Through the destruction of maya the aspirant for deliverance becomes established in his true state. Even the sage does not know its true nature because it perishes when looked at.
This is the meaning of a verse from the Yoga Vasishta. Strictly speaking, maya is the totality of samsara, consisting of the ignorance, which is the ego-sense, and its expanded form, the mind and its creation, the universe. These do not survive in the true state of the real Self.
The Supreme Being did not become mind, neither did it become the world. It remains unswerving from its true nature as pure, unmodified, consciousness, transcending time, space and the rest.
The world did not come into being, nor is it going to be destroyed. No one called ‘the individual self’ was really born. There is no one in bondage, no one who has become free, nor is there any spiritual seeker. This is the most excellent truth that has been clarified.
This is the truth of non-becoming, demonstrated by the sage Gaudapadacharya, in his Mandukya Karikas, which is strictly in agreement with the experience of all the sages. This is further explained.
Just as the supporting screen is not affected by the series of pictures passing over it, so the Supreme Being is not affected, even while the cinema of the world is being seen.
This is what Bhagavan says at the very beginning of Ulladu Narpadu (Forty Verses), where he employs the simile of the cinema show. The show begins with a lighted screen. On this is projected a series of pictures passing at great speed, so that the pictures are not seen separately. The screen does not become wet by the appearance of water, nor is it burned by an appearance of fire. At the end of the show the lighted screen alone remains. Such is the world-show. The lighted screen represents the real Self, which is both reality and consciousness.
This truth of non-becoming has been unmistakably stated many times by the great Guru Sankaracharya. Also, Sri Ramana, the Guru, has stated this truth clearly in a variety of ways for the benefit of aspirants.
Indeed it has been said by him that the so-called fourth state is alone real, and that the other three [the states of waking, dream and dreamless sleep] are always unreal. Also, it has been declared by him that the real is always only one, and that multiplicity is always unreal.
This has been set forth in detail in the very beginning. The truth of non-becoming is implicit in these teachings.
‘There is nothing real apart from you. You are one alone, transcending time, space and so on. Throw off the delusion of ignorance and remain at peace.’ Thus did he teach the state of true being, the Self.
‘In truth the creatures are not in me; all this is only my maya’ – thus did Bhagavan Krishna himself tell the truth of the non-becoming of the real Self in the Gita.
‘The supreme reality, without losing its fullness of being, by its own maya, became this complete universe. To the sage it appears only as fullness.’ Thus the Upanishad has stated the truth on non-becoming.
Now are given the five verses of Bhagavan’s Tamil Ekatma Panchakam.
When, forgetting the Self, one thinks that the body is oneself and goes through innumerable births and in the end remembers and becomes the Self, know this is only like awakening from a dream wherein one has wandered all over the world.
In a dream one may go on a world-tour and in the dream itself return home and lie down in one’s own bed; but when one awakes one knows that it was all a dream. In the same way all of one’s samsaric reincarnations are only a long-drawn out dream, at the end of which only the Self remains, unaffected by all this. There is a difference here, because it was not the Self that dreamed, but only the ego-mind.
In the second verse the quest of ‘Who am I?’ is ridiculed, logically enough.
One ever is the Self. To ask oneself ‘Who and whereabouts am I?’ is like the drunken man enquiring, ‘Who am I?’ and ‘Where am I?’
Here the difference is that the drunken man puts the question to others, but the sadhaka puts the question to his own ignorant, false self. The real Self remains unaffected all the time.
The body is within the Self. And yet one thinks one is inside the inert body, like some spectator who supposes that the screen on which the film is thrown is within the picture.
Herein the relation of supporter and the supported is turned topsy-turvy.
Does the ornament of gold exist apart from the gold? Can the body exist apart from the Self? The ignorant one thinks ‘I am the body’. The enlightened one knows ‘I am the Self’.
Here the truth is that the one Self is the substratum of all appearances. This has been explained before. In the true state there is no superimposition, only the substratum remains, but it is no longer a substratum.
The Self alone, the sole reality, exists forever. If of yore the first of teachers revealed it through unbroken silence, say, who can reveal it in spoken words?
So this is the rationale of the silent teaching by God as Dakshinamurti, the first Guru. Rightly to teach the Self is to be perfectly quiet. That is teaching by being only the Self, without ego and without mind. He who likewise remains as the Self, mind-free and egoless, understands this silent teaching.
Thus the truth of non-becoming is confirmed.
The knowledge thus far imparted is only preparatory to the teaching of the means of obtaining the right awareness. It is not itself that awareness.
