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Tattva Bodha by Adi
Sankaracharya
Translated by Charles Johnston
The Awakening to Reality
I
To the Master, the World-Soul, the Master of seekers for union,
obeisance; to the teacher, the giver of wisdom. To fulfill love for
those who would be free, this Awakening to Reality is addressed to
them.
The Four Perfections
We shall tell of the way of discerning reality, the perfection of
freedom, for those who are fitted by possessing the Four
Perfections.
What are the Four Perfections?
– The Discerning between lasting and unlasting things; No Rage for
enjoying the fruit of works, either here or there; the Six Graces
that follow Peace; and then the Longing to be free.
What is the Discerning between lasting and unlasting things?
– The one lasting thing is the Eternal; all, apart from it, is
unlasting.
What is No Rage?
– A lack of longing for enjoyments here and in the heaven-world.
What is possession of the Perfections that follow Peace?
– Peace; Self-Control; Steadiness; Sturdiness; Confidence;
Intentness.
What is Peace?
– A firm hold on emotion.
What is Self-Control?
– A firm hold on the lust of the eyes and the outward powers.
What is Steadiness?
– A following out of one’s own genius.
What is Sturdiness?
– A readiness to bear opposing forces, like cold and heat, pleasure
and pain.
What is Confidence?
– Confidence is a reliance on the Voice of the Teacher and Final
Wisdom.
What is Intentness?
– One-pointedness of the imagination.
What is the Longing to be free?
– It is the longing: “That Freedom may be mine.”
The Discerning of Reality
These are the Four Perfections. Through these, men are fitted to
discern Reality.
What is the Discerning of Reality?
– It is this: the Self is real; other than it, all is fancy.
Self, Vestures, Veils, Modes
What is the Self?
– He who stands apart from the Physical, the Emotional, and the
Causal Vestures; who is beyond the five Veils; who is witness of the
three Modes; whose own nature is Being, Consciousness, Bliss — this
is the Self.
The Three Vestures
What is the Physical Vesture?
– Being formed of the five creatures fivefolded, born through works,
it is the house where opposing forces like pleasure and pain are
enjoyed; having these six accidents: it is, is born, grows, turns
the corner, declines, perishes; such is the Physical Vesture.
What is the Emotional Vesture?
– Being formed of the five creatures not fivefolded, born through
works, the perfection of the enjoyment of opposing forces like
pleasure and pain, existing with its seventeen phases: the five
powers of knowing; the five powers of doing; the five lives;
emotion, one; the soul, one; this is the Emotional Vesture.
The five powers of knowing are: Hearing, Touch, Sight, Taste, Smell.
Hearing’s radiation is Space; Touch’s, Air; Sight’s, the Sun;
Smell’s, the Twin Physicians; these are the powers of knowing.
Hearing’s business is the seizing of sounds; Touch’s business, the
seizing of contacts; Sight’s business, the seizing of forms; Taste’s
business, the seizing of tastes; Smell’s business, the seizing of
odors.
The five powers of doing are: Voice, Hands, Feet, Putting-forth,
Generating. Voice’s radiation is the Tongue of Flame; Hands’, the
Master; Feet’s, the Pervader; Putting-forth’s, Death; Generating’s,
the Lord of Beings; thus the radiations of the powers of doing.
Voice’s business is speaking; Hands’ business is grasping things;
Feet’s business is going; Putting-forth’s business is removing
waste; Generating’s business is physical enjoying.
What is the Causal Vesture?
– Being formed through ineffable, beginningless unwisdom, it is the
Substance and Cause of the two Vestures; though unknowing as to its
own nature, it is yet in nature unerring; this is the Causal
Vesture.
The Three Modes
What are the Three Modes?
– The Modes of Waking, Dreaming, Dreamlessness.
What is the Mode, Waking?
– It is where knowledge comes through Hearing and the other knowing
powers, whose business is sound and the other perceptions; this is
the Waking Mode.
