[Advaita-l] Inward and outward contemplation

[Vinodh]

Namaskaram, with regard to the topic of the subject, I incidentally came
across the following from one of Sri Chandrasekharendra Saraswati (Voice of
God, Vol 4). It seemed very pertinent to the question being raised about
inward comtemplation from a point of view of a Jivatma vs. the outward
contemplation of multiple Jivatmas and the Jagat, and conveys a very nice
explanation for the shruti-vaakya "ayam atma brahma" (this Atma is
Brahmam).

'While searching for the true, fundamental state of the essence of a
Jivatma, this (advaita) shastra talks about the body, indriyas, then mind
and then goes on to Atma, the basic fundamental support. However, after the
Jiva's mind, comes Ishwara, another Supreme Mind that creates the jivas and
the jagat.

The reason for this apparent omission of the level of Ishwara in the
indriya-mind-Atma order is that the investigation proceeds from the Jiva's
point of view, going deeper and deeper into his internal basis. The body is
the first visible entity; it is the Jiva's individual body. Then come the
indriyas and their flair, the forces that control it; they are also the
individual Jiva's. Going further in, we discover the mind that is actually
creating these flair and controlling them. This is still in the realm of
the individual Jiva - the individual mind. Atma, which is going to be
attained in the end, is actually the fundamental supporting satya, the
essence of a Jiva. Therefore, to be fair, it shouldn't even be called as
that of an individual Jiva, especially since the experience of this Atma is
possible only when the individuality of a Jiva is struck down. Nonetheless,
since the Jiva thinks of it as his true state, with a possessive 'his', it
also ends up getting clumped with all the other aspects associated with an
individual Jiva. This is just from our point of view; in reality it can
never be possessed by anything whatsoever. Therefore, such a Jiva-centered
study, which goes into the internal principles pertaining only to the Jiva,
ends up with the following sequence. This sequence starts with the body,
consisting of the indriyas, then the Antahkarana having the mind as its
component, which controls the indriyas, and then the Atma, which is the
basis of all these. Since the investigation is only about the Jiva, the
discuss of Ishwara, who has created not only him, but also all the rest of
the Jiva prapancha and jada prapancha, doesn't come in between the mind and
the Atma.

However, if the same principle of satya is investigated from the jagat's
angle, instead of the jiva's point of view, this principle of Ishwara will
come in.

The basic principle that is investigated as the fundamental support for the
jagat is called 'Brahmam'. 'Brih' means 'huge'. Since this is the biggest
of the big, it is called 'Brahmam'. It is the cause of all these Jiva and
jada lokas, which consist of the crores and crores of life forms and the
mind boggling areas of crores and crores of miles consisting of crores and
crores of stars and other heavenly bodies. So it is certainly the biggest
of the big, isn't it? Hence the name 'Brahmam'. If it is such a cause of
all, support of all, and the basis of all, shouldn't it also be the basic
support of the Jiva? Didn't we just say that such a basic support of Jiva,
or his true form, is Atma? Therefore, this makes Atma one and the same as
Brahmam. So the ultimate entity that we reached coming from the Jiva's
point in the investigation for his basic satya, turned out to be same as
the ultimate reality that we arrived at coming from the jagat's point in
the in the investigation for its basis.

Instead of saying Brahmam is nothing but Atma, it is more appropriate to
say that Atma is nothing but Brahmam. Though Atma and Brahmam are one and
the same, Atma is mainly thought of with respect to a Jiva. So instead of
calling Brahmam, which is the causal matter of all of the jivas and jada as
nothing but Atma, it is more approriate to say, 'Atma is nothing but
Brahmam. That is, what appears as the entire universe, is the same as the
'you's, 'me's, and 'him's, the various kind of jivas.' That is a more
fitting description. The one who considers himself as Jiva is none other
than Brahmam. His Atma is indeed the Atma of everything. 'Atma of
everything' doesn't denote many Atmas. Atma is only one. It is the same
Atma for all. That single entity dons the guise of the entire set of jivas
and the jagat due to the power of Maya. Only when following this logic,
that is, investigating the basis from the jagat's point as opposed to the
Jiva's point, do we arrive at the Cosmic Mind, which is the Maya-influenced
Ishwara form, right next to Atma. After that comes the creation of smaller
minds, followed by the individual ahankara and the jivas. This same Ishwara
creates the jagat whose experience is attained by the Jiva's mind through
his indriyas."


On Wed, Aug 25, 2021 at 12:03 PM Jaldhar H. Vyas via Advaita-l <
advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> wrote:

> (was Re: [Advaita-l] Anugita bhasya)
>
>
> Owing to all kinds of things going on in my life most of all Shravana masa
> where daily abhishek takes precedence over everything, I am way behind in
> taking part in this list.  Hopefully over the next few days I can remedy
> this.
>
>
>
> On Thu, 24 Jun 2021, Ven Balakrishnan via Advaita-l wrote:
>
> >
> > On Ramana it always seemed to me that the quest of ‘who am I’ is the
> > fundamental question that Advaita is trying to address.  His essay "Nan
> > Yar” essentially summarises the key aspects of advaitic teaching,
> > without going into the logical reasoning that Sankara does.  Also this
> > ‘who am I’ diving inwardly contemplation, strikes me as comparable to BG
> > in its recommendation to have a constant stream of thought towards the
> > Self.  It is also I think the implication of Brhad Up 3.5.1 when it
> > talks about living on the strength of that knowledge and dwelling on it
> > - as Sankara says in Brhad Up 4.5.15:  neti, neti and renunciation is
> > the final conclusion of it all.
>
> Certainly "who am I?" should be the question every sadhaka should
> ask but why should that require only "inward" contemplation.  It
> should defintely include inward focus but sometimes I think it gets
> forgotten that Brahman is "pervades all this and ten fingers beyond" as
> the purushasukta puts it.  The root bR^inn from which brahman is derived
> also means growth or increase.  Brahman is as much "out there" as "in
> here."
>
> I think where the emphasis gets placed depends a lot on the experience of
> individual mystics.  Some experience a massive collapse of sense of self
> where one seems to be nothing at all. Others have an equally massive
> expansion of consciousness where one becomes everything.  Think of Arjunas
> vishvarupa darshana (though that experience did not go well for him.)  One
> of the reasons I think Ramana appeals to more "modern" types is that in
> the current culture one is taught to think of oneself as an individual,
> and the conditions of modernity leave many as alienated individuals at
> that.  Personally though I am also steeped in modernity, my group
> identity(ies) is/are more important to me and perhaps that's why I don't
> "get" Ramana the way others do.
>
> --
> Jaldhar H. Vyas <jaldhar at braincells.com>
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