Attainment

Sri Ramana Maharshi

What is the state of attainment of knowledge?

It is firm and effortless abidance in the Self in which the mind which has become one with the Self does not subsequently emerge again at any time. That is, just as everyone usually and naturally has the idea, ‘I am not a goat nor a cow nor any other animal but a man’, when he thinks of his body, so also when he has the idea ‘I am not the principles (tatwas) beginning with the body and ending with sound (nada), but the Self which is existence, consciousness and bliss’, the innate self-consciousness(atmaprajna), he is said to have attained firm knowledge.

To which of the seven stages of knowledge (jnana-bhoomikas) does the sage (jnani) belong?

He belongs to the fourth stage.

If that is so why have three more stages superior to it been distinguished?

The marks of the stages four to seven are based upon the experiences of the realized person (jivanmukta). They are not states of knowledge and release. So far as knowledge and release are concerned no distinction whatever is made in these four stages. Those who have attained the last four bhoomikas are called brahmavit, brahmavidvara, brahmavidvariya and brahmavid varistha respectively.

As liberation is common to all, why is the varistha (lit. the most excellent) alone praised excessively?

So far as the varistha’s common experience of bliss is concerned he is extolled only because of the special merit acquired by him in his previous births which is the cause of it.

As there is no one who does not desire to experience constant bliss what is the reason why all sages (jnanis) do not attain the state of varistha?

It is not to be attained by mere desire or effort. Karma (prarabdha) is its cause. As the ego dies along with its cause even in the fourth stage (bhoomika), what agent is there beyond that stage to desireanything or to make efforts? So long as they make efforts they will not be sages (jnanis) . Do the sacred texts (srutis) which specially mention the varistha say that the other three are unenlightened persons?