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Project Gutenberg The Upanishads translated by Swami Paramananda

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Advaita Vedanta

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Advaita Vedanta (IAST advaita vedānta; Devanagari अद्वैत वेदान्त; IPA [ədvaitə vé:dα:ntə]) is probably the best known of all Vedanta schools of philosophy of Hinduism, the others being Dvaita and Vishishtadvaita (total six). “Advaita” literally means “not two”, and is often called a monistic or non-dualistic system which essentially refers to the indivisibility of the Self (Atman) from the Whole (Brahman). The key texts from which all Vedanta (lit., end or the goal of the Vedas) texts draw are the Upanishads (twelve or thirteen in particular), which are usually at the end of the Vedas, and the Brahma Sutras (also known as Vedanta Sutras), which in turn discuss the essence of the Upanishads.

Adi Sankara: The Pillar of Advaita

The first person to consolidate the principles of Advaita was Adi Sankara (आदि शंकर, pronounced as /α:di shənkərə, 788-820 CE, i.e., 788-820 AD). He is also known as Śankarāchārya (शंकराचार्य, pronounced as /shənkərα:chα:ryə/). Continuing the line of thought of some of the Upanishadic teachers, and also that of his own teacher’s teacher Gaudapada, (Ajativada). Sankara expounded the doctrine of Advaita — a nondualistic reality. According to Advaitins (followers of Advaita), Sankara exposed the relative nature of the world and established the supreme truth of the Advaita by analysing the three states of experience — being awake (vaishvanara), dreaming (swapna), and being in deep sleep (sushupti). The supreme truth of the Advaita is said to be the non-dual reality of Brahman, in which atman (the individual soul) and Brahman (the Supreme Consciousness) are identified absolutely. (Brahman is not to be confused with Brahma, the Creator and one-third of the Trimurti along with Shiva, the Destroyer and Vishnu, the Preserver.)

Adi Shankara, with his disciples. [1]Psychologically, Advaita is a state in which the subject and object lose their independent identities — in which one can no longer differentiate on the basis of any material characteristics. The three states mentioned earlier are said to be mere transformations of this (fourth) state of experience of non-duality turiya.

This idea of a fourth state of consciousness is borrowed from the Taittariya Upanishad, dating back to about 1000 BCE. It may be noted that another school of non-dual (but agnostic) thought, Buddhism, also talks of such a similar transcendental state (as vinnanam anidassanam, in the Brahmanimantanika Sutta (Majjhima-Nikaya)). The idea of such a state of enlightenment has been a favorite with ancient Indian philosophers, and still continues to be.

Sankara’s contributions to Advaita are crucial. His main works are the commentaries on the Prasthanatrayi and the Gaudapadiya karikas. Another treatise on Advaita, popularly attributed to him by the more enthusiastic followers of the system, is the Viveka Chudamani. Note that many other followers believe that this is not the work of Sankara, citing several differences in style and ideas. Many philosophers after Sankara have criticized him of being hypocritical or pracchanabauddha (Buddhist in disguise), mainly due to this work. This is because the Buddhist positions which Sankara refutes in the Brahma Sutra Bhashyas seem to be wholly advocated in the Viveka Chudamani.

Sankara is also well known for propounding a system of bhakti (selfless devotion) and composing several bhajans (devotional songs), which he believed brought one closer to God. Some of his well-known bhajans are Bhaja Govindam, Saundaryalahari and Śivānandalahari.

Salient Features of Advaitism

Indian philosophy
Hindu philosophy
Samkhya
Nyaya
Vaisheshika
Yoga
Purva Mimamsa
Uttara Mimamsa
Advaita Vedanta
Vishishtadvaita
Dvaita
Carvaka philosophy
Jain philosophy
Buddhist philosophy
Logic

Three levels of Truth

The transcendental or the Pāramārthika level in which Brahman is the only reality and nothing else;
The pragmatic or the Vyāvahārika level in which both Jiva (living creatures or individual souls) and Ishvara are true; here, the material world is completely true, and,
The apparent or the Prātibhāsika level in which even material world reality is actually false, like illusion of a snake over a rope or a dream.

Brahman

According to Sankara, God, the the Supreme Cosmic Spirit or Brahman (pronounced as /brəh mən/; nominative singular Brahma, pronounced as /brəh mə/) is the One, the whole and the only reality. Other than Brahman, everything else, including, universe, material objects and individuals are not true. Brahman is (at best) described as that infinite, omnipresent, omnipotent, incorporeal, impersonal, transcendent reality that is the divine ground of all Being. It (gramatically neutral, but exceptionally treated as masculine), though not a substance, is the basis of the material world, which in turn is its illusionary transformation. Brahman is not the effect of the world. Brahman is said to be the purest knowledge itself, and is illuminant like a source of infinite light.

Due to ignorance (avidyā), the Brahman is visible as the material world and its objects. The actual Brahman is attributeless and formless (see Nirguna Brahman). It is the Self-existent, the Absolute and the Imperishable (not generally the object of worship but rather of meditation). Brahman is actually indescribable. But Sankara says that Brahman cannot be identified with Shunya or zeroness of Buddhism. It is at best, “Sat” + “Chit” + “Ananda”, ie, Infinite Truth, Infinite Consciousness and Infinite Bliss. Also, Brahman is free from any kind of differences. It does not have any sajātīya (homogeneous) differences because there is no second Brahman. It does not have any vijātīya (heterogeneous) differences because there is nobody in reality existing other than Brahman. It has neither svagata (internal) differences, because Brahman is itself homogenous.

Though Brahman is self-proven, some logical proofs have also been proposed by Shankara:

Shruti—the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita and the Brahma Sutras describe Brahman in almost exact manner as Shankara. This is the testimonial proof of Brahman.
Psychological—every person experiences his soul, or atman. According to Shankara, atman = Brahman. This argument also proves Brahman.
Teliological—the world appears very well ordered; the reason for this cannot be an unconscious principle. The reason must be Brahman.
Essential—Brahman is the basis of this created world.
Perceptible Feeling—Many people, when they achieve the turīya state, claim that their soul has become one with eveything else. The feeling of this transcedental perception is regarded as the best proof for Brahman.

Māyā

Māyā (/mα: yα:/) is the most important contribution of Sankara. Māyā is that complex illusionary power of Brahman which causes the Brahman to be seen as the distinct material world. It has two main functions — one is to “cover up” Brahman from the human minds, and the other is to present the material world in its stead. Māyā is also indescribable. It is neither completely real nor completely unreal—hence indescribable. Its shelter is Brahman, but Brahman itself is untouched by the profanity of Māyā, just like a magician is not tricked by his own magic. Māyā is temporary and is destroyed with “true knowledge”. This Māyāvāda of Sankara was highly criticized and misunderstood. Bhaskaracharya, a Hindu mathematician, described Shankara to be indebted to the Buddhists for his concept of Māyā. But Guff, Cowell and other writers claim to find the concept of Māyā in a germinating form in the Vedas and the Upanishads. Shankara had used the terms Māyā and avidya (ignorance) in the same sense, but the later Advaitins called Māyā as the positive force of God and avidyā as a negetive knowledge.

The concept of Māyā seems to be a hypothesis. Since according to the Upanishads only Brahman is real, but we see the material world to be real, Shankara explained the anomaly by the concept of this illusionary power Māyā.

Ishvara

Ishvara (pronounced as /ī:sh vərə/, lit., the Supreme Lord) — when man tries to know the attributeless Brahman with his mind, under the influence of Maya, Brahman becomes the Lord. Ishvara is Brahman with Maya — the manifested form of Brahman. Shankara uses a metaphor that when the “reflection” of the Cosmic Spirit falls upon the mirror of Maya, it appears as the Supreme Lord. The Supreme Lord is true only in the pragmatic level — his actual form in the transcendental level is the Cosmic Spirit.

Ishvara is Saguna Brahman or Brahman with innumerable auspicious qualities. He is all-perfect, omniscient, omnipresent, incorporeal, independent, Creator of the world, its ruler and also destroyer. He is causeless, eternal and unchangeable — and is yet the material and the efficient cause of the world. He is both immanent (like whiteness in milk) and transcendent (like a watch-maker independent of a watch). He may be even regarded to have a personality. He is the subject of worship. He is the basis of morality and giver of the fruits of one’s Karma. However, he himself is beyond sin and merit. He rules the world with his Maya — his divine power. This association with a “false” knowledge does not affect the perfection of Ishvara, in the same way as a magician is himself not tricked by his magic. However, while Isvara is the Lord of Maya and she (ie, Maya) is always under his control, the living beings (jīva, in the sense of humans) are the servants of Maya (in the form of ignorance). This ignorance is the cause of the unhappiness and sin in the mortal world. While Ishvara is Infinite Bliss, humans are miserable. Ishvara always knows the unity of the Brahman substance, and the Mayic nature of the world. There is no place of a Satan or devil in Hinduism, unlike Abrahamic religions. Advaitins explain the misery because of ignorance. Ishvara can also be visualized and worshipped in anthropomorphic form like Vishnu, Krishna or Shiva.

Now the question arises that why the Supreme Lord created the world. If one assumes that Ishvara creates the world for any incentive, this slanders the wholeness and perfection of Ishvara. For example, if one assumes that Ishvara creates the world for gaining something, it would be against his perfection. If we assume that He creates for compassion, it would be illogical, because the emotion of compassion cannot arise in a blank and void world in the beginning (when only Ishvara existed). So Shankara assumes that Creation is a sport of Ishvara. It is His nature, just as it is man’s nature to breathe.

