NATURE OF SELF

Self is Ātman, and Ātman is Self. This Ātman is itself the light that is Pure Intelligence and reveals everything by its own intelligence, states the Brihadāranyaka Upanishad. The Upanishad goes on to say that the Ātman is self-effulgent, free from ignorance, desire, and work, for it is unattached to any object. This doctrinaire line is well established in the scriptures of Sanatana Dharma (eternal order and eternal righteousness). It is, as a subject, distinct from the gross, subtle, and causal bodies as objects. Atman (inner self or inner spirit) within every being is not subject to the laws of Samsara (birth or death), and it is eternal. In Srimad Bhagavad Gita, Sri Krishna declares the evanescent nature of the material world and the eternity of the Ātman. Of the transient there is no endurance, and of the eternal there is no cessation. This has verily been observed and concluded by the seers of the Truth, after studying the nature of both. Srimad Bhagavad Gita further emphasises that the soul pervades the entire body and knows it to be indestructible. No one can cause the destruction of the imperishable soul. Bhagavad Gita emphatically declares that the material body is perishable and the embodied soul within is indestructible, immeasurable, and eternal.

Swami Krishnananda says that liberation, or moksha, is the birth right of man. He goes on to say that there is an ongoing battle for freedom, liberation, and the renunciation of all forms of servitude. No one needs anything else in this world than complete and unrestricted freedom for as long as that is possible. Freedom from death is the ultimate goal. Which is followed by liberation from ignorance, servitude, attachments, and all other forms of pathological moorings. Man's inability to perceive his position is his bondage. Knowledge is freedom; ignorance is servitude. But only human beings strive for freedom. He is unconcerned with life and death. We are ultimately destined for this freedom because, despite the imminent difficulty of birth and death, we are seeking a positive attainment of ultimate freedom that is unlimited and eternal in nature. Although we are connected in some ways—possibly in all ways here—this is not the end of human history.

1. Outline

 The Self is consciousness, non-dual, beyond time-space-causation, bliss, and the infinity of infinitude. It is the essence of Brahman (Supreme Being or Ultimate Reality) and is in every being as the Self. It is within us, yet we are unable to comprehend it. The Self is both conditioned and unconditioned. In its original unconditioned form, it is unmoving and one with the Supreme Self, or Ultimate Reality. In its conditioned form, it is among the multitude of embodied beings. In that sense, it is faster than the mind. If the mind, through desires and thought, is in Brahmalok (the abode of Lord Brahma), the Self is already there. This has been verily declared by Ishavasya Upanishad.

anejad ekaṃ manaso javīyo nainaddevā āpnuvanpūrvamarṣat |
taddhāvato'nyānatyeti tiṣṭhat tasminn apo mātariśvā dadhāti || 4 ||

Unmoving, one, and speedier than the mind; the senses reach it never; for it (Atman, or Self) goes before. Standing, it outstrips others that run. In virtue of it, does mātarisvā allot functions (severally to all)?

It is all-pervading, bright, incorporeal, scatheless and veinless, pure, and untouched by sin. It is, by its nature, Sat-Chit-Anand (eternal Truth-Consciousness-Bliss).The Self is the subject, the Atman (inner self or inner spirit) within every being, and not the object outside. The perceiver's goal is to perceive the Ātman consciously. The Self is unchanging, imperishable, indivisible, immeasurable, invisible, and eternal. It can only be realised by a real perceiver and is beyond the range of our conventional senses. Self-aware beings can perceive the Ātman within by turning their senses from outward sense objects to inward, the subject.

However, all the deviations, misadventures, confusions, delusions, and restlessness crop up in a continuous flow when the being identifies the embodied self with the finitude of the body-mind-intellect complex and the sense egos that reside therein. The selfhood, through its delusions, identifies itself with the ego, or Ahamkara. Selfhood arises from this deluded identification of oneself with the body-mind-intellect mechanisms. In this misadventure, Swami Sivananda says there are three defects: mala, or impurity; vikshepa, or tossing; and avarana, or veil.

Ishavasya Upanishad (in short, Isha) says the veil of ignorance is the foundation for the germination of all types of suffering for mortal beings. The mortal being identifies the self through the identification of ideas emanating from the body-mind-intellect system, and that way it submerges the Real Self under a veil of ignorance.

 asuryā nāma te lokā andhena tamasāvṛtāḥ |

tāṃste pretyābhigacchanti ye ke cātmahano janāḥ || 3 ||

Malignant are those worlds enveloped in blinding darkness, into which pass, after death, whatever people slay the Self.

Isha further proclaims that the idea is that all changes in the nature of cause and effect take place only when the Self, the eternal sentiency and substrate of all, exists.

Srimad Bhagavad Gita (10.20) tersely says that the soul can neither slay nor be slain. For truly, the soul neither kills nor can it be killed.

aham ātmā guḍākeśha sarva-bhūtāśhaya-sthitaḥ

aham ādiśh cha madhyaṁ cha bhūtānām anta eva cha

O Arjuna, I am seated in the heart of all living entities. I am the beginning, middle, and end of all beings.

Atman, as part of the Brahman (Supreme Self), pervades the entire body, and we know it to be indestructible. No one can cause the destruction of the imperishable soul.  Only the material body is perishable; the embodied soul within is indestructible, immeasurable, and eternal.

Sri Krishna in Srimad Bhagavad Gita further says that the soul is neither born nor does it ever die; nor, having once existed, does it ever cease to be. The soul is without birth, eternal, immortal, and ageless. It is not destroyed when the body is destroyed.

