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UPANIŞAD
"Just as there shoot out from a blazing fire sparks by the thousands, resembling the fire, so do the various beings (or states: bhāva) proceed from that Imperishable; and into It, verily, they return.'
"40
"Like the butter hidden in milk, Pure Consciousness (vijñāwam: the state of Atman as Brahman, sheer bliss) resides in every being. It is to be constantly churned, with the mind serving as the churning-rod." 4
41
The Metaphor of the Two Birds on One Tree
Dvā suparņā sayujā sakhāyā samānaṁ vrkṣaṁ parişa-svajāte tayor anyaḥ pippalam svadu atty anaśnann anyo abhicākasiti
"Two birds of beautiful plumage, close friends and companions, reside in intimate fellowship on the selfsame tree. One of them eats the sweet fruit of the tree; the other, without eating, watches."
The tree with the twin birds, the tree of life or of the human personality, is a well-known motif in Oriental tapestries and carpets. The figure is interpreted and developed in the succeeding
Samane vrkse puruşo nimagno 'nisaya socati muhyamānaḥ justam yada pasyaty anyam iśam asya mahimānam iti vītaśokaḥ
"The individual life-monad (puruşa), being deluded, laments, depressed by a feeling of helplessness (anīśāyā: of not being a sovereign lord); but when he beholds on the same tree that other, the Lord in whom the pious take delight (justam īsam), and comprehends His greatness, then his grief is gone"; 42 for he knows that between himself and that other there is a fundamental identity.
40 Mundaka Upanisad 2. 1. 1. (cf. Hume, op. cit., p. 370). 41 Amṛtabindu Upanisad 20.
42 Mundaka Upanisad 3. 1. 1-2. (cf. Hume, op. cit., p. 374).
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