[Advaita-l] Who Slept Very Well? - Part IV

[Nithin Sridhar]

Very nice write up. I am yet to read it fully, have only glanced through
it. I think Gaudapada in his Karika beautifully explains about the
difference. In Deep Sleep there is a Non-Apprehension of both the objects
and thoughts on one hand, and of the Real Nature of Self on he other hand.
Where as in Turiya there is no such "Non-Apprehension". Hence, Ramana
Maharshi says that, Turiya or Jnana is experience of Sushupti in Jagrata
i.e. Deep Sleep in Waking state!!

-Nithin


On Wed, Feb 5, 2014 at 9:45 AM, kuntimaddi sadananda <
kuntimaddisada at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Continuation as Part IV
> -------------------------------------
>
> Deep-Sleep State:
>
> When we go to deep sleep state, we start withdrawing each of the koshas,
> one by one, with the desire or thought of going to deep-sleep state. 'I
> want to sleep' thought forms contents of the vijnana maya kosha or the
> intellect, when it goes to sleep or when it goes into an unmanifested
> state.  In the process of sleeping, there is a withdrawal of each of the
> grosser koshas into the subtler one - that annamya kosha to pranamaya
> kosha, pranamaya to manomaya, manomaya to vijnaana maya.  At the time of
> sleep, the vijnaana maya or the intellectual sheath becomes unmanifested
> state with all the koshas as part of its ingredients, but in
> undifferentiated form. That unmanifested state of intellectual sheath with
> all its constituent koshas is now called anandamaya kosha, since there is
> absence of any discriminative thoughts, and associated relationships, other
> than the homogeneous thought of ignorance or avidya. This is referred to as
> avidya vRitti.  It is
>  in a sense an experience involving the knowledge of the absence of
> anything and everything.  Hence Mandukya says - na kinchana kaamam
> kaamayata - there is absence of desire for any object since there is no
> perception or recognition of any particular object of any kind in that
> unmanifested state.
>
> Along with the ignorance, there is an experience of happiness as the
> absence of any duality that involves all relationships. In essence, all
> human suffering comes from the notional relationships and ownerships that
> arise due to individual raaga and dweshaas or likes and dislikes. Hence it
> is happiness born out of absence of suffering.  It is still a reflected
> happiness or consciousness since reflection by the homogenous ignorance
> thought or avidyaa vRitti. Tai. Up classifies the degree of happiness in
> the anandamaya kosha in terms of moda, pramoda, etc. The very
> classification implies it is not an absolute happiness but only reflected
> happiness as in waking and dream states.
>
> Hence it is ananda mayam, and it is kosha since there is inherent
> identification with the Vijnaanamaya now in potential or unmanifested
> form.  It is now in its pure existential form since there is no apparent
> duality or plurality.  Pure existence is nothing but Brahman. Hence, one
> can say that it is Brahman in the form of ananda maya kosha exists in the
> deep sleep state. Identification with the vijnana maya kosha is now shifted
> to the identification with anandamaya kosha.  The experience of 'I slept
> well' involves both the existence (sat aspect of Brahman) as well as the
> bliss or ananda aspect of Brahman.
>
> In essence, this sequence of withdrawal of grosser koshas to the finer
> ones up to the anandamaya kosha is called going into deep sleep state.
> Since there are no two thoughts to differentiate from the other, and there
> is just an experience of a single homogenous thought of ignorance called
> avidya vRitti, there is no concept of space and time. Time arises as a gap
> between two sequential thoughts and movement in time is space; and both are
> absent in deep-sleep state.
>
> What is there in deep sleep state is only an undifferentiable homogeneous
> thought that started originally a thought as 'I want to sleep'. The
> knowledge also in aananda maya kosha, which is nothing but vijnanamaya
> kosha in potential form or unmanifested form, occurs also spontaneously as
> the all-pervading consciousness or sAkshI illumines this anandamaya kosha
> with the avidyaa vRitti. Although we can say that aanandamya kosha acts as
> a knower and the known is the absence of everything or avidya vRitti, it is
> unlike the knowledge in the waking state where the knower and known duality
> involves distinct pramANa or means of knowledge resulting in tripuTi or
> triad mentioned earlier. In the deep-sleep state the consciousness
> reflected in the anandamaya kosha as chidAbhAsa acts as the subject knower
> and the thought of ignorance as avidya vRitti forms the object of
> knowledge.  Since avidyaa vRitti involves homogenious undifferented
> ignorance of everything,
>  the reflected consciousness only illumines this ignorance as object of
> knowledge. The knower is the enlivening ananda mayakosha which is nothing
> but vijnaanamaya kosha with all its components (other koshes) in
> undifferentiated potential form. Hence in deep sleep there are three
> factors, a) vijnaanamaya kosha in potential form as anandamaya kosha, b)
> the reflected consciousness, chidAbhAsa reflected in this anandamaya kosha
> c) undifferented homogenious ignorance as vRitti.
>
> When one awakes from deep sleep state (due to pressure of vaasanaas) the
> unfolding of the koshas occur in reverse order with vijnaana maya kosha
> taking its manifested form, with unfolding of each of the koshas, first the
> manomaya and then praana maya  and then annamaya koshas. The knower -known
> dualily in the potential form is now unfolded where the knower is the
