Samayasara OR Nature of Self

SR No.: 011119
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: A Chakravarti
Publisher: Bharatiya Gyanpith
Publication Year: 1950
Total Pages: 406
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 38 MB

Page 153

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SAMAYASARA
and Paramatma are synonymous and interchangeable. Both the thinkers maintain that the individual self in the concrete world is ultimately identical with this absolute reality or Paramatma The nature of the individual self in concrete cxperience is the result of limitations imposed upon the ultimate reality, Paramatma The limiting conditions are very often spoken of as Upadhi, which is responsible for clouding the true nature of the ultimate reality. Kunda Kunda compares the ultimate reality with the shining sun in all his brilliance and the individual self is compared to the sun hidden by a dense layer of clouds which hides the sunshine. According to the variation in the density of the cloud, the rays of the sun will permeate through the clouds and make the sun visible in varying intensity. These variations in the appearance of the sun correspond to the various stages of spiritual developments of the individual soul. When the clouds completely get dispersed the sun begins to shine in all his glory without any intervening interiuption. Exactly in a similar manner, Karmic upadhis of different density obstruct the self-shining Supreme Atman where the Self will shine in his pristine purity and glory when all the karmic upadhıs are destroyed and got rid of. The doctrine of identifying Jivatma and Paramatma is common to both Sankara and Kunda Kunda. In this connection it is wo1th pointing out that both Kunda Kunda and Sankara in theil commentarics used the word “Advaita" the indication of the oneness of Jivatma and Paramatma, a term which becomes the central doctrine of Sankra's philosophy. It only means that the doctrine is common to both the Upanishadic thought and the Jaina thought. This individual self which is merely the Paramatma limited by Upadic conditions is subject to transmigration, the cycle of births and deaths. This career of births and deaths which is the peculiar property of the individual self is a result of the ultimate self forgetting its own nature and identify in itself with the external objects of the nonSelf. This confusion between the nature of the Self and the nonSelf is pointed out as the ultimate cause of transmigratory existence of the individual soul both in the Jaina (system as well as in the Vedantic systems. The initial error of Adhyasa of Mithya is