SIDDHANTA PANJARA - Chapter Two

SIDDHANTA PANJARA - Chapter Two

[A Basket of Philosophical Conclusions]

32. The body is stated to be Samsara (transmigration) and the Self the Samsarin (transmigrator). I shall now explain the relation between the body and the embodied.

33. The body, though inert, always acts; the Self though sentient does not act at all.

34. Just as the iron acts in the presence of the magnet, in the same way the body acts only because of the presence of the sentient (Self).

35. Just as people perform their actions when the sun rises, (though) the sun is neither the agent nor the causative agent, in the same way is the great Self.

36. The piece of wood does not have at any time the power to burn and to cook, but being identified with the fire, it is able to do both.

37. In the same way the body does not have at any time the power to act and to know, but is able to do both, by being identified with the Self.

38. Just as fatness or leanness of the fire is on the basis of that piece of wood, so also is the case of the Self, because of being identified with the body.

39. The body has always got inertness because that is its nature and the Self has sentience because sentience is the nature of the Self.

40. During sound sleep all bodies become unconscious for some time. Even then the Self, which is the Supreme Self, will be conscious.

41. 'I did not know anything' – this knowledge exists even then; so also the recollection 'I slept soundly', comes later.

42. Therefore this body, though insentient, on account of the presence of the Chit (consciousness) believes as if it is the seer, the doer and the enjoyer.

43. Thus it is because of the mutual association of the body and the Self that the body becomes the knower and the agent.

44. Hence the notion of the Supreme Self who is the embodied Self 'I am'. This O student, is the relation of the identity between them, on consideration.