The Mandukya Upanishad 3.3 : Swami Krishnananda
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29/02/2020.
Section - 3. The Universal Vaisvanara-3
#This is the cosmic description of the Virat-Purusha, and the Virat is a name that we give to Consciousness as animating the physical universe.
#Just as we have consciousness animating our physical body, there is a Consciousness animating the physical universe. This vast cosmos; with all its stellar and planetary systems, with all its milky ways, with all its space-time and causal laws, is the physical cosmos, and this is animated by a Consciousness, just as our bodies are animated. This animating Consciousness is the Antaryamin, so called because of His being immanent in all things, hidden behind all things, secretly present in everything, whether conscious or unconscious.
##For this Virat-Purusha, there is no difference between living being and dead matter. There is no such thing as inorganic substance and biological stuff, the distinctions that scientists do make, because inanimate matter, the vegetable kingdom, the animal world and the human species are distinctions made on account of the observation of degrees in the manifestation of Reality, by us, as human beings. No such distinction obtains to the Virat Himself.
##He is present in the inanimate as well as in the animate by means of what arc called the Gunas of Prakriti – Sattva, Rajas and Tamas – composure, activity and inertia – properties of matter. When He manifests Himself through Tamas alone, we call it inanimate existence.
##Such objects as stone, rock, which, from our point of view, do not seem to have any consciousness animating them, are revelations of the Virat-Purusha through Tamoguna Prakriti, a quality of Prakriti in which Rajas and Sattva are hidden, Tamas predominating over Rajas and Sattva.
###When Rajas and Sattva slowly reveal themselves more and more in larger quantity and extent, there is animation, life creeps into existence, and from the inanimate we come to the animate.
###The first manifestation of life is through what we call Prana – the vital sustaining power in all living beings. While Prana does not operate in inanimate objects like stone, there is Prana functioning in the world of plants, vegetables, etc. Plants breathe; they do not merely exist like rock. But plants do not think as animals do.
###The function of thinking belongs to a higher order of Reality we call the animal world, with all its instincts and sensations. Here we have a still greater degree of the manifestation of Reality.
####There is an approximation to Sattva in the human level, where we have not only functions of breathing and thinking, but also of understanding, ratiocination and logical discrimination.
####This is the condition of Vijnana as distinguished from Manas, to which alone the animal world is confined, and from Prana, to which alone the vegetable kingdom is constrained, and from Anna, to which alone the inanimate world is restricted.
#####But the Vijnana to which we have reached at the human level, the fourth degree, we may say, of the revelation of Reality, is not all. There is a higher step that we have to take above the human, beyond the Vijnana.
#####That step which is above Vijnana or the human level is the realm of Ananda or divine delight. So, from Anna we come to Prana, from Prana to Manas, from Manas to Vijnana, from Vijnana to Ananda.
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29/02/2020.
Section - 3. The Universal Vaisvanara-3
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1.#This is the cosmic description of the Virat-Purusha, and the Virat is a name that we give to Consciousness as animating the physical universe.
#Just as we have consciousness animating our physical body, there is a Consciousness animating the physical universe. This vast cosmos; with all its stellar and planetary systems, with all its milky ways, with all its space-time and causal laws, is the physical cosmos, and this is animated by a Consciousness, just as our bodies are animated. This animating Consciousness is the Antaryamin, so called because of His being immanent in all things, hidden behind all things, secretly present in everything, whether conscious or unconscious.
##For this Virat-Purusha, there is no difference between living being and dead matter. There is no such thing as inorganic substance and biological stuff, the distinctions that scientists do make, because inanimate matter, the vegetable kingdom, the animal world and the human species are distinctions made on account of the observation of degrees in the manifestation of Reality, by us, as human beings. No such distinction obtains to the Virat Himself.
##He is present in the inanimate as well as in the animate by means of what arc called the Gunas of Prakriti – Sattva, Rajas and Tamas – composure, activity and inertia – properties of matter. When He manifests Himself through Tamas alone, we call it inanimate existence.
##Such objects as stone, rock, which, from our point of view, do not seem to have any consciousness animating them, are revelations of the Virat-Purusha through Tamoguna Prakriti, a quality of Prakriti in which Rajas and Sattva are hidden, Tamas predominating over Rajas and Sattva.
###When Rajas and Sattva slowly reveal themselves more and more in larger quantity and extent, there is animation, life creeps into existence, and from the inanimate we come to the animate.
###The first manifestation of life is through what we call Prana – the vital sustaining power in all living beings. While Prana does not operate in inanimate objects like stone, there is Prana functioning in the world of plants, vegetables, etc. Plants breathe; they do not merely exist like rock. But plants do not think as animals do.
###The function of thinking belongs to a higher order of Reality we call the animal world, with all its instincts and sensations. Here we have a still greater degree of the manifestation of Reality.
####There is an approximation to Sattva in the human level, where we have not only functions of breathing and thinking, but also of understanding, ratiocination and logical discrimination.
####This is the condition of Vijnana as distinguished from Manas, to which alone the animal world is confined, and from Prana, to which alone the vegetable kingdom is constrained, and from Anna, to which alone the inanimate world is restricted.
#####But the Vijnana to which we have reached at the human level, the fourth degree, we may say, of the revelation of Reality, is not all. There is a higher step that we have to take above the human, beyond the Vijnana.
#####That step which is above Vijnana or the human level is the realm of Ananda or divine delight. So, from Anna we come to Prana, from Prana to Manas, from Manas to Vijnana, from Vijnana to Ananda.
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To be continued ..
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