When attributing itself to the Physical Vesture, the Self is called
the Pervading.
Then what is the Mode, Dreaming?
– The world that presents itself in rest, generated by impressions
of what has been seen and heard in the Mode, Waking, is the Mode,
Dreaming.
When attributing itself to the Emotional Vesture, the Self is called
the Radiant.
What then is the Mode, Dreamlessness?
– The sense that I perceive outwardly nothing at all, that rest is
joyfully enjoyed by me, this is the Mode, Dreamlessness.
When attributing itself to the Causal Vesture, the Self is called
the Intuitional.
The Five Veils
What are the Five Veils?
– The Food-formed; the Life-formed; the Emotion-formed; the
Knowledge-formed; the Bliss-formed.
What is the Food-formed?
– Coming into being through the essence of food, getting its growth
through the essence of food, in the food-formed world it is again
dispersed, this is the Food-formed Veil — the Physical Vesture.
What is the Life-formed?
– The Forward-life and the four other Lives, Voice and the four
other powers of doing; these are the Life-formed.
What is the Emotion-formed Veil?
– Emotion, joining itself to the five powers of knowing — this is
the Emotion-formed Veil.
What is the Knowledge-formed?
– The Soul, joining itself to the five powers of knowing — this is
the Knowledge-formed Veil.
What is the Bliss-formed?
– This verily is the Substance not quite pure because of the
unwisdom that gives birth to the Causal Vesture; in it are founded
all joys; this is the Bliss-formed Veil.
Thus the Five Veils.
By saying: “Mine are the lives; mine is emotion; mine is the soul;
mine is the wisdom”; these are recognized as possessions. And just
as a bracelet, a necklace, a house and such things separated from
one’s self, are recognized as possessions, so the Five Veils and the
Vestures, recognized as possessions, are not the Self (the
Possessor).
What then, is the Self?
– It is that whose own-nature is Being, Consciousness, Bliss.
What is Being?
– What stands through the Three Times (Present, Past, Future) — this
is Being.
What is Consciousness?
– The own-nature of Perceiving.
What is Bliss?
– The own-nature of Joy.
Thus let a man know that the own-nature of his own Self is Being,
Consciousness, Bliss.
II
We shall speak now of the way the four-and-twenty natures are
developed.
The Primitive Seven
Dwelling together with the Evolver in glamor, who is the very self
of the three potencies: substance, force, and space.
From this glamor, shining ether came forth.
From shining ether, breath came forth.
From breath, fire came forth.
From fire, the waters came forth.
From the waters, earth came forth.
Their Substantial Parts
Now, among these five natures:
From the substantial part of shining ether, the power of hearing
came forth.
From the substantial part of breath, the power of touch came forth.
From the substantial part of fire, the power of seeing came forth.
From the substantial part of the waters, the power of taste came
forth.
From the substantial part of earth, the power of smelling came
forth.
From the united substantial parts of these five natures, the inner
powers — mind, soul, self-assertion, imagination — came forth.
Mind is the very self of intending and doubting.
Soul is the very self of affirmation.
Self-assertion is the very self of attributing selfhood.
Imagination is the very self of image-making.
The regent of mind is the Moon.
The regent of soul is the Evolver.
The regent of self-assertion is the Transformer.
The regent of imagination is the Pervader.
Their Forceful Parts
Now, among these five natures:
From the forceful part of shining ether, the power of voice came
forth.
From the forceful part of breath, the power of handling came forth.
From the forceful part of fire, the power of moving came forth.
From the forceful part of the waters, the power of engendering came
forth.
From the forceful part of earth, the power of extruding came forth.
From the united forceful parts of these natures, the five lives —
the upward-life, the forward-life, the uniting-life, the
distributing-life, the downward-life — came forth.
Their Spatial Parts Of these five natures, from their spatial parts,
the five-folded five elements come forth.