Even though the truth of the Self has been stated in many ways, it remains untold, because it can be known only by actual experience. For the aspirant to deliverance, that experiential awareness of the Self is prevented by the mind, and its firmly established conviction, ‘I am the body’.
Those minds that have been purified from worldly attachments immediately get firmly established in the natural state of the real Self merely by listening to this truth. Others need to go through some excellent process for the extinction of the ego sense.
‘One should seek the Self, which is pure and free from sorrow, with a firm resolve to know it. This is the way to peace.’ In such terms do the ancient revelation and the Guru describe the direct path for the experience of the truth of the real Self.
The ‘resolve to know’ mentioned here is the firm intention to win the experience of one’s own Self. Only by having such an intention can the aspirant turn his mind inwards in the quest for his own Self.
In the ancient revelation it is mentioned that the dwelling place of the supreme one is named the Heart. Since he himself [the supreme one] is all there is, how can the Heart be designated as his dwelling place?
The explanation follows.
The real Heart is just consciousness in its native purity. The Self is also that consciousness. So, it follows that the Self is itself the Heart, and all creation is established in it.
The sages and the Vedanta teach that the one who really has no dwelling place has a dwelling place called the Heart inside the body in order to cause the inward-turning of the mind in the quest.
The necessity of this inward turning is then shown.
The organs of perception are always turned outwards, and this is the reason why the Self is covered over by the world. There is only one means to uncover it: the aspirant turning within in a quest for the Self.
This is the meaning of an upanishadic verse.
The experience of the sages has shown the difference between bondage and deliverance. The bound one suffers from the arising of the ego sense, whereas the ego sense does not arise in the case of the one who is free.
Though the great being, the Self, is ever present, dearly beloved and of great effulgence, it is as if its effulgence is dimmed by the evil one, the ego, so that it does not shine sufficiently enough to be recognised.
Ignorance is the awareness that consists of the experience ‘I am the body’. How can this experiential awareness be a definitive knowledge, since it is without the experiential awareness, ‘I am the pure consciousness?’
Because ignorance, which is itself bondage, consists in an experiential awareness, even though wrong, it can be extinguished only by the right awareness, which is also an experience. Mere inferential knowledge, usually called knowledge of something absent – parokshajnanam – is wholly ineffectual for winning deliverance. The sadhana as taught by Bhagavan is the direct path to that experience. This sadhana will now be explained.
The thought that arises in the form ‘I am the body’ is itself the form in which the individual soul is experienced. The aspirant must seek the source wherefrom it arises, after separating from it the fraction of it that is real.
This individual is not altogether unreal. He is not so in the same sense as the barren woman’s son is unreal. The real Self is present as the substratum on which the sense of an individual soul is superimposed, and hence, even though unreal, he is taken to be real.
This distinction is very important, as it will be seen. Everyone knows that there is no barren woman’s son, mare’s horn, and so on, because these notions have no substratum.
On the other hand, the rope-snake, the silver in the mother-of-pearl, etc., are capable of being imagined to be seen, because these have a substratum, as explained before. So the individual soul comes to be taken as existing, though he really does not exist, as taught before.
The question then is what is the substratum on which the appearance of an individual soul is superimposed. This and other pertinent questions are answered in the verses that follow.
The real element of the soul, the ‘I’, is consciousness, the nature of the real Self. By taking hold of this real element, the seeker of deliverance is enabled to engage in the quest of the Self.
Give up the element of unreality of this soul, the body and all the rest of it, and fix the mind on the consciousness of the Self that has the form of ‘I’. This is extremely subtle, like a ray of the real Self. The seeker should then dive into the Heart, seeking the place of birth of this ‘I’-sense by asking the question ‘Who am I?’ or ‘Whence is this “I”?’ This is the way a dog rejoins his master, seeking him by following his scent. It is like a diver diving into water to recover something that has fallen there. This is the way to attain one’s own real state.
If during this quest of one’s own Self, the mind turns outwards, due to attachment to sense objects, the seeker should turn it inwards again by merging the world in the Self.
This is explained next.
‘Just as waves, foam, etc., are only the ocean, and as the dream-world is only the seer of the dream, and nothing else, so the whole world is only myself and nothing else.’ This view is the merging of the world in the Self.
If during the quest of one’s own Self the mind turns outwards on account of its attachment to objects of perception, the seeker should turn it inwards again. He should bring the mind back again and again and re-engage it in the quest. There must be a resolve to become aware of the truth of oneself by means of the question, ‘Who is he that has this attachment to objects of perception?’