The sole proof for Ishvara that Sankara gives is Shruti’s mentions about Ishvara, as Ishvara is beyond logic and thinking. This is similar to Kant ’s philosophy about Ishvara in which he says that “faith” is the basis of theism. However, Shankara has also given few other logical proofs for Ishvara, but warning us not to completely rely on them:

The world is a work, an effect, and so must have real cause. This cause must be Ishvara.
The world has a wonderful unity, coordination and order, so its creator must have been an intelligent being.
People do good and sinful work and get its fruits, either in this life or after. People themselves cannot be the giver of their fruits, as no one would give himself the fruit of his sin. Also, this giver cannot be an unconscious object. So the giver of the fruits of Karma is Ishvara.

Atman

The swan is an important motif in Advaitism. It symbolizes two things — firstly, the swan is called hamsah in Sanskrit (which becomes hamso if the first letter in the next word is /h/). Upon repeating this hamso indefinitely, it becomes so-aham, meaning, “I am That”. Secondly, just like a swan lives in water but its feathers are not soiled by water, similarly a liberated Advaitin lives in this world full of Maya but is untouched by its illusion.The soul or the self (Atman) is exactly equal to Brahman. It is not a part of Brahman that ultimately dissolves into Brahman, but the whole Brahman itself. Now the arguers ask that how can the individual soul, which is limited and one in each body, be the same as Brahman? Shankara explains that the soul is not an individual concept. Atman is only one and unique. It is a false concept that there are several Atmans. Shankara says that just as the same moon appears as several moons on its reflections on the surface of water covered with bubbles, the one Atman appears as multiple atmans in our bodies because of Maya. Atman it self-proven, however, some proofs are discussed—eg., a person says “I am blind”, “I am happy”, “I am fat” etc. So what is this ego here? Only that thing is the ego which is there in all the states of that person — this proves the existence of Atman, and that consciousness is its characteristic. Reality and Bliss are also its characteristics. By nature, Atman is free and beyond sin and merit. It does not experience happiness or pain. It does not do any Karma. It is incorporeal.

When the reflection of atman falls on Avidya (ignorance), atman becomes jīva — a living being with a body and senses. Each jiva feels as if he has his own, unique and distinct Atman, called jivatman. The concept of jiva is true only in the pragmatic level. In the transcendental level, only the one Atman, equal to Brahman, is true.

Salvation

Liberation or Moksha (akin to Nirvana of the Buddhists) — Advaitins also believe in the theory of reincarnation of souls (Atman) into plants, animals and humans according to their karma. They believe that suffering is due to Maya, and only true knowledge of the Brahman can destroy Maya. When Maya is removed, there exists ultimately no difference between the Jiva-Atman and the Brahman. Such a state of bliss called Moksha can even be achieved while living (jivana mukti). While one is in the pragmatic level, one can (and MUST) worship God in any way and in any form, like Krishna as he wishes. Sankara himself was a proponent of devotional worship or Bhakti. But Sankara believes that Vedic sacrifices, puja and devotional worship can lead man to true knowledge, however, they cannot lead him directly to Moksha. Moksha is the outcome solely of true knowledge.

Other points

The famous mantra of Shankara was “Brahma Satyam Jagat Mithyā, jīvo Brahmaiva nāparah”, ie, Brahman is the only truth, the world is unreal, and there is ultimately no difference between Brahman and individual self.
Shankara also explicitly condemned the caste or varna system of the Hindu society, calling it utterly foolish. This is in contrast to other schools like Vishishtadvata, Dvaita and Mimamsa who believe that since caste is based upon one’s karmas in previous life, it should be unscrupulously followed. Sankara also condemned many other superstitions.
Shankara established four monastries (mathas) in the four corners of Hinduism to guide the Hindu religion in the future. Each matha was assigned one Veda. The mathas are Jyothir Math at Badrinath in northern India with Atharva Veda; Sharada Math at Shringeri in southern India with Yajur Veda; Govardhan Math at Jagannath Puri in eastern India with Rig Veda and Kalikā Math at Dwarka in western India with Sama Veda. Each of the abbots of these four mathas also have the title of Jagadguru Shankaracharya — and are regarded as Patriarchs of Hinduism by many Hindus. Sometimes, the title of Shankaracharya is also applied to the abbot of the Kamakoti Math at Kanchi, the place where Adi Shankara reportedly passed away.

Are the world and God wholly false?
Status of the world

People often get confused by Advaita teachings that the universe is false. Shankara says that the world is not true, it is an illusion, but this is because of some logical reasons. Let us first analyse Shankara’s definition of Truth, and hence why the world is not considered true.

Shankara says that whatever thing remains eternal is true, and whatever is non-eternal is untrue. Since the world is created and destroyed, it is not true.
Truth is the thing which is unchanging. Since the world is changing, it is not true.
Whatever is independent of space and time is true, and whatever has space and time in itself is untrue.
Just as one sees dreams in sleep, he sees a kind of super-dream when he is waking.The world is compared to this conscious dream.
The world is believed to be a superimposition of the Brahman. Superimposition cannot be true.
On the other hand, Shankara claims that the world is not absolutely false. It appears false only when compared to Brahman. In the pragmatic state, the world is completely true—which occurs as long as we are under the influence of Maya. The world cannot be both true and false at the same time; hence Shankara has classified the world as indescribable. The following points suggest that according to Shankara, the world is not false (Shankara himself gave most of the arguments):

If the world were false, then with the liberation of the first human being, the world would have been annihilated. However, the world continues to exist even if a human attains liberation.
Shankara believes in Karma, or good actions. This is a feature of this world. So the world cannot be false.
The Supreme Reality Brahman is the basis of this world. The world is like its reflection. Hence the world cannot be totally false.
False is something which is ascribed to inexistent things, like Sky-lotus. The world is a logical thing which is perceived by our senses.
Consider a scientific logic. A pen is placed in front of a mirror. One can see its reflection. To our eyes, the image of the pen is perceived. Now, what should the image be called? It cannot be true, because it is an image. The truth is the pen. It cannot be false, because it is seen by our eyes.

Status of God

Some people claim that in Shankara’s philosophy, there is no place for a personal God (Ishvara), because Ishvara is also described as “false”. He appears as Ishvara because of the curtain of Maya. However, as described earlier, just as the world is true in the pragmatic level, similarly, Ishvara is also pragmatically true. Just as the world is not absolutely false, Ishvara is also not absolutely false. He is the distributor of the fruits of one’s Karma. In order to make the pragmatic life successful, it is very important to believe in God and worship him. In the pragmatic level, whenever we talk about Brahman, we are in fact talking about God. God is the highest knowledge theoretically possible in that level. Devotion (Bhakti) will cancel the effects of bad Karma and will make a person closer to the true knowledge by purifying his mind. Slowly, the difference between the worshipper and the worshipped decreases and upon true knowledge, liberation occurs.

Status of ethics

Some claim that there is no place for ethics in Advaitism, because everything is ultimately illusionary. But on analysis, ethics also has a firm place in this philosophy—the same place as the world and God. Ethics, which implies doing good Karma, indirectly helps in attaining true knowledge. The basis of merit and sin is the Shruti (the Vedas and the Upanishads). Truth, non-violence, service of others, pity, etc are Dharma, and lies, violence, cheating, selfishness, greed, etc are adharma (sin).

Shankara’s theory of creation

In the pragmatic level, Shankara believes in the Creation of the world through Satkaryavada. It is like the philosophy of Samkhya, which says that the cause is always hidden into its effect—and the effect is just a transformation of the cause. However, Samkhya believes in a sub-form of Satkaryavada called Parinamvada (evolution)—whereby the cause results in an action. Instead, Shankara believes in a sub-form called Vivartavada. According to this, the effect is merely a superimposition of its cause—like its illusion. eg., In darkness, a man often confuses a rope to be a snake. But this does not mean that the rope has actually transformed into a snake.

In the pragmatic level, the universe is believed to be the creation of the Supreme Lord Ishvara. Maya is the divine magic of Ishvara, with the help of which Ishvara creates the world. The serial of Creation is taken from the Upanishads. First of all, the five subtle elements (ether, air, fire, water and earth) are created from Ishvara. Ether is created by Maya. From ether, air is born. From air, water is born. From water, earth is born. From a proportional combination of all five subtle elements, the five gross elements are created, like the gross sky, the gross fire, etc. From these gross elements, the universe and life are created. This series is exactly the opposite during destruction.

Some people have criticized that these principles are against Satkaryavada. According to Satkaryavada, the cause is hidden inside the effect. How can Ishvara, whose form is spiritual, be the effect of this material world? Shankra says that just as from a conscious living human, inanimate objects like hair and nails are formed, similarly, the inanimate world is formed from the spiritual Ishvara.

Comparison with the Buddhist school of Shunyavada

The Buddha had not answered philosophical questions like God, the world and its creation. So the later Buddhist schools developed their own theory. The Madhyamika school of Mahayana Buddhism developed a theory, called Shunyavada, which is quite similar to Advaitism.

Similarities between the two:

The world is not believed to be eternal, nor true.
Both have defined different levels of truth. the Madhyamikas have defined two levels of truth.
The Madhyamikas believe that the eternal voidness (Shunyata) is the cause of this material world. This occurs because of illusion.
Differences between the two:

The Shunyata of the Madhyamikas is neither real nor false—it cannot be described at all. In contrast, Brahman is infinite Truth, infinite Consciousness and supreme Bliss.
The soul is believed to be false in the Madhyamika school, but true in Advaitism.
Some people interpret the Shunya to be falsehood. So the world of these Buddhist seems to evolve from a void—from a false thing. In Advaitism, the world evolves from the true Brahman. Shankara had given only one criticism against the Madhyamikas—The Shunyavada, “being contradictory to all valid means of knowledge, we have not thought worth while to refute.” [2]
In Advaitism, the personal God (Ishvara)is the manifestation of the Brahman (God). Among the Madhyamikas, there is no place for a personal God.

