From the distorted perception, how can one attain to the state of Videhamukta?
Videhamukta means liberation without a body — the state of one who is free even beyond the appearance of embodiment, is indeed the absolute itself. But if your very perception is distorted — if it is rooted in the sense of ‘I’, ‘you’, and ‘the world’ — then it is already bent by ignorance. And this ignorance rests on something that has never actually been created. So where do you even begin? This is what Ṛṣi Vasiṣṭha is asking: how can we say that Brahman has become all these worlds?
Look at an ornament — what do you actually see? Gold. The shape, the name, the form — these are appearances. The gold alone is real. Look at a wave — what is it but water taking a momentary shape? The wave has no existence apart from the water. In the same way, when I look at this world — at all that appears as ‘I’, ‘you’, and ‘the world’ — I see only Brahman. Not because I am dismissing what appears, but because I see through it. The forms are there, but they do not distract me from what they are made of. This is not philosophy — this is direct seeing. And this is what Ṛṣi Vasiṣṭha is pointing you to.
The perception of the world as something separate and real — is beginningless ignorance. There was never a moment when you first fell into it. It has no traceable origin. And yet — it will vanish. Not through suppression, not through renunciation alone, but through enquiry into truth. Ṛṣi Vasiṣṭha says: only that ceases to be which has come into being. This world — as a separate reality — has never actually come into being. It only appears to. And what only appears to exist cannot truly cease either. You are not destroying the world through enquiry — you are seeing that it was never what you took it to be.
When the previous cosmic dissolution took place, everything that had appeared — simply disappeared. And what remained? Not emptiness, not form. Not something you could point to, nor something you could deny. You could not say it was, nor that it was not. It was beyond both. And yet — this is what Ṛṣi Vasiṣṭha wants you to see — that infinite alone is. It has no ears, no eyes, no tongue, and yet it hears, sees, and tastes. It is uncaused, uncreated — and yet it is the cause of everything, as water is the cause of waves. This infinite and eternal light is not somewhere else. It is the heart of all. And in its light, the three worlds shine — as a mirage shines in the heat. Apparently real, apparently there — but not what they seem.
When the infinite vibrates, worlds appear to emerge. When it does not vibrate, worlds appear to submerge. Ṛṣi Vasiṣṭha gives you a simple image: take a firebrand and whirl it fast — you see a circle of fire. Hold it still — the circle vanishes. The circle was never there. Only the firebrand was. In the same way, the worlds are not separate from the infinite — they are its movement, its vibration appearing as form. And whether it vibrates or not, the infinite remains the same — everywhere, at all times. The appearance changes. The reality does not. Not realising this, you are caught — subject to delusion, to craving, to anxiety. But when it is realised — seen directly — all of that falls away.
From it is time. From it is the perception of every perceivable object. Everything you experience — action, form, taste, smell, sound, touch, thinking — all of it is it alone. And here is what Ṛṣi Vasiṣṭha wants you to sit with: It is in the seer, in the sight, and in the seen — as the very seeing itself. When you know it, you realise your Self.
Wherefore it is not right on the part of the enlightened to say that such and such things are produced from Brahmā, when there is nothing that exists apart or separate from him. An infinity of living beings will continue to spring from the same, like blades of grass sprouting from the earth below; and they will likewise be reduced to the same, like the season plants of spring, dying away in the hot weather of Summer. We see the different tribes of demons and brutes, and of men and gods in this world, coming into existence from non-existence, and this is repeated without end. I reckon two things as the two eyes of the ignorant, for their discernment of the path of salvation. Because one who is righteous in his conduct only, without joining his righteousness with his knowledge also, is never taken into account; and is slighted by all to be plunged into insignificance and misery. The one is their good conduct, and the other their knowledge of the Sāstras, which follows the former. Again Sir;—it is the joint assent of men and the Veda, that acts and their actors come one after the other; and not as you said of their rising simultaneously from their divine origin. Acts are the causes of animal births, as the seed gives birth to the sprouts of plants; and again works proceed from living beings as the sprouts produce the seeds. You have well asked, my good Rāma! about this intricate subject, which I will now explain to you in a manner that will enlighten your understanding. It is the exertion of bodily activity, which we call an action here; but it is well known to the wise to be preceded by a mental action, which is called its thought in the mind (chitta of the chit or the thought of the thinking principle). The mind being ever restless in itself, becomes identified with the actions proceeding from its activity. The actions also whether good or bad, become identified with the mind, which feels their just rewards and punishments. Hence you see Rāma! The inseparable connection of the mind and acts, in reciprocating their actions and reactions upon each other.
