Bhagavan once made the following remarks about the waking and the dream states.
‘The world vision which appears in the waking state and the world vision which appears in the dream state are both the same. There is not even a trace of a
difference. The dream state happens merely to prove the unreality of the world which we see in the waking state. This is one of the operations of God’s grace. …
Some people dispute this by saying, ‘But the same world which we saw yesterday is existing today. Dream worlds are never the same from one night to the next. Therefore how can we believe that the world of the waking state is unreal? History tells us that the world has existed for thousands of years.’
We take the evidence that this changing world has been existing for a long time and decide that this constitutes a proof that the world is real. This is an unjustified conclusion.
The world changes every moment. How? Our body is not the same as it was when we were young. A lamp, which we light at night, may seem to be the same in the morning but all the oil in the flame has changed. Is this not so? Water flows in a river. If we see the river on two successive days we say it is the same river. But it is not the same; the water has changed completely.
The world is always changing. It is not permanent. But we exist unchanged in all the three states of waking, dreaming and sleeping. Nobody can truthfully say, ‘I did not exist during these three states.’ Therefore we must conclude that this ‘I’ is the permanent substance because everything else is in a state of perpetual flux. If you never forget this, this is liberation.”
Since this view of the world is so contrary to what we regard as common sense, Bhagavan was frequently questioned about it. Even his long-term devotees sometimes tried to get him to modify his views a little. I remember, for instance, one evening in the hall when Major Chadwick tried to persuade Bhagavan that the world did have some reality and permanence.
‘If the world exists only when my mind exists, ‘ he began, ‘when my mind subsides in meditation or sleep, does the outside world disappear also?
I think not. If one considers the experiences of others who were aware of the world while I slept, one must conclude that the world existed then. Is it not more correct to say that the world got created and is ever existing in some huge collective mind? If this is true how can one say that there is no world and that it is only a dream?’
Bhagavan refused to modify his position. ‘The world does not say that it was created in the collective mind or that it was created in the individual mind. It appears only in your small mind. If your mind gets destroyed, there will be no world. …
Bhagavan summarised these views a little later by saying, ‘Every jiva (individual self) is seeing his own separate world but a jnani does not see anything other than himself. This is the state of Truth.’
- Living by the Words of Bhagavan, p.232 and 236
‘The world vision which appears in the waking state and the world vision which appears in the dream state are both the same. There is not even a trace of a
difference. The dream state happens merely to prove the unreality of the world which we see in the waking state. This is one of the operations of God’s grace. …
Some people dispute this by saying, ‘But the same world which we saw yesterday is existing today. Dream worlds are never the same from one night to the next. Therefore how can we believe that the world of the waking state is unreal? History tells us that the world has existed for thousands of years.’
We take the evidence that this changing world has been existing for a long time and decide that this constitutes a proof that the world is real. This is an unjustified conclusion.
The world changes every moment. How? Our body is not the same as it was when we were young. A lamp, which we light at night, may seem to be the same in the morning but all the oil in the flame has changed. Is this not so? Water flows in a river. If we see the river on two successive days we say it is the same river. But it is not the same; the water has changed completely.
The world is always changing. It is not permanent. But we exist unchanged in all the three states of waking, dreaming and sleeping. Nobody can truthfully say, ‘I did not exist during these three states.’ Therefore we must conclude that this ‘I’ is the permanent substance because everything else is in a state of perpetual flux. If you never forget this, this is liberation.”
Since this view of the world is so contrary to what we regard as common sense, Bhagavan was frequently questioned about it. Even his long-term devotees sometimes tried to get him to modify his views a little. I remember, for instance, one evening in the hall when Major Chadwick tried to persuade Bhagavan that the world did have some reality and permanence.
‘If the world exists only when my mind exists, ‘ he began, ‘when my mind subsides in meditation or sleep, does the outside world disappear also?
I think not. If one considers the experiences of others who were aware of the world while I slept, one must conclude that the world existed then. Is it not more correct to say that the world got created and is ever existing in some huge collective mind? If this is true how can one say that there is no world and that it is only a dream?’
Bhagavan refused to modify his position. ‘The world does not say that it was created in the collective mind or that it was created in the individual mind. It appears only in your small mind. If your mind gets destroyed, there will be no world. …
Bhagavan summarised these views a little later by saying, ‘Every jiva (individual self) is seeing his own separate world but a jnani does not see anything other than himself. This is the state of Truth.’
- Living by the Words of Bhagavan, p.232 and 236
The ego, the embryo [of manifestation] who suffers in the two states of waking and dream, imagining, ‘I am the one who sees’, is also the one who, by thinking, ‘I did not see anything in sleep’, loses his greatness and gets mentally perplexed.
Bhagavan: The same person sleeps, dreams and wakes up. The waking state is considered to be full of beautiful and interesting things. The absence of such experiences makes one say that the sleep state is dull. Before we proceed further let us make this point clear. Do you not admit that you exist in your sleep?
Question: Yes, I do.
Bhagavan: You are the same person that is now awake. Is it not so?
Question: Yes.
Bhagavan: So there is a continuity in the sleep and the waking states. What is that continuity? It is only the state of pure being.
There is a difference in the two states. What is that difference? The incidents, namely, the body, the world and the objects appear in the waking state but they disappear in sleep.
Question: But I am not aware in my sleep.
