Part 6 - Important Couplets From Vedanta Panchadasi By Sri Vidyaranya Swami

Translated by Swami Swahananda Published by Sri Ramakrishna Math, Chennai

48. Or, if he has no worldly desires, he is born in a family of Yogis who have pure
intellect due to their practice of enquiry into the nature of Brahman, for such a birth is hard to obtain.

81. A student, diligent in reciting the Vedas, reads or recites them even in his dreams through the force of habit. Similarly, one who practises meditation, continues it even in his dreams.

84. A woman devoted to a paramour, though engaged in household duties, will all
the time be dwelling in mind on the pleasures with him.

85. While enjoying in mind the pleasure of the company of her lover, her household
duties though not much disturbed, are managed indifferently.

86. The woman with attachment to a paramour cannot fully do the work as a woman attached to her domestic duties does, with enthusiasm.

91. If he controls and concentrates his mind, he is a meditator and not a knower of
truth. To know a pot the mind need not be controlled.

95. Once the nature of the Self has been conclusively determined, the knower can
speak of it, think of it or meditate on it at will.

96. (Doubt): The knower too, like a meditator, forgets worldly affairs in his
contemplation. (Reply): Let him forget. This forgetfulness is due to his meditation
and not because of his knowledge of the Self.

97. Meditation is left to his will, for his release has been achieved through
knowledge. From knowledge alone comes release. This the scriptures announce with
drum-beats.

98. (Doubt): If a knower does not meditate, he would be drawn to external affairs.
(Reply): Let him happily engage himself in them. What is the objection for a knower
to be so engaged ?

99. (Doubt): This sort of reasoning is wrong, for there the scriptures will be violated.

(Reply): If so, what is right reasoning please ? (Doubt): Right reasoning is to follow the injunctions and prohibitions of the scriptures. (Reply): But they do not apply to the enlightened.

100. All these injunctions and prohibitions are meant for those who believe
themselves to belong to a certain caste or station and stage of life.

102. The clear-sighted knower from whose heart all attachment has vanished is a
liberated soul whether he performs or not concentration or action.

103. He whose mind is free from all desires or former impressions has nothing to
gain from either action or inaction, meditation (Samadhi) or repetitions of holy
formulas.

104. The Self is associationless and everything other than the Self is a display of the magic of Maya. When a mind has such a firm conviction, wherefrom will any desire
or impression come in it ?

130. Those who give up meditation on the attributeless Brahman and undertake
pilgrimages, recitations of the holy formulas and other methods, may be compared
to ‘those who drop the sweets and lick the hand’.

X. THE LAMP OF THE THEATRE

9. That consciousness which reveals at one and the same time the agent, the action
and the external objects is called ‘witness’ in the Vedanta.

10. The witness, like the lamp in a dancing hall, reveals all these as ‘I see’, ‘I hear’,‘I smell’, ‘I taste’, ‘I touch’ as pieces of knowledge.

11. The light in the dancing hall uniformly reveals the patron, the audience and the
dancer. Even when they are absent, the light continues to shine.

12. The witness-consciousness lights up the ego, the intellect and the sense-objects.
Even when ego etc., are absent, it remains self-luminous as ever.

13. The unchangeable witness is ever present as self-luminous consciousness; the intellect functions under its light and dances in a variety of ways.

14. In this illustration the patron(sponsrer) is the ego, the various sense-objects are the audience, the intellect is the dancer, the musicians playing on their instruments are the sense-organs and the light illumining them all is the witness-consciousness.

15. As the light reveals all the objects remaining in its own place, so the witnessconsciousness,itself ever motionless, illumines the objects within and without (including the operations of the mind).

XI. THE BLISS OF YOGA

21. As the happiness derived from sense-objects is covered by thousands of afflictions, it is misery only. There is therefore no happiness in the limited.

37. Our happiness and misery, however, are not to be known by inference; both
their presence and absence are directly experienced.

39. If sleep does not produce an experience of bliss why do people make so much efforts to procure soft beds etc., ?

42. But the happiness experienced in deep sleep is not obtained from any object. A man may go to sleep expecting to be happy, but before long he experiences a happiness of a higher order.

45. To remove that weariness the Jiva rushes towards his real Self and becoming
united with it experiences the bliss of Brahman in sleep.

Source: http://www.celextel.org/othervedantabooks/panchadasi.html