Adi Sankara’s thoughts in a summary

Adi Sankara’s treatises on the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita and the Brahma Sutras are his principal and almost undeniably his own works. Although he mostly adhered to traditional means of commenting on the Brahma Sutra, there are a number of original ideas and arguments. He taught that it was only through knowledge and wisdom of nonduality that one could be enlightened.

Sankara’s opponents accused him of teaching Buddhism in the garb of Hinduism, because his non-dualistic ideals were a bit radical to contemporary Hindu philosophy. However, it may be noted that while the Later Buddhists arrived at a changeless, deathless, absolute truth after their insightful understanding of the unreality of samsara, historically Vedantins never liked this idea. Although Advaita also proposes the theory of Maya, explaining the universe as a “trick of a magician”, Sankara and his followers see this as a consequence of their basic premise that Brahman is real. Their idea of Maya emerges from their belief in the reality of Brahman, rather than the other way around.

Sankara was a peripatetic orthodox Hindu monk who traveled the length and breadth of India. The more enthusiastic followers of the Advaita tradition claim that he was chiefly responsible for “driving the Buddhists away”. Historically the decline of Buddhism in India is known to have taken place long after Sankara or even Kumarila Bhatta (who according to a legend had “driven the Buddhists away” by defeating them in debates), sometime before the Muslim invasion into Afghanistan (earlier Gandhara).

Although today’s most enthusiastic followers of Advaita believe Sankara argued against Buddhists in person, a historical source, the Madhaviya Sankara Vijayam, indicates that Sankara sought debates with Mimamsa, Samkhya, Nyaya, Vaisheshika and Yoga scholars as keenly as with any Buddhists. In fact his arguments against the Buddhists are quite mild in the Upanishad Bhashyas, while they border on the acrimonious in the Brahma Sutra Bhashya.

The Vishistadvaita and Dvaita schools believed in an ultimately saguna Brahman. They differ passionately with Advaita, and believe that his nirguna Brahman is not different from the Buddhist Sunyata (wholeness or zeroness) — much to the dismay of the Advaita school. A careful study of the Buddhist Sunyata will show that it is in some ways metaphysically similar as Brahman. Whether Sankara agrees with the Buddhists is not very clear from his commentaries on the Upanishads. His arguments against Buddhism in the Brahma Sutra Bhashyas are more a representation of Vedantic traditional debate with Buddhists than a true representation of his own individual belief. (See link: Sankara’s arguments against Buddhism)

The Impact of Advaita

Advaita Vedanta philosophy had a tremendous impact on the Hindu system of Tantra and also served to bolster Yogic (see Yoga) ideas of the ultimate Self, Brahman/Atman, being One. Advaita rejuvenated much of Hindu thought and also spurred on debate that led to the expounding of Vishishtadvaita (qualified nondualism) and Dvaita (dualism). Advaita served to bring to the fore the Hindu/Vedic philosophy whose seed can be seen in the Rig Vedic statement “Truth is One, though the sages see it as many.” Advaitism is definitely the deepest and the most influential philosophy of India. Even today, pious Hindus regard material wealth and money as “Moha-Maya”.

Advaita and Science

According to some followers of Advaita, it may very well be a place where the scientific world intersects with the spiritual world. They point to the relationships between mass, frequency, and energy that 20th century physics has established and the Advaitic ‘Unity of the Universe’ as the common ground. They feel that these relationships, formalized as equations by Planck and Einstein, suggest that the whole mesh of the Universe blend into a One that exhibits itself as many (namely, mass, energy, wave etc), and that this follows Advaita’s view that everything is but the manifestation of an omnipresent, omniscient and omnipotent “One”. It must be remembered however, that none of these physicists have talked of an ‘omnipresent, omniscient and omnipotent “One”‘.

They also connect the De Broglie waves of modern physics to Aum in Hindu philosophy. However, scientists in India and abroad clarify that the de Broglie waves (or matter waves) are neither optical nor acoustic waves, but are “just functions of a probability distribution of finding a particle, which may be represented as a Fourier sum of constituent probability waves.”

However, notable scientists like Erwin Schrödinger and Robert Oppenheimer were also Vedantists. Fritjof Capra’s book, The Tao of Physics, is one among several that pursue this viewpoint as it investigates the relationship between modern, particularly quantum, physics and the core philosophies of various Eastern religions, including Hinduism, Buddhism and Taoism.

It must be noted that Advaita does not share the same ground on Science as other schools of philosophy do. For example, Sankara rejected the idea of momentariness of the Universe in his Brahma Sutra commentary since Brahman is immanent in the Universe, while Buddhists affirm that the universe on its own accord, due to the causality of the dharmas, is constantly changing. The dvaita-enthusiasts on the contrary, blame Sankara for inconsistency, since he adopts the view that the Universe is momentary in many of his other works like the Upanishad bhashya. Dvaita-enthusiasts see the Universe as a creation of God, while Advaitins see it as a manifestation of Brahman; Buddhists on the other hand see it as a flux of changes, originating from natural phenomena leading to its formation.

Mahavakya

Mahavakya, or “the great sentences,” state the unity of Brahman and Atman. They are 4 in number and their variations are found in other Upanishads.

Sr. No. Vakya Meaning Upanishad Veda
1 प्रज्नानम ब्रह्म prajnānam brahmā Brahman is knowledge aitareya Rig Veda
2. अहम ब्रह्मास्मि Aham brahmāsmi I am brahman brihadāranyaka Yajur Veda
3. तत्त्त्वमसि tattvamasi That thou art chhandogya Sama Veda
4. अयमात्मा ब्रह्म Ayamātmā brahmā This Atman is Brahman mandukya Atharva Veda

Founders & key texts

Sri Adi Shankaracharya - (attributed work) Viveka Chudamani, the Brahma Sutra Bhashya Bhagavad Gita Bhashya, Upanishad bhashya.
Upanishads
Vedanta Sutras
Vedas
Traditional life history of Adi Shankara - Historical record accepted by scholars worldwide. Written by Madhava Vidyaranya, English translations by Swamy Tapsyananda of Ramkrishna Ashram, Mylapore, Chennai.
mahavkyas are six in number-

1-aham brahmasmi

2-ayam atma brahma

3-tat tvam asi

4-sarvam khalvidam brahma

5-pragyanam brahma

6-soaham

Demigods, Sages, and Saints of Advaitins

Lord Shri Rama
Lord Shri Krishna
Marici
Angiras
Atri
pulaha
kratu
pulastya
Vashishta
Kashyapa
Vishwamitra
Jamadagni
Gautama
Bharadwaja
Bhrigu
Agastya
Shri Dattatreya
Shri Ashtawakra
Vyasa

Later teachers and proponents

Shri Ramakrishna (1836-1886) well-known modern proponent of Advaita; the primary source book, Gospel of Shri Ramakrishna (Shri Ramakrishna Kathamrita), was written by an eyewitness devotee ‘M’. It documents his later life and conversations with disciples/devotees and serves as the key reference for his philosophy/teachings
Sai Baba of Shirdi (c. 1838-1918), a mystic philosopher of Maharashtra, he was followed devotedly by Hindus and Muslims alike and practiced a blend of Vedantic Hinduism and Sufi Islam.
Shri Narayana Guru (1856-1928)- Vedic scholar, mystic philosopher, prolific poet and social reformer, who, after Adi Shankara, was the next greatest proponent of Advaita Vedanta from the present-day Kerala.
Swami Vivekananda (1863-1902), disciple of Shri Ramakrishna, wrote books on four Hindu Yogas: Bhakti Yoga, Jnana Yoga, Karma Yoga and Raja Yoga. The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda contains a complete collection of transcribed lectures. Spoke at the 1893 Parliament of Religions at the Columbian Exhibition in Chicago.
Sri Aurobindo (1872–1950) Bengali philosopher-sage who synthesized Advaita thought with Western theories of evolution.
Shri Ramana Maharshi (1879–1950) the silent sage of Tamil Nadu who had a profound realization of nonduality
Shri Swami Tapovan Maharaj - A virakta mahatma
Shri Swami Sivananda (1887—1963), Divine Life Society. Bestowed samyasa initiation of Swami Chinmayananda, scholar, and author of over 300 books on Hinduism, many available on the web.
Shri Swami Chinmayananda Jnana diksha bestowed under Shri Swami Tapovan Maharaj in Uttarkashi. Disciples founded the Chinmaya Mission. ‘Chinmaya’ = “pure consciousness of bliss”.
Shri Swami Dayananda Saraswati, a contemporary Advaitin who united disparate Hindu sects under a single body known as the Arya Samaj.
Shri Nisargadatta Maharaj A twentieth-century master of Neo-Advaita
Shri Sathya Sai Baba, whose philosophy draws on Hindu philosophy while also acknowledging other major religions.
Master Nome (aka Jeffrey Smith), founder of Society of Abidance in Truth. Teaches in tradition of Ramana Maharshi. Co-translator into English of Adi Sankara’s Svatmanirupanam (The True Definition of One’s Own Self) and the Ribhu Gita. Translator of Adi Sankara’s Nirvana-satkam (Six Verses on Nirvana).

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article “Advaita Vedanta”.