Bhagavan: True, there is no awareness of the body or of the world. But you must exist in your sleep in order to say now ‘I was not aware in my sleep’. Who says so now? It is the wakeful person. The sleeper cannot say so. That is to say, the individual who is now identifying the Self with the body says that such awareness did not exist in sleep.
Because you identify yourself with the body, you see the world around you and say that the waking state is filled with beautiful and interesting things. The sleep state appears dull because you were not there as an individual, and therefore these things were not. But what is the fact? There is the continuity of being in all the three states, but no continuity of the individual and the objects.
( Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi, Talk no. 609)
ജനുവരി 17 1939
മഹര്ഷി ലേഡി ബേറ്റ്മനിനോട് പറഞ്ഞു:
നിര്വ്വികാരവും നിശ്ചഞ്ചലവുമായ ഒരു ശാശ്വതാവസ്ഥ എല്ലാവര്ക്കുമുണ്ട്. അതില് ജാഗ്രത് സ്വപ്ന സുഷുപ്തി അവസ്ഥകള് മാറിമാറി വന്നുപൊയ്ക്കൊണ്ടിരിക്കുന്നു; സിനിമാസ്ക്രീനില് ചിത്രങ്ങള് എന്നപോലെ.
തീവണ്ടിയില് സഞ്ചരിക്കുന്ന ഒരാള് നിശ്ചലനായിരിക്കവെതന്നെ ഗ്രാമങ്ങളും പട്ടണങ്ങളും വന്നു പൊയ്ക്കൊണ്ടിരിക്കുന്നു. അതുപോലെതന്നെ ഒരു ജ്ഞാനിയും മിണ്ടാതെ ഇരിക്കവെ വിഷയാദികള് അവന്റെ മുമ്പില്കൂടി വന്നുപൊയ്ക്കൊണ്ടിരിക്കുന്നു.
ജ്ഞാനിയും അജ്ഞാനിയും ഒരുപോലെതന്നെ കാണപ്പെടുന്നു. ജ്ഞാനി ലോക വിഷയാദികളില് ഭ്രമിച്ചു പോകുന്നില്ല. ഒന്നിനെയും സ്പര്ശിക്കുന്നേയില്ല. അജ്ഞാനി, ദേഹമാണ് താന് എന്ന അജ്ഞാനത്താല് കണ്ടതെല്ലാം സത്യമാണെന്ന് വ്യാമോഹിച്ചു അതുകളോട് ചേര്ന്നുകൊള്ളുന്നു.
ആഹാരം കഴിക്കുന്നതിനുമുമ്പേ ഉറങ്ങിപ്പോയ കുഞ്ഞിനെ അമ്മ ഉണര്ത്തി ആഹാരിപ്പിക്കുന്നു. ആഹാരം കഴിക്കുന്നു എന്ന ബോധമില്ലാതെതന്നെ കുഞ്ഞ് ആഹാരം കഴിക്കുന്നതുപോലെയാണ് ജ്ഞാനി ചെയ്യുന്ന വ്യവഹാരങ്ങളും. ഇതറിയാതെ അവനും വ്യവഹാരങ്ങള് ചെയ്യുന്നു എന്നു മറ്റുള്ളവര് കരുതുന്നു.
മനസ്സ് മറ്റൊരു വിഷയത്തില് പെട്ടിരിക്കുന്ന ഒരുവന് കഥ കേള്ക്കുമ്പോലെയാണ് ജ്ഞാനിയുടെ വ്യവഹാരവും. കഥ കേള്ക്കുന്നവന് കഥ എന്താണെന്നറിയാതെ അവന്റെ മനസ്സ് സ്വസ്വരൂപ നിര്വൃതിയില് ലയിച്ചിരിക്കും.
ത്രിപുടികളെ കണ്ടുകൊണ്ടിരിക്കുന്നവര്ക്ക് അത് സത്യമല്ലെന്ന് തോന്നുകയില്ല. സ്വപ്നത്തില് നിന്നും ഉണര്ന്നവനേ സ്വപ്നം മനോസങ്കല്പമാണെന്നറിയൂ. ഉണര്ച്ചയാണെന്ന് പറയുന്ന ജാഗ്രത്ത് അജ്ഞാന നിദ്രയ്ക്കിടയില് തോന്നുന്ന സ്വപ്നമാണ്. അജ്ഞാന നിദ്രയില് നിന്നും ഉണര്ന്നവന് ഇപ്പറഞ്ഞ ജാഗ്രല് സ്വപനം മാറി അന്യമറ്റ അഖണ്ഡാനന്ദസ്വരൂപനായി പ്രകാശിക്കും.
ചോദ്യം: അവയവങ്ങളുടെ തളര്ച്ചയെ മാറ്റാനാണുറക്കം. അതു മന്ദമാണ്. എന്നാല് ജാഗ്രത്ത് മനോഹരവും രസകരവുമാണ്.
മഹര്ഷി പക്ഷെ ജ്ഞാനിയെ സംബന്ധിച്ചിടത്തോളം നേരെമറിച്ചാണ്. ‘യാനിശാ സര്വ്വഭൂതാനാം തസ്യാം ജാഗ്രതി സംയമി’. മറ്റുള്ളവര് ഉറങ്ങിക്കിടക്കുമ്പോള് ജ്ഞാനി ഉണര്ന്നിരിക്കും. നിങ്ങള് ജാഗ്രത്ത് എന്ന് പറയുന്ന ഈ സുഷുപ്തിയില് നിന്നും ഉണരുക.
No comments:
Post a Comment