The mind became amalgamated (identic), with the contents of the world, in the Spirit of Brahmā, now showing itself in the form of man, and now appearing as a God. Know Rāma, that there are three spheres of the infinite vacuity, at immense distances from one another: and these are the intellectual, mental, and the physical spheres. The ignorant require to be instructed in appropriate words and precise language, showing the demarkation between monotheism and ditheism, which is unnecessary for the instruction of the enlightened.
It is the province of the heart, to secure the sedateness of the world in itself; and it lies in the power of the heart, either to make its bondage or get its freedom, from the desires and troubles of the world. There stood a man of a terrific and gigantic figure in it, with a sorrowful visage and troubled mind, and having a thousand arms and a thousand eyes. Thus striking and crying and flying afar on all sides, he became tired and spent, and lank in his legs and arms. After the lapse of a long time, he scrambled out of the pit with difficulty; and again continued to run away, and strike himself with his own hands as before. Having then gone a great way off from that place, he got to a grove of plantain arbour under the cooling moonbeams, where he sat for a while with a smiling countenance. Going again a great way in his hurriness, he fell down again in a great and darksome ditch, by being exhausted in all his limbs and his whole body. I asked him saying:—Who are you Sir, and why do you act in this manner? What business have you in this place, and why do you wail and trouble yourself for nothing? After his laughter and loud shouts were over, hear, O Rāma! what the man next did before me. He began to tear off and separate the members of his big body, and cast them away on all sides. He kept running with his big legs and outstretched stout arms, until he fell into the pit, whence he rose again, and betook to his flight as before. I stopped him in his course, and asked about what he was doing; to which he returned his crying and laughter for his answers by turns.He fell in the same dark pit in his flight, where I stood long to witness his sad and fearful plight. You wicked Brāhman! he said to me, and went on in his course; while I kept wandering in that dreadful desert in my own way. Some among these had no egress from the plantain grove for a long while, and some were lost forever, amidst the thorns and thistles of Karanja thickets. O that dreadful desert is this world, filled with thorns and dangers on all sides. It is a dark desert amidst a thick spread darkness, and no body that comes herein, finds the peace and quiet of his heart, except such as have acquired the divine knowledge, which makes it a rose garden to them.
Let any pain or pleasure befall on the body, as dew-drops falling on lotus-leaves: it can affect us no more than it is for the fading lotus, to affect or afflict in any manner the flying and aerial bee. After destruction of the body, the soul flies from it, to abide in the infinite space of empty air; like the wind mixing with the air after dispersion of the clouds, and the bee flying to it after the lotus has faded away. As a plum is held in the hand or it falls into a pit, so the vacuous soul is reposed in or deposed from the body. The mind and body of living beings, are apt to disappear at times from their habitations, and hide themselves under the shroud of death; why then should we sorrow for such renegades? Therefore renounce, O Rāma! Your selfish desires, and know the falsity of egoism. Forsake the bond of the body for flying upward, as a new fledged bird flies above, and leaves its nest behind. As one wishing to overcome his cold, gets his object at sunrise; so he who wishes to demolish his mind (its errors), succeeds in it at the rise of his reason. The mind by its restless desires, hastens itself to a painful death; which reasonable are trying to avoid; by their government of the mind. The world is a vast wilderness, full of the forests of our weal and woe, and beset by the dragons of disease and death on all sides: the irrational mind is as the rampant lord of the desert land, and drives us anon to all sorts of dangers and difficulties.
The mind makes a mountain of a mote by its thought, and thinks itself a lord with its little of a trifle. The mind is so changeful by the influence of time, place, power and nature of acts and things, that it continually shuffles from one feeling to another, like an actor personating his many parts on the stage. As the seasons cause the changes in trees, so the mind makes differences in the dispositions of living beings. The perceptions of the quickness and slowness of motion, and of much or little in quantity, as also of swiftness or tardiness of time, belong to the mind and not to the dull material body. The thoughts that we have of the agent, effect and instrument of things, as also of the viewer, view and the instrumentality of sight, all belong to the mind.
