Jnana is the Self

Sri Ramana Maharshi

An Andhra visitor asked: What is sleep?

M.: Why, you experience it every day.

D.: I want to know exactly what it is, so that it may be distinguished from samadhi.

M.: How can you know sleep when you are awake? The answer is to go to sleep and find out what it is.

D.: But I cannot know it in this way.

M.: This question must be raised in sleep.

D.: But I cannot raise the question then.

M.: So, that is sleep.

Sri Bhagavan went out for a few minutes. On his return the same man asked: Self-realised jnanis are seen to take food and do actions like others. Do they similarly experience the states of dream and of sleep?

M.: Why do you seek to know the state of others, maybe jnanis? What do you gain by knowing about others? You must seek to know your own real nature. Who do you think that you are? Evidently, the body.

D.: Yes.

M.: Similarly, you take the jnani to be the visible body whereon the actions are superimposed by you. That makes you put these questions. The jnani himself does not ask if he has the dream or sleep state. He has no doubts himself. The doubts are in you. This must convince you of your wrong premises. The jnani is not the body. He is the Self of all. The sleep, dream, samadhi, etc., are all states of the ajnanis. The Self is free from all these. Here is the answer for the former question also.

D.: I sought to know the state of sthita prajnata (unshaken knowledge).

M.: The sastras are not for the jnani. He has no doubts to be cleared. The riddles are for ajnanis only. The sastras are for them alone.

D.: Sleep is the state of nescience and so it is said of samadhi also.

M.: Jnana is beyond knowledge and nescience. There can be no question about that state. It is the Self.