The Moksha Gita : Swami Sivananda // Commentary : Chapter 5.2 - Swami Krishnananda.

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Monday, March 13, 2023. 07:00.

The Moksha Gita : Swami Sivananda

Chapter 5: The Nature of the Universe -2.

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2. "Just as a snake is superimposed on the rope, silver on the mother-of-pearl, a thief on the post, city in the clouds, mirage in the desert, blueness in the sky, so also this world is superimposed on Brahman."

A rope is mistaken to be a snake. This is taken as an illustration to prove the similar superimposition of the world on Brahman. When a person mistakes a rope to be a snake, he remembers a snake which he has previously seen and the form of the snake and the rope being similar, there is an intelligible occasion for mistaking one thing for the other. The memory of a thing seen in the past becomes the cause of the mistaken notion. But the critic asks, what object that is similar to the world has the individual previously seen in order to commit the mistake of superimposing it on Brahman? There is no possibility of the Jiva's having seen any such thing before in its life in the course of evolution. Therefore the hasty thinker concludes that the universe is not a superimposition but must be a reality.

This wrong judgment is born of stretching the illustration beyond limits. The illustration is employed merely to suggest that the Eternal Brahman is the sole reality and that the universe is neither a limitation nor a manifestation nor a changed form of Brahman, even as the snake is not the effect of any change on the part of the rope. It is not meant to be pulled in any way beyond this meaning. According to Gaudapada, the perception of the snake and perception of the rope are both unreal. The appearance of the universe is due to no change of the Reality even as the mirage is not the effect of any change in the sun or the dream objects are not the productions of any change of the dreaming person. The whole question is centred round mere "thought", a form of Consciousness itself and nothing more. The universe is an appearance, nothing else!

Similarly the other illustrations cited are not meant to be taken in their literal sense but only in their spirit which is used to solve the mysterious relation between Brahman and the universe. They all go to prove that the world and the Reality are not related as two objects but as an identical Oneness. Vidyaranya says that if there is any relation between Brahman and the Jiva, it is one of the Self, Identical Homogeneity of the One Undivided Essence and not anything else

3, 4. "Just as it is water alone that appears as waves, ripples, etc., gold alone as earrings, bangles, etc., clay alone as pots, jars, etc., threads alone as cloth, towels, etc., so also does Brahman alone appear as many universes."

The idea that the universe is Brahman Itself absolutely is brought out by the illustrations of causes and their effects which bear the identity of nature. These illustrations are again not without the defects which generally appear before the critic's eye. For, these illustrations again involve modification of the cause. Waves and ripples are the formation of the blow of the wind on the surface of water, but what is the air that disturbs the surface of Brahman, so that it may project forth the waves of individuals and universes? This force which gives rise to universes in Brahman is Maya or the Shakti of Brahman. Seeing that it is impossible to consider Brahman to have created differences within Itself, Sri Sankara said that Brahman is the only reality and the whole universe is a mere phantasmagoria arisen in the mind.

We find again Uddalaka explaining to his son Swetaketu how the knowledge of Brahman involves the automatic knowledge of everything else, by giving examples of a lump of clay and its formations, a nugget of gold and its modifications, a pair of nail-scissors and the iron instruments. These illustrations make one feel that the One Brahman has modified itself as the multiple universe. But a subsequent sentence of the same Upanishad says that "all modifications are false, a mere name, a mere play of speech." Evolution is found to be an impossibility in Infinity and the Supreme majesty of Sankara's Advaita or Gaudapada's Ajativada or acosmism becomes the inevitable conclusion of philosophical speculations.

Sri Sankara has told in his commentary on the Upanishads that the stories of creation etc. in the Upanishads act as suitable preparations for the grasping of the transcendental Truth of pure Non-Dualism where change, progress, downfall, evolution, involution and all such changes get cancelled due to the rigour of the Truth of Indivisible Absoluteness, we have therefore to look upon the universe as Brahman Itself illumining without changing itself even in the least.

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To be continued

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