Maharshi's Gospel - 9

[Guest guest]

D. It is then like sleepwalking.

 

Maharshi :

 

Like somnambulism ? Quite so . When a child is fast asleep ,

his mother feeds him; the child eats the food just as well as he

is fully awake. But the next morning he says to the mother ,

"Mother , I did not take food last night." The mother and others

know that he did , but he says that he did not; he was not aware;

still the action had gone on.

 

A traveler in a cart has fallen asleep. The bulls move , stand still , or

are unyoked during the journey. He does not know these events but

finds himself in a different place after he wakes up. He has been

blissfully ignorant of the occurrences on the way, but the journey

has been finished. Similarly with the Self of a person.

The everwakeful Self is compared to the traveler asleep in the cart.

The waking state is the moving of the bulls ; samadhi is their

standing still ( because samadhi means jagratsushupti, that is

to say , the person is aware but not concerned in the action;

the bulls are yoked but do not move); sleep is the unyoking of the bulls ,

for there is complete stopping of activity corresponding to the relief

of the bulls from the yoke.

 

Or again , take the instance of the cinema. Scenes are projected on the screen

in the cinema show . But the moving pictures do not affect or alter the screen .

The spectator pays attention to them, not to the screen. They cannot exist

apart from the screen , yet the screen is ignored . So also , the Self is the

screen where the pictures , activities , etc. , are seen going on. The man

is aware of the latter but not aware of the essential former. All the same the world

of pictures is not apart from the Self. Whether he is aware of the screen or unaware,

the actions will continue.

 

Maharshi's Gospel