LAMP OF NON-DUAL KNOWLEDGE-3

[Guest guest]

ADVAITA BODHA DEEPIKA

[LAMP OF NON-DUAL KNOWLEDGE]

 

61. M.: Maya is called Maya because it can make the impossible

possible. It is the power which brings into view what was not always

there, like a magician making his audience see a celestial city in

mid air. If a man can do this, can maya not do that? There is

nothing absurd in it.

62-66. D.: Please make it clear to me.

M.: Now consider the power of sleep to call forth dream visions. A

man lying on a cot in a closed room falls asleep and in his dream

wanders about taking the shapes of birds and beasts; the dreamer

sleeping in his home, the dream presents him as walking in the

streets of Benares or on the sands of Setu; although the sleeper is

lying unchanged yet in his dream he flies up in the air, falls

headlong into an abyss, or cuts off his own hand and carries it in

his hand. In the dream itself there is no question of consistency or

otherwise. Whatever is seen in it appears to be appropriate and is

not criticised. If simple sleep can make the impossible possible

what wonder can there be in the Almighty Maya creating this

indescribable universe? It is its very nature.

67-74. To illustrate it, I shall briefly tell you a story from Yoga

Vasishta. There was once a king named Lavana, a jewel of Ikshvaku

line. One day when all were assembled in the court hall, a magician

appeared before him. Quickly he approached the king, saluted and

said " Your Majesty, I shall show you a wonder, look! " At once he

waved a flail of peacock feathers before the king. The king was

dazed, forgot himself and saw a great illusion like an extraordinary

dream. He found a horse in front of him, mounted it and rode on it

hunting in a forest. After hunting long, he was thirsty, could not

find water and grew weary. Just then a low caste girl happened to

come there with some coarse food in an earthen dish. Driven by

hunger and thirst, he cast aside all restrictions of caste, and his

own sense of dignity, and asked her for food and drink. She offered

to oblige him only if she could be made his legitimate wife. Without

hesitation he agreed, took the food given by her, and then went to

her hamlet where they both lived as husband and wife and had two

sons and one daughter.

All along the king remained on the throne. But in the short interval

of an hour and a half, he had led another illusory life of

wretchedness, extending over several years. In this way Vasishta had

related several long stories to Rama in order to impress on him the

wonderful play of Maya by which the impossible is easily made

possible.

75-76. There is no illusion which is beyond the power of mind to

spread, and no one not deluded by it. Its characteristic is to

accomplish that which is impossible. Nothing can escape its power.

Even the Self which is always unchanging and untainted, has been

made to look changed and tainted.

D.: How can it be so?

M .: See how the sky which is impartite and untainted, looks blue.

The Supreme Self too though always pure has been invested by it with

the ego and is made to parade as jiva, just as Lavana the king lived

as a low caste wretch.

77. D.: If the Supreme Self had by joining the I-mode of the mind

become the illusory jiva he should appear as a single jiva. But

there are many jivas. How can the single Reality manifest as

innumerable jivas?

78-80. M.: As soon as the illusion of a single jiva becomes

operative in the Pure Supreme Self, it naturally begets other

illusory jivas in the Pure Ether of Knowledge. If a dog enters a

room walled by mirrors, it first gives rise to one reflection in one

mirror which by a series of reflections becomes innumerable and the

dog finding itself surrounded by so many other dogs growls and shows

fight. So it is with the Self of pure, non-dual Ether of

Consciousness. The illusion of one jiva is perforce associated with

illusion of several jivas.

81-83. Again, the habit of seeing the world as you-I-he etc.,

forces the dreamer to see similar illusory entities in dreams also.

Similarly the accumulated habits of past births make the Self which

is only pure Knowledge-Ether see numberless illusory jivas even now.

What can be beyond the scope of Maya which is itself inscrutable?

Now this done, listen to how the bodies and the spheres were created.

84-85. Just as the Supreme Self is presented as " I " by the I-mode of

Maya, so also It is presented by the `this' mode as this universe

with all its contents.

D.: How?

M.: The power of multiplicity is the `this' mode whose nature is to

be imagining `this' and `that'. In the Ether of Consciousness it

recollects the millions of latencies, as `this' and `that'. Being

stirred up by these latencies, the jiva though itself the Ether of

consciousness, now manifests as the individual body etc., the

external worlds and the diversities.

D.: How?

86-89. M.: First, mind appears in the impartite Ether of

Consciousness. Its movements form the aforesaid latencies which show

forth in various illusory forms, such as " here is the body with

organs and limbs " — " I am this body " — " here is my father " — " I am

his son " — " my age is such and such " — " these are our relatives and

friends " — " this is our house " — " I and you " — " this and that " —

" good and bad " — " pleasure and pain " — " bondage and release " —

" castes, creeds and duties " — " Gods, men and other creatures " —

" high, low and middling " — " enjoyer and enjoyments " — " many

millions of spheres " — and so on.

D.: How can the latencies themselves appear as this vast universe?

90. M.: A man remaining unmoving and happy in deep sleep, when

stirred up by the rising latencies, sees illusory dream visions of

creatures and worlds; they are nothing but the latencies in him. So

in the waking state also he is deluded by the latencies manifesting

as these creatures and worlds.