If that is so, Atman by its nature, is imperishable, eternal, unborn, and immutable; thus, it cannot kill anyone or cause anyone to kill.

According to Swami Krishnananda, Atman, exists in all three states of waking, dreaming, and sleeping of the body-mind-intellect system. But the body system functions only in particular states. He goes on to say that the Ātman is whatever and wherever the sheaths are, but the sheaths are not whatever and wherever the Ātman is. This independent nature of the Ātman is to be realised by carefully analysing the material unconscious nature of the sheaths as distinguished from the universal and conscious nature of the Ātman, which is the Kutastha-Chaitanya, or immutable consciousness.

2. Scriptures

The scriptures of Sanatana Dharma profusely speak of the imperishable, eternal, unborn, and immutable consciousness of the Self, Ātman.

Srimad Bhagavad Gita succinctly declares that the soul is neither born nor does it ever die, nor, having once existed, does it ever cease to be. The soul is without birth, eternal, immortal, and ageless. It is not destroyed when the body is destroyed.

na jāyate mriyate vā kadāchin

nāyaṁ bhūtvā bhavitā vā na bhūyaḥ

ajo nityaḥ śhāśhvato ’yaṁ purāṇo

na hanyate hanyamāne śharīre

Similarly, Katha Upanishad asserts the atman is not born, nor does he die; he did not come from anywhere, nor was he anything, unborn, eternal, everlasting, ancient; he is not slain though the body is slain.

na jāyate mriyate vā vipaścinnāyaṃ kutaścinna babhūva kaścit |

ajo nityaḥ śāśvato'yaṃ purāṇo na hanyate hanyamāne śarīre || 18 ||

This Ātman came not from anything, i.e., from any other cause; nor did any other real thing proceed from this atman; therefore, this atman is unborn, eternal, everlasting, undecaying; therefore, ancient, i.e., new, even formerly; for instance, a pot, etc.; but the atman who is of a contrary nature is ancient, i.e., incapable of development; this being so, he is not slain or affected, even though the body is slain by swords, etc. Though in it, he is in it like the akas.

In a similar vein, Brihadāranyaka Upanishad says that the great, birthless Self is undecaying, immortal, undying, fearless, and Brahman (infinite). Brahman is indeed fearless. He who knows It as such becomes the fearless Brahman.

sa vā eṣa mahānaja ātmājaro'maro'mṛto'bhayo brahma; abhayaṃ vai brahma; abhayaṃ hi vai

 brahma bhavati ya evaṃ veda || 25 ||

iti caturthaṃ brāhmaṇam ||

That great, birthless Self is undecaying, i.e., it does not wear off; it is immortal because It is undecaying. That which is born and decays also dies, but because It is indestructible on account of Its being birthless and undecaying, therefore It is undying. That is to say, since It is free from the three changes of condition—birth and so on, It is also free from the other three changes of condition and their effects—desire, work, delusion, etc., which are but forms of death.

Brihadāranyaka Upanishad emphasises that Self can be realised by the removal of the veil of ignorance that covers the Self. The Self is That, which is free from fear, the Brahman, known or accessible to us by the removal of the veil of ignorance created by the limiting adjuncts.

Self is pure intelligence, and the consciousness emanating from the Self, according to Brahmasutras, pervades throughout the body. It is like the paste of sandalwood and the fragrance of a flower. "Fragrance is a quality of the flower. But the garden where the flower grows also becomes fragrant." (Brahmasutras-Jnadhikaranam: Topic 12; Avirodhaschandanavat II.3.23 -239)

3. Remarks

How to realise the consciousness of the Self consciously is a huge and fundamental question. It needs to be mediated upon constantly and continuously without any break. The veil of ignorance covers the identification of the body-mind-intellect complex as "I." Bhagwan Raman Maharshi rightly answers the question, Who am I?

The gross body which is composed of the seven humours (Dhatus), I am not; the five cognitive sense organs, viz. the senses of hearing, touch, sight, taste, and smell, which apprehend their respective objects, viz. sound, touch, colour, taste, and odour, I am not; the five cognitive sense-organs, viz. the organs of speech, locomotion, grasping, excretion, and procreation, which have as their respective functions speaking, moving, grasping, excreting, and enjoying, I am not; the five vital airs, prana, etc., which perform respectively the five functions of in-breathing, etc., I am not; even the mind which thinks, I am not; the nescience too, which is endowed only with the residual impressions of objects, and in which there are no objects and no functioning’s, I am not. After negating all of the above-mentioned as ‘not this’, ‘not this', that Awareness which alone remains - that I am. (Who Am I?, The Teachings of Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi, Translation by Dr. T. M. P. Mahadevan, from the original Tamil, Published by V. S. Ramanan, President, Board of Trustees Sri Ramanasramam, Tiruvannamalai, 1982)

 Avidya (ignorance), Asmita (egoism), Abhinivesa (bodily love of life and fear of death), Aviveka (non-discrimination), Ahamkara (individuality or I-saying), Raga-dvesha (attachment-aversion), Karma (action or deeds), Janma (birth), and Duhkha (sufferings), according to Swami Krishnananda, deprive a being of becoming conscious of his own Self. All these become the source of the erroneous identification of the Self with its limited existence in the form of a personality or a body. Realisation of the Self requires continuous self-enquiry, self-discipline, huge moral courage, and ethical perfection.

-Asutosh Satpathy