October 8, 2026
tanmaivaṁ kriyatāmetadabandhasyaiva bandhanaṁ
kā ‘nyatā amalavyomnaścinmayasya nirākṛteḥ (35)
RĀMA asked:
In the story that we just heard we saw how the sage and the hunter passed through diverse experiences. Is it the very nature of things that determines such experiences or is there another reason for it?
VASIṢṬHA replied:
Such whirlpools of appearances keep occurring of their own accord in the ocean of infinite consciousness all the time. One set of whirlpool-like appearances remains steady till another arises and supersedes it. Some of these appearances seem to be permanent because they are long-standing and others are temporary: but just as movement, however slight, is inevitable to air, even so this appearance exists always in the infinite consciousness. The enlightened ones call it pure consciousness; the ignorant call it the world. It is neither real nor unreal: what should one call it? This universe is movement of awareness in the infinite consciousness or the Lord. Hence, both hope and hopelessness are irrelevant to it. O wise men, be what you are.
The infinite consciousness itself regards the movement that arose within it as the world: where is earth (and such other elements) in it? It is the light of the infinite consciousness which shines, there is no other light. Brahman alone rests forever in Brahman and this self-awareness is known as ignorance! The entire space is filled with the fullness of consciousness and that is known as creation. In it there is no contradiction nor duality. When that infinite consciousness alone exists, what is there to come to an end? Just as the world experienced in a dream does not exist, this world does not exist as a material entity, though it is seen. Just as it is one’s own consciousness only that shines as the dream, it is the same consciousness that shines as the objective world in the waking state. Hence, there is no difference between the dream and the waking state. One who wakes up from a dream thinks, “It is like this and not like that which I saw in the dream”; after death, too, one thinks “It is like this and not like that which I saw before death”. The dream may be brief and the life may be long, but the experience of the moment is the same in both. Just as in one lifetime one experiences hundreds of dreams, till one attains nirvāṇa one experiences hundreds of waking states. Just as some people remember their dreams, some people also remember their past existences.
When thus there is no difference between the two, what is known as the world and what is ignorance? When ignorance does not exist, what is bondage? Pray, do not bind one who is ever free! There does not exist “another” except the one pure, formless consciousness. Even when this world-appearance arises in that consciousness, it does not get bound to it; and therefore there is no liberation either. There is no ignorance in consciousness; there is no notion in pure consciousness. Space alone is space. That which is “aware” even in deep sleep, that alone is aware in dreams as well as in the waking state: that is pure consciousness. It is that consciousness alone that is responsible even for the awareness of diversity. Creation itself is the supreme Brahman, both the unity and the diversity.