Avidyaa and the States of Consciousness (Part-3)

Note: This article is meant for intellectuals only

Part-1   Part-2   Part-3   Part-4

THIRD PART

Enjoyer in all the three states

If you consider the bundle of thoughts itself to be the subtle body, it means that you are considering it to be the container. Who then is the possessor contained inside the container of the bundle of thoughts? You might argue that the possessor contained in the bundle of thoughts is pure awareness. That might be fine, but it leads to another problem. If the bundle of thoughts itself is considered to be the subtle body, it can never exist independently. For the generation of awareness or thoughts, it is essential to have a body which is either made out of a combination of matter and energy or out of energy alone. The body that is the basis to generate and maintain the awareness and thoughts is said to be the container of awareness and thoughts. In the awaken state, the existence of the bundle of thoughts ultimately depends on the gross physical body consisting of matter and energy. But after death, when the gross physical body is left, the bundle of thoughts (individual soul) would not have any container to be the basis to generate and maintain the awareness. So, it is not correct to call the bundle of thoughts itself as the subtle body. We, therefore, must accept that the subtle body is a body made out of energy acting as the basis for thoughts. It is the basis to generate and maintain awareness and the bundle of thoughts in it. The subtle energetic body is the external container and the bundle of thoughts is the contained possessor of that container. This is in agreement with the Vedic statement that the manomaya, which is the bundle of thoughts, leads the living energetic body away after death.

Opponent: We wish to consider the word mayaṭ in the sense of predominance (mayaṭ prācurye). Then, manomaya would mean ‘that which predominantly possesses mind’. Mind is a bundle of thoughts. So, manomaya is that which predominantly possesses a bundle of thoughts. It is pure awareness that possesses a bundle of thoughts. The bundle of thoughts thus can be called as the subtle body. The pure awareness is then the contained possessor and the bundle of thoughts is the container or the body. Hence, the subtle body means the bundle of thoughts and the pure awareness contained in the bundle of thoughts is taken as the possessor of the container (body).

Swami: The old objection comes here again. The pure awareness is considered to be the contained possessor present in the container of the bundle of thoughts. But, this container (bundle of thoughts) called as subtle body needs another container because a thought or pure awareness cannot exist independently without a container made of matter or energy. It needs a further external container to maintain it. The container can either be made of energy alone as in the case of a soul in dream (or after death) or can be made out of a combination of matter and energy as in the case of the soul present in alive body.

The container of the awareness, along with the bundle of thoughts (the individual soul) is the energetic or material body. The body made out of energy is called the subtle body, while the body made out of both matter and energy is called the gross body. In the dream state, the individual soul, who is the enjoyer of the dream is said to be the taijasa. Tejas means inert energy. Taijasa means energetic or the possessor of an energetic body. Thus, the terminology used in the Veda is well-justified as per our theory. The further advantage of our theory is that we are able to accommodate your concept too. Mayaṭ can also be used in the sense of predominance. The subtle energetic body contains predominantly the bundle of thoughts. The thoughts pervade the subtle body due to which it can be called vāsanāmaya, which means ‘that which contains qualities or thoughts’. Here, mayaṭ stands in the sense of predominance indicating that the subtle energetic body is predominantly pervaded by thoughts.

Opponent: Our problem is that if the bundle of thoughts becomes the possessor, pure awareness cannot get the status of the possessor.

Swami: You need not worry about this issue at all. In our theory, the bundle of thoughts is treated as the possessor of the subtle energetic body. But, it can act as the container for the pure awareness which becomes the ultimate possessor. You are the possessor of the shirt and the shirt is the possessor of the external coat. The possessor can become the container of another possessor that is internal to it. Similarly, the container can become the possessor of some other container that is external to it. In fact, even the pure awareness cannot be the ultimate possessor. It (pure awareness) also becomes a body for the final ultimate Possessor, who is the unimaginable God merged with the first energetic incarnation of God. Energetic or material body is the container for awareness and here awareness is dependent on the body like water in the vessel. In the case of God, the body is dependent on God like the worn shirt depending on the wearing person. The entire creation is said to be the container or body of the eternal, final and ultimate Possessor, who is the unimaginable God merged with the first energetic form (Datta or Eshvara). Hence, Rāmānuja says that the soul, which is pure awareness along with its various bodies, which are the bundle of thoughts and the energetic or material bodies, becomes a tiny part of creation. This creation itself is like the body possessed by God. Such a soul containing energetic or materialized tiny body, being a tiny part of entire creation is said to be very small (Sūkṣhmacidacit viśiṣṭaḥ). The mediated God containing this whole creation-body is said to be Sthūla cidacit viśiṣṭaḥ.

