Ignorance of the Self is the root cause of illusions of jiva, jagat and Isvara

[Guest guest]

ADVAITA BODHA DEEPIKA[LAMP OF NON-DUAL KNOWLEDGE][Originally

Sri Shankaracharya and other great Sages hadwritten several works like the commentary on the Vedanta Sutrasand thus furnished the methods for those engaged in Self enquiryto accomplish their purpose.From those, Sri Karapatra Swami later condensed thesalient

points

into

Sanskrit

verse

in

a

work

of

twelve

chapters,called Sri Advaita

Bodha Deepika.Still later, some great man seems to have translated thisinto Tamil prose. For some unknown reasons only some eightchapters

of

the

same

are

found

published.]ON SUPERIMPOSITION169-174. Disciple: The scriptures say that Isvara is the productof Maya and how can we say that He is of Ignorance?Master: The Ignorance of the Self may function singly or totallyas we speak of single trees or a whole forest. The total Ignoranceof all the universe is called Maya. Its product Isvara functions asVirat in the universal waking state; as Hiranyagarbha in theuniversal dream state, and as the In-dweller in the universaldeep sleep. He is omniscient and omnipotent. Beginning withthe Will to create and ending with the entry into all creatures,this is His samsara. The individual ignorance is said to be simplyignorance. Its product the jiva functions respectively as visva,taijasa and prajna in the individual waking, dream and deepsleep states. His knowledge and capacity are limited. He is saidto be doer and enjoyer. His samsara consists of all that liesbetween the present wakeful activities and final Liberation. Inthis way the scriptures have made it clear that Isvara, the jivaand the jagat are all illusory.175-179. D.: Now, master, just as the ignorance of therope can give rise to the illusion only of a snake, so one'signorance may spread the illusion of oneself being a jiva. Buthow can it be extended to create the illusions of Isvara andjagat as well?M.: Ignorance has no parts; it acts as a whole and producesall the three illusions at the same time. The jiva manifesting inthe waking and dream states, Isvara and jagat also manifest. Asthe jiva is resolved, the others are also resolved. This is provedby our experience of the waking and dream manifestations,and their disappearance in deep sleep, swoons, death andsamadhi.Moreover simultaneous with the final annihilation of jivahoodby knowledge the others also are finally annihilated alongwith it. The sages whose ignorance has completely been lostwith all its attendant illusions and who are aware only as theSelf, directly experience the non-dual Reality. Hence it is clearthat the Ignorance of the Self is the root cause of all the threeillusions — jiva, jagat and Isvara.