CHAPTER VII.

ATMAN, THE ETERNAL LIGHT.

Seventh Stanza of the Hymn.

To Him who, by means of the blessed symbol, manifests to the disciples the True Self that always shines within as the Ego, Constant in all the varying states of infancy, (manhood, and old age), of jagrat (svapna and sushupti) and so on; to Him who is incarnate in the Teacher, to Him in the Effulgent Form Facing the South, to Him (Siva) be this bow!

The blessed symbol here referred to is variously named as follows: Chinmudra, the symbol of consciousness; Vyakhya-mudra, the symbol of exposition; Tarka-mudra, the symbol of investigation; Jnana-mudra, the symbol of wisdom. It consists of a circle formed by joining the thumb and the index-finger at their tips.

Authority of pratyabhijna questioned.

1. Question: If it be concluded, on the strength of pratyabhijna or recognition of self-identity, that Atman is a persistent entity, (we ask), what is this pratyabhijna? and what its purpose?

2. Pratyabhijna is not enumerated among pramanas--right sources of knowledge--along with pratyaksha, etc. How can it be a pramana? The questioner is enlightened (by the seventh stanza of the Hymn).

Pratyabhijna proves Atman's Eternality.

The meaning of the stanza may be explained as follows:

3. Pratyabhijnana consists in recognising a thing--in the form 'this is the same as that'--which, having once before presented itself to consciousness, again becomes an object of consciousness at present.

4. Just as (in the case of external objects) an identical thing which is continuously present is referred to in the words "this is that"--all the accidental circumstances of place, time and form being left out of account,--so also:

5. The pratyabhijnana of Atman consists in His becoming conscious that He is omniscient, etc., after casting aside the notion that He is of limited knowledge,

and so on,--a notion engendered by His association with Maya.

That is to say, the recognition of Atman's self-identity consists in the intuitive realisation of His essential nature as the infinite Consciousness and infinite Bliss, after eliminating all limitations of Maya and its effects ascribed to Him by the ignorant.

6. By a recollection of the experience in a former birth, the new-born animal proceeds, of itself, to suck the mother's milk.

Thus, just as Atman remains the same through all the varying states of jagrat, svapna, and sushupti, unchanging though the body changes in infancy, childhood, youth, manhood, and old age,--so, too, He continues the same while passing in succession through the bodies of Devas, animals, men, and so on,--not born when the bodies are born, not dying when the bodies die.

7. It is, therefore, concluded that Atman exists the same even in other bodies,