Viveka-Chudamani of Adi Sankaracharya

531. The consciousness, “I am Devadatta”, is independent of circumstances; similar is the case with the realisation of the knower of
Brahman that he is Brahman.

532. What indeed can manifest That whose lustre, like the sun, causes the whole universe – unsubstantial, unreal, insignificant – to
appear at all ?

533. What, indeed, can illumine that Eternal Subject by which the Vedas and Puranas and other Scriptures, as well as all beings
are endowed with a meaning ?

534. Here is the Self-effulgent Atman, of infinite power, beyond the range of conditioned knowledge, yet the common experience of
all – realising which alone this incomparable knower of Brahman lives his glorious life, freed from bondage.

535. Satisfied with undiluted, constant Bliss, he is neither grieved nor elated by sense-objects, is neither attached nor averse to
them, but always disports with the Self and takes pleasure therein.

536. A child plays with its toys forgetting hunger and bodily pains; exactly so does the man of realisation take pleasure in the
Reality, without ideas of “I” or “mine”, and is happy.

537. Men of realisation have their food without anxiety or humiliation by begging, and their drink from the water of rivers; they live
freely and independently, and sleep without fear in cremation grounds or forests; their clothing may be the quarters themselves,
which need no washing and drying, or any bark etc., the earth is their bed; they roam in the avenue of the Vedanta; while their
pastime is in the Supreme Brahman.

538. The knower of the Atman, who wears no outward mark and is unattached to external things, rests on this body without
identification, and experiences all sorts of sense-objects as they come, through others’ wish, like a child.

539. Established in the ethereal plane of Absolute Knowledge, he wanders in the world, sometimes like a madman, sometimes like
a child and at other times like a ghoul, having no other clothes on his person except the quarters, or sometimes wearing clothes, or
perhaps skins at other times.

540. The sage, living alone, enjoys the sense-objects, being the very embodiment of desirelessness – always satisfied with his own
Self, and himself present at the All.

541. Sometimes a fool, sometimes a sage, sometimes possessed of regal splendour; sometimes wandering, sometimes behaving
like a motionless python, sometimes wearing a benignant expression; sometimes honoured, sometimes insulted, sometimes
unknown – thus lives the man of realisation, ever happy with Supreme Bliss.

542. Though without riches, yet ever content; though helpless, yet very powerful, though not enjoying the sense-objects, yet
eternally satisfied; though without an exemplar, yet looking upon all with an eye of equality.

543. Though doing, yet inactive; though experiencing fruits of past actions, yet untouched by them; though possessed of a body, yet
without identification with it; though limited, yet omnipresent is he.

544. Neither pleasure nor pain, nor good nor evil, ever touches this knower of Brahman, who always lives without the body-idea.

545. Pleasure or pain, or good or evil, affects only him who has connections with the gross body etc., and identifies himself with
these. How can good or evil, or their effects, touch the sage who has identified himself with the Reality and thereby shattered his
bondage ?

546. The sun which appears to be, but is not actually, swallowed by Rahu, is said to be swallowed, on account of delusion, by
people, not knowing the real nature of the sun.

547. Similarly, ignorant people look upon the perfect knower of Brahman, who is wholly rid of bondages of the body etc., as
possessed of the body, seeing but an appearance of it.

548. In reality, however, he rests discarding the body, like the snake its slough; and the body is moved hither and thither by the
force of the Prana, just as it listeth.

549. As a piece of wood is borne by the current to a high or low ground, so is his body carried on by the momentum of past actions
to the varied experience of their fruits, as these present themselves in due course.

550. The man of realisation, bereft of the body-idea, moves amid sense-enjoyments like a man subject to transmigration, through
desires engendered by the Prarabdha work. He himself, however, lives unmoved in the body, like a witness, free from mental
oscillations, like the pivot of the potter’s wheel.

551. He neither directs the sense-organs to their objects nor detaches them from these, but stays like an unconcerned spectator.
And he has not the least regard for the fruits of actions, his mind being thoroughly inebriated with drinking the undiluted elixir of the
Bliss of the Atman.

552. He who, giving up all considerations of the fitness or otherwise of objects of meditation, lives as the Absolute Atman, is verily
Shiva Himself, and he is the best among the knowers of Brahman.

553. Through the destruction of limitations, the perfect knower of Brahman is merged in the One Brahman without a second – which
he had been all along – becomes very free even while living, and attains the goal of his life.

554. As an actor, when he puts on the dress of his role, or when he does not, is always a man, so the perfect knower of Brahman is
always Brahman and nothing else.

556. Let the body of the Sannyasin who has realised his identity with Brahman, wither and fall anywhere like the leaf of a tree, (it is
of little consequence to him, for) it has already been burnt by the fire of knowledge.