I halted here after my tiresome journey and lengthened troubles, as one who had fled from the confines of hell; and took my rest like the withering lotus, from the scorching sunbeams and heat of summer. Afterwards my younger son Prach’chhaka, who was as dear to us as he was the less intelligent, rose up and stood before me. I was then moved by paternal affection, and affliction of my heart, to tell him, “child, cut off a slice of my flesh, and roast and eat it.” I understood this conjurer had wrought this enchantment on me, and put me to all these imaginable troubles for so long a period. This man was no sorcerer, our liege lord! who had no mercenary views of his own in this; but it was a divine magic (theurgy), that was displayed to our lord, to represent the lot of humanity and the state of the world. These hundreds of worldly systems, display the multifarious powers of Omnipotence; which delude even the minds of the most wise, to believe in the reality of unrealities, as it were by the spell of magic. Thus the mind is enlarged by the various inventions of its imagination, as a tree is extended by the expansion of its boughs and branches. The extended mind encompasses all things, as an outstretched arbour overspreads on the ground. It is the mind’s comprehension of every thing, and its conversancy with the natures of all things, that serve to lead it to its state of perfection.
The building of an aerial castle however untrue, is taken for truth for the time being; and the mind dwelling on hopes, is a dreamer in its waking state. He who has removed by his reasoning, the vain anxieties of his mind, has displayed the light of his soul, like that of the unclouded sun to sight. Whatever is done with the mind or voluntarily by any man, know Rāma, that act to be actually done by him (since an involuntary action is indifferent by itself); and whatsoever is shunned by it, know that to be kept out in actual. If the mind do not join a thing with its known properties and qualities; then the sun and the luminaries would appear to be without their light. The mind that preserves its clear sightedness, and its equanimity and unalterableness in all places, and under all conditions; retains its even temper and nice discernment at all times, under the testimony of its consciousness, and approbation of its good conscience. The waking mind deems the objects of its desire, to be as sweet as honey, and whatever it does not like, to be as bitter as gall; although they may be sweet to taste. It vanishes in vacuity and extends in the space; it dwells in everything at its pleasure, and flies from everywhere at its will. What is seen by the mind, is seen with the eyes, and what is unseen by it, is never seen by the visual organs; as things lying in the dark are not perceptible to the sight. The mind of the sage, which is practised in mental abstraction, may with ease be inclined to convert his pleasures to pain, and his pains to pleasure. As the waters of the sea display themselves in huge surges, billows and waves, so the mind which is in the body, displays itself in the various sights exhibited in our dreams. Whatever we think ourselves to be in our consciousness, the same soon comes to pass upon us; therefore mould the thoughts of your mind in any way you like. As the idea of man includes that of a woman also, and the idea of father comprises that of the son likewise; so the mind includes the wish, and the wish is accompanied by its action with every person. He who does not give indulgence to levities and fickleness in his heart, is sure to subdue his mind; as one binds an elephant by its chain to the post. Steadiness of the mind is attended with the stillness of worldly commotions, as the suspension of the churning Mandara, was attended with the calmness of the ocean of milk.
He who remains at rest by giving up the objects of his desire, is verily the conqueror of his mind; which is reduced under his subjection as an elephant wanting its tusks. The renunciation of a highly desirable object, is in the power of one, who resigns himself to the divine will; it is a shame therefore to that worm of human being, who finds this precept difficult for his practice. No one can reach the best course of his life, without the tranquillity of his mind; which is to be acquired by means of his own exertion, in getting rid of the fond objects of his desire. All bodily pains of men are quite at an end, no sooner the mind is at rest, after the removal of mental anxieties by means of true knowledge.
