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UPANISAD
gard oneself as the gross and tangible individual; not even as the subtle personality; but as the principle out of which those had emanated. All manifested things whatsoever were to be known to be Its "transformations” (vikāra). The forms were accidental. Furthermore, the forms were fragile: pottery breaks, but clay remains. Tat Ivam asi means: “thou art to be aware of the identity of thine inmost essence with the invisible substance of all and everything"-which represents an extreme withdrawal from the differentiated sphere of individualized appearances. The gross and subtle forms of the world therewith were relegated, in the hierarchy of the gradations of reality, to a radically lower rank than that of the formless void.
Dve vāva brahmano rūpe murtam cämurtam ca, atha yan mürtan tad asatyam yad amūrtam tat satyam,
tad brahma yad brahma taj jyotiḥ. "There are, assuredly, two forms of Brahman: the formed and the formless. Now, that which is formed is unreal (asatyam), while that which is formless is real (satyam), is Brahman, is light.
"Light,” the text goes on, "that is the sun, and even it (the sun) has this syllable OM as its Self.” 20
It required time to evolve and press to its conclusion the conception of the absolutely formless. The quest for the “really real" rested for a time, therefore, with such phenomena as the sun in the macrocosm (as the primary source of light), the life-breath (prāņa) in the microcosm (as the primary source of life), and the ritual syllable OM. These remain in the texts, and still serve as preliminary holds. But in the end the courageous step was taken, and the goal of absolute transcendence attained.
Three stages, or levels, in the sphere of human consciousness were easily recognized:
1. the waking state, where the sense faculties are turned outward, and the field of cognition is that of the gross body;
20 Maitri Upanişad 6. . For satya and asatya, cf. supra, pp. 166-167.
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