What is this five-folding?
It is this: taking the spatial parts of the five primitive natures —
one part of each — these parts are each first divided in two; then
one half of each part is left alone, on one side, while the other
halves of each are each divided into four. Then to the half of each
nature, is joined the fourth of the half [the eighth] of each of the
other natures. And thus five-folding is made.
From these five primitive natures, thus five-folded, the physical
vesture is formed. Hence the essential unity between the clod and
the Evolving Egg.
The Life and the Lord
There is an image of the Eternal, which attributes itself to the
vestures, and is called the Life. And this Life, through the power
of Nature, regards the Lord as separate from itself.
When wearing the disguise of Unwisdom, the Self is called the Life.
When wearing the disguise of Glamor, the Self is called the Lord.
Thus, through the difference of their disguises, there is an
appearance of difference between the Life and the Lord. And as long
as this appearance of difference continues, so long will the
revolving world of birth and death continue. For this reason the
idea of the difference between the Life and the Lord is not to be
admitted.
But how can the idea of unity between the self-assertive,
little-knowing Life, and the selfless, all-knowing Lord, be
accepted, according to the famous words, that thou art; since the
genius of these two, the Life and the Lord, is so opposite?
This is not really so; for ‘Life attributing itself to the physical
and emotional vestures’ is only the verbal meaning of thou; while
the real meaning of thou is ‘pure Consciousness, bare of all
disguises, in dreamless life.’
And so ‘the Lord full of omniscience and power’ is but the verbal
meaning of that; while the real meaning of that is ‘pure
Consciousness stripped of disguises.’ Thus there is no contradiction
in the unity of the Life and the Lord, since both are pure
Consciousness.
The Free-in-Life
And thus all beings in whom the idea of the eternal has been
developed, through the words of wisdom and the true Teacher, are
Free-in-life.
Who is Free-in-life?
Just as there is the firm belief that ‘I am the body,’ ‘I am a man,’
‘I am a priest,’ ‘I am a serf,’ so he who possesses the firm
conviction that ‘I am neither priest nor serf nor man, but stainless
Being, Consciousness, Bliss, the Shining, the inner Master, Shining
Wisdom,’ and knows this by direct perception, he is Free-in-life.
The Three Modes of Deeds
Thus by the direct knowledge that ‘I am the Eternal,’ he is freed
from all the bonds of his deeds.
How many modes of these ‘deeds’ are there? If counted as ‘deeds to
come,’ ‘deeds accumulated,’ and ‘deeds entered on,’ there are three
modes.
The pure and impure deeds that are done by the body of the wise,
after wisdom is won, are called ‘deeds to come.’
And what of ‘deeds accumulated’? The deeds that are waiting to be
done, sprung from seeds sown in endless myriads of births, are
‘deeds accumulated.’
And what are ‘deeds entered on’? The deeds that give joy and sorrow
here in the world, in this vesture, are ‘deeds entered on.’ Through
experiencing them they reach cessation; for the using-up of deeds
entered on comes through experiencing them. And ‘deeds accumulated’
reach cessation through wisdom, the very self of certainty that ‘I
am the Eternal.’ ‘Deeds to come’ also reach cessation through
wisdom. For, as water is not bound to the lotus-leaf, so ‘deeds to
come’ are not bound to the wise.
For those who praise and love and honor the wise, to them come the
pure ‘deeds to come’ of the wise. And those who blame and hate and
attack the wise, to them come all the unspeakable deeds, whose very
self is impurity, of the wise man’s ‘deeds to come.’
The End
Then the Knower of the Self, crossing over the circling world, even
here enjoys the bliss of the Eternal. As the sacred books say: The
Knower of the Self crosses over sorrow.
And the sacred traditions say: Whether he leave his mortal form in
Benares or in a dog-keeper’s hut, if he has gained wisdom, he is
free, his limitations laid aside.
Thus the Awakening to Reality is completed.
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