Adi Shankara

Adi Shankara with the Four DisciplesAdi Shankara (Śaṅkara, Shri Shankaracharya, Adhi Shankaracharya, Ādi Śaṅkarācārya; ‘the first Shankara’ in his lineage), reverentially called Bhagavatpada Acharya (the teacher at the feet of the Lord) (approximately 8th century, but see below) was the most famous advaita philosopher, who had a profound influence on the growth of Hinduism through his non-dualistic philosophy. He advocated the greatness and importance of the important Hindu scriptures, the Veda (most particularly on the Upanishads), spoke to a spirituality founded on reason and without dogma or ritualism, and gave new life to Hinduism at a time when Buddhism and Jainism were gaining popularity. He is considered the founder of the Dasanami sannyasin.

Life

Shankara was born in Kalady, a small village in Kerala, India, to a Namboothiri brahmin couple, Shivaguru and Aryamba. The traditional source for accounts of his life is the Shankara Vijayams, which are essentially hagiographies. The most important among them are the MadhavIya Shankaravijaya, the AnandagirIya Shankaravijaya, cidvilAsIya Shankaravijaya, and keralIya Shankaravijaya. What follows is the standard story of Shankara’s life; some of it is clearly mythical, but a substantial portion is historical, according to most scholars. In fact some of them are blatantly misleading. For example it is mentioned in Madhaviya Sankaravijaya that Adi Sankara had an encounter with a great tantric Abhinavagupta of Kamarupa. In fact the great scholar Abhinavagupta, who wrote Tantraloka and Tantrasara among his many books, was a contemporary of Abhinava Sankara and was from Kashmir and not Kamarupa.

Birth

Shankara’s parents were childless for many years, and prayed at the Vadakkumnathan (vRashAcala) temple in Thrissur, Kerala, for the birth of a child. Legend has it that Shiva appeared to both husband and wife in their dreams, and offered them a choice: a mediocre son who would live a long life, or an extraordinary son who would not live long. Both Shivaguru and Aryamba chose the latter. The son was named Shankara, in honour of Shiva.

Formal education

Shivaguru died while Shankara was very young. The child showed remarkable scholarship, and is said to have mastered the four Vedas by the age of eight. Following the common practice of that era, Shankara lived and studied at the home of his teacher. It was customary for students and men of learning to receive Bhiksha or alms from the laity; on one occasion, while accepting Bhiksha, Shankara came upon a woman who had nothing to eat in her house except a single dried amlaka fruit. Rather than consume this last bit of food herself, the pious lady gave away the fruit to Sankara as Bhiksha. Moved by her piety, Shankara composed the Kanakadhara Stotram on the spot. Legend has it that on completion of the stotram, golden amlaka fruits were showered upon the woman by the goddess Lakshmi.

Renunciation

From a young age, Shankara was attracted to asceticism and to the life of a renunciate. However, his mother, Aryamba, was entirely against his becoming a sannyasi, and consistently refused him her formal permission, which was required before he could take Sannyasam. Once when Shankara was bathing in the river, a crocodile gripped him by the leg and began to drag him into the water. Only his mother was nearby, and it proved impossible for her to get him away from the grip of the crocodile. Shankara then told his mother that he was on the verge of death; if she would give him her formal permission verbally, he would at this moment renounce the world and die a Sannyasi or ascetic. At the end of her wits, his mother agreed; Shankara immediately recited the words that made a renunciate of him, entered Sannyasa, and awaited death. But inexplicably, the crocodile released him from its very jaws and swam away. Shankara emerged unscathed from the river, now a Sannyasi.

Seeing in this incident the hand of God, Aryamba put no further obstacles in the path of her son. Shankara then left Kerala and travelled thoroughout India. When he reached the banks of the river Narmada, he met Govinda Bhagavatpada, the disciple of the Advaitin Gaudapada. Shankara was initiated as his disciple.

Travels

Shankara travelled extensively, while writing commentaries on the Upanishads, Vishnu sahasranama, Brahma Sutras, and the Bhagavad Gita. He engaged in a series of debates with Buddhist scholars, and with scholars of the Purva Mimamsa school, which helped in cementing his spiritual ascendancy. One of the most famous of these debates was with the famed ritualist Mandana Mishra.

His most famous encounter was however with an untouchable. On his way to the Vishwanath temple in Kashi, he came upon an untouchable and his dog. When asked to move aside by Shankara’s disciples, the untouchable asked: “Do you wish that I move my soul, the Ātman and ever lasting, or this body made of clay?” Seeing the untouchable as none other than the Lord Shiva, Shankara prostrated himself before Ishwara, composing five shlokas (Manisha Panchakam). It was from Benaras (Kashi) that he started his Vishwa Vijaya Yatra (journey to conquor the world).

Once he was saved by Sri Narasimha from being sacrificed to goddess Kali by a Kapalika. He then composed the Laksmi-Nrsimha stotra. Another famous composition of Sri Adi Shankara is his Bhaja Govindam, in praise of Vishnu.

It is a traditional belief that Adi Sankara installed at Srirangam a yantra called janakarshana to attract pilgrims to this sacred temple, just as at Tirupati he installed the dhanakarshana yantra. Indeed, Srirangam is the most visited Hindu temple in the world, and Tirupati is the richest.

Shankara is believed to have visited the Sarvajnapitha (lit., the Throne of Omniscience) in Kanchi, where he attained samadhi. A later day famous Abhinava Sankarachaya is known to have visited the Sarvajnapitha in Kashmir before he withdrew to Kedarnath and attained samadhi. The Kamakshi Amman temple at Kanchipuram also has a vrindavanam where he is believed to have attained siddhi. He died at Kanchi when only thirty-two years of age. (A variant tradition expounded by keraliya Shankaravijaya places his place of death as Vadakkumnathan (vRashAcala) temple in Thrissur, Kerala.)

Shankara’s dates

Modern scholarship is agreed on dates in the 8th century, though it has proved impossible to reach agreement on Shankara’s precise dates of birth or death. Some religious institutions dedicated to Shankara, such as Shankara mathams, however, ascribe much earlier dates to him. If these dates were true, they would require moving back the date of Buddha (which serves as an anchor for modern academic history of India).

Of the major Shankara Mathams active today, the Kanchi, Dwaraka, and Puri ascribe the dates 509–477 BCE to Shankara. The Sringeri Peetham, on the other hand, accepts the 788–820 CE dates. (See also below.)

According to Swami Niranjanananda Saraswati’s biography of Shankara, published in his book Sannyasa Darshan, Shankara was born in Kalady, Kerala, in 686, and attained mahasamadhi at Kedarnath, Uttaranchal, in 718.

Philosophy and religious thought

At the time of Shankara’s life, Hinduism had lost some of its appeal because of the influence of Buddhism and Jainism. Shankara stressed the importance of the Vedas, and his work helped Hinduism regain strength and popularity. Although he did not live long, he had travelled on foot to various parts of India to restore the study of the Vedas. His philosophy is known as Advaita Vedanta.

Shankara’s theology maintains that spiritual ignorance (avidya) is caused by seeing the self (Ātman) where self is not. Discrimination needs to be developed in order to distinguish true from false and knowledge (jnana) from ignorance (avidya). Shankara proposed that, while the phenomenal universe, our consciousness and bodily being are certainly experienced, they are not true reality, but are rather maya. He considered that the ultimate truth was Brahman, the single divine foundation, which is beyond time, space, and causation. Brahman is immanent and transcendent, but not merely a pantheistic concept. Indeed, while Brahman is the efficient and material cause for the cosmos, Brahman itself is not limited by self-projection, and transcends all binary opposites or dualities, especially such individuated aspects as form and being.

We must pierce through a hazy lens to understand our true being and nature, which is not change and mortality, but unmitigated bliss for eternity. If we are to understand the true motive behind our actions and thoughts, we must become aware of the fundamental unity of being. How, he asks, can a limited mind comprehend the limitless Ātman? It cannot, he argues, and therefore we must transcend even the mind and become one with Soul-consciousness.

Shankara denounced caste and meaningless ritual as foolish, and in his own charismatic manner exhorted the true devotee to meditate on god’s love and to apprehend truth. His treatises on the Upanishads, Bhagavad Gita, and Vedanta Sutras are testaments to a keen and intuitive mind that did not want to admit dogma but advocated reason. His greatest lesson was that reason and abstract philosophising alone would not lead to moksha (liberation). It was only through selflessness and love governed by viveka (discrimination) that a devotee would realise his inner self. Charges that his philosophical views were influenced by Buddhism are unfounded, as both Buddha and Sankara’s views were based on the ancient shastras. Buddhas shunyata is misconstrued by many as negation of being. Nagarjuna in Mulamadhyamakakaika clearly states that shunyata of Buddhism is neither nothingness nor no-nothingness. It is like the Nisadiya sutra of the Rig veda telling that the ultimate reality is neither existence nor non-existence. Sankara believed that the unmanifest Brahman manifested itself as Ishwara, the loving, perfect being on high who is seen by many as being Vishnu or Shiva or whatever their hearts dictate. Shankara is said to have travelled throughout India, from the South to Kashmir, preaching to the local populaces and debating philosophy (apparently successfully, though no documentation exists) with other Hindu and Buddhist scholars and monks along the way.

His beliefs form the basis of the Smarta tradition, or Smartism and influenced Sant Matha lineages such as Advait Matha. [1]

Even though he lived for only thirty-two years, his impact on India and on Hinduism cannot be stressed enough, as he countered the increasing sacerdotalism (the belief that priests can mediate between humans and god) of the masses, and reintroduced a purer form of Vedic thought. He presented a face of Hinduism that could reasonably contend with Buddhist ideas and spread it, as well as reformist measures, across the land, travelling from as far up as Kashmir from areas in South India. His Hindu revival movement paved the way for the strict theistic movements of Ramanuja and Madhva. The historians like Vincent Smith suggested that it was due to Adi Sankaracharya there was decline of Buddhism in India. Other argue that it was due to the Muslim invasion (of Bakhtyar) that Nalanda was routed and the library there was burned and thousands of Buddha viharas were destroyed subsequently.

