The Chhandogya Upanishad - 68: Swami Krishnananda.

====================================================================================

Saturday 26, October 2024. 06:45.
Chapter 4: An Analysis of the Nature of the Self
Appendix 1: Sandilya-Vidya
Post-68.

=====================================================================================

Mantram-2.

"Mano-mayah prana-sariro bha-rupah 

satya-samkalpa akasatma sarva-karma 

sarva-kamah sarva-gandhah sarva-rasah 

sarvam idam abhyatto'vakyanadarah."

The whole mental world is permeated by this Being. The light of the mind, the light of understanding, the light of intelligence is the light of Brahman. It appears to be embodied through these pranas and the body. They are a vehicle, an embodiment to particularise this infinite consciousness. And as I have mentioned already, even these as effects are not different from consciousness, the cause. So, this mental body or vital body of ours is not to be regarded as distinct from the Absolute. They are only occasions for the meditation on Brahman. From the particular we have to go to the universal. Though the particular is limited in comparison with the expanse of the universal, qualitatively it cannot be different from the universal. Just as from a drop you can know the ocean, from the particular we can reach the universal. Thus is the meditation. It is effulgence in its nature and light is its character. It is the glory of consciousness that is effulgence.

Whatever is willed through this consciousness is materialised at once—satya-samkalpah. This is what we studied in the last chapter of this Upanishad.

The Self of this Being is as vast as space. It is not a limited individual self. The whole space itself is the Self-akasatma. As vast as space is, so wide is this Self which is Brahman. It is, therefore, all-comprehensive.

All actions are its actions—sarvakarma. It performs everything. Whatever I do, whatever you do, whatever anyone does, whatever happens anywhere in all the levels of creation—all these are activities of that Being. It is the fingers of God working through all these phenomena of nature. All the ways in which the mind thinks are the ways He thinks.

Sarvakamah—all the wishes in your mind, all the desires, are the desires of the Self ultimately in some way or other. Every kind of desire, whatever the nature of the desire be, is nothing but a movement of consciousness towards universality in some way or other. This subject is discussed in some detail in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, which describes how every desire is universal desire ultimately. Anything that you smell through the nose is again an activity of That Being only—sarva-gandhah. This again has been mentioned earlier, in the last chapter of the Upanishad. The objects as well as the means of cognition are both Itself only appearing objectively on one side in one aspect, and subjectively in another. All the tastes, anything that you contact through the organ of taste, is nothing but Its activity—sarva-rasah.

Everything is enveloped by That—sarvam-idam-abhyattah. What further can we speak of It? It is enveloping all—isavasyam idam sarvam as the Isavasya Upanishad puts it. Inside and outside It is there as the antaryamin. It does not speak, but It can convey Its message and It is free from agitation and eagerness—avaki anadarah. It has no desires in the ordinary sense. It is not eager to grasp things, grab things and have things, because It is all things. This is not merely a teaching giving some information, but it is instruction about meditation, the way in which a mind has to be organised in daily meditation so that it may not wander from place to place and may not think of many things. The many things do not exist. What will the mind think when it knows this truth!

*****

Next

Mantram-3:

"Esa ma atmantar-hrdaye'niyan vriher-va, 

yavad-va, sarsapad-va, syamakad-va, 

syamaka-tandulad-va, esa ma atmantar-hrdaye jyayan prthivyah, 

jyayan antarikasajjayan divah, jyayan ebhyo lokebhyah."

Continued

===========================================================================================