This is the meaning of a verse from the Yoga Vasishta. Strictly speaking, maya is the totality of samsara, consisting of the ignorance, which is the ego-sense, and its expanded form, the mind and its creation, the universe. These do not survive in the true state of the real Self.
The Supreme Being did not become mind, neither did it become the world. It remains unswerving from its true nature as pure, unmodified, consciousness, transcending time, space and the rest.
The world did not come into being, nor is it going to be destroyed. No one called ‘the individual self’ was really born. There is no one in bondage, no one who has become free, nor is there any spiritual seeker. This is the most excellent truth that has been clarified.
This is the truth of non-becoming, demonstrated by the sage Gaudapadacharya, in his Mandukya Karikas, which is strictly in agreement with the experience of all the sages. This is further explained.
Just as the supporting screen is not affected by the series of pictures passing over it, so the Supreme Being is not affected, even while the cinema of the world is being seen.
This is what Bhagavan says at the very beginning of Ulladu Narpadu (Forty Verses), where he employs the simile of the cinema show. The show begins with a lighted screen. On this is projected a series of pictures passing at great speed, so that the pictures are not seen separately. The screen does not become wet by the appearance of water, nor is it burned by an appearance of fire. At the end of the show the lighted screen alone remains. Such is the world-show. The lighted screen represents the real Self, which is both reality and consciousness.
This truth of non-becoming has been unmistakably stated many times by the great Guru Sankaracharya. Also, Sri Ramana, the Guru, has stated this truth clearly in a variety of ways for the benefit of aspirants.
Indeed it has been said by him that the so-called fourth state is alone real, and that the other three [the states of waking, dream and dreamless sleep] are always unreal. Also, it has been declared by him that the real is always only one, and that multiplicity is always unreal.
This has been set forth in detail in the very beginning. The truth of non-becoming is implicit in these teachings.
‘There is nothing real apart from you. You are one alone, transcending time, space and so on. Throw off the delusion of ignorance and remain at peace.’ Thus did he teach the state of true being, the Self.
‘In truth the creatures are not in me; all this is only my maya’ – thus did Bhagavan Krishna himself tell the truth of the non-becoming of the real Self in the Gita.
‘The supreme reality, without losing its fullness of being, by its own maya, became this complete universe. To the sage it appears only as fullness.’ Thus the Upanishad has stated the truth on non-becoming.
Now are given the five verses of Bhagavan’s Tamil Ekatma Panchakam.
When, forgetting the Self, one thinks that the body is oneself and goes through innumerable births and in the end remembers and becomes the Self, know this is only like awakening from a dream wherein one has wandered all over the world.
In a dream one may go on a world-tour and in the dream itself return home and lie down in one’s own bed; but when one awakes one knows that it was all a dream. In the same way all of one’s samsaric reincarnations are only a long-drawn out dream, at the end of which only the Self remains, unaffected by all this. There is a difference here, because it was not the Self that dreamed, but only the ego-mind.
In the second verse the quest of ‘Who am I?’ is ridiculed, logically enough.
One ever is the Self. To ask oneself ‘Who and whereabouts am I?’ is like the drunken man enquiring, ‘Who am I?’ and ‘Where am I?’
Here the difference is that the drunken man puts the question to others, but the sadhaka puts the question to his own ignorant, false self. The real Self remains unaffected all the time.
The body is within the Self. And yet one thinks one is inside the inert body, like some spectator who supposes that the screen on which the film is thrown is within the picture.
Herein the relation of supporter and the supported is turned topsy-turvy.
Does the ornament of gold exist apart from the gold? Can the body exist apart from the Self? The ignorant one thinks ‘I am the body’. The enlightened one knows ‘I am the Self’.
Here the truth is that the one Self is the substratum of all appearances. This has been explained before. In the true state there is no superimposition, only the substratum remains, but it is no longer a substratum.
The Self alone, the sole reality, exists forever. If of yore the first of teachers revealed it through unbroken silence, say, who can reveal it in spoken words?
So this is the rationale of the silent teaching by God as Dakshinamurti, the first Guru. Rightly to teach the Self is to be perfectly quiet. That is teaching by being only the Self, without ego and without mind. He who likewise remains as the Self, mind-free and egoless, understands this silent teaching.
Thus the truth of non-becoming is confirmed.
The knowledge thus far imparted is only preparatory to the teaching of the means of obtaining the right awareness. It is not itself that awareness.
