[Advaita-l] Physical death of the Jnani and related issues

[Kuntimaddi Sadananda]

Subbuji - PraNAms



I am glad you have brought out the Ch. Up sad vidya portion to make the
point. I felt it was useless to discuss any further when people of strong
convictions contrary to scriptures and advaita. It is however important to
point out as you did, the true aspect of advaita so that wrong concepts do
not get propagated in the name of advaita.



When Ramana says mind dies - manasantu kim maargane kRite, naiva maanasam ..
when one inquires about the mind the mind get dissolved - what he is
referring to is the notional mind - the mind with misconceptions about
oneself - that mind gets destroyed and objective mind remains as is needed
even to compose the Upadesa saara. If Body is there as the sthuula shariira
for us to see the jnaani, I see no problem in assuming that jnaani should
have mind also to deal with the world. If not it will be a mindless body
moving around.

What is fact is jnaani recognizes that he is not the mind - he is not the
body and he is not the intellect - they are in him and He being Brahman can
- as though- utilize the body and mind for loka kalyaanam or for the his
benefit (he being the entire universe). He has the mind but mind is not
Him.  ajnaani is one who takes himself to be the mind. There is a big
difference between the two.
Hari Om!
Sadananda

On Tue, Mar 2, 2010 at 4:33 PM, V Subrahmanian <v.subrahmanian at gmail.com>wrote:

