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INTRODUCTION
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weaknesses, can one remove those shortcomings and the accumulated evils of the past. There is simply no other way. However, this has to be a continuous process if one really wants to change onself. However, the Kanjipanthi maintain that knowledge of the inactive self is the easy way to liberation of the self from the cycle of births. They are averse to the adoption of means (sadhan) for the purification of the self through the efforts of vyavahara and nishchaya charitra (conduct), which are prescribed in Niyamsara, or the adoption of self-restraints (samyam) and austerities (tapas) described in Pravachanasara (PS 14).
In Pravachanasara, knowledge of the reality of things or categories (padartha), including the self and the non-self, samyam (self-restraints) and tapa (austerities), along with detachment and equanimity in pleasure and pain, are significant constituents of pure psychic attention (shuddha upayoga) (PS 14). Psychic activity is stated to be good (shubha) since it leads to accumulation of punya [karma]; if it is evil (ashubha), it leads to accretion of sinful (papa) [karma]. However, in the absence of both psychic attention, there is no accession [of karmas] (PS 156).
A person whose psychic-attention (upayoga) is purified (vishuddha) puts an end to all the pain and miseries relating to the body (PS 78). Such pure self or pure consciousness (shuddha atma) is, in fact, devoid of karmas (karma-rahita). It is considered the supreme soul (paramatma) or liberated soul, which can only be attained by efforts of moral selfrestraints and spiritual self-discipline, which have been described in Niyamsara and Pravachanasara.
Though Kanjipanthi profess to hold Kundakunda in high esteem and consider themselves to be mumukshu (desirous of moksha), they do not concur or adhere to his prescription of vyavahara and nishchaya charitra (conduct) for attaining the highest objective of human endeavour, i.e. (moksha). They continue to emphasize and harp on the inactive self, whose knowledge, they feel, will liberate one from the cycle of births. In their mistaken one-sided conviction, they do not feel any need to make any efforts in that regard. The only duty/ obligation of the soul (atma) is knowing. This alone, they maintain, is sufficient for the destruction of deluded view as well as conductdeluding attachment and aversion.181
Undue Emphasis on Knowledge as the only Cause of Liberation
The only thing, Bharill asserts, that one has to do is to know the self and continue to know it. To know the self is knowledge, while to