Even though the truth of the Self has been stated in many ways, it remains untold, because it can be known only by actual experience. For the aspirant to deliverance, that experiential awareness of the Self is prevented by the mind, and its firmly established conviction, ‘I am the body’.
Those minds that have been purified from worldly attachments immediately get firmly established in the natural state of the real Self merely by listening to this truth. Others need to go through some excellent process for the extinction of the ego sense.
‘One should seek the Self, which is pure and free from sorrow, with a firm resolve to know it. This is the way to peace.’ In such terms do the ancient revelation and the Guru describe the direct path for the experience of the truth of the real Self.
The ‘resolve to know’ mentioned here is the firm intention to win the experience of one’s own Self. Only by having such an intention can the aspirant turn his mind inwards in the quest for his own Self.
In the ancient revelation it is mentioned that the dwelling place of the supreme one is named the Heart. Since he himself [the supreme one] is all there is, how can the Heart be designated as his dwelling place?
The explanation follows.
The real Heart is just consciousness in its native purity. The Self is also that consciousness. So, it follows that the Self is itself the Heart, and all creation is established in it.
The sages and the Vedanta teach that the one who really has no dwelling place has a dwelling place called the Heart inside the body in order to cause the inward-turning of the mind in the quest.
The necessity of this inward turning is then shown.
The organs of perception are always turned outwards, and this is the reason why the Self is covered over by the world. There is only one means to uncover it: the aspirant turning within in a quest for the Self.
This is the meaning of an upanishadic verse.
The experience of the sages has shown the difference between bondage and deliverance. The bound one suffers from the arising of the ego sense, whereas the ego sense does not arise in the case of the one who is free.
Though the great being, the Self, is ever present, dearly beloved and of great effulgence, it is as if its effulgence is dimmed by the evil one, the ego, so that it does not shine sufficiently enough to be recognised.
Ignorance is the awareness that consists of the experience ‘I am the body’. How can this experiential awareness be a definitive knowledge, since it is without the experiential awareness, ‘I am the pure consciousness?’
Because ignorance, which is itself bondage, consists in an experiential awareness, even though wrong, it can be extinguished only by the right awareness, which is also an experience. Mere inferential knowledge, usually called knowledge of something absent – parokshajnanam – is wholly ineffectual for winning deliverance. The sadhana as taught by Bhagavan is the direct path to that experience. This sadhana will now be explained.
The thought that arises in the form ‘I am the body’ is itself the form in which the individual soul is experienced. The aspirant must seek the source wherefrom it arises, after separating from it the fraction of it that is real.
This individual is not altogether unreal. He is not so in the same sense as the barren woman’s son is unreal. The real Self is present as the substratum on which the sense of an individual soul is superimposed, and hence, even though unreal, he is taken to be real.
This distinction is very important, as it will be seen. Everyone knows that there is no barren woman’s son, mare’s horn, and so on, because these notions have no substratum.
On the other hand, the rope-snake, the silver in the mother-of-pearl, etc., are capable of being imagined to be seen, because these have a substratum, as explained before. So the individual soul comes to be taken as existing, though he really does not exist, as taught before.
The question then is what is the substratum on which the appearance of an individual soul is superimposed. This and other pertinent questions are answered in the verses that follow.
The real element of the soul, the ‘I’, is consciousness, the nature of the real Self. By taking hold of this real element, the seeker of deliverance is enabled to engage in the quest of the Self.
Give up the element of unreality of this soul, the body and all the rest of it, and fix the mind on the consciousness of the Self that has the form of ‘I’. This is extremely subtle, like a ray of the real Self. The seeker should then dive into the Heart, seeking the place of birth of this ‘I’-sense by asking the question ‘Who am I?’ or ‘Whence is this “I”?’ This is the way a dog rejoins his master, seeking him by following his scent. It is like a diver diving into water to recover something that has fallen there. This is the way to attain one’s own real state.
If during this quest of one’s own Self, the mind turns outwards, due to attachment to sense objects, the seeker should turn it inwards again by merging the world in the Self.
This is explained next.
‘Just as waves, foam, etc., are only the ocean, and as the dream-world is only the seer of the dream, and nothing else, so the whole world is only myself and nothing else.’ This view is the merging of the world in the Self.
If during the quest of one’s own Self the mind turns outwards on account of its attachment to objects of perception, the seeker should turn it inwards again. He should bring the mind back again and again and re-engage it in the quest. There must be a resolve to become aware of the truth of oneself by means of the question, ‘Who is he that has this attachment to objects of perception?’
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