This Saturday 22nd April I’ll be speaking at the ‘Many Paths, One Self’ conference at 16:30pm UK time.
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From Guru Vachaka Kovai verse 1105:
1105. The Jnani, the unchanging one, who is sleeping naturally within the body, does not know His activities [vyavahara] in the world, His absorption [nishtha] and His sleep, just as one who is sleeping in the cart does not know the moving of the cart, its standing still and its lying [with the bullocks unyoked].
The above verse by Sri Muruganar was rewritten by Sri Bhagavan in the form of the following verse, which is also included in Ulladu Narpadu – Anubandham as verse 31:
B21. To the knower of the reality [mey-jnani], who is asleep within the fleshy body, which is [like] a cart, His activities [in waking and in dream], His absorption [nishtha] and His sleep are similar to the moving of the cart, its standing still and the cart being unyoked, to one who is sleeping in the cart
Sri Sadhu Om: The bodily life of a Jnani appears to be real only from the perspective of others. So ignorant people [ajnanis] think, “This Jnani is performing activities here in the waking state.”
But since the Jnani is verily bodiless, He does not know those activities; to Him the body and its activities are completely non-existent.
Just as the traveler who is sleeping in a bullock cart does not know the movement of the cart, and just as a sleeping child does not know that he is taking food, so also the Jnani does not know the state in which the body, the senses and the mind are active.
When the body, the senses and the mind of a Jnani remain without activities, people think, “This Jnani is in samadhi.” This is similar to the state where the oxen remain yoked to the cart but are motionless. Even this state of samadhi or nishtha is not known to the Jnani; for Him it is completely non-existent. When people think, “This Jnani is sleeping,” this state of apparent deep sleep in which his body, his senses and his mind seem to be unconscious, is similar to the cart that is with the unyoked oxen.
Just as the fact that the car is undone is not known to the traveler who sleeps in the car, so also the state of deep sleep is not known to the Jnani; for him this state it is completely non-existent.
Therefore, these three different states in the life of a Jnani seem to exist only under the erroneous perspective of the ajnanis, who see the bodiless Jnani as a body.
For the Jnani, the state of activity [wakefulness and sleep], the state of samadhi and the state of deep sleep do not really exist.
That is why Sri Bhagavan says in verse 31 of Ulladu Narpadu:
“Who can conceive and how what his [the Jnani’s] state is?”
~ above text is by Sri Sadhu Om in his commentary on Guru Vachaka Kovai verses 1105 and B21
For more on the same topic, please also see here:
How can the Jnani (sage) function with NO THOUGHTS? Sri Ramana Maharshi
Ramana Maharshi: how to abide as the Self, the world is not real, attend to yourself
Does the Sage (Jnani) see the world? Does the world appearance exist after liberation?
Multiplicity, plurality and polarity ARE duality | Non-duality | Sri Ramana Maharshi
The nature of liberation | Manonasa by Michael Langford | Ramana Maharshi | PDF download
I am always grateful to receive a testimonial – here is a recent testimonial I received from someone – note that ‘Guru’ simply means teacher – see here for more testimonials:
Tom is the only living Guru that I have met who speaks directly and one pointedly to the path and method of Sri Ramana. I came across Tom’s teachings while seeking some answers to questions about Sri Ramana’s methods applied to a householder’s life. After only a few 1 on 1 sessions I had strong clarity on how to deal with the obstacles I was running into. And I felt this sense of self confidence or confidence in my SELF that was being overlooked in the past. Through his loving acceptance of wherever I was, Tom kept bringing me back to the true Guru that is inside of me. The SELF. Along the way he also reminded me to honor my feelings and to drop self-judgment – another way of reinforcing my true self.
I also appreciated that Tom pointed me to the most relevant and effective texts amongst the sea of reading that is out there. It felt like every time he referred me to a text, that was exactly what I needed in that moment.
He helped me understand the true meaning of the texts and how to interpret them the way Sri Ramana had meant them, while still making it applicable to my busy lifestyle.
I’m deeply grateful to Tom’s guidance and teaching and his highly scientific and logical approach to the path of liberation.
Also see:
Does Jnana (or Self-Enquiry) lead to Bhakti (or Self-Surrender) or the other way round?
Non-dual devotion, worship and prayer
Here we see Sri Ramana Maharshi’s teaching on those who ridicule and denounce idol-worship or image-worship as follows in Guru Vachaka Kovai verse 208:
208
O you that ridicule idol-worship, having not discovered through heart-melting love its secret, how is that you [daily] worship the filthy idol of your body as ‘I’?
Commentary on this verse by Sri Sadhu Om:
It is generally believed that idol worship is to mistake an idol as God and to treat it accordingly, offering it a bath, cloth, food, and all hospitality; but to mistake a body as Self, and to treat it accordingly, is also a form of idol worship. Indeed to treat and love a body as ‘I’ is the primal mistake which leads to all other forms of idol worship. So it is clear that we are all idol-worshippers, even if we take pride in scorning those that worship temple idols.
As long as one takes one’s body as ‘I’, there is no wrong in also worshipping an idol as God, and until one feels that it is wrong to treat one’s body as ‘I’, one should not be scornful and criticize others for treating an idol as God.
If one first roots out and destroys the ‘I am the body’ notion, one is then in a position to criticize idol worship, if such criticism is necessary [in the light of Jnana such criticism will of course be clearly seen as unnecessary].
