MANDUKYA UPANISHAD with GAUDAPADA’S KARIKA: 54. Swami Advayananda.

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Tuesday 16, May 2025, 11:00.

MANDUKYA UPANISHAD 

GAUDAPADA’S KARIKA

Agama Prakarana – “The Scriptural Treatise”

GAUDAPADA’S KARIKA:  PART 4/4:   

ALAATA-SHANTI PRAKARANA (100 mantras): 

Quenching the Firebrand:

The Illusion of CAUSALITY  

Karika Section 4.6:   Mantras - 33-41 (9 No.) 

Mantram - 4.41: Fanciful Whims in Waking State 

Post-54.

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Mantram - 4.41: Fanciful Whims in Waking State: 

1.  Viparyaasaat yathaa jaagrat,= Just as, through false knowledge, in waking state 

2.  achintyaat bhootavat sprishet;= one may take a “fanciful whim” as being real. 

3.  tathaa swapne viparyaasaat,=  so too, through false knowledge, in dream,    

4. dharmaan tatra eva pashyati.=  ne sees “fanciful objects” that are real only there.

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False knowledge in this verse is the same as saying ‘lack of proper discrimination”. It is the very opposite of the solid discriminative logicused in the previous mantram by which all possibilities of Causality were eliminated. 

The purpose of this verse is to eliminate even the slightest chance of rejecting the “World is Unreal” proposition, on such grounds as, “It is only a vague or fanciful whim.”  

In the comparison of the waking state with the dream state, we generally take for granted, i) discrimination in the waking state, and ii) non-discrimination in the dream state. 

This is not a correct assumption. The verse sets out to show that in most cases even the waking state is governed mainly by non-discrimination, due to impurity in the intellect. Such non-discrimination is more dangerous than the non-discrimination of dream. It creates real problems in our life, not just the imaginary ones that dreams are known for and which can, therefore, just be ignored. 

1-2

 There is a phrase called “wool gathering” in English that resembles what is being spoken of in the verse as ‘Achintyaat’. It is something like ‘daydreaming’. In woolgathering, whatever thoughts pass through the mind are meant to be taken only as being unreal in an ordinary sense. Nobody takes wool-gathering seriously. Just because one happens to ‘wool-gather’ in the waking state, that is not reason enough to regard the ‘wool’ as being real.  

The problem is that, philosophically speaking, wool-gathering is not an exception, but rather the rule for most of us. This is the core point of Sri Gaudapadaji here. That the world is unreal is the belief that is exceptional among men. Most regard it as real, and they are even complimented for it by being called “the normal people”! In other words, most of us are “wool gathering” while we are fully awake! We cannot concur with Sri Gaudapadaji’s view, and so we use every means we can to discredit him. 

3-4

In dream, fanciful dreams occur of objects that are unique to dream, for example, seeing dream people with horns on them. Dreams have no bearing on reality. 

However real they may appear in dream, they have to be ignored when one is awake.  

The implication is that, as we make light of ‘wool-gathering’ in the waking state when we regain our alertness, so should we consider our “world is real” concept as just a form of wool-gathering and regard it as untrue when we are philosophically awakened.  

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Next

The Sage’s COMPROMISE:

Karika Section 7:   Mantras 42-46 (5 No.) 

Mantram - 4.42: The Sage’s Compassionate Compromise    

Continurd

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