[Advaita-l] Does Brahman know?

[V Subrahmanian]

On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 2:01 PM, Venkatesh Murthy <vmurthy36 at gmail.com>wrote:

>
> If Sarvajna is right only in the three Padas what does it mean in 3 36
> Sakrudvibhatam Sarvajnam? Question is does Brahman know itself in
> Turiya? If it does not it will not be aware of itself. It will not
> have self awareness. It will not have I feeling. Kindly correct me if
> wrong.
>


Namaste.

It is good that you asked about the word 'sarvajnam' in the kArikA 3.36.  I
should have addressed it on my own.  The bhashya for that word is: सर्वं च
तत् *ज्ञस्वरूपं *च इति सर्वज्ञम् .  It is all (sarvam), as the substratum,
and by nature is awareness Itself (j~nasvarUpam). We should note that here
it is not presented as 'It is the *knower* of everything'.

In this kArikA the 'sakRdvibhAtam' word is for 'eternal Consciousness'
(nitya chaitanyam) and the word 'sarvajnam' is for 'vastu pariccheda rahita
' Consciousness (ananta/akhaNDa chaitanyam).  It is like the 'sarvAtmabhAva'
of the bhashya for 'aham brahma asmi' of Br.Up.1.4.10.  It is 'pUrNam', '
अन्तर्बहिश्च तत्सर्वं व्याप्य नारायण स्थितः’.  It is to be seen as the
realization of the 'yasmin vijnAte sarvam idam vijnAtam bhavati' (by knowing
the substratum, the entire superimposed becomes known) It is the 'sarva
sAmAnya jnana' that is shown here.  On the other hand Ishwara's is the
'sarva visheSha jnAnam' too.

Regards,
subrahmanian.v

>