[Advaita-l] Sleep, tamas and brahman

[Kalyan]

 Dear Sri Venkatraghavanji
I believe your reading is not natural. If you look at the entire passage, the self in deep sleep is said to be free from all ill-things many times and the self in deep sleep is also called as the highest and advaitam.  It is also mentioned about 8 or 9 times that there is no second thing in deep sleep. Since self is advaitam and there is no second thing, for that reason also, there is no ignorance in deep sleep. You are welcome to disagree with me, but from my side, I will leave it at that.
RegardsKalyan
    On Friday, May 4, 2018, 2:36:56 PM GMT+5:30, Venkatraghavan S <agnimile at gmail.com> wrote:  
 
 Thanks Kalyanji. 
Swami Madhavananda translates this as "The form of the self that is directly perceived in the sate of profound sleep is free from ignorance, desire and work". All this is saying is that the self is perceived as free from ignorance - this does not mean is that ignorance is absent. Why?
The relationship between ignorance and the self is what is being denied here (if you see the first sentence of this bhAShya), Swami Madhavananda says - "It has been said that the self-effulgent Atman which is being described is free from ignorance, desire and work, for it is unattached, while they are adventitious". Again, the focus of the teaching is the freedom of Atma from ignorance, not the absence of ignorance. 
The very nature of ignorance in deep sleep is agrahaNam, non-perception, so how can it be perceived? The failure to perceive it does not mean that it does not exist. 
Kind regards,Venkatraghavan


On Fri, May 4, 2018 at 9:51 AM, Kalyan via Advaita-l <advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> wrote:

//Thus Shankara is not saying that ignorance is absent in deep sleep, but
that the Atma is absent from ignorance can be understood from the
experience of deep sleep.//


Dear Sri Venkatraghavanji,

Your reading is not correct. The bhAshya means that the form of the self that is free from ignorance is experienced in deep sleep. You are welcome to check translation of Swami Madhavananda. 

In fact, the whole teaching stands because the self is free from ignorance in deep sleep. Otherwise, ignorance will become the nature of the self.

By observing the 3 states and showing that in deep sleep, there is no ignorance, it is shown that the self can achieve liberation, as ignorance is not in the nature of the self.

Regards
Kalyan
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