DDV: Verse 20
Class Notes | Week 19 | Feb 16, 2021
Class Notes by Bhargavi
We should live our life with the Bhava (feeling) that we are serving and moving closer to the seer. Bhava or feeling comes from Thinking. A source of a feeling is a thought. We have been thinking about the seer for 5 months now. We should have been feeling and living for the seer.
Verses 1–5:
Message: These verses are directing us to Atma (Truth). In Mundakaupanishad, the visualization of two birds, one of which is actively moving around, it represents Jeeva and the other bird that is observing is the Atma.
Practice: Be Careful. More careful we are, more we understand and appreciate that there are two parts to our personality. The do-er and the Be-er (inside) AND seer and seen (outside). By not being careful, we will never understand this Truth.
Verses 6–12:
Message: If there is a truth, there is Ahamkara (Lie). This lie is the notion of doership and deservership. The joy and beauty of Atma, the Ahamkara as if steals it.
Practice: Be Grateful (to see that Atma and Ahamkara are separate). More grateful you are, less caught up we will be in deservership. One who is ungrateful is trying to find completeness from an outside source.
Verses 13–19:
Message: The reason there is a lie is because of Avidya (ignorance/forgetfulness/Maya). This “why” for the lie is highly relative. The more you believe in the lie, more you believe in the why. The less you believe in the lie, less you need the why.
The story of 17 horses and three sons is a good example of Maya. When a stranger comes with the 18th horse to help divide the horses among the sons as per their father’s wishes and returns back with her horse depicts how we are similarly asserting this variable to make our experience work. Let us not be Maya dependent.
Practice: Be meaningful. All that we do, we should find meaning from it.
In Vivekachudamani, Acharya Shankara uses a visualization to help us understand the importance of these practices further. The only way we can clear moss growing on the surface of water, is by sticking a hose and putting more water so that the moss overflows and does not come back again. When our lifestyle is more careful, grateful and meaningful, it is like putting a hose in our personality and all the moss like negativity and ignorance will be purged.
Verse 20: This verse is like a valedictory address and lets us shift to an uncontrolled environment. This verse focuses on contemplation/nidhidhyasana.
Asti means existence (Sat), Bhati means Awareness (Chit) and Priyam means Joy (Ananda). Every experience is infused with existence, awareness, joy. Every experience has 3 facets: The sense of who you are, “I”ness is existence. Within this experience, there is knowingness. Everything you do is for joy. Therefore, “I Know Why”. The implication of this is that we have only experienced and are experiencing and will experience “Brahman”. When Devi Draupadi is being disrobed, she starts to think about Bhagavan Krishna and only when she stops holding on to her body and clothing and surrenders to the Lord, does the Lord in the form of cloth (Vastra avatara) comes to her rescue. As soon as she let go of the “lie vastra”, the “truth vastra” was there. Our body, clothes, etc are all nothing but Brahman, this is the Truth. What is not the truth is Rupa (form) and nama (name) (the other facets of our experience). These facets are dependent on the first three. Since the guage of reality is independence, the names and forms are not real.
Genesis of speech: Vaikhari is the uttered speech, Madhyama preceeds vaikhari and pashyati preceeds madhyama and Para preceeds pashyati. Para or awareness is therefore the origin of every word we use, it then took on an unclear form (Pashyati). When the form becomes clear and be seen, it is then called Madhyama and finally this clear thought is spoken as Vaikhari (nama). We are therefore to think all the names and forms are being perceived and expressed as words but what is the source of it all?
Acharya Shankara continues his teaching to say that the first three aspects (Asti, Bhati, Priyam) are real and unchanging. These are the seer. This is where we should be investing by investing in knowledge. By being virtuous and having a vision, we can access the knowledge. Rupa and nama belong to the multiverse and is not real but personal. This is the seen.Rupa and nama are dependent on our mood and therefore wasteful.
Practice for verse 20: Decrease/ reduce/dismantle sense of labeling. When we do that, we will reduce likes which in turn will reduce limits. Those who are lost in forms and names can never go back to what is behind those forms and names.
