Extracts from Sri Sankacharya’s works describing his experience of the Non-Dual Self

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The following is an extract from page 111-114 of the introduction to the

book Self-Knowledge in which Nikhilananda has provided an Introduction and

translation to Sri Sankacharya’s Atmabodha. The Publisher is Sri Ramakrishna

Math. The book can be purchased through the Vedanta Society in New York City

for $5.00.

 

 

The Goal:

 

 

The knower of Brahman becomes Brahman. Knowledge is accompanies by

realization. The illusion of name and form is destroyed, and the knower is

no longer a victim of the false fear and false expectation that plague at

every step the life of the unillumined person. For the knower of Truth, the

seen, the seer and the seeing all merge in the indescribable experience of

the Absolute. Consciousness of time and space is obliterated; the fetters of

causality are broken forever. This is the experience of Peace, Knowledge,

and Reality that passes all understanding. In the graphic words of Sankara*:

 

"The illumined person, realizes within himself, through samadhi, the

infinite and indescribable Brahman, which is of the nature of Eternal

Knowledge and Absolute Bliss, which is without a peer in the world of

relative experience, which transcends all limitations and is ever free and

actionless - which is like the limitless sky, indivisible and absolute.

 

"The illumined person realizes in his heart(1), through samadhi, the

Infinite Brahman, which is devoid of the ideas of cause and effect, which is

Reality untouched by any imagination, homogeneous, matchless, beyond the

range of proofs, established by the pronouncements of the Vedas, and ever

familiar through the manifestation of I-consciousness.

 

"The illumined person realizes in his heart(1), through samadhi, the

Infinite Brahman, undecaying and immortal, the positive Substance which

precludes all negation, which resembles a serene and waveless ocean and is

without a name, in which there are neither merits nor demerits - which is

eternal, serene and One."

 

The man illumined by the realization of Brahman enters the realm of Pure

Consciousness. His mind vanishes; his activities associated with the ideas

of a doer, instrument, and result come to a stop. Emerging from the

experience of samadhi and still inebriated with the Bliss of Brahman, he

cries out in amazement(2):

 

"Where is the universe gone? By whom is it removed? And where is it merged?

It was just seen by me; and has it ceased to exist? I see everywhere the

Ocean of Reality filled with the nectar of Absolute Bliss. There is nothing

to shun, nothing to accept, nothing to despise. I do no see anything; I do

not hear anything; I do no know anything. I simply exist as the Self, the

Eternal Bliss. Blessed am I; I have attained the Goal of my life. I am free

from the clutches of transmigration. I am unattached. I am free from the

body, both the gross and the subtle. I am undecaying, immaculate, and

eternal. I am neither the doer nor the enjoyer. I am changeless and beyond

activity; I am the essence of pure knowledge.

 

 

* Vivekacudamani, 408-410

 

1 Hrdayam (the spiritual heart to the right, not the Anahata Chakra or the

physical organ)

 

2 Amazement that this non-dual Consciousness is and has always been ones

true and natural state

 

Page 1 of 2

 

Sankara’s Self-Knowledge, an excerpt

 

 

"I am indeed Brahman, One without a second, without a peer, the Reality that

has no beginning, beyond the illusion of ‘you’ or ‘I,’ ‘this’ or ‘that.’ I

am the Essence of Eternal Bliss and Truth. I alone reside in all beings as

Knowledge and Reality, their internal and external Support. I am the enjoyer

and all that is enjoyable.

 

"In me, the Ocean of Infinite Bliss, the waves of the universe arise and

merge by the playing of the wind of maya. Like the sky, I am beyond

contamination; like the sun, I am distinct from all things illumined; like a

mountain, I am motionless; like the ocean, I am limitless. I have no

connection with the body, as the sky has no connection with clouds; I am

unaffected by waking, dreaming, and deep sleep. I do not engage in work nor

desist from it. How can I ever exert myself, since I am all-pervading, like

the ether? Merits and demerits cannot affect me, neither heat nor cold,

neither good nor evil; I neither work nor make others work; I neither enjoy

nor make others enjoy; I nether see nor make others see - I am Atman,

self-effulgent and transcendent. Let this inert body drop away, either in

water or on land. I am not touched by what may happen to it. Is the sky

inside a jar ever befouled by the properties of the jar? Let there be

changes in the body or in the senses, tenfold, a hundredfold or a

thousandfold; I, Pure Consciousness, am ever free. Can the clouds ever touch

the dome of the heavens.

 

"I am verily Brahman, the One without a second, which, like the sky, is

beginningless and endless, in which the whole universe, from the causal to

the gross, appears to be a mere shadow. I am verily Brahman, the One without

a second, which is the Support of all, which has infinite forms, is

omnipresent, devoid of multiplicity, eternal, pure, unmoved and absolute. I

am the Soul of the universe. I am the All, I am transcendent. I am Absolute

and Infinite Knowledge."

 

The illumined person realizes his indebtedness to his guru, through whose

grace he has received the splendour of the sovereignty of Self-effulgence.

Prostrating himself before the teacher, he says: "O teacher, out of sheer

grace thou hast awakened me from sleep and completely saved me, who was

wandering in an interminable dream, in the forest of birth, decay, and death

created by illusion, being tormented day after day by countless afflictions

and sorely troubled by the ugly beast of egoism. Salutations to thee, O

prince of teachers! O thou of indescribable greatness, thee I salute."*

 

 

* The state of Liberation cannot be comprehended by our relative minds. The

terms existence and non-existence, as we understand them cannot be applied

to a liberated soul. All that can be said about such a person is that he is

forever freed from the spell of ignorance. He has entered into the realm of

Light, compared to which the highest knowledge of the relative world is

sheer darkness. He no longer dreams but is fully awake. He no longer enjoys

the shadows of the phenomenal world. It is often asked how long the embodied

soul must practice discipline in the relative world before attaining

Liberation.. The concept of time cannot be applied to the Knowledge of

Brahman. Time is a relative thing, dependent on the state of mind. Many

years spent in the dream world may be only a few minutes from the waking

standpoint. The passage of the soul from the realm of relativity to the

Absolute is dependent upon the Knowledge of Reality, and not upon any period

of time; it is instantaneous, like lightning.