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464
VIVEKACŪDĀMANI
tadvilaksanam: chāyāvilaksanam: distinct from the shadow.
The qualities of what is witnessed do not ever affect the witness.
506
अविकारमुदासीनं गृहधर्माः प्रदीपवत् ।
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The qualities of the body, the organs and the mind do not affect the ātman even as the qualities of the objects of a house will not affect the lamp that illumines them.
As the objects in a room do not affect the lamp that illumines the room, so too the qualities of what is witnessed i.e., qualities of the buddhi, indriya and śarīra which are the dřśya (the seen), do not ever affect what is different from them, which is of the nature of the drk (seer), self-effulgent, unchanging and indifferent and which is the witness. By saying this with the example of the light, the meaning of the sloka referring to punya and pāpa is made clear.
507 The unattached character of the ātman is explained by three slokas.
रबर्यथा कर्मणि साक्षिभावो वह्नर्यथा वाऽयसि दाहकत्वम् ।
रज्जोर्यथाऽरोपितवस्तुसङ्गः तथैव कूटस्थचिदात्मनो मे ॥ ५०७ ॥ raver yathā karmaņi sākşibhāvo
vahner yathā vā'yasi dāhakatvami rajjor yatha'ropitavastusangaḥ
tathaiva kūțasthacidātmano me ll
As the sun is a mere witness of an action, as the fire makes for the burning quality of iron, as the rope is associated with the object super-imposed on it, so too is what pertains to me who am the cidātman in my inmost being.
Known as karmasākşi (the witness of all actions), jagaccakşuh (the eye of the universe), the sun is the witness of actions of all creatures. But it is not connected with any of these actions. So too I am the witness of all actions being the inmost unchanging cidātman. As the burning character of fire is imagined in the iron when it is said that the (heated) iron burns, the agency for action