Works

Adi Shankara has authored many works of stotras, and bhashyas, many of these are debated and questioned but below are a list of Books certainly written by Adi Shankara:

The “Crest-Jewel of Discrimination” or Viveka Chudamani, one of his most famous works, which summarises his ideas of non-dual Vedanta
The commentary Bhashya on the Brahma Sutra
The commentary on the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad
The commentary on the Taittiriya Upanishad
The Thousand Teachings or Upadesasahasri
A hymn to Krishna as the Herder of Cows, known as Bhaja Govindam
Benedictory invocation to Shiva and Shakti, namely Shivanandalahari and Saundaryalahari respectively
Commentary on Vishnu Sahasranama
Books he probably wrote are:

The commentary on Gaudapada’s Karika to the Mandukya Upanishad

The commentary on the Bhagavad Gita, though there is no scholarly agreement on this.

Mathas (monasteries)

Shankara is said to have founded four maṭhas (a matha is a monastery or religious order), which are important to this day, to guide the Hindu religion in the future. These are at Sringeri in Karnataka, in the south; Dwaraka in Gujarat in the west; Puri in Orissa in the east; and Jyotirmath (Joshimath) in Uttaranchal in the north. He put in charge of these mathas his four main disciples: Sureshwaracharya, Hastamalaka, Padmapada, and Trotakacharya respectively; the heads of the mathas trace their authority back to them. Each matha was assigned one Veda. The Jyothir Math near Badrinath in northern India is assigned with Atharva Veda; Sharada Math at Shringeri in southern India with Yajur Veda; Govardhan Math at Jagannath Puri in eastern India with Rig Veda and Kalikā Math at Dwarka in western India with Sama Veda. Each of the abbots of these four mathas also have the title of Jagadguru Shankaracharya — and are regarded as Patriarchs of Hinduism by many Hindus. However, some claim that there is no concrete evidence for the existence of these mathas before the 14th century.

The matha at Kanchipuram or Kanchi in Tamil Nadu claims that it was also founded by Shankara. According to this matha, it was where he settled in his last days and attained mahāsamādhi (i.e. left his body), but there are other, accounts which claim that he attained mahāsamādhi at Kedarnath.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article “Adi_Shankara”.

The Upanishads, translated by Juan Mascaro, is a beautiful translation, which, like Mascaro’s translation of The Bhagavid Gita, breathes simplicity and purity throughout. The Upanishads are maxims on the spiritual life, and are poetry, scripture, guidance all in one. “The truth is hidden by a circle of gold. Unveil the truth, oh God of light, that I might see!” “It is not for the love of the husband that the husband is dear, but for the soul that is in the husband.” “Behold, all that lives and walks on earth. Leaving the transient, take refuge in the eternal, set not your heart on another’s possession. Working thus, a man can wish for a life of one hundred years. Only actions done in God, bind not the heart of man.” (I paraphrase). This collection is truly wonderful, and should be a part of everyone’s spiritual library, along with the major scriptures of all the world’s faiths…Amazon review

The Yoga Sutras - III

PATANJALI AND THE YOGA SUTRAS

Almost nothing is known about the sage who wrote the Yoga Sutras. The dating of his life has varied widely between the fourth century B.C.E. and the sixth century C.E., but the fourth century B.C.E. is the period noted for the appearance of aphoristic literature. Traditional Indian literature, especially the Padma Purana, includes brief references to Patanjali, indicating that he was born in Illavrita Varsha. Bharata Var-sha is the ancient designation of Greater India as an integral part of Jambudvipa, the world as conceived in classical topography, but Illavrita Varsha is not one of its subdivisions. It is an exalted realm inhabited by the gods and enlightened beings who have transcended even the rarefied celestial regions encompassed by the sevenfold Jambudvipa. Patanjali is said to be the son of Angira and Sati, to have married Lolupa, whom he discovered in the hol-low of a tree on the northern slope of Mount Sumeru, and to have reduced the degenerate denizens of Bhotabhandra to ashes with fire from his mouth. Such legendary details conceal more than they reveal and suggest that Patanjali was a great Rishi who de-scended to earth in order to share the fruits of his wisdom with those who were ready to receive it.

Some commentators identify the author of the Yoga Sutras with the Patanjali who wrote the Mahabhashya or Great Commentary on Panini’s famous treatise on Sanskrit grammar sometime between the third and first centuries B.C.E. Although several scholars have contended that internal evidence contradicts such an identification, others have not found this reasoning conclusive. King Bhoja, who wrote a well-known commentary in the tenth century, was inclined to ascribe both works to a single author, perhaps partly as a reaction to others who placed Patanjali several centuries C.E. owing to his alleged implicit criticisms of late Buddhist doctrines. A more venerable tradition, however, rejects this identification altogether and holds that the author of the Yoga Sutras lived long before the commentator on Panini. In this view, oblique references to Buddhist doctrines are actually allusions to modes of thought found in some Upanishads.

In addition to our lack of definite knowledge about Patanjali’s life, confusion arises from contrasting appraisals of the Yoga Sutras itself. There is a strong consensus that the Yoga Sutras represents a masterly compendium of various Yoga practices which can be traced back through the Upanishads to the Vedas. Many forms of Yoga existed by the time this treatise was written, and Patanjali came at the end of a long and ancient line of yogins. In accord with the free- thinking tradition of shramanas, forest recluses and wandering mendicants, the ultimate vindication of the Yoga system is to be found in the lifelong experiences of its ardent votaries and exemplars. The Yoga Sutras constitutes a practitioner’s manual, and has long been cherished as the pristine expression of Raja Yoga. The basic texts of Raja Yoga are Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, the Yogabhashya of Vyasa and the Tattvavaisharadi of Vachaspati Mishra. Hatha Yoga was formulated by Gorakshanatha, who lived around 1200 C.E. The main texts of this school are the Goraksha Sutaka, the Nathayoga Pradipika of Yogindra of the flfteenth century, and the later Shivasamhita. Whereas Hatha Yoga stresses breath regulation and bodily discipline, Raja Yoga is essentially concerned with mind control, meditation and self-study.

The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali is universal in the manner of the Bhagavad Gita, including a diversity of standpoints whilst fusing Sankhya metaphysics with bhakti or self-surrender. There is room for differences of emphasis, but every diligent user of Patanjali’s aphorisms is enabled to refine aspirations, clarify thoughts, strengthen efforts, and sharpen focus on essentials in spiritual self-discipline. Accommodating a variety of exercises — mind control, visualization, breath, posture, moral training — Patanjali brings together the best in differing approaches, providing an integrated discipline marked by moderation, flexibility and balance, as well as degrees of depth in meditative absorption. The text eludes any simple classification within the vast resources of Indian sacred literature and a fortiori among the manifold scriptures of the world. Although it does not resist philosophical analysis in the way many mystical treatises do, it is primarily a practical aid to the quest for spiritual freedom, which transcends the concerns of theoretical clarification. Yet like any arcane science which necessarily pushes beyond the shifting boundaries of sensory experience, beyond conventional concepts of inductive reasoning and mundane reality, it reaffirms at every point its vital connection with the universal search for meaning and deliverance from bondage to shared illusions. It is a summons to systematic self- mastery which can aspire to the summits of gnosis.

The actual text as it has come down to the present may not be exactly what Patanjali penned. Perhaps he reformulated in terse aphoristic language crucial insights found in time- honoured but long-forgotten texts. Perhaps he borrowed terms and phrases from diverse schools of thought and training. References to breath control, pranayama, can be found in the oldest Upanishads, and the lineaments of systems of Yoga may be discerned in the Maitrayana, Shvetashvatara and Katha Upanishads, and veiled instructions are given in the ‘Yoga’ Upanishads — Yogatattva, Dhyanabindu, Hamsa, Amritanada, Shandilya, Varaha, Mandala Brahmana, Nadabindu and Yogakundali — though a leaning towards Sankhya metaphysics occurs only in the Maitrayana. The Mahabharata mentions the Sankhya and the Yoga as ancient systems of thought. Hiranyagarbha is traditionally regarded as the propounder of Yoga, just as Kapila is known as the original expounder of Sankhya. The Ahirbudhnya states that Hiranyagarbha disclosed the entire science of Yoga in two texts — the Nirodha Samhita and the Karma Samhita. The former treatise has been called the Yoganushasanam, and Patanjali also begins his work with the same term. He also stresses nirodha in the first section of his work.

In general, the affinities of the Yoga Sutras with the texts of Hiranyagarbha suggest that Patanjali was an adherent of the Hiranyagarbha school of Yoga, and yet his own manner of treatment of the subject is distinctive. His reliance upon the fundamental principles of Sankhya entitle him to be considered as also belonging to the Sankhya Yoga school. On the other hand, the significant variations of the later Sankhya of Ishvarakrishna from older traditions of proto-Sankhya point to the advantage of not subsuming the Yoga Sutras under broader systems. The author of Yuktidipika stresses that for Patanjali there are twelve capacities, unlike Ishvarakrishna’s thirteen, that egoity is not a separate principle for Patanjali but is bound up with intellect and volition. Furthermore, Patanjali held that the subtle body is created anew with each embodiment and lasts only as long as a particular embodiment, and also that the capacities can only function from within. Altogether, Patanjali’s work provides a unique synthesis of standpoints and is backed by the testimony of the accumulated wisdom derived from the experiences of many practitioners and earlier lineages of teachers.

