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Sumayasāra
Chapter - 1 distinguishing between the enlightened and unenlightened souls. The most fundamental principle of the process of self-realization is the intrinsic purity of the self. Its impurity is due to its association and defilement by the karmic matter. In order to tread the path of spiritual realization the first thing that one has to get rid of is the materialist view of the self as identical with any thing that is nonself which includes karmic matter.
Enlightenment first dawns when one is fully convinced of the distinction between self and non-self. To start with, one must distinguish between two kinds of empirical selves, viz., (i) bahirātmā the self which is externally-oriented and (ii) antarātmā, the self which is internally-oriented. Later on, one is required to rise much highet and concentrate upon and realize the transcendental self, paramātmā which is free from the limitations of the empirical self. The external self becomes the pure and perfect transcendental self by means of the intermediate internal self. In other words, the transcendental self is the self-realization of the external self through the intermediary stage of internal self or amtarātmā.
The self, with the deluded and false belief that it is none other than the material encumbrances (upādhis), some animate, others inanimate, with which it is surrounded in worldly life, is bahirātmā. This is the identification of the self with alien objects. Firstly, to believe one's own body as oneself, which is generally done in ordinary life, is nothing but delusion. Next the statements: “this body is mine” or “I am so and so” “this is my wife”, “these are my children”, ”these are my ornaments, my house, my fields, my crops, my community, my nation" or "I am her husband, their father, their owner" identify one's self with alien persons and things.
The self that clearly discriminates itself from the alien persons and things is internally-oriented or antarātmā.
Admonishment by the Ācārya अण्णाणमोहिदमदी मज्झमिणं भणदि पोग्गलं दव्वं ।
बद्धमबद्धं च तहा जीवो बहुभावसंजुत्तो॥२३॥ annāņamohidamadi majjhamiņam bhanadi poggalam davvam.
buddhamabaddham ca tahā jīvo bahubhāvasamjutto.. 23
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