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Preface
Scripture is not knowledge because scripture does not comprehend anything. Therefore, knowledge is one thing and scripture another; this has been proclaimed by the Omniscient Lord.
Out of my ignorance, I had not understood then that all karmic influxes, virtuous and wicked, are other than the Self, impure, lead to bondage, and misery. Due to my erroneous thought dispositions, I was constantly involved in the adoption of karmic matter and, conditioned by karmic matter like delusion, I was instrumental in attracting impurities including nescience. To be able to grasp the essence of this profound treatise, one must exert to see the Self as pure, free from bondage, inseparable from the attributes of knowledge, faith etc., and distinct from all alien substances.
Samayasāra for a purposeful life
Our wrong beliefs, passions and emotions are the causes which interfere with the dawn of knowledge. One debilitating phenomenon in our lives, almost universally, is that we live under the shadow of multitude of fear. Take a look at the kinds of fear that we entertain:
Fear, perhaps, is the worst enemy of happiness; in extreme cases, it has the license to kill. As the world is marching ahead, as the means of communication are getting more potent than ever before, as the individual is getting involved in more and more activities, the scope and intensity of fear that we experience each day of our lives is increasing. Try to figure out a day, after your childhood days, which you have been able to spend without a tinge of fear tarnishing your natural happiness. There is the fear of failure, theft, gun, terrorist, accident, earthquake, flood, drought, tsunami, and so on. There is the fear of police, company law, central excise, labour law, income tax and sales tax. Future itself has become one big cause of fear - future health, security, relationships, old age, and, ultimately, death - termed appropriately as the fear of the unknown. We do not stop at thinking about possible mishaps till we are alive; we also entertain the fear of surety of our kin after our death. Even God has become an object of fear rather than of love and devotion. The list is indicative, not exhaustive.