This concept can also be extended to the philosophy of Śaṅkara. The final ultimate Possessor or the unimaginable God also becomes the Possessor of the soul, which is pure awareness. The Sanskrit word for soul is ātman which was used by Śaṅkara. Ātman can be used to indicate pure awareness, but, it can also be used to indicate unimaginable God in the ultimate sense. Atman means pervading item (Atati iti Aatmaa). The unimaginable God pervades all over the incarnation and hence, can be called Ātman. When Ātman is used to indicate the unimaginable God, it is used in the sense of the Ultimate Soul. In this sense, Ātman means the Unimaginable Awareness or the Absolute Awareness. But be aware, this Absolute Awareness or Ultimate Soul is not the relative awareness generated in the nervous systems of living beings. The relative awareness is only a work form of inert energy. Inert energy gets converted into this special work-form only in a functioning nervous system. As long as you take care of this simple point (unimaginable awareness is not relative awareness), both the philosophies of Śaṅkara and Rāmānuja become one and the same. Of course, Śaṅkara called this relative awareness as the ultimate soul (unimaginable awareness) to attract and convert atheists into theists. He was certainly not ignorant of the reality. Śaṅkara was an Incarnation of God. He declared monism to be true in His angle. He was actually God and from His angle, the world was indeed unreal! Rāmānuja and Madhva were the incarnations of Adiśeṣa and Vāyu, who are the servants of God. They are souls. Hence, both these preachers gave their respective philosophies from the angle of the soul. They supported the dualism between the soul and God and accepted the reality of creation. They agreed with Śaṅkara on the point that creation is constantly changing, but they said it was still true. For instance, the water flowing in a stream is constantly changing but it is true. Creation is similarly true for the soul since the soul is a tiny part of creation.

Opponent: We are only interested in creation, which is the imaginable domain. We also want to stay confined to the case of an ordinary human being. We want to see the pure awareness or soul in the human being as the ultimate possessor or God. Hence, we treat the bundle of thoughts as the body of this ultimate soul or God.

Swami: We do not have any objection provided you remember one critical point. It is that a subtle body made of inert energy is an external container, which is absolutely necessary for both the soul and its bundle of thoughts. This means that your soul-God needs a basis for existence! This energetic external body has already been treated as the subtle body as per the Vedic statement mentioned above. So, you can treat the bundle of thoughts as another body internal to the subtle body, which is possessed by your soul. It would be like the shirt worn by the person under the external coat. In that case, you cannot call the bundle of thoughts as the subtle body since it would lead to repetition. You can call this bundle of thoughts by another name, which is the causal body. This name is proper since these thoughts and qualities are the cause for the entire behavior of the soul. In deep sleep also, these thoughts exist as inert impressions in the brain, which are responsible (cause) for the behavior of the individual soul. These inert impressions being inactive due to absence of awareness can be called as avidyaa. But, you can’t say that the causal body is made of awareness in deep sleep. You can’t have both relative awareness and avidyaa together in deep sleep. In meditation only, you can have both these together in meditation since relative awareness exists as simple pure awareness and avidyaa exists as disconnected thoughts. Avidyaa covers this pure relative awareness as its body in meditation. The subtle body, as we have clearly established, is made of energy and it contains awareness. The gross body is made of matter, which also contains energy and awareness. Thus, the three states in an ordinary human being are properly represented.

When you say about possessor (contained item or shariirii) and the body (container item or Shariiram) two concepts result in opposite directions. If you take the example of water (Shariirii) present in a vessel (Shariiram) water depends on the vessel for its existence. If you take a person as the possessor (Shariirii) and the shirt worn by him as the body (Shariiram) the existence of shirt depends on the person. When we take the soul (pure awareness) or the individual soul (bundle of thoughts) the example to be taken here is water and vessel and not the person and shirt. From the angle of inner item and outer item we can take both examples for the same concept because water and person are inner items and vessel and shirt are outer items. But, from the angle of basis and based items, the examples can’t be taken as common in both because person is basis and shirt is based items whereas water is based and vessel basis items. The relative awareness (individual soul) or the pure awareness (soul) is the based item and not basis because soul or individual soul needs materialized or energetic body as its basis.

The unimaginable awareness or God is always the basis (Aadhaara) and is never based item (Aadheya). The relative awareness or the soul or the individual soul is always based item and is never a basis because it always needs a materialized or energetic body as its basis. Can you, now, call the soul or individual soul (relative awareness) as God? Ramaanuja, Himself proposed that God is always basis and the world containing the souls is based item. Hence, ordinary soul, being a tiny part of the world-shirt is always a based item and can never become basis of anything. The case of human incarnation is different because God merged with the soul and body of the selected human being acting as always basis and the philosophy of Shankara is confined to human incarnation only and not to any human being. He made every human being as human incarnation in order to make atheist to accept the existence of God since He Himself is God. He is used this trick since no human being can deny its own existence! Except this trick, no concept will make atheist to accept the existence of God! When the human incarnation, Krishna, showed the world in His mouth, He showed His divine aspect. Simultaneously, Krishna is in this world (which is also seen in the mouth) shows His human concept! The first point proves monism and second point proves dualism simultaneously!

