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VIVEKACUDAMANI
201
By attaining purity through the cultivation of firm discrimination and uncompromising renunciation, the mind gets qualified for liberaton. So, a seeker for liberation must first be firmly established in them.
vivekavairāgyagunātirekāt: Discrimination and renunciation are qualities that will yield beneficent results. atireka or atiśayaḥ in them means firmness in discrimination and supreme unyielding renunciation. By such firm discrimination and austere renunciation, by the conviction that Brahman is the only truth and the world is mithyā, desire will not arise for the worldly objects which are all mithyā. So detachment from everything upto Brahmaloka is hailed as praiseworthy.
śuddhatvamāsādya: attaining purity; only he who is not subject to desire (kāma) is said to be pure.
The mind qualified by those two virtues, attaining such purity and absence of defilement; it helps to get rid absolutely of all traces of bondage; for it ceases to be extrovert (bahirmukha) and is firmly set cn Brahman. Thus, the mind of firm discrimination and uncompromising renunciation is the cause of liberation. So the buddhimān i.e., the intelligent man who understands the means (to liberation), perfectly, who desires the end-result of liberation must be unswerving in the possession of these virtues. For with reference to desire for means, the desire for fruit is the cause. If the person who desires liberation at first acquires with effort discrimination and renunciation, it is as good as declaring that the end-result (of liberation) is not denied, that it is inescapable.
178
After stating that discrimination and renunciation are the means to withdraw the mind from sense-objects, the Guru proceeds to show that an object which produces a sense of danger makes for withdrawal from it. For, if a man mistakes a diamond for a mere bit of glass, he is not attracted to it and does not go to pick it. So too a fearful object produces fright and hinders approach. So, with great compassion, the Guru turns the mind from sense-objects by producing the sense of fear for them.
मनो नाम महाव्याघ्रः विषयारण्यभूमिषु ।
चरत्यत्र न गच्छन्तु साधबो ये मुमुक्षवः ॥१७८॥ mano nāma mahāvyāghraþ vişayāraṇyabhūmiņu i caratyatra na gacchantu sādhavo ye mumukṣavaḥ 11
