The Yoga-Vasishtha Maharamayana of Valmiki, Vol. 3 (of 4), Part 2 (of 2)Valmiki
Religion
The Yoga-Vasishtha Maharamayana of Valmiki, Vol. 3 (of 4), Part 2 (of 2)
Valmiki
Hinduism -- Doctrines -- Early works to 1800; Religious life -- Hinduism -- Early works to 1800
4. There is no reality of the cosmos or any of its contents; and
all that seem to be in existence, are no more than the various
representations of the one self-existent Brahma himself. (Because there
is no duality beside the unity of Brahma).
5. It is said that there was no mind or its personification of Brahmá,
and the final dissolution of the world, and this proves the unreality
of both of them. Again it is said that the mind took the form of Brahmá
and created the world in the beginning, which proves also the mind to
be the divine mind, and represented by substitution of the metaphor of
Brahmá.
6. As there can be no material object without the prior existence of
a material cause, so it is impossible to believe the existence of the
sensible mind and the myriads of the sensible objects in absence of
their material cause, which never existed from before. (The spirit
alone was the pre-existent thing, which could not create anything
except in its own immaterial form).
7. Hence there is no such thing, as a dull and unconscious world; and
all that appears to exist as such, is no other than a representation of
the Divine spirit (which reflects itself in various ways) as the gold
exhibits its ornaments to view.
8. It is entirely false to believe, that the nameless and formless
Deity does this all; and because the world is visible, yet there is no
proof of its reality in our subjective knowledge of it.
9. That the nameless and formless spirit of God, which has no shelter
nor support for itself, should make this world for the abode of others,
is a laughable assumption of the ignorant only (therefore this world is
his own abode and the stage of his own action).
10. From these reasons it is plain that there is no world in existence,
nor even the mind, which is but a part of it; the world being a
non-entity, there can be no mind which is conversant alone with it.
11. The mind means no more than the wish, and then only there is said
to be a wish in any one, when there is an object to be wished for;
but this world which appears to be so very desirable, being a nullity
itself, how can there be the mind to desire it. (The mind is a nullity
for want of any of its objects to dwell upon or engage its attention).
12. That which is manifested unto us under the name of the Mind, is
no other than a manifestation of the spirit of God in itself, and is
designated by various appellations.
13. This visible which is so desirable to everybody, is no production
of any one; it is an uncaused entity ever existent in the divine mind,
from before its production by the mind of Brahmá the creator. (Being
prior to the mind, it is no production of it).
14. Therefore the divine soul, is of the form of an intellectual
vacuum, and is a void as the transcendent air; it is full with the
light of its intelligence, and having no shadow of the gross world in
it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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