XVIII
Ashtavakra said:
1. Praise be to that by the awareness of which delusion itself becomes dream-like, to that which is pure happiness, peace and light.
2. One may get all sorts of pleasure by the acquisition of various objects of enjoyment, but one cannot be happy except by the renunciation of everything.
3. How can there be happiness, for one who has been burnt inside by the blistering sun of the pain of things that need doing, without the rain of the nectar of peace?
4. This existence is just imagination. It is nothing in reality, but there is no non-being for natures that know how to distinguish being from not being.
5. The realm of one’s self is not far away, and nor can it be achieved by the addition of limitations to its nature. It is unimaginable, effortless, unchanging and spotless.
6. By the simple elimination of delusion and the recognition of one’s true nature, those whose vision is unclouded live, free from sorrow.
7. Knowing everything as just imagination, and oneself as eternally free, how should the wise person behave like a fool?
8. Knowing oneself to be God and being and non-being just imagination, what should the person free from desire learn, say or do?
9. Considerations like ‘I am this’ or ‘I am not this’ are finished for the mystic who has gone silent realising ‘Everything is myself’.
10. For the mystic who has found peace, there is no distraction or one-pointedness, no higher knowledge or ignorance, no pleasure and no pain.
11. The dominion of heaven or beggary, gain or loss, life in society or in the forest, these make no difference to a mystic whose nature is free from distinctions.
12. There is no religion, wealth, sensuality or discrimination for a mystic free from the pairs of opposites such as ‘I have done this’ and ‘I have not done that.’
13. There is nothing needing to be done, or any attachment in one’s heart for the mystic liberated while still alive. Things are so for the life-time.
14. There is no delusion, world, meditation on That, or liberation for the pacified great soul. All these things are just the realm of imagination.
15. Whoever sees all this may well make out it doesn’t exist, but what is the desireless one to do, eh? Even in seeing, one does not see it.
16. He by whom the Supreme Brahman is seen may think ‘Ah I am Brahma,’ but what is he to think who is without thought, and who sees no duality.
17. He by whom inner distraction is seen may put an end to it, but the noble one is not distracted. When there is nothing to achieve what is he to do?
18. The wise man, unlike the worldly man, does not see inner stillness, distraction or fault, even when living like a worldly man.
19. Nothing is done by one who is free from being and non-being, who is contented, desireless and wise, even if in the world’s eyes personal action occurs .
20. The wise person who just goes on doing what presents itself for one to do, encounters no difficulty in either activity or inactivity.
21. One who is desireless, self-reliant, independent and free of bonds functions like a dead leaf blown about by the wind of causality.
22. There is neither joy nor sorrow for one who has transcended samsara. With a peaceful mind one lives as if without a body.
23. One whose joy is in oneself, and who is peaceful and pure within has no desire for renunciation or sense of loss in anything.
24. For the person with a naturally empty mind, doing just as one pleases, there is no such thing as pride or false humility, as there is for the natural man.
25. ‘This action was done by the body but not by me.’ The pure-natured person thinking like this, is not acting even when acting.
26. One acts without being able to say why, yett is not thereby a fool, rather is one liberated while still alive, happy and blessed. Such a one thrives even in samsara.
27. One who has had enough of endless considerations and has attained to peace, does not think, know, hear or see.
28. One who is beyond mental stillness and distraction does not desire either liberation or its opposite nor their compliments. Recognising that things are just constructions of the imagination, that great soul lives as God here and now.
29. One who feels responsibility within, acts even when not acting, but there is no sense of done or undone for the wise person free from the sense of responsibility.
30. The mind of the liberated person is not upset or pleased. It shines, unmoving, desireless, and free from doubt.
31. One whose mind does not set out to meditate or act, meditates and acts without an object.
32. A stupid person is bewildered even when hearing the truth, while even a clever person is humbled by it, just like the fool.
33. The ignorant make a great effort to practise one-pointedness and the stopping of thought, while the wise see nothing to be done and remain in themselves like those asleep.
34. The stupid does not attain cessation whether he acts or abandons action, while the wise person finds peace within simply by knowing the truth.
35. People cannot come to know themselves by practices – pure awareness, clear, complete, beyond multiplicity and faultless though they are.
36. The stupid does not achieve liberation even through regular practice, but the fortunate one remains free and actionless simply by discrimination.
37. The stupid does not attain Godhead because he wants to be it, while the wise person enjoys the Supreme Godhead without even wanting it.
38. Even when living without any support and eager for achievement, the stupid are still nourishing Samsara, while the wise have cut at the very root of unhappiness.
39. The stupid does not find peace because he is wanting it, while the wise discriminates the truth and so is always peaceful-minded.
40. How can there be self-knowledge for one whose knowledge depends on what he sees? The wise do not see this and that, but see themselves as unending.
41. How can there be cessation of thought for the misguided who is striving for it? Yet it is there always naturally for the wise person delighted in oneself.
42. Some think that something exists, and others that nothing does. Rare is the person who does not think either, and is thereby free from distraction.
43. Those of weak intelligence think of themselves as pure nonduality, but because of their delusion they do not know this, and remain unfulfilled all their lives.
44. The mind of the person seeking liberation can find no resting place within, but the mind of the liberated person is always free from desire by the very fact of being without a resting place.
45. Seeing the tigers of the senses, the frightened refuge-seekers at once enter the cave in search of cessation of thought and one-pointedness.
46. Seeing the desireless lion, the elephants of the senses silently run away, or, if they cannot flee, stay to serve that king like flatterers.
47. The person who is free from doubts and whose mind is free from longing and repulsion does not bother about means of liberation. Whether seeing, hearing, feeling smelling or tasting, such a one lives at ease.
48. One whose mind is pure and undistracted from the simple hearing of the Truth sees neither something to do nor something to avoid nor a cause for indifference.
49. The straightforward person does whatever arrives to be done, good or bad, for such a one’s actions are like those of a child.
50. By inner freedom one attains happiness, by inner freedom one reaches the Supreme, by inner freedom one comes to absence of thought, by inner freedom to the Ultimate State.
