Part20 - Sri Ramana Paravidyopanishad By Lakshman Sarma

537 The power there is in the silence of the Guru is immeasurable. Hence, teaching by silence is the highest there is. In this way alone does the aspirant’s mind obtain peace.

There is the question about initiation. What is true initiation?

538 It is said that initiation is of three forms, namely, looking, thinking and touching with the hand. But the highest initiation consists of the Guru remaining in the supreme silence. So says our Guru.

The supreme state is called silence.

539 Because that state is taught by silence, and also because it is attained by remaining in silence, it is called silence. The sage is in silence always, even when he speaks.

The last statement is difficult to understand. It will be better understood when Bhagavan’s teaching about the natural state (sahaja samadhi) is explained.
This enlightenment is the subject of many questions. One of these is, ‘Will it remain permanent, or will it be lost later?’

540 That eternal state is ever shining by the light of the sun of consciousness, the real Self. After realising it, there is no possibility of swerving from that natural state of the Self due to forgetfulness.

The reason is that when right awareness dawns by following the direct path, the ego and mind merge and are once and for all lost in that Self. It is otherwise when some sort of bliss is experienced as a result of yoga. Yoga by itself does not lead up to egolessness.

Does the world survive after the egolessness is established?

541 The statement of the vedantic text that the Self swallows up the moving and the unmoving, means that the world, which is only darkness, is consumed by the effulgence of that Self.

The Upanishads thus clearly state that the world, being only darkness, cannot possibly survive in the presence of the light of right awareness.

The very same truth has been expressed by Bhagavan in the first verse of his Arunachala Pancharatnam, which is paraphrased here.

542 The essential nature of the Self has been sung by Guru Bhagavan in the following words: ‘The Supreme Self, named Arunachalesa [The Lord of Arunachala], shines alone without a second, having swallowed this solid-seeming universe by his own consciousness-light.’

This confirms the statement that creation is composed of darkness (ignorance) alone, and has no substantial reality even now, when ignorance and ego are rampant.

An inaccuracy of statement that is unavoidably made is corrected.

543 The statement that the Self, by attaining oneness with Brahman, becomes freed from the bondage of samsara is not true, because the Self never fell from its true state.

544 Just as white cloth does not acquire a new whiteness, whiteness being its nature, so the Self does not become Brahman because the Self is eternally Brahman by nature.

It is said that for creating the world Brahman itself became the Self when entering the created bodies. This only means that the Self is never other than Brahman.
Certain expressions, freely used to designate the sage, are next critically viewed.

545 Two names are commonly in use to designate the sage, namely ‘Knower of Brahman’ and ‘Knower of the Self’. Since the sage is himself Brahman, as well as the Self, how can they become known to the sage?

Neither of the two, which are identical with each other, can become the object of knowledge. The Self, as the eternal subject, is not an object to be known, and Brahman is therefore not an object. The unknowability of Brahman is due to its being the Self. So the terms, taken literally, are inapplicable. What then are their proper meanings?

546 To be free of the notion ‘I am not Brahman’ is itself the knowing of Brahman. Freedom from the notion that anything not the Self is the Self is the correct knowing of the Self.

The reason is given next.

547 When, by making the quest of one’s Self, one becomes consumed, like food, by that supreme one, how can anyone survive as separate from it and still be called a sage.
The use of some word or other to designate one that has found the Self after sadhana is necessary and inevitable. But since in this case the success of the quest involves the loss of the unreal individuality of the seeker, practically all the words available are objectionable as implying something not true.

Another reason, shown next, is that the state is advaitic.

548 How can one, after experiencing the truth of non-duality [in that supreme state], remain separate from the Supreme Being? For that state has been styled, by Sri Krishna, himself, the supreme one, as merger into Brahman.

By this merger there is the loss of individuality.

549 In the sacred lore the sage is described in the same terms that Brahman itself is described. Since the true nature of Brahman is pure, supreme consciousness, the true nature of the sage is not different.

