The Mandukya Upanishads - 4.1. Swami Krishnananda

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Tuesday, August  04, 2020.4:12. AM.
Section 4: The Mystery of Dream and Sleep
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HIRANYAGARBA :

1.
The first phase of the Atman, as the waking consciousness, has been explained. Internal to the waking consciousness, and pervading the waking consciousness, there is a subtler function of this very same consciousness, which is subjectively known as the dream-consciousness, or Taijasa, and universally known as Hiranyagarbha, or the Cosmic Subtle Consciousness. This is the theme of the description in the next Mantra of the Mandukya Upanishad, beginning with 'Svapnasthanah', etc.

That which has dream as its abode is Svapnasthana. That which is aware only of the internal and not of the external is Antah-prajna. That which has seven limbs is Saptanga. That which has nineteen mouths is Ekonavimsatimukha. That which absorbs only the subtle into its being is Praviviktabhuk. This is Taijasa, the second phase, the second foot of the Atman.

2.
Now we are in the dream consciousness, the world of subtle perception. We regard, usually, dreams to be consequences of waking perception, and it is held that the objects seen in dream are psychological rather than physical. We come in contact with real objects in the waking state, but we contact only imagined things in the dream state. While there is actual satisfaction, actual pleasure and actual pain in the waking world, there is an imagined pleasure, imagined satisfaction and imagined pain in the dream world. While the objects of the waking world are not our creation, the objects of the dream world are our own mental creation. This is the usual opinion that we have about the dream world in relation to the waking world.


3.
The Mandukya Upanishad goes into an analysis of dream and holds a conclusion which is a little different from the usual opinion that we have about the relation between the two states. We regard dream as unreal and waking as real. However, it should be obvious that this is not the whole truth. While we say that the dream world is imaginary in contradistinction with the waking world, we are not stating all sides of the matter. 

The dream world appears to be unreal in comparison with the waking world. The waking objects appear to be of more practical value than the dream objects, again, by a comparison of the two states. No such statement about the reality of the waking world in relation to the dream world is possible without this comparison. 

Now, who can make this comparison? Neither the one who is always wakeful can make such a comparison, nor the one who is always dreaming. That judge or witness of the two states cannot be confined to either of the states. Just as a judge in a court does not belong to either party contending, the one that makes a comparison between the waking and dreaming states cannot be said to belong to either of the states, wholly. 

If the judge of the two states wholly belongs to the waking state, he would be a partisan; and so, also, would be his condition if he wholly belongs to the dreaming state. What makes you pass a judgment on the relation between the two conditions of waking and dream? It is done because you seem to have an awareness of both the states, and you are not confined wholly to either of the states; and no comparison of any kind is possible, anywhere, unless one has a simultaneous consciousness of the two parties, two sides, or two phases of the case on hand. 

Now, we come to the interesting question: who makes this comparison? 

You can make a comparison between the two states through which you pass. Who is it that passes through the states of waking and dream? 

When you jump from waking to dream, you are not in waking; you are only in dream. And when you come from dream to waking, you are in waking, and not in dream. How can you be, simultaneously, in both the states? 

To be continued ....

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