Fw: no doer

[Guest guest]

" ...the rejection of mental activity...becomes automatic... "

-

Gloria Lee<gleelee

< >

Sunday, December 30, 2007 2:33 PM

no doer

 

 

 

 

Question: I see you doing things. How can you say that you never perform

actions?

 

Sri Ramana Maharshi: The radio sings and speaks, but if you open it you will

find no one inside. Similarly, my existence is like the space; though this body

speaks like the radio, there is no one inside as a doer.

 

Question: I find this hard to understand. Could you please elaborate on this?

 

Sri Ramana Maharshi: Various illustrations are given in books to enable us to

understand how the jnani can live and act without the mind, although living and

acting require the use of the mind. The potter's wheel goes on turning round

even after the potter has ceased to turn it because the pot is finished. In the

same way, the electric fan goes on revolving for some minutes after we switch

off the current. Prarabdha (predestined Karma) which created the body will make

it go through whatever activities it was meant for. But the jnani goes through

all these activities without the notion that he is the doer of them. It is hard

to understand how this is possible. The illustration generally given is that the

jnani performs actions in some such way as a child that is roused from sleep to

eat eats but does not remember next morning that it ate. It has to be remembered

that all these explanations are not for the jnani. He knows and has no doubts.

He knows that he is not the body and he knows that he is not doing anything even

though his body may be engaged in some activity. These explanations are for the

onlookers who think of the jnani as one with a body and cannot help identifying

him with his body.

 

- Ramana Maharshi, from The Teachings of Sri Ramana Maharshi, edited by David

Godman