Some scholars and commentators have speculated that Patanjali wrote only the first three padas of the Yoga Sutras, whilst the exceptionally short fourth pada was added later. Indeed, as early as the writings of King Bhoja, one verse in the fourth pada (IV. 16) was recognized asa line interpolated from Vyasa’s seventh commentary in which he dissented from Vijnanavadin Buddhists. Other interpolations may have occurred even in the first three padas, such as III.22, which some classical commentators questioned. The fact that the third pada ends with the word iti (’thus’, ’so’, usually indicating the end of a text), as it does at the end of the fourth pada, might suggest that the original contained only three books. However, the philosophical significance of the fourth pada is such that the coherence of the entire text need not be questioned on the basis of inconclusive speculations.

Al-Biruni translated into Arabic a book he called Kitab Patanjal (The Book of Patanjali), which he said was famous throughout India. Although his text has an aim similar to the Yoga Sutras and uses many of the same concepts, it is more theistic in its content and even has a slightly Sufi tone. It is not the text now known as the Yoga Sutras, but it may be a kind of paraphrase popular at the time, rather like the Dnyaneshwari, which stands both as an independent work and a helpful restatement of the Bhagavad Gita. The Kitab translated by al-Biruni illustrates the pervasive influence of Patanjali’s work throughout the Indian subcontinent.

For the practical aspirant to inner tranquillity and spiritual realization, the recurring speculations of scholars and commentators, stimulated by the lack of exact historical information about the author and the text, are of secondary value. Whatever the precise details regarding the composition of the treatise as it has come down through the centuries, it is clearly an integrated whole, every verse of which is helpful not only for theoretical understanding but also for sustained practice. The Yoga Sutras constitutes a complete text on meditation and is invaluable in that every sutra demands deep reflection and repeated application. Patanjali advocated less a doctrinaire method than a generous framework with which one can make experiments with truth, grow in comprehension and initiate progressive awakenings to the supernal reality of the Logos in the cosmos.

The word yoga is derived from the Sanskrit verbal root yuj, ‘to yoke’ or ‘to join’, related to the Latin jungere, ‘to join’, ‘to unite’. In its broadest usages it can mean addition in arithmetic; in astronomy it refers to the conjunction of stars and planets; in grammar it is the joining of letters and words. In Mimamsa philosophy it indicates the force of a sentence made up of united words, whilst in Nyaya logic it signifies the power of the parts taken together. In medicine it denotes the compounding of herbs and other substances. In general, yoga and viyoga pertain to the processes of synthesis and analysis in both theoretical and applied sciences. Panini distinguishes between the root yuj in the sense of concentration (samadhi) and yujir in the sense of joining or connecting. Buddhists have used the term yoga to designate the withdrawal of the mind from all mental and sensory objects. Vaishesika philosophy means by yoga the concentrated attention to a single subject through mental abstraction from all contexts. Whereas the followers of Ramanuja use the term to depict the fervent aspiration to join one’s ishtadeva or chosen deity, Vedanta chiefly uses the term to characterize the complete union of the human soul with the divine spirit, a connotation compatible with its use in Yoga philosophy. In addition, Patanjali uses the term yoga to refer to the deliberate cessation of all mental modifications.

Every method of self-mastery, the systematic removal of ignorance and the progressive realization of Truth, can be called yoga, but in its deepest sense it signifies the union of one’s apparent and fugitive self with one’s essential nature and true being, or the conscious union of the embodied self with the Supreme Spirit. The Maitrayana Upanishad states:

Carried along by the waves of the qualities darkened in his imagination, unstable, fickle, crippled, full of desires, vacillating, he enters into belief, believing I am he, this is mine, and he binds his self by his self as a bird with a net. Therefore a man, being possessed of will, imagination and belief, is a slave, but he who is the opposite is free. For this reason let a man stand free from will, imagination and belief. This is the sign of liberty, this is the path that leads to brahman, this is the opening of the door, and through it he will go to the other shore of darkness.

Thus, yoga refers to the removal of bondage and the consequent attainment of true spiritual freedom. Whenever yoga goes beyond this and actually implies the fusion of an individual with his ideal, whether viewed as his real nature, his true self or the universal spirit, it is gnostic self-realization and universal self-consciousness, a selfsustaining state of serene enlightenment. Patanjali’s metaphysical and epistemological debt to Sankhya is crucial to a proper comprehension of the Yoga Sutras, but his distinct stress on praxis rather than theoria shows a deep insight of his own into the phases and problems that are encountered by earnest practitioners of Yoga. His chief concern was to show how and by what means the spirit, trammelled in the world of matter, can withdraw completely from it and attain total emancipation by transforming matter into its original state and thus realize its own pristine nature. This applies at all levels of self-awakening, from the initial cessation of mental modifications, through degrees of meditative absorption, to the climactic experience of spiritual freedom.

Patanjali organized the Yoga Sutras into four padas or books which suggest his architectonic intent. Samadhi Pada, the first book, deals with concentration of mind (samadhi), without which no serious practice of Yoga is possible. Since samadhi is necessarily experiential, this pada explores the hindrances to and the practical steps needed to achieve alert quietude. Both restraint of the senses and of the discursive intellect are essential for samadhi. Having set forth what must be done to attain and maintain meditative absorption, the second book, Sadhana Pada, provides the method or means required to establish full concentration. Any effort to subdue the tendency of the mind to become diffuse, fragmented or agitated demands a resolute, consistent and continuous practice of self-imposed, steadfast restraint, tapas, which cannot become stable without a commensurate disinterest in all phenomena. This relaxed disinterestedness, vairagya, has nothing to do with passive indifference, positive disgust, inert apathy or feeble-minded ennui as often experienced in the midst of desperation and tension in daily affairs. Those are really the self-protective responses of one who is captive to the pleasure-pain principle and is deeply vulnerable to the flux of events and the vicissitudes of fortune. Vairagya implies a conscious transcendence of the pleasure-pain principle through a radical reappraisal of expectations, memories and habits. The pleasure-pain principle, dependent upon passivity, ignorance and servility for its operation, is replaced by a reality principle rooted in an active, noetic apprehension of psycho-spiritual causation. Only when this impersonal perspective is gained can the yogin safely begin to alter significantly his psycho-physical nature through breath control, pranayama, and other exercises.

The third book, Vibhuti Pada, considers complete meditative absorption, sanyama, its characteristics and consequences. Once calm, continuous attention is mastered, one can discover an even more transcendent mode of meditation which has no object of cognition whatsoever. Since levels of consciousness correspond to planes of being, to step behind the uttermost veil of consciousness is also to rise above all manifestations of matter. From that wholly transcendent standpoint beyond the ever-changing contrast between spirit and matter, one may choose any conceivable state of consciousness and, by implication, any possible material condition. Now the yogin becomes capable of tapping all the siddhis or theurgic powers. These prodigious mental and moral feats are indeed magical, although there is nothing miraculous or even supernatural about them. They represent the refined capacities and exalted abilities of the perfected human being. Just as any person who has achieved proficiency in some specialized skill or knowledge should be careful to use it wisely and precisely, so too the yogin whose spiritual and mental powers may seem practically unlimited must not waste his energy or misuse his hard-won gifts. If he were to do so, he would risk getting entangled in worldly concerns in the myriad ways from which he had sought to free himself. Instead, the mind must be merged into the inmost spirit, the result of which is kaivalya, steadfast isolation or eventual emancipation from the bonds of illusion and the meretricious glamour of terrestrial existence.

In Kaivalya Pada, the fourth book which crowns the Yoga Sutras, Patanjali conveys the true nature of isolation or supreme spiritual freedom insofar as it is possible to do so in words. Since kaivalya is the term used for the sublime state of consciousness in which the enlightened soul has gone beyond the differentiating sense of ‘I am’, it cannot be characterized in the conceptual languages that are dependent on the subject-object distinction. Isolation is not nothingness, nor is it a static condition. Patanjali throws light on this state of gnosis by providing a metaphysical and metapsychological explanation of cosmic and human intellection, the operation of karma and the deep-seated persistence of the tendency of selflimitation. By showing how the suppression of modifications of consciousness can enable it to realize its true nature as pure potential and master the lessons of manifested Nature, he intimates the immense potency of the highest meditations and the inscrutable purpose of cosmic selfhood.

The metapsychology of the Yoga Sutras bridges complex metaphysics and compelling ethics, creative transcendence and critical immanence, in an original, inspiring and penetrating style, whilst its aphoristic method leaves much unsaid, throwing aspirants back upon themselves with a powerful stimulus to self-testing and self-discovery. Despite his sophisticated use of Sankhya concepts and presuppositions, Patanjali’s text has a universal appeal for all ardent aspirants to Raja Yoga. He conveys the vast spectrum of consciousness, diagnoses the common predicament of human bondage to mental ailments, and offers practical guidance on the arduous pathway of lifelong contemplation that could lead to the summit of self-mastery and spiritual freedom.

Hermes, January 1989 Raghavan Iyer

The Yoga Sutras - IV

Samadhi Pada
Through study let one practise yoga.
Through yoga let one concentrate on study.
By perfection in study and in yoga
The Supreme Soul shines forth clearly.

-Vyasa

The classic text of Patanjali opens with the simplest statement: “atha yoganushasanam’, “Now begins instruction in yoga. ” The typical reader today might well expect this terse announcement to be followed by a full explanation of the term yoga and its diverse meanings, perhaps a polemical digression on different schools of thought and some methodological guidance concerning the best way to use the text. None of this occurs. Rather, Patanjali set down his most famous words: “yogash chitta-vritti-nirodhah”, “Yoga is the restraint of the modifications of the mind.” He stated the essential meaning of yoga without any argument or illustration, as if he were providing a basic axiom. He thus showed at the very start that he was concerned with practical instruction rather than theoretical exposition. He thereby took for granted that the user of the text already had some understanding of the task of yoga and was ready to undergo a demanding daily discipline.

