37. This universe did not exist before its creation and will not exist after the cosmic dissolution, too. So its existence in Thee, the Sat-Cit-Anand, during the interval, can only be in a phenomenal sense, without any substantiality. It is, therefore, compared to ornaments and pots which are the modifications of gold and mud respectively. Ignorant people mistake these temporary transformations of the mind to be permanent.
The Reality is that which exists in the beginning and in the end. The transformations arise in the middle; and they are only phenomenal and super-impositions on the Reality.
They are ever transient and, therefore, unreal, though they are not non-existent during the period of their existence.
38. Prompted by Maya, Thy creative Power, the Jiva embraces the ignorance aspect of that Power and gets established in the feeling that it is a body-mind complex.
Consequently it loses its blissful nature and becomes subject to birth and death in the trans-migratory cycle. But Thou, who art established in Thy spiritual glory, have shed ignorance, like a snake its slough, and shine in Thy unlimited majesty exhibiting the six-fold powers.
The practical activity in the manifold world is the result of the dynamic, creative aspect of Maya or avidya. The cognitive aspect of our life and the cognitions of our activities and of the objects toward which our activities are directed are due to the pure, conscious aspect of Maya or avidya. Indeed, Maya or avidya is obviously creative.
Said in other words, Paramatman as ruling Maya is Isvara. Paramatman as under Maya is Jivatma. Maya is the sum total of manifestations that will vanish in realization.
Maya is the energy of the universe, potential and kinetic. Until the Divine Mother releases us from Maya, we cannot be free. The ‘why’ of anything is in Maya. If one asks why Maya arises, it elicits no answer as it is within Maya. The question does not arise beyond Maya as there is none to raise it.
39. Oh Lord! If renunciates (yatis or sannyasins) do not root out the desire for enjoyment from their hearts, then Thou, though present in their hearts, dost not reveal Thy presence to those hypocrites, just as a jewel does not reveal itself to its wearer who has forgotten its presence on his neck. The ascetics who are after sense enjoyment have to suffer misery from two sources, death which is sure to visit them, and from Thee who does not reveal Thyself to them.
40. Oh Thou Lord of countless glories! In one who is illumined with Thy knowledge, the bond of self-centred life (egoity) is broken and, therefore, he is oblivious of (becomes free from) Thy laws regarding merit and demerit, enjoyment and suffering. The scriptural injunctions pertaining to man, who is body-centred, become meaningless for him.
For, he is then established in the bliss of spiritual freedom which is Thyself, who hast entered into the hearts of men through the glorious devotional traditions transmitted in every age by great men through a succession of teachers and disciples.
The ego is the thought ‘I’. Of all the thoughts that arise in the mind, the ‘I’ thought Is the first. Other thoughts arise later. Holding a form, it comes into being. It stays on as the form is held. It breeds on it and grows strong. It changes form as suddenly as it assumes form.]
If one focuses one’s thought on ego-sense, it takes to flight. One is, therefore, able to transcend the phenomenal existence of the ego when one dives deep into the source from where the ‘I’ thought arises. Everything rises with the rise of the ego. Everything subsides when the ego subsides. To destroy the ego through self-enquiry is renunciation.
Egotism is quietened by constant practice – abhyasa.
Abhyasa is thinking of ‘That’ alone, speaking of ‘That’, conversing of ‘That’ with one another and utter dedication to ‘That’ alone. When one’s intellect is filled with beauty and bliss, when one’s vision is broad and when passion for sensual enjoyment is absent in one, then that is abhyasa or practice. When one is firmly established in the conviction that this universe has never been created and, therefore, it does not exist as such, and when thoughts like ‘this is the world’, ‘I am pleased’, etc do not arise at all in one, and then that is abhyasa or practice. In such state one is beyond attraction and repulsion and, as such, egotism.
One will have attained true wisdom. This is the practice of the yoga of true wisdom by means of which one acquires the faculty of instantly materializing one’s thoughts. By such practice one acquires full knowledge of the past, the present and the future, too.
