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Upadesa Sahasri by Adi Shankara -
Part 4
66. Disciple.-" Sir, I
cannot but make it, I am not independent. I am made to act by someone
else."
67. Teacher.-" Then you do not exist for yourself as you are
non-conscious. That by which you are made to act like one dependent on
another is conscious and exists for itself. You are only a combination
(of the body and other things)."
68. Disciple.-" If I be non-conscious then how do I cognise pain and
pleasure and also of what you say?"
69. The teacher replied: "Are you different from the cognition of
pain and pleasure and from what I say, or not?"
70. The disciple said, "It is not a fact that I am not different from
them. For, I know them to be objects of my knowledge like jars and other
things. If I were not different I could not cognise them. But I know
them; so I am different. If I were not different the modifications of
the mind called pain and pleasure and the words spoken by you would
exist for themselves. But that is not reasonable. For pleasure and pain
produced by sandal paste and a thorn respectively, and also the use of a
jar are not for their own sake. Therefore the purposes served by sandal
paste etc., are for the sake of me who am their cogniser. I am different
from them as I know all things pervaded by the intellect."
71. The teacher said to him. "As you are possessed of consciousness,
you exist for yourself and are not made to act by anyone else. For an
independent conscious being is not made to act by another as it is not
reasonable that one possessed of consciousness exists for the sake of
another possessing consciousness, both being of the same nature like the
lights of two lamps. Nor does one possessed of consciousness exist for
the sake of another having no consciousness; for it is not possible that
a thing exists for itself for the very fact that it is non-conscious.
Nor again is it seen that two non-conscious things exist for each
other's purpose."
72. Disciple: " But it may be said that the servant. and the master
are seen to serve each other's purpose though they are equally possessed
of consciousness."
73. Teacher.-"It is not so. For I speak of consciousness belonging to
you like heat and light to fire. It is for this reason that I cited the
example of the lights of the two lamps. Therefore, as changeless and
eternal consciousness, like the heat and light of fire, you know
everything presented to your intellect. Thus when you always know the
Self to be without any attribute why did you say, "I experience pain and
pleasure again and again during the states of waking and dream after
intervals of rest in deep sleep?" And why did you say, "It is my own
nature or causal?" Has this delusion vanished or not?"
74. To this the disciple replied, "The delusion, Sir, is gone by your
grace; but I have doubts about the changeless nature which, you say
pertains to me." Teacher, "What doubts?"
75. Disciple, "Sound etc., do not exist independently as they are
non-conscious. But they come into existence when there arise in the mind
modifications resembling sound and so on. It is impossible that these
modifications should have an independent existence as they are exclusive
of one another as regards their special characteristics ( of resembling
sound etc.,) and appear to be blue, yellow etc. (So sound etc. are not
the same as mental modifications. ( It is therefore inferred that these
modifications are caused by external objects. So, it is proved that
modifications of the mind also are combinations and therefore
non-conscious. So, not existing for their own sake, they, like sound
etc., exist only when known by one different from them. Though the Self
is not a combination, it consists of consciousness and though it exists
for Its own sake, It is the knower of the mental modifications appearing
to be blue, yellow and so on. It must therefore be of a changeful
nature. Hence is the doubt about the changeless nature of the Self."
The teacher said to him, "Your doubt is not justifiable, for you, the
Self, are proved to be free from change, and therefore perpetually the
same on the ground that all the modifications of the mind without a
single exception are (simultaneously) known by you. You regard this
knowledge of all the modifications which is the reason for the above
inference as that for your doubt. If you were changeful like the mind or
the senses (which pervade their objects one after another), you would
not simultaneously know all the mental modifications, the objects of
your knowledge. Nor are you aware of a portion only of the objects of
your knowledge (at a time). You are, therefore, absolutely changeless."
76.The disciple said, "Knowledge is the meaning of a root and
therefore surely consists of change, and that knower ( as you say) is of
a changeless character. This is a contradiction."
77. Teacher: "It is not so. For the word knowledge is used only in a
secondary sense to mean a change called an action, the meaning of a
root. A modification of the intellect called an action ends in a result
in itself, which is the reflection of Knowledge, the Self. It is for
this reason that this modification is called knowledge in a secondary
sense, just as cutting (a thing) in two parts is secondarily called the
meaning of the root (to cut).
78. Told thus, the disciple said, "Sir, the example cited by you
cannot prove that I am changeless." Teacher, "How?"
Disciple, "For, just as the action of cutting, producing and
including the ultimate change in to be cut, is secondarily called the
meaning of the root (to cut), so the word knowledge is used secondarily
for the mental modification which is the meaning of the root (to know)
and which ends in the result that is a change in knowledge, the Self.
The example cited by you cannot, therefore, establish the changeless
nature of the Self."
79. The teacher said, "What you say would be true if there were a
distinction existing between the Knower and Knowledge. For, the Knower
is eternal Knowledge only. The Knower and Knowledge are not different as
they are in the argumentative philosophy."
80. Disciple.-" How is it then that an action ends in a result which
is Knowledge?"
81. The teacher said, "Listen. It was said (that the mental
modification, called an action) ended in a result which was the
reflection of Knowledge. Did you not hear it? I did not say that a
change was produced in the Self as a result (of the modification of the
mind)."
82. The disciple said, "How then am 1, who am changeless, the knower,
as you say, of all the mental modifications of endless objects of my
knowledge?"
83. The teacher said to him, "I told you the right thing. The very
fact (that you know simultaneously all the mental modifications) was
adduced by me as the reason why you are eternally immutable."
Adi Shankara
Upadesa Sahasri
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