Yoga psychology differs radically from more recent, and especially post-Freudian, schools of thought in its stress on self-emancipation rather than on self-acceptance in relation to social norms or psychic tensions. Most modern varieties of psychology, including even the recent humanistic preoccupation with self-actualization as propounded by Abraham Maslow and elaborated in different directions by Carl Rogers and Rollo May, essentially aim at an integration and harmonizing of otherwise disparate and conflicting elements in a person in contemporary society. For Patanjali, all these identifiable elements — thoughts, feelings, intentions, motives and desires (conscious and unconscious) — are chittavrittis, mental modifications which must be seen as hindrances to contemplative calm. Even if they are deftly balanced and fully integrated, the individual would at best be a mature person marked by thoughtful and creative responses in a world of suffering and ignorance. Conquering, not coping, transcending, not reconciling, were Patanjali’s chief concerns. For him, the latter were by-products of the former, and never the reverse. The psychology of self-emancipation means the deliberate and self-conscious restraint of everything that is productive of mental confusion, weakness and pain.

Patanjali’s stipulative definition of yoga might seem dogmatic, but this reaction springs from ignorance of his central purpose and unstated presuppositions. Patanjali wrote not from the standpoint of revealed scripture, academic scholarship or of theoretical clarification, but from the standpoint of concrete experience through controlled experiment. If truth is ontologically bound up and intimately fused with self-transcendence, then what from the standpoint of self- emancipation is a stark description is, from the standpoint of the unenlightened, an arbitrary prescription. What would be the naturalistic fallacy on a single plane of manifested Nature becomes a necessary line of thought when multiple planes of unmanifested Nature are taken into account. The ability to alter states of consciousness presupposes the capacity to emulate the architectonics of a higher and less differentiated plane on a lower and more fragmented plane of percepts and concepts. In other words, yoga is that science in which the descriptions of reality necessarily function as prescriptions for those who have not experienced it. The analogy would be closer to music or mathematics than to the visual arts or the empirical sciences as normally understood.

Skilful methods are those which provide apt descriptions, giving the instructional guidance needed. Hence, in the hands of a spiritual master, the actual method to be pursued varies with each aspirant, for it is the vital and original link between the adept’s transcendent (taraka) wisdom and the disciple’s mental temperament and devotion (bhakti). There is a reciprocal interaction between the readiness to receive and the mode of giving — of disciple and master. For Patanjali, the true nature of chitta, the mind, can be known only when it is not modified by external influences and their internal impresses. For as long as modifications persist without being deliberately chosen for a purpose, the mind unwittingly identifies with them, falling into passivity, habitude, and the pain which results from a state of fragmentation and self-alienation.

Since mental modifications ramify in myriad directions, their root causes need to be grasped clearly if they are to be firmly removed. The essential principle to be understood is central to the second and third of Gautama Buddha’s Four Noble Truths. Those persistent misconceptions which, directly or indirectly, produce discontent and suffering have a distinctive set of causes which, if eliminated, inevitably ensure the cessation of their concomitant effects. Patanjali pointed to five chittavrittis which are distinct and yet share the common tendency to be pleasurable or painful. Whilst yoga psychology fully acknowledges the strength of the pleasure principle — the propensity to be drawn towards pleasurable sensations as if by a magnet and to be repelled by painful ones — it denies its relevance to real individuation as a moral agent, a Manushya, whose name comes from manas, ‘mind’, the root of which is man, ‘to think’. Self- emancipation, the culmination in yoga of self-transcendence, requires the complete subordination of the pleasure-pain principle to the reality principle. Reality, in this view, has nothing to do with involuntary change, the inherent propensity of prakriti, matter, and not purusha, spirit, whilst pleasure and pain are necessarily bound up with conditioning and change. This is why the most attractive states of mind seem so readily and recurrently to alter into the most repugnant states. In general, mental modifications obscure and obstruct the intrinsically blissful nature of pure consciousness, the serene state of mind of the “spectator without a spectacle”.

The five types of mental modifications are: correct cognition, based on direct perception, valid inference and verbal testimony; misconception, based upon something other than itself, namely the five kleshas or sources of sorrow — ignorance, egoism, attachment, hate and the fear of death, according to the Yogabhashya; fantasy, engendered by words and concepts, when and to the degree that they do not refer to reality; sleep, which occurs when other modifications cease and the mind is emptied of mental contents; and memory, which is the result of clinging to, or at least not letting go of, objects or images of subjective experiences. The chittavrittis can be diagrammatically depicted as follows:

Although this array of mental modifications is easy to outline, its implications are extensive and radical. When Patanjali included correct cognition amongst the mental modifications, he was adhering to strict theoretical and practical consistency. He was concerned to deny that mundane insight, discursive thought and even scriptural authority can free the mind from bondage to delusion and suffering. Yet without a preliminary apprehension of yoga philosophy, how could one adopt its methods and hope to achieve its aims? In part the answer lies in a proper grasp of the pervasiveness of maya or illusion. If everything that conceals the changeless Real is maya, then the human being who seeks to know the Real by conventional methods is trapped in some sort of metaphysical split or even schizophrenia. Philosophers from the pre-Socratics and Platonists to Descartes and Spinoza recognized that a substance cannot become what it is not. To say that human beings are intrinsically capable of attaining kaivalya, self-emancipation or transcendence of maya, is to affirm that they are quintessentially what they seek. Their inmost nature is one with the Real. On the other hand, to say that they have to strive in earnest to realize fully what they essentially are implies that they have allowed themselves to become captive to maya through persistent self-limitation.

Given this delusive condition, the mere temporary cessation of modifications, such as occurs in sleep, will not help to liberate man’s immortal spirit. As maya is pervasive illusion, humanity as it knows itself is a part of it. Ignorant or involuntary withdrawal from its action only makes it unconscious, and this is why sleep is classed as one of the chittavrittis. Rather, one has to master the rules of maya and learn how to extricate oneself gradually from it. Otherwise, one only makes random moves, embedding oneself in deeper ignorance and greater suffering. Patanjali taught that deliverance can only come through abhyasa, assiduous practice, and vairagya, dispassionate detachment. Abhyasa is the active opposite of passive sleep, and vairagya frees one from all attachments, including the kleshas, which induce misconceptions. Together, these two mirror in the world of change that which is changeless beyond it. In the language of the Isha Upanishad, one has to find the transcendent in the immanent, and for Patanjali, abhyasa and vairagya constitute exactly that mode of awareness.

For Patanjali, however, abhyasa is not just striving to do something; it is rather the effort to be something. “Abhyasa is the continuous effort to abide in a steady state.” According to the Yogabhashya, abhyasa is the attempt to preserve prashantavahita, continuity of mind or consciousness which is both fully awake and without fluctuations. Like all such spiritual exercises, abhyasa becomes richer, more refined and more relaxed with persistence that comes from repeated effort, moral earnestness and joyous devotion. Abhyasa is the constant criterion for all effort, and the indispensable tool, whenever and however taken up.

Vairagya cannot be merely passive disinterest in the content of experience any more than sleep can substitute for wakeful serenity. It is true detachment whilst being fully aware of the relative significance of objects, and this element of self-conscious maintenance of calm detachment is exactly what makes it real vairagya. Through vairagya, one comes to know the world for what it is because one recognizes that every object of sense, whether seen or unseen, is an assemblage of evanescent attributes or qualities (gunas) of prakriti, whereas the enduring reality, from the standpoint of the seeker for emancipation, is purusha, the Self of all. Shankaracharya stated: “The seer of purusha becomes one who is freed from rejecting or accepting anything…. Detachment is extreme clarity of cognition.”

Abhyasa and vairagya are fused in the intense yet serene mental absorption known as samadhi. Patanjali characterized samadhi (which means ‘concentration’, ‘contemplation’ and ‘meditation’, depending on the context) in relation to a succession of stages, for if samadhi signifies a specific state, the contemplative seeker would either abide in it or fail to do so. But Patanjali knew that no one can suddenly bridge the gap between fragmented, distracted consciousness and wholly unified meditation. Rather, concentration (samadhi) proceeds by degrees for one who persists in the effort, because one progressively overcomes everything that hinders it. In the arduous ascent from greater degrees of relative maya towards greater degrees of reality, the transformation of consciousness requires a calm apprehension of those higher states. The conscious descent from exalted planes of being requires the capacity to bring down a clearer awareness of reality into the grosser regions of maya. Continuous self-transformation on the ascent must be converted into confident self-transmutation on the descent.

Patanjali saw in the evolving process of meditation several broad but distinct levels of samadhi. The first is sanprajnata samadhi, cognitive contemplation, in which the meditator is aware of a distinction between himself and the thought he entertains. This form of meditation is also called sabija samadhi, or meditation with a seed (bija), wherein some object or specific theme serves as a focal point on which to settle the mind in a steady state. Since such a point is extrinsic to pure consciousness, the basic distinction between thinker and thought persists. In its least abstracted form, sanprajnata samadhi involves vitarka (reasoning), vichara (deliberation), ananda (bliss) and asmita (the sense of ‘I’). Meditation is some sort of bhavana, or becoming that upon which one ponders, for consciousness identifies with, takes on and virtually becomes what it contemplates. Meditation on a seed passes through stages in which these types of conditioning recede and vanish as the focal point of consciousness passes beyond every kind of deliberation and even bliss itself, until only asmita or the pure sense of ‘I’ remains. Even this, however, is a limiting focus which can be transcended.