> vijnaana maya kosha and known is the homogeneous ignorance of everything.
> Hence when the mind (vijaanamyaka kosha) says I slept well implies that I
> was there in potential form and I did not know anything expressing both
> experiences one as my existence as I was there to sleep well, and the other
> is my ignorance while I was in that state. I being referred to here is
> again the unholy combination of the pure consciousness with the anandamaya
> kosha or unfolded vijnaanamaya kosha.  One can also say that ahankaara in
> the potential form slept very well since as we mentioned that ahankaara is
>  identification of I am with this - this here being the anandamaya kosha.
> Thus, upahita chaitanya (RC or reflected consciousness) identifying with
> the upAdhi as ahankaara jiiva slept very well and did not know anything in
> the deep-sleep state.  As we mentioned before, the pure all-pervading
> consciousness has nothing to do with waking, dreaming or deep-sleeping
> states. It is the witnessing consciousness that is every shining principle
> without any duality whatsoever.  Hence even the deep-sleep state is also
> from vyavahaara point only, as declared by Mandukya in mantra 7 as turIyam
> as na prajnaana ghanam.  Since the experience in deep-sleep state involves
> absence of all dualities, it is an experience of non-duality but without
> any knowledge of the absolute truth of advaita.  Here I am differentiating
> non-duality from the advaita and the reason is advaita knowledge involves
> knowledge of non-duality, in spite of apparent duality, whereas the in the
>  deep-sleep state there is only the absence of duality and knowledge of
> the ignorance.  Thus advaitic understanding differs from just the
> experience of non-duality. This aspect is very important since many want to
> experience non-duality as the goal of self-realization. What is required is
> the knowledge of the absoluteness of the self that is aham brahmaasmi or I
> am the infiniteness. That knowledge has to take place with the mind and in
> the mind only. Hence, the advice of the scriptures is to approach a teacher
> for this knowledge.
>
> Analysis of our deep sleep experience should provide us many aspects for a
> keen Vedantic student.
>
> 1.    It is an advaitic experience without knowledge of the absolute truth
> - indicating that self-realization does not involve an experience of
> non-duality by shunning or shutting of the mind, since we are experiencing
> this all the time when we go to deep sleep state. No one gets up from
> deep-sleep with advaitic knowledge or with self-realization.
>
> 2.    Self-realization therefore involves clear understanding of my
> advaitic nature irrespective of the presence or absence of duality. That
> understanding comes only with the mind which is ready to learn via
> shravana, manana and nidhidhyaasana that scriptures prescribe. That is
> listening to the scriptures under a competent teacher who himself has
> learned this from his teacher, and reflecting on the teaching until there
> are no more doubts and contemplating on the teaching until one recognizes
> all the time I am that pure existent consciousness, one without a second.
>
> 3.    In the deep sleep state, jnaani sleeps as jnaani and ajnaani sleeps
> as ajnaani. This is because the mind that has the knowledge or ignorance of
> one's true nature is folded with its knowledge to be in potential form.
> Hence jnaanam or ajnaanam of oneself is in potential form in the anandamaya
> kosha.
>
> 4.    The knowledge including the self-knowledge occurs in or with the
> upahita chaitanya or reflected consciousness, reflected in the vijnaamaya
> kosha. Hence viveka or discriminative intellect becomes important tool
> along with shraddhaa or faith in the teaching as emphasized by Lord Krishna
> as - shraddhaavan labhate jnaanam.
>
> 5.  There are several misconceptions about deep-sleep state in the
> literature. See for example the discussion between Shree Ananda wood and
> Shree Dennis relating to Shree Atmanandaji account of deep-sleep state. The
> discussion can be found at
> http://www.advaita.org.uk/discourses/atmananda/atmananda4f.htm
> It appears from the discussion deep-sleep is being described somewhat
> similar to turIyam while in fact in the description of turIyam the
> scripture negates the deep-sleep state as part of mithyaa only. The
> confusion can be due to the misunderstanding that pure consciousness
> involves objectless awareness as the description indicates. Even if one
> takes that operational definition, the deep sleep state is not objectless
> awareness. In deep sleep state we are aware of the homogeneous ignorance
> just as stated above with example of pitch dark room where we are aware of
> objectless-ness.  In both pitch dark room and in deep sleep state we have
> an object for awareness; darkness in the pitch dark room and ignorance in
> the deep-sleep state. For that reason only we can say - I do not see or
> know anything there in the pitch dark room or in the deep-sleep state.
> Absence of non-existence of an object or objects is knowledge stated as
> anupalabdi pramANa. As a final
>  note again - self-realization does not necessarily involves objectless
> awareness but recognition that I am awareness with or without thoughts or
> vRittis or object-thoughts. Hence, advaitic knowledge involves recognition
> that I am pure existence-consciousness-limitless with or without the world
> of plurality present since the plurality that is present is only mithyaa
> and therefore cannot disturb my advaitic state.
>
> Hari Om!
> Sadananda
>
>
>
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