> The Chandogya Upanishad, in the mantra 6.15.1, says thus:
> The man on the verge of passing out is found to respond to questions from
> those surrounding him so long as his speech does not subside in the mind
> and
> the mind in the prana and the prana itself in the tejas, bodily heat and
> finally the heat also (not) dissolving in the Sat. But as soon as the
> successive dissolving of the faculties occurs, the man stops responding to
> the others’ questions.  In the description of the death, the faculties of
> speech, mind, life force (VAk, manas and prana) are shown to merge in
> tejas,
> fire and tejas itself in Sat.  The Sat is the material cause from which
> matter consisting of fire, etc. has emerged and into which all these
> dissolve in the end.
>
> **
>
> *Chandogya Up. mantra 6.15.2:
> *
>
> //"But when his speech is merged in his *mind, his mind *in his  prana, his
> prana in heat and the heat in the Highest Deity, then  he does not know
> them.//
>
> **
>
> Shankara's commentary for mantra 6.15.2 :
>
> संसारिणो यो मरणक्रमः, स एवायं विदुषोऽपि सत्सम्पत्तिक्रम इत्येतदाह -...
>
> //The process of death of a transmigrating soul is the SAME as the process
> of attaining Sat, Existence, by a man of KNOWLEDGE also.  The text speaks
> of
> this as follows:
>
> The ignorant man, re emerging from Sat, enters into the states of a tiger,
> or a man...in accordance with his past thoughts.  But the man of Knowledge
> does not return after entering into Sat which is Brahman identified with
> his
> own Self, and which is revealed by the lamp of knowledge produced by the
> scriptures and instructions of the Teacher.  This is the process of
> attaining Existence (Brahman).  //
>
> Shankaracharya comments thus for the mantra 6.15.3:
>
> //When replied thus, Shvetaketu asks: *If the process of passing out is the
> same for the Knower (JnAnin) and the ignorant, *ajnAnin, why is it that
> only
> the ajnAnin returns to samsara and not the JnAnin who gets liberated?//
>
> *The Reply:*
> The reply is given in the mantra 6.16.1, 2 and 3 through an example (of the
> offenders caught by the police).
>
> In the foregoing we have seen the *Scriptural evidence for the existence of
> the Mind for the Jnani and Shankaracharya's confirmatory comments for the
> fact of the mind existing for the Jnani till the death.
>
> *Here follows Shankaracharya's commentary, based on the Chandogya mantra
> 6.14.2, establishing the prarabdha karma phala bhoga for a Jnani:
>
> The reproduction is from the Bhashyam translation of Sw.Gambhirananda:
>
> //...Those actions which have started yielding results, and those by which
> the body of the man of Knowledge (Jnani) has been moulded, get exhausted
> ONLY THRU ENJOYMENT, just as an arrow etc. that has gathered momentum after
> being shot towards a target, stops only with the exhaustion of its momentum
> and not because it has no purpose to serve at the time it pierces the
> target.  Similar is the case here.  But other actions which have not
> started
> yielding results, and which were done here before the dawn of Knowledge or
> after it, or those which are being performed, or those which were done in
> past lives but had not started yielding results, they become BURNT by
> Knowledge, just as sins are burnt by expiation.  ...the enjoyment of the
> results of actions that have become active is INEVITABLE FOR THE JNANI,
> EVEN
> THOUGH THERE IS NO NEED FOR HIS LIVING, etc.//
>
> A discussion on similar tenor is found in the Acharya's Bhashya for the
> Bhagavadgita 13. 23.  Here the Acharya makes a very emphatic statement:
>
> ..एवं शरीरारंभकं कर्म शरीरस्थितिप्रयोजने निवृत्तेऽपि आसंस्कारवेगक्षयात्
> पूर्ववद्वर्तत एव । [..so also, though the purpose of the bodily existence
> has been gained, the effects of actions which have produced the body
> continue as before till the exhaustion of their inherent energy. ]
>
> It is in these sample instances that we can find the unmistakable evidence
> for the concept of 'avidyaa lesha' for a Jnani, in Shankara Bhashya.
> 'आसंस्कारवेगक्षयात् ' is what is translatable as 'avidyaa lesha'.  Shankara
> has also very categorically clarified in the Briharadaranyaka Bhashya
> 1.4.10
> that the prarabdha / avidyaa lesha of a Jnani is ONLY that much as is
> required to experience the effects, bhoga, of the pararabdha karma and NOT
> to create samsara afresh.  Thus, the concept of 'avidyaa lesha' is quite
> justifiable, based on the bedrock of Shankara's bhAshya and the Shruti.
>  All
> advaitins accept, on the lines of the teaching of Shankaracharya, that
> samsara is 'avidyA-kRta', or caused by ignorance/adhyasa.  What manifests
> in
> prarabdha bhoga is only the effects of action.  The Br.Up. says: The
> ignorant one desires and the desireful one acts.  Thus, there is a cause
> effect relationship between ignorance and action, avidya and karma.  Thus
> when action, performed in the state of ignorance, is now yielding its
> fruit,
> after one has gained aparoksha jnanam, there is absolutely no defect in
> terming it 'avidyaa lesha'.  Especially, when we have Shankara's explicit
> support in the sample bhashya vaakyas we have quoted above, and also
> Shankara's explicit clarification that:  //that the prarabdha / avidyaa
> lesha of a Jnani is ONLY that much as is required to experience the
> effects,
> bhoga, of the pararabdha karma and NOT to create samsara afresh//
>
> All this does not, however, militate against the Shruti proclamation of
> 'Brahmavit Brahmaiva'.  Shankaracharya does not give room for any confusion
> or mixup between this Shruti and the handling of the prarabdha bhoga for a
> Jnani.
>
> In and through all this discussion we aught to remember that the mind is as
> much physical in its make up as is the body; as per the Chandogya
> Upanishad,
> the mind and body are evolutes/transformation of 'annam, water and fire'
> the
> three elements.  Thus, just as the physical body of the Jnani, even the
> mind
> and speech faculties continue till the extinction of the body-mind
> apparatus.  This is the upshot of the foregoing discussion.
>
> Shri Bhaskar ji, pl. note this is what I had said regarding the 'kombu'.
>  It
> is the 'akhanDAkAra vritti'  that is likened to the kombu. That is the
> dArShTantika and NOT the mind itself, as you have mis-comprehended from my
> post:
>
> // The jnani, owing to his sadhana under a Guru, has trained his mind and
> made the 'akhanDAkAra vritti' jnAnam possible.  This special vritti which
> has the Atma for its form destroys the avidya aavaraNam and itself gets
> destroyed.  The example given is the 'veTTiyAn's kombu'.  He kindles the
> fire in the grave yard with this kombu and finally consigns the kombu too
> into the fire. //
>
> And the proof for this is in the Acharya's Bhashyam to the Mandukya
> Upanishad  7th mantra नान्तःप्रज्ञम्.. :
>
> //  *प्रतिषेधविज्ञानप्रमाणस्य..*.ज्ञानस्य द्वैतनिवृत्ति-क्षण-व्यतिरेकेण *
> क्षणान्तर-अनवस्थानात्* । अवस्थाने च अनवस्थाप्रसङ्गाद् द्वतानिवृत्तिः । //
>
> [The instrument of knowledge (which is what is known as ''akhanDAkAra
> vritti') ...has no other action on Turiya, apart from eliminating the
> unwanted attributes like .......for knowledge (as a mental state, vRtti),
> *does
> not continue for a second moment following that of the cessation of
> duality.]*
>
> Om Tat Sat
> subrahmanian.v
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