[Advaita-l] Commentary on Ramana's Forty Verses

[Ven Balakrishnan]

“DEAD TO THEMSELVES AND THEIR POSSESSIONS”

Ramanamaharishi is entirely consistent with Sankara saying a jnani will inevitably take up the life of a paramahamsa ascetic, since s/he has no desires, no fear, no attachments, not even to body-mind - like a snake that has shed its skin. 


Sent from my iPad

> On 15 Jun 2021, at 17:26, Akilesh Ayyar via Advaita-l <advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> wrote:
> 
> Namaste,
> 
> This is the commentary on the next verse.
> 
> From
> https://www.siftingtothetruth.com/blog/2021/6/15/commentary-on-ramanas-forty-verses-invocatory-part-two-of-two
> :
> 
> II. THOSE WHO KNOW INTENSE FEAR OF DEATH SEEK REFUGE ONLY AT THE FEET OF
> THE LORD WHO HAS NEITHER DEATH NOR BIRTH. DEAD TO THEMSELVES AND THEIR
> POSSESSIONS, CAN THE THOUGHT OF DEATH OCCUR TO THEM AGAIN? DEATHLESS ARE
> THEY.
> 
> *Commentary:* All fear is rooted in the fear of death. But death can only
> afflict what is born, that is, what is changing: that is, what is thought.
> We have just seen that what is Real is unchanging, and that what is Real is
> us.
> 
> The Lord who has neither birth nor death is none other than this very
> Reality, the Heart. This Lord may go by many other names — Shiva or Vishnu
> or God or the Goddess, for example. But ultimately they all refer to this
> unchanging Reality.
> 
> In order to take refuge at the feet of this Lord, all else must be given
> up. This giving up is a kind of death. By dying to what is changing — to
> what one thought one was, but in fact is not — one realizes oneself to
> actually be the unchanging. What seems mortal has in fact never been born
> to begin with, and what is immortal cannot die. And the thought of death
> cannot occur to the immortals, which are those who have given up their
> stake in everything changing.
> 
> At any time, see all the forty verses posts that I have published so far
> here
> <https://www.siftingtothetruth.com/blog/tag/Forty%20Verses%20Commentary>.
> Akilesh Ayyar
> Spiritual guidance - http://www.siftingtothetruth.com/
> ᐧ
> _______________________________________________
> Archives: https://lists.advaita-vedanta.org/archives/advaita-l/
> http://blog.gmane.org/gmane.culture.religion.advaita
> 
> To unsubscribe or change your options:
> https://lists.advaita-vedanta.org/cgi-bin/listinfo/advaita-l
> 
> For assistance, contact:
> listmaster at advaita-vedanta.org