Traverses on Less Trodden Path of Indian Philosophy and Religion

Author(s): Yajneshwar S Shastri
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 145

136
Traverses on less trodden path...
Asanga belicves like the Vedāntins that the right knowledge of the Ultimate Reality can only deliver an individual from his worldly shackles. nirvāna means the state of mind which is completely free from every kind of passion, desire and worldly attachment. It is reaching a state of total passionlessness and desirelessness. If mind can dissociate itself from the mental attachments to the worldly things, if the mind can rise above temptation of the worldly thirgs and does not allow itself to be influenced by the external things, naturally the mind can release itself from the painful sbackles. One must eradicate from his mind the conception of not only of his own individuality but also of the substantiality of any thing whatsoever perceived by him.
When the adventitious, physical and mental screens are removed, when the ignorance is destroyed by enlightenment, the citta realises its identity with the tathatā-thatness, vanishing multiplicity of subject and objects. It is recognition of the normal state of consciousness. When a being attains the state of samatā, a state of mind in which he can not distinguish himself from any other thing of the universe, he can be said to have attained nirvāna in the view of Asanga. Concept of nirvana is not negative concept for Asanga. It means destruction of ignorance, routing out of desire and cessation of all suffering. It means realisation of essencelessness on the negative side and realisation of pure consciousness or tathata (suchness) on the positive side. Mystically it stands for reali. sation of divinity which is within us.