The mind being long practised in its highest duty, of the cultivation of divine knowledge, becomes extinct in the intellect, and is elevated to its higher state of intellectual form. So no body is born here nor dies at any time; it is the mind that conceives its birth and death and migration in other bodies and worlds. It goes hence to another world, and there appears in another form (of the body and mind); or it is relieved from the encumbrance of flesh, which is called its liberation. Where then is this death and why fear to die? The mind being destroyed; the soul attains its tranquillity, and the light of the intellect shines forth in the cavity of the heart. The mind is blown away by its destitution of egoism (Ahantā) and meitatism (mamatā), like a cloud by the winds. Our minds are as inveterate and indomitable, as ferocious lions of the forest; and they are true victors, who have conquered these, and are thereby entitled to salvation. The man that is devoid of desires, cares for nothing, whether the winds may howl with the fury of storms; or the seas break their bounds, or the twelve suns (of the Zodiac) rise at once to burn the universe. The more we curb the desires of our minds, the greater we feel our inward happiness; as the fire being extinguished, we find ourselves cooled from its heat. Opulence in expectancy, is full of anxiety to the mind, and the expected wealth when gained is no less troublesome to it; but the treasure of contentment is fraught with lasting peace of mind, therefore be victorious over your greedy mind by abandonment of all your desires.
Rāma said:—Tell me sir, why the mind is identified with momentum, and what is the cause of its velocity; tell me also; if there is any other force to impede the motion of the mind. As the essence of air is imperceptible without its vibration, so we can have no notion of the momentum of our minds, apart from the idea of their oscillation. The restlessness of the mind is the effect of its ignorance; therefore Rāma! exert your reason to destroy all its desires. You can also be free from fears, and find your rest in your reliance in the sorrowless Being; provided you exercise your manly activities therein, and curb the proclivities of your mind by your intelligence. But the mind being guided by its intellectual powers, to the investigation of abstract truths, becomes an intelligent and intellectual principle, by its continued practice of thinking itself as such. The mind only is capable of subduing the mind; for who can subdue a king unless he is a king himself? Let your own mind cut the net of the mind, which is ensnared in this world; and extricate your soul, by this wise policy, which is the only means of your liberation. The thought of the unknowable, will remove the thoughts of knowables; this is equivalent to the destruction of desires, of the mind and ignorance also. It is by their own attention that men soon come to the knowledge of the knowables; but it is the unknowing or unconsciousness of these that is our nirvāna, while our consciousness is the cause of our woe.
The sight of the all-pervading God, dispels our ignorance in the same manner, as the light of the twelve zodiacal suns (all shining at once), puts the shadows of night to flight from all sides of the horizon. The stiffness of our desires, tends to bind the mind fast in its worldly chains; as the advance of night serves to increase the fear of goblins in children. That which is not the subject of thought, which is all-pervasive, and the thought of which is beyond expression and comprehension is the universal spirit. There resides also the impure mind, which is in its nature beyond all physical objects, and runs after its own desire; it is conceivable by the Intellect as sullied by its own activity. Therefore the world being the production of desire or will, has its extinction with the privation of desires; for that which comes the growth of a thing, causes its extinction also; as the wind which kindles the fire, extinguishes it likewise. The goddess of ignorance—Avidyā, with her uplifted arms resembling the long stalks of lotus plants, laughs in exultation over her conquests, with the glaring light of shining moonbeams. The thought that ‘I am neither flesh nor bones, but some thing else than my body,’ releases one from his bondage; and one having such assurance in him, is said to have weakened his avidyā or ignorance. O fortunate Rāma! the firmament (sunya) which is a vast vacuum, is open to a sister of ignorance (avidyā) with regard to its inward hollowness. It is better, O good Rāma! to distrust the delusions of this world, and disbelieve the blueness of the sky, than to labour under the error of their reality. Ignorance is the producer of passions and tempter to all transient objects; it is busy in destroying the knowledge of the soul, and is destroyed by knowledge of the soul only. Thy body is a void, wherein thy desires have produced all thy selfish thoughts; as the empty winds raise the gliding waves on the surface of the sea. The thought that ‘I am happy or miserable,’ is as false as the conception of water in the mirage:—and knowing it as such, give up your misconceptions of pleasure and pain, and place your reliance in the sole truth. Ignorance taking possession of the mind, converts the enthroned princes to peasants; and reduces them to a condition worse than that of beastly huntsmen.
