The Gradation of the Categories

The objects of the senses are grosser than the senses, which, again, are grosser than the subtle rudimentary principles that actuate the senses. The subject that is characterised by the senses is always superior to the object that is bereft of consciousness, because the subject is subtler than the object. Only that which is subtle can pervade and comprehend what is gross. The mind, however, is subtler than even the subtle principles that preside over the senses, because the mind is the synthesising agent and the real operator of diverse sense functions. The mind is nearest to consciousness and, hence, it has the greatest power over all that is an effect and that which is inferior to the mind in subtlety. The mind is naturally fickle in character, and hence, it is not useful to the individual in acts like steady knowledge of anything. The intellect is subtler than the mind, and it is free from the fickleness that the mind is infected with. Intelligence in its aspect of determination is found only in the Buddhi or the intellect. The highest faculty of knowledge in the individual is the intellect.

The intellect, however, has certain defects, in spite of its being the most precious possession of an individual. The intellect always functions on a dualistic basis. It can have no knowledge except by connecting the subject with the object. Unfortunately, contact is not the way of acquiring perfect knowledge of anything. This means that the intellect cannot have perfect knowledge, unless it ceases from working on the basis of duality. With duality there is no real knowledge and without quality there is no intellect at all. Therefore, perfect and complete knowledge, is not given to the human being. It is only the cosmic intelligence or the mahat-tattva that can have complete knowledge, because it is free from the perception of duality. It is the collective totality of all principles of intelligence in the universe, and, therefore, outside it there is nothing. The cosmic intellect is not the understander of anything external to it. But it knows Itself as complete in Itself. Therefore, the mahat is superior to the individual intellect. The mahat-tattva is characterised by omniscience, and omniscience necessitates the acceptance of a cause of omniscience. This cause of even the mahat-tattva is called the avyakta which is superior to the mahat. The cosmic intellect exists buried in a potential condition in this avyakta. In fact, the avyakta is not an existent something but only the possibility and the explanation of the appearance of the Absolute as cosmic intelligence. Superior to the avyakta is the purusha. The purusha is the same as Brahman, beyond which there is nothing. This is the Supreme Goal.

The purusha is described as the supreme destination of all the individuals. The word destination may give rise to a doubt that it is possible for one to move towards the purusha, even as a person may move towards a town or a village. In the case of movement towards a place, destination has its literal meaning, but, in the case of the attainment of the purusha, it has only a figurative meaning. The purusha that is to be attained is not different from the one who attains it. It is the knowledge of the Self that is signified by the word destination. Movement is an action, and knowledge is not action; because in movement we have to do something, but in knowledge, we have to do nothing. A literal movement towards the purusha is not possible, because external to the purusha there is nothing. Movement is the function of the pranas, the senses, the mind and the intellect. But knowledge is not the property of any of these. Hence knowledge is different from movement or any kind of action. If one can go to or move towards anything, one can also come back from that. Action always implies reaction. But the Srutis declare that there is no return to mortal experience after the attainment of the purusha. This shows that the attainment of the purusha is the same as existence which is eternal, and not an act which is temporary. The sruti says, “They go by the pathless path,” which means that the path to perfection is not like a lengthy road situated in space but a state of consciousness within. It is quite obvious that one cannot have the awareness of oneself through any amount of external struggle, even as a sleeping person cannot know himself except by waking into consciousness.

This atman is subtler than every conceptual being. Therefore, it does not shine before the organs of know ledge. The cognitive organs can know only what is grosser than themselves and not what is subtler. This atman is beheld only by the subtlest condition of the intellect. viz., the steady intelligence of a sattvika character in which alone the consciousness of the Self can be reflected. The atman is known only by the most careful seers who have the subtlest sense of perception and the most acute and penetrating intelligence freed from the shackles of desires and actions. In fact, even the principle of the creator of the universe himself is an object when compared to the Brahman-consciousness, and therefore, even the creator is less than Brahman. The knowers of the atman constitute only a minority of the individuals, because of the difficulty of the transfiguration of oneself from mortal experience in the world to non-relational Absolute-Experience. The principle that is nearest in subtlety to the atman knows it the best and those that are subtler know it better. The senses have got the least knowledge of the atman. The mind has got the least knowledge of it. The intellect knows it still better. The cosmic intellect supersedes even the ordinary intellect in knowledge. It is the cosmic intellect that has got omniscience, because of freedom from the obstructions of objectivity. The state transcending omniscience is the Absolute or Brahman. 

The Process of Withdrawal

The energy that is spent by the senses should be conserved through the stoppage of the activity of the senses. When the senses are stopped from their functions, there is a natural revolt of the senses, as a reaction to the attempt at their subdual. The reason for this revolt is that the energy that is withdrawn from the senses is not utilised well. No energy can rest in suspension, without being used; it shall find a way out. Hence the totality of sense-energy should be dissolved in the mind, so that there may not be any chance or possibility of its being expressed once again through the senses. But the mind also being an organ that is an extrovert in nature may project itself again through the senses, if the energy is allowed to stay in the mind without being utilised for a purpose. Generally forced stoppage of sense-activity without proper discrimination results in nervousness, excitement, confusion and ultimately a kind of madness. For this reason the energy of the mind should be spent in the process of purifying it and transforming it into the purity of intelligence. The character of intelligence is not dynamic energy, but unruffled consciousness. Consciousness does not require itself to be spent out, because there is nothing subtler than consciousness. But, when the mental energy is transformed into the intellect, it remains in the individual in the form of a dynamic power. Power is always objective and is always in motion. Power cannot rest in itself and so forces itself out in some way or the other. Therefore, the intellectual energy should be reduced to universal consciousness or mahat, where there is no danger of power getting itself externalised. This mahat should further be reduced to the shanta-atman or the Absolute Self that is free from even the very possibility of objective consciousness. This is the ultimate goal. The drift of the whole statement is that all ideas, names and forms, actions and their results, have to be resolved into the peaceful Self, through the knowledge of its Absoluteness. 