This is what Bhagavan has to say on this point:

550 ‘Since no one has two selves, it follows that the sayings “I know myself” and “I do not know myself” are both ridiculously nonsensical. The Self never becomes an object to be known.’ Such is the statement made by the most holy one [Sri Ramana].

It may be asked why that state is one of non-duality. The answer is the following.

551 This state of being one’s own true Self, freed from all limiting superimpositions, is called the state of non-duality, because in that state the supreme sole reality, the infinite Brahman, is not other than that Self.

An incidental question is whether the state of non-duality came into existence for the first time at the end of the quest, or had been existing all along?

552 The state of the non-dual, real Self, experienced by the sage who attains the supreme state, is not the fruit of the practice of sadhana. It is the eternal nature of that Self.

The following view, held by some, is next stated and discussed.

553 Some say that this duality will remain real as long as one is engaged in practising sadhana, but that when the goal is reached, non-duality will come into being by the extinction of the duality.

These thinkers seek to reconcile the dvaitic and advaitic teachings.

554 These men do not know the truth of the transcendental state beyond time, in which the world has not come into being. Non-duality has neither beginning nor end. Duality, with space and time, is unreal, always.

Here, the whole discussion about the world and the teaching of non-becoming are relevant, and also the discussion whether bondage is real, which comes later.

What then is the use of the sadhana?

555 In the sacred lore it is said, ‘By the extinction of ego there is, for the aspirant to deliverance, cessation of his delusion’. What is real cannot be destroyed by right awareness, nor will anything unreal shine as real in the supreme state.
The extreme doctrine of the dvaitins is next stated and refuted.

556 The conclusion [of the dvaitins] that this duality is always real, that it will not cease to exist even when right awareness dawns, and that non-duality will never be achieved, is much farther away for the aspirant [than the one stated before].

What Bhagavan says on this point is next set forth.

557 Both when it is being sought by the quest ‘Who am I?’ and when it is realised, the Self is non-dual and ever real, just as the tenth man was there all along, even when he was being sought.

The reference here is to a parable of the loss and the finding of the tenth man in a party of ten. The ten, while travelling, crossed a river and then, one by one, they counted the members to see whether all had safely crossed over. But as each one counted only the others, leaving himself out, they believed that one, the tenth man, was lost. They were bewailing the loss when a passer-by saw them and asked them the cause of their sorrow. When he was told, he counted them and found all the ten were there. He convinced them of this truth by making them count the blows he would give all of them. There were ten blows and this convinced the men.

558 Those who have understood, as taught in Mandukya, the truth of the non-becoming of the supreme reality, will not be perplexed by these theories of the ignorant, because they are firmly convinced of the true nature of the Supreme Being.
563 Since the real Self is all that is, when that Self is won, nothing remains for the sage to be won. Hence, in the sacred lore the sage is as one who has attained and enjoyed all objects of desire and is, therefore, desireless, just like God Himself.
It must be remembered that God is really impersonal, as Brahman, so that the personal God is only a modification of it.

564 Viveka Chudamani asks, ‘How can one who has experienced the truth of his own Self identify with his body and suffer from desiring objects? Who is there left to desire?’ This revelation shows that for the sage desires do not arise.

565 Only that man has desires who identifies himself with the body. But the sage has become free from the thought ‘I am the body’. The sage looks upon his own body as if it were the body of another.

The first sentence in the above is a quotation from the Viveka Chudamani.
Another powerful reason is that the sage is by nature eternally happy with the bliss of the real Self. This has been stated and explained before.

But the bliss of the sage does not cause bondage, as is shown next.

566 In the supreme state there is no tasting of bliss, for there the sense of being happy or miserable cannot arise. Since in that state there are no pairs of opposites, the bliss of the sage has no similarities to the pleasures and miseries of samsara.

The explanation is that while, in samsara, pleasures are from external objects, in the natural state the bliss is the very nature of the Self, who is identical with Parabrahman.

This difference is related to another, which is dealt with next.

Source: http://www.davidgodman.org/rteach/rpv_intro.shtml