Attend now to the nature of the sevenfold states or grounds of ignorance; and you will come to know thereby, the nature of the septuple grounds of knowledge also. But falling off from the consciousness of self-entity—swarūpa, and diving into the intellect—Chit, in search of the thoughts of cognizable objects (chetyārthas), is the greatest ignorance and error of mankind. That state of the soul, which is devoid of its sense of egoism and destitute of its knowledge of dualism, and its distinction from the state of the one universal soul, and shines forth with its unsleeping intelligence, is said to be at rest in itself or swarūpa. These are the seven-fold grounds, productive of sheer ignorance, and which when joined with one another, become many more and mixed ones, known under different denominations as you will hear by and by. A dream dreamt either in the whole body or dead body of the dreamer, appears as a phantom of the waking state. A long continued waking dream is accounted as the waking state—jāgrat, and it becomes diversified according to the diversity of its objects.
The king Lavana, having at the end of his dream, perceived the falsehood of his vision, resolved on the following day to visit that great forest himself. There he wandered about the southern, and eastern and western shores of the sea. He was as delighted with his curvilinear course, as the luminary of the day, in his diurnal journey from east to west. The old matrons with their eyes flowing with brilliant drops of tears, and with their bodies and bosoms emaciated under the pressure of their afflictions; were mourning with loud acclamations of woe in that dreary district, stricken by drought and dearth. We remember your sweet smiles, showing your coral teeth resembling the red gunjaphalas to our lords, as they descended from the towering tāla (palm trees), with their red-ripe fruits held by their teeth, and growing on the cloud-capt mountains. Now grown husbandless, and having of late lost my daughter also, and being thrown in a distant and barren land, I am become the most miserable and wretched of beings. Born of a low caste, I am cast out of all prospect in life, and have become a personification of terror to myself, and a sight of horror to others. She lived long with him in connubial bliss, and produced to him both sons and daughters, who grew up in the covert of this forest, as the gourd plant grows on a tree serving as its support. Thence forward O lord! we are exposed to utmost misery, and sit lamenting here in our helpless poverty. Behold us lord, all bathed in tears falling profusely from our undrying eyelids. He reflected repeatedly on this strange occurrence, and its curious concurrence with his adventures in the dream. He made repeated queries relating to other circumstances, and the more he heard and learned of them, the more he found their coincidence with the occurrences of his vision. In the morning the King appeared in his court hall, and sitting there amidst his courtiers, asked me saying:—”How is it, O sage, that my dream has come to be verified in my presence to each item and to my great surprise?” Tell me sir, how the dream came to be verified; it is a mysterious account that cannot find a place in my heart? What is untrue seems to be a truth as in dreaming one’s own death in sleep; and that which is impossible appears possible, as in one’s aerial journey in a dream. It is by mere accident, that men come in possession of the objects of their desire; and it is custom that determines the mode of mutual dealings. It was thence that the king came to find the same conduct in the habitation of the Chandālas at the side of Vindhyā, as he had been impressed with its notion in his dream as said before. All that we see in our error, is as inexistent as oiliness in sands; and so the bracelet is nothing in reality, but a formal appearance of the substance of gold. The relation of gum resin and the tree, is one of dissimilar union, and affords no distinct ideas of them except that of the tree which contains the other. Similar things being joined with similar form together their wholes of the same kind, presenting one form and differing in nothing. Intellectual beings do not take into account the difference of material things as wood and stone; which combine together for some useful purpose.
Spiritually considered, all things are alike, because they are full with the same spirit; otherwise the error of distinction between the viewer and the view, creates endless differences as betwixt wood and stones and other things. Know ye seekers of truth, all things to be identic with the entity
of God. Renounce your knowledge of nonentities and the various kinds of errors and fallacies and know the One as All to pan. Remain always in that quiet state, which is neither one of waking, dreaming nor of sleeping; and which is neither the state of sensibility or insensibility; but one of everlasting tranquillity and rest. Remain free from anxiety about the present, as you are unconcerned about the future. Never be impelled by the impulses of your mind; but remain steadfast in your trust in the true God. As there is no water in the stone nor fire in water, so the spiritual man has no mental action, nor the Divine spirit hath any. He who understands that there is no such thing as the mind, or that he had one before but it is dead in him to-day; becomes as immovable as a marble statue with this assurance in himself. Remain firm as thou art with thyself (soul), by casting afar thy fancied and fanciful mind from thee; and be freed from the thoughts of the world, by being settled in the thought of the Supreme Soul. He that has purged off his mind, is indeed a man of great understanding; he has gone across the error of the existence of the world, and become purified in his soul. We have considered long, and never found anything as the impure mind in the pure soul.
