Tripura Rahasya

Sage Dattatreya said,

Hemalekha continued,

Listen Prince! I will tell you further. As long as these knots are not cut asunder so long will bliss not be found (the knowledge acquired is thus not effective). These knots are millions in number and are created by the bond of delusion which is no other than ignorance of Self. These knots give rise to mistaken ideas, the chief of which is the identification of the body with the Self, which in turn gives rise to the perennial stream of happiness and misery in the shape of cycle of births and deaths. The second knot is the differentiation of the world from the Self whose being-consciousness is the mirror in which the phenomena are simply reflected. Similarly with the other knots including the differentiation of beings among themselves and from the universal Self. They have originated from time immemorial and recur with unbroken ignorance. The man is not finally redeemed until he has extricated himself from these numberless knots of ignorance.