When the self of one, self-forgetfully, identifies itself with the objects seen and experienced and thus becomes impure, there arises craving based on ego-sense. This craving intensifies delusion. All sufferings and calamities in the world are the result of craving. Ego-sense is the source of all sins. One is to cut at the very root of this ego-sense with the sword of wisdom. When the whole universe is realized as illusory, craving loses its meaning.
Craving ascends to the skies and suddenly dives into the nether world. It is ever restless, for it is based on the emptiness of the mind. He alone is happy who is free from egotism. Only he is a hero who is able to cross the ocean known as the mind and the senses.
The delusion known as the ego-sense is like the blueness of the sky.
Of the mind and the ego-sense, if one ceases, the other ceases to be.
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.
Renunciation of everything puts an end to all sorrow. By renunciation, everything is gained. Renunciation of the ego-sense leads to realization of the Absolute. There is total renunciation when the mind – citta with the ego-sense is abandoned. When one abandons the mind, one is no more afflicted by fear of old age, death and such other events in life. That alone is supreme bliss. All else is terrible sorrow.
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.
In other words, what covers the embodied soul is egotism. This egotism covers everything like a veil. All troubles come to an end when the ego dies. Then, though living in the body, one is liberated. This Maya, that is, the ego, is like a cloud. The sun cannot be seen on account of a thin patch of cloud. When the cloud disappears, one sees the sun. If, by the grace of the guru, one’s ego vanishes, then one is liberated.
2. The son got a daughter Avabodha (consciousness) and she got a son Vijnana (knowledge).
Consciousness is the central aspect of our inner world and thus, first of all, an experience. Basically the term has been used in three distinct ways. First, it is as a theoretical construct referring to the system by which an individual becomes aware of. Second, it is to refer to reflective awareness, an awareness of being aware. Third, it is as a general term encompassing all forms of awareness. The first two ways of experiencing consciousness are restrictive. Therefore, consciousness is best utilized as a general term referring to all forms of experience or awareness. This is not restricted to either conscious behaviour or to waking experience.
Shankara says, “If you do not have a consciousness, then everything is dark and nothing in the universe exists.” This corresponds to the view of the modern quantum mechanics that unless you can observe a thing, it just does not exist. This is for the reason that there must be an interaction between the observer and the observed to complete a measurement. It is consciousness that fills the bill in the material world in the sense that it determines its existence.
The Perennial Philosophy considers that pure consciousness is the true state of the divine Ground or the Godhead and it permeates the whole universe as the pure activity of the Godhead. All conscious experiences are the states of consciousness altered or modified with respect to pure consciousness. As a corollary, consciousness is presumed present in all beings – sentient and insentient in the universe. The material world exists. The conscious world exists. They go together. It is the combined cycle that operates. One must have the other. And there is not one without the other. Both are ever in symbolic interaction with each other.
Taittiriya Upanisad propounds that the Brahman is the Truth, Consciousness and the Infinite. From the Atman is born ether, air, fire, water, earth, plants, food and man as ‘I’, one from the other sequentially. Man is called atman because he eats, swallows and absorbs (adyate) the different elements constituting the objective world. Inward to the atman made of food is the atman made of the vital principle (prana). Inward to the vital principle lies the mind, inward to mind, reason (vijnana) and inward to reason, bliss (ananda). Each latter is the atman of the former and each former is the body of the latter. But every one of them is a form of Purusa (Atman) Himself. Thus, vijnana (reason) is what leads to bliss (ananda), the state of liberation.
3. He got five sons comprehending all comprehensible objects, and named Aksa and the rest (eye etc).
What comprehend all comprehensible objects are the sense organs (jnanendriyas) corresponding to their sense perceptions. They are eye, ear, nose, taste buds in the tongue and skin. The five corresponding powers of sense perception are seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting and feeling by touch.
4. These (sense-organs) were the Dasyus (hostile aborigines) who were subjugated by the king.
5. In their abstract form, they made an abode for themselves (in the king’s person), a city consisting of nine outlets, a single pillar, four pathways, and numerous rivulets and ponds.
6. All the nine entered the city together and soon Pasupala became the concrete Purusa.
7. Established in that city, the king brought the Vedas there by contemplating on them.
8. The king also arranged there for all the Vratas, rules and sacrifices laid down in them.
The Vratas are primarily meant to propitiate Visnu, but also Siva, Sakti and others with fasting, prayer, worship and gifts. Each Vrata is taken as capable of dissolving sins, and to confer special benefits such as health, wealth, progeny, etc. But performance of Vratas without any desire is also recommended.
The rules include recitation of mantras prescribed for ritualistic worship. They may not be drawn from the Veda, but are only puranic.
9. The king once felt distressed and evoked the karmakanda (ritualism), and then the Supreme Lord, remaining in yogic slumber, got forth a son with four faces, four hands and four feet, embodying the four Vedas.
Karmakanda is what is prescribed for performance of sacrifices (yajnas – yagas) in the Veda. In other words, it is Vedic ritualism.
10. From then onwards, every object of sense came to be under the king’s perfect control.
11. He found the sea and the forest, the grass and the elephant, etc alike, as a result of his invocation of the karmakanda.