41. Even leading Divinities like Brahma do not find the limits of Thee; for Thou art the unlimited, and the unlimited by its nature cannot be fully comprehended. For the same reason even Thou dost not know Thy limits. Within that infinite and incomprehensible being of Thine, countless brahmandas (universes), each with its seven expansive
external coverings, whirl about together under the propulsion of Time like clusters of dust in the air. So the words of the Veda, unable to describe Thee positively, arrive at Thee only as the final residue left after negating all conceivable entities.
An aspirant reasons about the Brahman as long as he has not realized IT. One cannot have this knowledge so long as there is the slightest trace of worldliness. The aspirant is to keep his mind aloof from the objects of sight, hearing, touch and other things of a worldly nature. As long as an aspirant is conscious of his body, he is conscious of duality. It is when he tries to describe what he sees, he finds duality. He is to give up his identification with worldly things, discriminating ‘not this, not this’.
Only thus does he realize the Brahman as his own inner consciousness.
The aspirant believes that the acts of creation, preservation and dissolution of the universe and all its living beings are the manifestations of Sakti, the Divine Power. By reasoning, he will realize that all these are as illusory as a dream in the sense that they are transient. The Brahman alone is the Reality. All else is unreal. Even this very Sakti is unsubstantial, like a dream.
The aspirant, sticking to the path of knowledge, always reasons about the Reality. The Brahman is neither ‘this’ nor ‘that’. It is neither the universe nor the living beings.
Reasoning this way, the mind becomes steady. Then it is transcended and the aspirant goes into samadhi. This is the knowledge of the Brahman. It is the unwavering conviction of the aspirant that the Brahman alone is real and the world illusory, like a dream. What the Brahman is cannot be described.
Rishi Narayana said:
42. The great sages, born of the mind of Brahma, heard this exposition of the truth of the Brahman by Sanandana with great attention, and then saluted the Rishi, their hearts illumined by the knowledge of the Atman.
43. Thus was the quintessence of the Vedas, the Puranas and the Upanisads expounded by the ancient sage Sanandana and others, who move about from sphere to sphere in the universe.
44. Oh thou, inheritor of the bliss of Brahma! Thinking, with deep faith, over this message of renunciation for men, you may freely move about in the worlds.
Sri Suka Said:
45. Oh King! The sage Narada, who had perfect control over his mind and who observed strict celibacy in life, heard the teachings of Rishi Narayana with deep faith and receptivity and became filled with joy, thinking over them again and again.
46. Sri Narada said: ‘Salutations to Thee the Divine Incarnate, a manifestation of the Supreme Lord Krishna of holy fame who comes down as glorious Incarnations for the welfare of all creatures!’
47. Paying homage to Rishi Narayana, the first and foremost of sages, and to his worthy disciples, Narada went to the ashrama where my father Vyasa dwelt.
48. Received respectfully by Vyasa, Narada took a seat and narrated to him what he had heard from the mouth of Rishi Narayana, and I learned it from my father.
49. Thus have I answered, through the account of the above conversation, your question how the Brahman, beyond the gunas and words, can be grasped by the mind.
50. Meditate always on Hari who, as the creator, designed this universe for the benefit of the Jiva; who, as its material cause, remains unaffected as its substratum during its creation, sustenance and dissolution; who is the lord and director of dissolution; who is the lord and director of matter and Jiva; who, after creating the categories, enters into His creation along with the Jiva as the Indwelling Spirit and directs its evolution into various world systems and bodies of living beings; who governs the Jiva providing them with food and other conditions for higher evolution; who, through instruction as the guru, enables the Jiva to take refuge in Him and to abandon identification with the body even in the waking state as in the state of sleep; and who, being ever established in the Bliss-consciousness without the slightest trace of ignorance, is capable of giving complete freedom from fear to all beings..
