Harmless Soul

SR No.: 001196
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: W J Johnson, Dayanand Bhargav
Publisher: Motilal Banarasidas
Publication Year: 1995
Total Pages: 372
Language: English
Classification: Book_English, Philosophy, & Principle
File Size: 20 MB

Page 223

Kundakunda: The Pravacanasāra 209 meditation is characterised in the Pravacanasāra. Gāthā 2:104 reads:
He, who has destroyed the impurity of delusion, who has no interest in the objects of the senses, and who, having restrained his mind, is fixed in his own nature, is a meditator on the self.
In other words, meditation on the (pure) self is nothing less than realisation of that self; the successful meditator becomes the pure self which is his own nature (svabhāva). As the Tattvadipikā on 2:104 puts it: 'Thus meditation, which takes the form of absorption in one's own nature, is the self, because it is nothing other than the self.84
That is to say, the ātman has and can have no dravya for its substratum (adhikarana) other than its own nature; its own nature (as defined by the Tattvadīpikā) is 'infinite, innate intelligence' (anantasahajacaitanya), and it is the fixing of oneself in this svabhāva which constitutes meditation.85
Kundakunda himself has already defined the self's svabhāva in some detail as being constituted of jñāna and darśana, an object beyond the senses, eternal (dhuva), unmoving (acala), without support - so independent (aņālamba), and pure (suddha).86 This is the eternal self, whose 'self is upayoga (2:101), meditation upon which destroys moha,87 and leads to 'imperishable happiness'.88
Kundakunda then asks the question (Pravacanasāra 2:105), what does the person who has realised his pure self, who has attained kevalajñāna, meditate upon (given that he
84 ataḥ svabhāvāvasthānarūpatvena dhyānam ātmano 'nanyatvāt dhyānam ātmaiveti - TD on 2:104.
85 See TD on 2:104. 86 At Pravac. 2:100-101. 87 See above, pp. 140-143, 147-149.
88 sokkham akkhayam / saukhyam akşayam - 2:103. Note that the TD on 2:102 defines dhyāna as ekāgrasamcetana, 'one-pointed awareness'.