The Mandukya Upanishad

 

 

The "mAndukya" is the pithiest of ten principal

Upanishads which in our Vedantic tradition are

collectively known as "dasOpanishad". It belongs to

the Atharvana Veda. It contains only 12 brief

"mantrA-s". Scholars both past and present have

regarded this Upanishad to be brilliant but the most

inscrutable. Nonetheless, all the great Vedantic

'achAryA-s', from VyAsa and Gaudapada to Adi

Shankara, RamanujAchArya and Ranga-ramanuja-muni, have

all alluded, either directly or indirectly, to this

Upanishad in their respective commentaries. Shankara,

it is said, once declared that if a person could only

study a single Upanishad in a lifetime it should be

this one. In another less known, minor Upanishad

called "Muktika" (Deliverance), there is an account,

it is said, of Rama appearing before a devotee and

saying "the Mandukya alone is sufficient for the

deliverance of the spiritual aspirant", though less

eager devotees will have to read the 'dasOpanishad',

or thirty-two or even all one hundred and eight. "In

its succinctness the Mandukya distills essentials of

mystical insight", wrote a contemporary scholar, Sri

Eknath Eswaran.

 

 

No Upanishad study is recommended without the guidance

and supervision of a personal and qualified teacher.

The Mandukya is no exception. The Mandukya's terse

description of the experience of Sleep as

"sUshUpta-sthAna" (literally, a "place of Sleep") and

as "truteeyah: pAdah:" (the third state of human

experience) is extremely difficult to comprehend in

layman terms. Only a Vedantic guru can illumine a

student on the truth of the Mandukya passages.

However, even in the absence of a proper teacher, and

even when left to his own means, a serious student

placing his trust in God and doggedly pursuing the

Upanishad, can still expect to grasp at least the

outlines of the central theme of the sacred text, if

he diligently and whole-heartedly applies his mind to

the task. The task begins, firstly, in being able to

imagine Sleep to be a journey into the night Man

undertakes --- a journey with three stops along the

way...

 

 

Let us follow it.

 

*****************

 

 

(to be continued)

 

 

dAsan,

 

Sudarshan

 

 

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