The Mandukya Upanishad -2. Swami Krishnananda.

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Monday, 19 Jun, 2023. 06:25.

Post-2.

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Then there are the five pranas – the prana, or the vital energy in us, operates in five ways. When we breathe out, expel breath, the prana is acting. When we breathe in, when we inhale the breath, the apana is acting. The vyana is a third form of the operation of this energy, which causes circulation of blood and makes us feel a sensation of liveliness in every part of the body because of the operative action of the bloodstream, which is pushed onward in a circular fashion throughout the body by the action of a particular function of prana, called vyana. There is another action of the prana, which is udana; it causes the swallowing of food. When we put food in the mouth, it goes inside through the oesophagus and it is pushed down by the action of a prana called udana. Udana has also certain other functions to perform. It takes us to deep sleep. Our jiva consciousness, our individualised consciousness is pushed into a state of somnambulism, sleep; that also is the work of udana. Udana has also a third function to perform, namely the separation of the vital body from the physical body at the time of death. Three actions, three performances are attributed to udana. There is another, fifth one, samana, which operates through the navel region and causes digestion of food. It creates heat in the stomach and in the naval region so that the gastric juices operate and we feel appetite. Hunger is caused and food is digested by the action of this samana. So, there are five pranas – prana, apana, vyana, udana, samana.

Five senses of knowledge, five organs of action and five pranas make fifteen. There are four functions of the psychic organ. The internal psyche, which we generally call manas or mind in ordinary language, has four functions. In Sanskrit these four functions are designated as manas, buddhi, ahamkara and chitta. Manas is ordinary, indeterminate thinking – just being aware that something is there. Manas is the work of the mind. Buddhi determines, decides and logically comes to a conclusion that something is such-and-such a thing. That is another aspect of the operation of the psyche – buddhi or intellect. The third form of it is ahamkara – ego, affirmation, assertion, 'I know'. "I know that there is some object in front of me, and I also know that I know. I know that I am existing as this so-and-so." This kind of affirmation attributed to one's own individuality is the work of ahamkara, known as egoism. The subconscious action, memory, etc., is caused by chitta. It is the fourth function. So manas, buddhi, ahamkara, chitta – these are the four basic functions of the internal organ, the psychological organ.

So, we have five senses of knowledge, five organs of action, five pranas and four operations of the psyche, totalling nineteen. These are the mouths through which consciousness grasps objects from outside, and we feel secure and happy because all these nineteen things are acting at the same time in some form or other, with more emphasis or less emphasis. Any one can act at any time, under special given conditions; and inasmuch as any one can act at any time, it is virtually saying that all are acting at the same time. Therefore we are objectively conscious through the nineteen operative media of the individual consciousness acting in the waking condition. We are aware of this vast world of sensory perception, and we go on contacting these objects of the world through these media.

It is also mentioned, in this connection, that we can conceive this form of perception in a cosmic way. Cosmic consciousness can be conceived to be operating in this manner in a cosmic waking condition. In the same way as we are individually conscious of objects in our waking condition, in a similar manner we can conceive that the universal consciousness is awake to the world of daylight. The whole universe is the object of the consciousness of a consciousness in its manner, similar to an individualised, circumscribed world becoming the object of our individual consciousness in the waking state. The waking state is called jagrat-avastha-jagratsthan. Technical words are used, which may be remembered or not remembered. For instance, visva is the word used to designate consciousness in the waking, individualised state. Our consciousness, the jiva-tattva, this individuality of ours at this moment of waking, is called visva. This very waking world of universal expanse in space and time, animated by a universal consciousness, is called Vaishvanara, or sometimes the word used is Virat. There is a consciousness pervading all things, as we know already. If this consciousness, which is universal and hidden behind all things, is to be aware of the whole cosmos as we perceive in our waking condition, that cosmic awaking or awareness of the whole universe may be regarded as Virat-tattva, or cosmic consciousness of the whole physical world, the entire cosmos of physicality.

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To be continued

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