Here we have wonderful teachings from Sri Ramana Maharshi in his own handwriting – and best of all for us English speakers and readers – he has written these teachings in English himself!
Many of the core themes of the teachings are given and because they have been written by Bhagavan, and because he was writing out in English the verses he himself corrected (see below for the full context), this means we can be sure of the authoritativeness of these teachings given below.
Be sure to download the PDF files below which contain even more verses than what I have included in this post. They were taken from editions of The Mountain Path (a quarterly Journal founded in 1964 by Arthur Osborne and published by Sri Ramanansramam) from 2005.
The following are all Sri Ramana Maharshi’s own English handwriting:
Sri Ramana Maharshi’s English Handwriting PDF 1 (Mountain Path April 2005)
Sri Ramana Maharshi’s English Handwriting PDF 2 (Mountain Path July 2005)
The following images are taken from The Mountain Path April 2005:
In the Mountain Path (April 2005) it explains the following:
In 1917 Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi composed five cryptic Sanskrit slokas in Arya metre entitled Arunachalapancharatnam. These verses, the quintessence of upanishadic teachings, he later translated into Tamil and they are chanted by devotees at the end of the Tamil parayanam. Sri K. Lakshmana Sharma (WHO) wrote a Sanskrit commentary on these slokas entitled Laghu Vritti (Short Commentary) and this he submitted to Sri Bhagavan, who, on perusal of the text, corrected the title to vartikam. Vartikam is defined as a supplement which elucidates that which is said, that which is left unsaid, or that which is imperfectly said and needs clarification. There is a historical precedent in Sri Sureswaracharia, a direct disciple of Adi Sankara, who was known as Vartikakara because he had written a Vartikam on Sri Sankara’s bhashya (commentary) on Brihadaranyaka Upanishad and Dhakshinamoorthy stotra among others. Since Bhagavan corrected Sri Sarma’s title to Vartikam, he also named him Vartikakara.
A second note book containing Bhagavan’s corrections was submitted to Bhagavan who confirmed his original corrections and added some more verses. The original commentary of 79 slokas was increased to 108 slokas. The corrections made by Bhagavan with English and Tamil translations of this Vartikam was again rewritten in a pocket size note book by Bhagavan himself, and this book is maintained in the Ashram Archives. We have a rare example here of Bhagavan’s handwriting in three languages, namely Sanskrit, Tamil and English. This is one of the few instances of his written English; for reasons of its rarity we decided to print here only the English translation of some verses. In the next issue, Advent 2005 [see PDF downloads on this page], we will publish examples of Bhagavan’s handwriting in all three languages together for specific verses. We have slightly magnified the writing. Any discrepancies in size are due to the varying sizes Bhagavan used to accommodate the verses in the limited space available in the notebook.
In verses 1 and 2, above, Sri Ramana declares that he is nothing other than the Self, pure consciousness.
In verse 3 above, Bhagavan Sri Ramana states that the Self, also known as Turiya, is worldless, that is, without objective phenomena, and in verse 4 he states it is blissful and free from evil.
In verses 5 (above) and 6 (below), Sri Ramana writes that his teaching is the true Upanishad (ie. the genuine revealed teaching or shruti).
In verse 7 it is stated that because the teachings are authoritative, the conclusions will be stated in brief (without the need to provide logical reasoning as a support or proof).
Verse 8 starts with ‘O Sea of the Nectar of Grace…’ and states how Arunachala, which is the Self, will swallow up the worlds (objective phenomena) just as light ‘swallows’ darkness, indicating how the world, which is illusion (see below) is merely ignorance (darkness).
Below Sri Ramana explains ‘Here it is also shown that the Supreme Being is worldless’ (verse 9), meaning that the world appearance does not appear in the Self, and that the world appearance is due solely to ignorance (verse 25).
The triad of ‘soul, God and object’ in verse 25 refers to Jiva, Iswara and Jagat.
Verse 26 shows that ‘the world as it really is’ refers to pure consciousness devoid of objective phenomena, ie. when the nama rupa (names and forms) have been removed the Self is revealed, as the verse says, the world needs to be renounced.
Below in verse 36 Sri Ramana states that the whole teaching is only to facilitate Self Enquiry (‘The Quest’), and in verses 36 and 49 he states that to do Self Enquiry one must ‘turn inwards’ explaining this means to turn ‘away from the world’:
Here in verse 63 Bhagavan Sri Ramana states that Awareness of Self is Deathlessness, Silence and Fearlessness, also known as the Fourth (Turiya).
In verse 64 below Sri Ramana states that there are no objects and no knower of objects in the Self (which is formless and objectless, One Whole without any differentiation whatsoever):
The following images are from The Mountain Path July 2005:
Here in verses 15 and 31 Sri Ramana states that the world is certainly not real, the world being a creation or projection of the mind:, only the Self, the Pure Consciousness devoid of objects and full of bliss is the only reality (and this must be known directly through Self-Enquiry, see verse 97 below)
Here in verse 91 Sri Ramana states that unless one does Self-Enquiry (Vichara) or Self-Surrender, one will not end suffering. The asterixed portion confirms that Self-Surrender itself is essentially Self-Enquiry, there being truly onle One Path to the One Self:
Tom Das 