The case of the subtle body after death or during a dream is very clear. It is basically made of energy and is pervaded by the thoughts of the individual soul, so that it is called vāsanāmaya. The case of the causal body needs to be examined since Advaitins say that the causal body is made of ignorance or avidyā. They say that in the state of deep sleep, the soul is the possessor or enjoyer of the causal body alone, since the connection with the subtle and gross bodies is lost. If you take the causal body to be the total ignorance that exists in deep sleep, a possessor for such a causal body is absent. There is no soul or pure awareness in deep sleep. Who can then be called the enjoyer of this state of deep sleep? The bundle of thoughts exists in the brain. They are present in the part of the mind called as memory or cittam. This is similar to information remaining stored, in the memory chip, while the computer is switched off. The computer is like our nervous system taking full rest in deep sleep. When the computer is switched off, there is no electrical energy passing through it and hence, it does not function. In the case of our brain, even though energy is available in our brain during deep sleep to carry out the vital bodily functions, it does not produce awareness since nervous system is not functioning in full rest. The bundle of thoughts or qualities too remains stored in the brain in the form of inert nerve impulses, but there is no awareness to grasp these thoughts.

Opponent:- Even in deep sleep the neuron-mechanical waves exist in the brain, which are communicated to various systems of body for their proper function. We can say that the nervous energy or awareness or neurons exist even in deep sleep. This proves the existence of awareness in the deep sleep as the enjoyer.

Swami:- The fundamental characteristic of the awareness is that the impressions are active and the active ‘I’ impression is in touch with other impressions or thoughts and this is called awaken state, in which the external world is also in contact with the ‘I’ impression apart from the internal thoughts. We recognize such state as awareness. In deep sleep, neither ‘I’ impression nor other impressions are active and the external world is also not in contact with the ‘I’ impression. Even if you say that the awareness exists in deep sleep in the form of neurons-mechanical waves, such awareness is not enjoying the bliss of rest during the time of deep sleep. Even though such so called awareness is making the systems to function properly, such awareness is not aware about even such functions of the systems caused by itself! In the awaken state, in the contact with external world, the awareness is aware of the objects in contact. When these waves of awareness are in contact with the systems in the body, why such awareness is not at all aware of such systems in deep sleep or at least in the latter awaken state through recollection? This means that such waves of awareness are inert and mechanical only without any awareness. They are like the inert electric signals used in the control of traffic in the city.

You can take the inert energy existing in deep sleep to be the soul. It is basic material-cause of awareness. So, the soul can be said to exist even in deep sleep in the form of inert energy. In this way, both the soul as the basic inert energy and its causal body, which is the inert bundle of thoughts or nerve-impulses, can be said to exist. In this context, we must remember that both the soul and its causal body are inert. In view of the inert nature of both the soul and its causal body, we can say that ignorance is the causal body. But we have to remember that the possessor of the causal body or soul is also ignorant.

Here, Śaṅkara had taken the soul to be God, which is to say that every human being is a Human incarnation of God. So, according to Him, the soul is the Unimaginable Awareness or the unimaginable God. He said that this unimaginable God is the enjoyer in the deep sleep state and is called prājña in the sense of the supreme knower (pra+jña). This prājña is the witness of the inert bundle of thoughts, which is the causal body. Hence, the causal body alone is taken as inert bundle of thoughts or avidyā. Here, the enjoyer is not the relative awareness existing in the tiny body since such enjoyer has become inert like Ahalya becoming a stone. The enjoyer in this state is the mediated God (or unimaginable God) enjoying the whole world and this tiny body being a tiny part of the world also becomes a tiny object of a tiny part of His total enjoyment of the world. In this way, you can connect the tiny inert soul of an ordinary human being to the main God to say that enjoyer exists in deep sleep also. This whole world is constantly enjoyed by God and hence, the tiny soul also becomes a tiny part of His constant enjoyment in all the three states (deep sleep, dream and awaken states). In deep sleep, God is only the enjoyer whereas in awaken and dream state both God and soul are enjoyers as said in the Veda (Dvaa suparnaa…) and in the Gita (Dvaavimau purushau…). God is the enjoyer in all the three states whereas soul is the enjoyer in two states. With this idea only, Shankara proposed existence of enjoyer in deep sleep also.

In the case of an ordinary human being, when God is taken as the Ultimate Soul, the inert soul also becomes a part of witnessed ignorance (avidyā). If you take God as the Ultimate Soul, you have to treat the relative soul also as a part of the ignorance. So, you cannot claim this relative soul to be the Ultimate Soul or unimaginable God because God is enjoyer of three states whereas the soul is enjoyer of two states only. Hence, the ordinary soul is not God. You cannot blame Śaṅkara on this point since Śaṅkara used this confusion deliberately to convert the atheist into a theist, which was the need of the time in which He existed on this earth.

Apart from these three states related to the soul, a fourth state called ‘Turiiya’ is also described by the Veda and this state has no connection with the ordinary soul. This fourth state tells us that the human incarnation is the same unimaginable God and that there is no difference between unimaginable God and mediated God or first energetic incarnation (or human incarnation). This state is related to the human incarnation only, where a selected human being becomes the mediated God or the unimaginable God.

To be continued...

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