The Path of the Seeker

The sruti says, “Arise, Awake! Through obtaining men of wisdom, know it. A sharpened edge of a razor, hard to tread, a difficult path it is, - thus sages declare.” The individuals of the universe are all sleeping persons or dreamers in the night of ignorance. They are exhorted to wake up to the day of knowledge. The path of sadhana is beset with great dangers. The sadhaka has to experience sorrows and very unpleasant conditions in the process of the transformation of the individual into the Supreme. Knowledge arises, in the beginning, not through more self effort but through the company of the wise, the result of which is accelerated by the effects of past meritorious deeds. Self-effort takes the form of an intellectual undertaking, and the intellect being very strongly influenced by internal convictions and experiences of the individual concerned, the effort is many times not well directed. Every right effort should be preceded by right thinking, and no right thinking is possible as long as the individual is controlled by personal prejudices and desires. Hence the need for the company of the wise, which shall break open the fort of preconceived notions in the individual. Further, the path is a very difficult one to tread. The search for truth is attended with many dangers. The sadhaka is likely to be tempted, opposed, misled or held up on the way. The inner propensities take concrete forms and present themselves before the seeker because of his attempt at concentration of mind. Concentration is a death-blow given to mental desires, and hence they rise up with all might to put an end to the practice of concentration. Moreover, sadhana is the method of the disintegration of the entire personality consisting of the five material sheaths. These sheaths include within themselves the substance of the entire universe. Therefore, when the aspirant turns his face against these sheaths, he is actually acting against the lower natural current of the whole external universe of manifestation. Here lies the danger of the practice. The objective powers of the universe rebel against the internal consciousness, and though this consciousness is more powerful than any objective power, it does not appear to be so because of its non-manifestation. The aspirant seems to be defeated, because his condition is one where the external tendencies are opposed and the internal Self is not known. Hence, he has no help until a higher state is reached, though he is unconsciously being led higher by the law of the Absolute. It is in this helpless condition of the absence of knowledge that the power of the result of previous discriminative practices raises the individual above the material entanglements. The object of knowledge is too subtle to be easily known, and the object of the senses is too gross to be easily avoided. This is the reason why there is every likelihood of the seeker’s falling back into relative experience. But there is one great helping hand that pushes forward every sadhaka, in spite of the several oppositions before him. Every bit of action that is done as a sadhana for perfection produces such a power that it can never be destroyed by any material force of the universe. When a sadhaka is opposed by an external power, the impression of the previous practice urges him forward, and this forward march is another act which adds another fresh stock of power to the already existing one. Every step taken forward adds more power to the previous stock, and the cumulative effect of sadhana-shakti becomes so great that it is able to overcome any external power. The subject is always more powerful than the object, because the subject is conscious and is the influencer of the object. The knower has a power over the known. The fact that the knower has the power to know the entirety of nature shows that nature is subservient to the knower. If the knower were less than the known, it would never have been possible for the knower to have complete knowledge of anything. Knowledge of everything means transcending everything in quality as well as in quantity. The path to perfection is, therefore, the way to the expansion of the localised being into the limitless existence. Since every being is essentially consciousness, it is possible for everyone to become the greatest and the best, and exist as the Absolute. 

The Liberation of the Individual

When that which is soundless, touchless, formless, changeless, tasteless, eternal, odourless, beginningless, endless, greater than the cosmic intellect, the permanent being, is known, one is liberated from the mouth of death.

That which is characterised by qualities like sound has to modify itself, because these qualities are not absolute values, but valid only relatively. That which is not absolutely valid cannot exist eternally. All relative values serve a purpose only in relation to particular times and conditions. That which is ever enduring does not exist in relation to another thing or condition, but is self-sufficient. That which has no beginning may have an end, and that which has no end may have a beginning. But Brahman is beginningless and endless. That which has a beginning is a product, and every product, being conditioned by its cause, is limited. It has to resolve itself into its cause, because the effect cannot have a nature different from that of its cause. But that which is beginningless and endless is neither a cause nor an effect. Hence, it is transcendentally real. The atman is kootastha-nitya, eternally real, as distinct from the elements which are parinami-nitya or changefully real. By knowing such atman, as being identical with one’s own Self, one gets liberated from the jaws of death. Death consists in the presence of avidya, kama and karma within. Avidya is the cause of kama and kama is the cause of karma. Karma is the cause of birth and death. Hence, death is situated within, and not without. The cause of change that gives rise to birth and death and different experiences in life is present in the mind in the form of the necessity to transform oneself into another condition. The fact that there is imperfect knowledge, imperfect power and imperfect joy in an individual, shows that perfection can be attained only by transcending this imperfect condition. This process of transcending oneself is called change and death. It is not possible to become unlimitedly perfect as long as the consciousness of limitedness is not negated. Deaths, therefore, are the processes of purification of the soul for immortality.