Disciple: O Master, adored even by the gods! you are all-knowing and can kindly clear this doubt of mine: in this world of cause and effect, the experience of one cannot be felt by another. In deep sleep, the intellectual sheath has subsided and the blissful sheath has the experience of happiness. Is it right that this experience should be remembered by the intellectual sheath which expresses it?
Master: Know that these two (stand to each other in the relationship of) melted ghee and solidified ghee. They differ in their limiting thoughts, but not in their (intrinsic) knowledge. The intellectual sheath limited by the mind and active in the waking state, and the blissful one made of the bliss of pure Consciousness which appears when the painful mind subsides in deep sleep, are not different from each other, just like rain water and the water stored in a reservoir, or like sugar and syrup.
Disciple: In that case, why should anyone lose hold of that non dual bliss of brahman and come out of it?
Master: He is drawn out by the force of his past karma. The man who has just wakened from deep sleep does not immediately lose the happiness of sleep for he does not bestir himself at once nor forget the happiness. This short interval of peace which is neither sleep nor waking, is the bliss of remembrance.
At the instant 'I am the body' idea starts, he loses himself in the troubles of the world and forgets the bliss. His past karma brings on pain or pleasure. Peace results in equipoise. Everyone has experienced the state void of thoughts and the pleasure consequent upon it. This is nijananda.
Can this be the bliss of samadhi? (No). The external moisture is not the water contained within the pot. This happiness (of indifference) is only the shadow of the bliss of yogic samadhi cast upon the rising ego. When the ego subsides and samadhi results there is the state of Repose in which the mind is not aware of the environment nor asleep, and the body stays stiff like a post.
No comments:
Post a Comment