Atma Bodha - Post 12

Yesterday we understood that ignorance is not ‘removed’ but only negated. Let us continue further on this…

Example of the “Kataka-nut”:

The above process is compared with the effect that the powder of the kataka-nut has on a bucket of muddy water. In India, this powder, which is also ‘dirt’, is added to water which is to be used for drinking, especially during the Monsoon season, when the water sources are always very muddy.

The powder has the special quality to precipitate the fine muddy particles in the water and make them settle to the bottom of the bucket. The clear water left behind at the top of the bucket is decanted for drinking. Finally the dirty mixture of mud and the powder at the bottom of the bucket is discarded, having done its job of clearing the rest of the water.

The simile applies in the following manner: 

1) The water is the Self. 

2) The adulteration with mud is the impurities embedded in our Jiva due to the lifestyle fostered in us by Ignorance. 

The ignorance referred to in these verses is the Primal or the first and the subtlest ignorance of the real truth that we are divine. This Ignorance gives birth to our identity as a human being with a Body, Mind and an Intellect. This then extends our identity to so many things like - I am a doctor, I am a CA, I am rich, I am  poor, I am handsome, I am bad looking, I am this, I am that .........., the list is endless.   

3) The remedy for a disease depends on the cause of that disease. Here, the disease is IGNORANCE. So, the cure for this disease has to be KNOWLEDGE.

4) So, the Kataka nut in this case is the KNOWLEDGE of Brahman to remove the DIRT of our ignorance, which is covering the clean water which is SELF.

5) Thus, only the state of "AHAM BRAHMASMI" can drive away our mistaken notion of "I AM SO AND SO".

It does not end there. 

When once, a disciple approached his Guru and told, "Guruji, I have known Brahman", the Guru says only 2 lines - "SHUT UP AND GET OUT".

What did the Guru mean??

The Guru meant " GET MORE AND MORE INWARD WITH THE APPARENT KNOWLEDGE  ABOUT BRAHMAN WHICH YOU HAVE GOT, WHEN HE SAID, " SHUT UP".

AND WHEN HE SAID "GET OUT", HE MEANT, LET THAT KNOWLEDGE ITSELF GO OUT OF YOU WITH THE INWARD EXPERIENCE YOU WOULD GET WHEN YOU GET INWARD!

Dear All,

This verse stands out as one of the most crucial verse in the entire Atma Bodha text, in the context of those who take up the path of Knowledge or Jnana Yoga for God realization.

One dangerous disease which grips one who studies all treatise on Knowledge, the upanishads, all vedanta treatise is that, the person is internally blown up with the impression that he is the most learned person on the earth.

This is called as "Shastra Vasana", i.e., impression about one's expertise and one's knowledge of shastras.

When such impression sets in, the entire knowledge gathered by that person of wisdom has only added more ego to him, rather than removing the very ego, the very ignorance of the real truth that HE IS VERILY DIVINE SELF.

So, the actual culmination of Knowledge happens when the knowledge gathered is absorbed so intensely that it transforms into inner subjective experience of the TRUTH, the ONLY TRUTH that ONE IS DIVINE SELF. Once such a Jnani abides in SELF, then the so called knowledge or say, the impression about one's knowledge does and must leave him once for all, like the kataka nut dissolves in the water after clearing all the impurities so that the water is rendered pure and clean!!!!!

This inward experience of Knowledge is easier said than done. It is the last stage in Sadhana where, having spoken or meditated enough on "I AM BRAHMAN", the meditator actually attains the intuitive intimate inner experience of Brahman which is referred as BRAHMA ANUBHUTI and thereafter, there is no object of meditation - Brahman, there is no one who is meditating on Brahman, there is no meditation even.

All the three - the meditator, the meditation and the object of meditation merge together like the Triveni Sangam where Ganga, Yamuna and Saraswati come together and merge in Allahabad. 

Thereafter, the Jiva is freed of all bondage and becomes a Jivan Mukhta!!

Love.