Samayasara OR Nature of Self

SR No.: 011119
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: A Chakravarti
Publisher: Bharatiya Gyanpith
Publication Year: 1950
Total Pages: 406
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 38 MB

Page 247

SAMAYSARA
COMMENTARY The Self out of ignorance, not realising its own pure nature, may identify itself either with the impure emotions and ideas of inner consciousness or with the external objects of knowledge In both these cases the ignorant Self figures as the agent It may either imagine that anger, love, fear, etc, ale its own attributes or that the external "things such as dharma, etc are of its own nature The commentators explain both these erroneous beliefs through illustrations A possessed person identifies himself with the spirit possessing him and behaves exactly as if that spirit is acting He is able to carry out certain extraordinary deeds such as cairying a heavy stone or a heavy log of timber through the influence of the spirit and yet he thinks that he derforms all these deeds Anger, fear, affection, etc are all emotions due to alien influence and yet an ignorant person takes these to be his own just as a possessed individual imagines himself to be the agent of the extraordinary feats of strength exhibited by him Secondly a person concentrating his attention upon an object of thought very intensely may end in identifying himself with that object On account of the intensity of concentration on the object, he may forget to notice the difference between the Self attending to and the object attended to He may cry in illusory joy, 'I am that object “I am Mahāmahisha, the great and powerful animal (Buffalo) 'I am Garuda, the king of Birds, I am Kāmadêva, the god of Love, I am Agni, the fire (evidently taken from Vedic mantras)' This false identification of the Knower and the object known as the result of intense concentration is given as an illustration for the ignorant identification of the Self with the external categories such as space, time, dharma, adharma, etc Both these notions of identity are condemned as erroneous, since they are alien to the pure nature of the Self
एदेण दु सो कत्ता आदा णिच्छयविहि परिकहिदो।
एव खल जो जाणदि सो मुचदि सव्वकत्तित्त ॥९७॥ Edena du so katta āda nichchayavıduhım parikahıdo Evam kalu 10 anadı so munchadı savva kattittam (97)