Asanprajnata samadhi arises out of meditation on a seed though it is itself seedless. Here supreme detachment frees one from even the subtlest cognition and one enters nirbija samadhi, meditation without a seed, which is self-sustaining because free of any supporting focalization on an object. From the standpoint of the succession of objects of thought — the type of consciousness all human beings experience in a chaotic or fragmentary way and a few encounter even in meditation on a seed — nirbija samadhi is nonexistence or emptiness, for it is absolutely quiescent consciousness. Nonetheless, it is not the highest consciousness attainable, for it is the retreat of mind to a neutral (laya) centre from which it can begin to operate on a wholly different plane of being. This elevated form of pure consciousness is similar to a state experienced in a disembodied condition between death and rebirth, when consciousness is free of the involvement with vestures needed for manifestation in differentiated matter. Just as an individual becomes unconscious when falling into deep dreamless sleep, because consciousness fails to remain alert except in conditions of differentiation, so too consciousness in a body becomes unconscious and forgetful of its intrinsic nature on higher planes. Samadhi aims to restore that essential awareness self-consciously, making the alert meditator capable of altering planes of consciousness without any loss of awareness.

For earnest practitioners, Patanjali taught, samadhi is attained in several distinct but interrelated ways — through shraddha (faith), virya (energy), smriti (retentiveness) and prajna (intellectual insight) — which are vital prerequisites for the metapsychological yoga of samadhi. Shraddha is the calm and confident conviction that yoga is efficacious, coupled with the wholehearted orientation of one’s psychic, moral and mental nature towards experiential confirmation. Undistracted shraddha of this sort leads naturally to virya, energy which releases the resolve to reach the goal and the resourceful courage needed to persist in seeking it. In The Voice of the Silence, an ancient text of spiritual discipline, virya is viewed as the fifth of seven keys required to unlock seven portals on the path to wisdom. In this text, virya follows upon dana, shila, kshanti and viraga (vairagya) — charity, harmony in conduct, patience, and detachment in regard to the fruits of action — all suggesting the hidden depths of shraddha which can release dauntless energy in the pursuit of Truth.

Smriti implies the refinement of memory which helps to extract the essential lesson of each experience without the needless elaboration of irrelevancies. It requires the perception of significant connections and the summoning of full recollection, the soulmemory stressed by Plato wherein one awakens powers and potentialities transcending the experiences of a lifetime. Prajna, released by such inner awakenings, enables consciousness to turn within and cognize the deeper layers of oneself. Seen and strengthened in this manner, one’s innate soul-wisdom becomes the basis of one’s progressive understanding of the integral connection between freedom and necessity. In time, the ‘is’ of external facticity becomes a vital pointer to the ‘ought’ of the spiritual Path and the ‘can’ of one’s true self-hood.

Supreme meditation, the most complete samadhi, is possible for those who can bring clarity, control and imaginative intensity to daily practice. Yet Patanjali’s instructions, like those of an athletic coach who guides the gifted but also aids those who show lesser promise, apply to every seeker who sincerely strives to make a modest beginning in the direction of the highest samadhi as well as to those able to make its attainment the constant target of their contemplations. He spoke explicitly of those whose progress is rapid but also of those whose efforts are mild or moderate. An individual’s strivings are stimulated to the degree they recognize that they are ever reaching beyond themselves as they have come to think of themselves through habit, convention, weakness and every form of ignorance. Rather than naively thinking that one is suddenly going to surmount every obstacle and obscuration in one’s own nature, one can sedulously foster bhakti, total devotion and willing surrender to Ishvara, the Supreme Spirit immanent in all souls, even if one has hardly begun to grasp one’s true self- hood. Such sustained devotion is ishvarapranidhana, the potent invocation of the Supreme Self through persistent surrender to It, isomorphic on the plane of consciousness with abnegation of the fruits of all acts to Krishna on the plane of conduct, as taught in the Bhagavad Gita.

Ishvara is saguna brahman, the supreme repository of all resplendent qualities, in contrast to nirguna brahman, the attributeless Absolute. Ishvara is purusha, “untouched by troubles, actions and their results” (I.24), immanent in all prakriti. Cherishing the one source of all is the means by which one moves through degrees of samadhi, culminating in the complete union of the individual and the cosmic, the state of kaivalya or isolation. Like Kether, the crown in the Kabbalah, Ishvara is at once the single motivating force behind the cosmic activity of prakriti and the utterly transcendent (nirguna) purusha or pure spirit. What exists in each human soul as the latent bud of omniscience is awakened and it expands into the realm of infinitude in Ishvara itself. Untouched by time and therefore untrammelled by ordinary consciousness which is time-bound, Ishvara is the supreme Initiator of all, from the ancient Rishis to the humble disciple sitting in meditation. Ishvara is OM, the primal sound, the basic keynote of all being, the source of the music of the spheres, mirrored in the myriad manifestations of prakriti. Surrender to Ishvara is aided by the silent repetition of the sacred OM and by deep meditation upon its mystery and meaning. When bhakti flows freely in this rapturous rhythm, consciousness readily turns inward and removes all hindrances to progress in samadhi.

Surrender to the luminous core of one’s consciousness, which is more powerful than one’s strongest proclivities, initiates a mighty countervailing force against the cumulative momentum generated by the chittavrittis. As the mind has grown accustomed to indulge, identify with and even cherish ceaseless modifications, any attempt to check those modifications runs against the self-reproducing tenacity of longestablished habits, impressions and tendencies. The chittavrittis are virtually infinite in their discrete manifestations and yet are amenable to broad classification on the basis of essential traits. The hindrances which aggravate mental distraction, fragmented consciousness and continual modification are disease, dullness, doubt, heedlessness, indolence, addiction to objects of sense, distorted perception, and failure to stabilize the mind in any particular state. Though distinct from each other, these distractions are all accompanied by sorrow (duhkha), depression, bodily agitation and irregular breathing. They can, however, be most effectively eliminated through abhyasa, or constant practice of a single truth or principle. Whilst any profound truth which deeply moves one can be chosen, to the degree that it is true — and so to the degree that it is efficacious over time — it is ekatattva, the one principle, which in Sankhya philosophy is purusha or pure spirit.

Overcoming mental obstructions through abhyasa in respect to one principle requires the progressive purification of the mind, freeing it from the froth and dross of old patterns fostered by feeble and fickle attention. Most seekers typically find easiest and most effective a concerted effort to expand the feeling of friendliness towards all beings, compassion for every creature, inward gladness and a cool detachment in regard to pleasure and pain, virtue and vice. On the physical plane of human nature, one can learn to make one’s breathing calm and even, steady and rhythmical. Through intense concentration, one can begin to awaken subtler perceptions which are not subject to hindrances in the way the ordinary sense-organs are, to an almost grotesque extent. One may even activate a spark of buddhi, pure insight and deep penetration, sensing the vast ocean of supernal cosmic light which interpenetrates and encloses everything. Some seekers will find it more feasible to contemplate the lustrous splendour of a mythic, historical or living being who is a paragon of supreme self-mastery. Others may benefit by brooding on flashes of reminiscence that recur in dreams or come from deep dreamless sleep. Patanjali also pointed out that one could gain mental stability by meditating intently upon what one most ardently desired. In the words of Charles Johnston, “Love is a form of knowledge”, when it is profound and sacrificial, constant and unconditional.

All such efforts to surmount the hindrances which distract the mind are aids to deep meditation, and when they have fully worked their benevolent magic, the becalmed mind becomes the effortless master of everything which comes into the horizon of consciousness, from the atomic to the infinite. When all the hindrances disappear, mental modifications cease and the mind “becomes like a transparent crystal, attaining the power of transformation, taking on the colour of what it rests on, whether it be the cognizer, the cognized or the act of cognition”.(I.41) When the mind is distracted through discursive trains of thought, it tends to oscillate between passive disorientation and aggressive attempts to conceal its ignorance through contentious and partisan fixations. But when the memory is purged of external traces and encrusted conditionality, and the mind is withdrawn from all limiting conceptions — including even its abstract self-image, thus focussed solely on ekatattva, truth alone — it is free from obscuration, unclouded (nirvitarka), and sees each truth as a whole. It notices the subtle elements behind shifting appearances, including the noumenal, primordial and undifferentiated sources and causes of all mental modifications. This serene self-emancipation of consciousness is called sabija samadhi, meditation with a seed, the fulcrum for gaining all knowledge. In this sublime condition, the mind has become as pellucid as crystal and mirrors the spiritual light of purusha, whence dawns direct insight (prajna) into the ultimate Truth.

Unlike other methods of cognizing truth — which concern this or that and hence are involved with samvritti satya, relative truths, though truths nonetheless — prajna has but one single object for its focus, the Supreme Truth itself (paramartha satya). Its power displaces and transcends all lesser forms of truth, exiling them permanently from consciousness. Beyond this lies only that indescribable state called nirbija samadhi, meditation without a seed, wherein the mind lets go of even Truth itself as an object. When the mind ceases to function, the Yogabhashya teaches, purusha becomes isolated, pure and liberated. Mind has become the pure instrument that guides the soul ever closer to that threshold where, when reached, spirit steps from false finitude into inconceivable infinitude, leaving the mind behind, passing into kaivalya, total isolation or supreme freedom. The last psychic veil is drawn aside and the spiritual man stands with unveiled vision. As M.N. Dvivedi commented, “The mind thus having nothing to rest upon exhausts itself. . . and purusha alone shines in perfect bliss and peace.” “The Light”, I.K. Taimni remarked, “which was up to this stage illuminating other objects now illuminates Itself, for it has withdrawn beyond the realm of these objects. The Seer is now established in his own Self.”

Having depicted the entire path leading from ignorance and bewilderm