In the case of Ramana’s ‘I am’ there is no question whatsoever of a temporal phenomenon, a level that can still be transcended.
I have the impression that Nisargadatta’s use of the expression ‘I am’ as a kind of in-between level still causes much confusion with readers. Hence, I want to go more deeply again into this in-between level and into a possible connection with both other teachers on this subject – if necessary by the use of different terms.
As a starting point I want to use the quote that was also highlighted in the last chapter. That quote ends as follows:
“That knowledge of ‘I am’ is the greatest foe and the greatest friend. Although it might be your greatest foe, if you propitiate it properly, it will turn around and lead you to the highest state.”3
This statement puts into words the great mystery of duality, the mystery of something that simultaneously is true ánd untrue, that simultaneously is your biggest friend and your worst enemy. Nisargadatta repeatedly calls the knowledge ‘I am’ the beginning of all duality, the root of it.4
It is important to see that this statement refers to a beginning that can be observed; something that can be observed like an object. At least, that is partly the case. The point is that it is an object as well as not being an object. It is right here that everything comes together.5 If you recognize this, you can also understand why Nisargadatta talks so utterly paradoxically about it. The feeling ‘I am’ is subject as well as object: at this point the true moment of separation occurs. It is mercurial, super-fast. At one moment it seems to be object, the next moment it seems to be subject. It is the subject because it is the experiencing element in all experiences, and the object because it can be observed as experience itself, an object that is always the same. Nisargadatta’s words about this come down to ‘you are this – no, on the contrary, you are not this’ (sometimes even in the same sentence, for example, “this knowledge which you are, which is an outcome of the food body, is not you”6).
What is so important about the remark that the ‘I am’- feeling is (also) an object is that it is easy for everybody to make contact with this objective aspect. Everybody is used to dealing with objects. Nisargadatta is saying that you are permitted to start with the easiest, the directly tangible, experiential aspect. Although this object ‘I am’ can be your enemy, you can at least notice it, feel it, experience it as such, by paying full attention to it. In fact, it is unmasked in this way.
“Once you catch hold of that principle which moves about in various disguises, there is an end to illusion.”7
The Root of The Mistake Is The Medicine
The mistake, the belief in duality as being reality, already starts prior to the person. The mistake already starts at a level you may call universal. This is the level all Holy Books and mythologies are speaking about, like ‘the fall’.8 The multiplicity of individuals directly stems from this point, and yet, within all these individuals, this point, the ‘I am’-ness, is identical.9 By reducing it to a simple object, it can be useful because it isolates the misconception of multiplicity. This way it can serve as an instrument, not unlike a microscope or telescope.10 It sharpens our eye as to what exactly is this birth.
If we truly realize that this universal feeling ‘I am’ is the root of all separation and dilemma, then the implication is that one can no longer believe that this root is to be discovered in your personal past, with its karmic content. The root is universal, and the power of what you may call your personal past or karma only provides it with a specific content, like a colour. The root precedes this* – it is on the hinge between freedom and bondage.
As the root is still on the borderline, it can be used as a medicine.11 It is a medicine that cures you from falling under the spell of the belief in a separate person. In all teachings the liberating, ‘healing’ element is the most important aspect. Hence, I want to specifically treat the ‘I am’-ness as a medicine, and to take it literally for the moment, as a pill (see the picture on page 54), for the simple reason that the feeling ‘I am’ is also an object that can be observed.
This medicine is experience in itself. This is in accordance with the linguistic usage of Atmananda, who used the English term ‘experience’ literally, though he probably would not have interpreted it as a term for a kind of in-between level. In Atma Darshan he says:
“In one’s Experience – strictly so called – there is neither thought nor external object present. It is the state in which all alone one abides in one’s Self. Objects of perception being believed to be the cause of Experience, tempt the ignorant. … But no such cause appears in one’s Experience. It follows that Experience has no cause.”12
Atmananda sometimes used a capital E to emphasize what he meant with Experience, as is illustrated by the following quotation.
“If the experience has many objects, it is no Experience. You are superimposing objects upon your Experience. Your Experience is one and the same, always.”13
Elsewhere he has clearly said that Experience is something where in fact diversity does not exist:
“Two are not seen. Experience is one thing. You experience only one thing. … Your Experience is one thing – your Experience is only in relation to the One. You experience only One thing, One thing.”14
A large part of Atmananda’s teaching consists of the invitation to find out for yourself what an apparently commonplace element such as ‘experience’ really is:
“Always contemplating the nature of Experience itself, will bring about this merger [of thoughts].”15
The Pure, Unmixed Beingness Quality (Shuddha Sattva)
It is about this nature, the true nature, also here in this chapter. The pill depicted here, is divided into two halves by a groove, in order to indicate the primordial split, the place of the possible ‘fall’ or temptation. Also it is the place where ‘the enemy’ can convert into ‘the friend’. Above the groove has been indicated that which is the true nature of the entire pill – that which, in fact, is the essence of all aspects of the pill.* The terms underneath the groove indicate the general characteristics of the pill, and show something of its veiling element of temptation and identification. Actually, of course, the elements depicted here as two halves are completely interwoven. The pill illustrates ‘the singleness of the twofold’: the staggering multiple has been reduced to a simple ‘two’.
There are some terms which can be used for the entire pill, for above as well as beneath the groove: ‘I am’, ‘Being’, ‘Beingness’, ‘Experience’, ‘Presence’, ‘Jnana’ – and especially the multi-interpretable term ‘the Self’ (Atman).* The term Shuddha Sattva perhaps indicates best the difference between the top and the bottom. It means ‘pure, unmixed Beingness quality’. As described in chapter 3, sattva is the beingness quality. It is one of the three qualities (gunas) that is, sattva, rajas (restlessness) and tamas (sloth) which, merged with each other, bear all manifestation. Likewise, the pill’s entirety consists of the merger of all these three qualities. Shuddha means ‘pure, unmixed’. Nisargadatta explains:
“Pure sattva is perfect freedom from sloth [tamas] and restlessness [rajas]. Sattva is pure and strong always. It is like the sun. It may seem obscured by clouds and dust, but only from the point of view of the perceiver.”16
This Shuddha Sattva is the healing element in the pill, the actual medicine that gives freedom. It may be called healing because it is prepared to sacrifice itself, in the same way as soap powder gets totally dissolved when used to cleanse textiles. It is true it is still one of the gunas, and is, therefore, called Sa-guna (filled with qualities); however, in its pureness it no longer holds on to something, and in this way it ultimately turns out to be Nirguna - ‘That’ which is without quality, and precedes experience. In the famous Advaita scripture Viveka Chudamani is stated:
“Tamas is overcome by rajas and sattva. Rajas is overcome by sattva. Sattva dissolves of its own accord when pure (shuddha).”17
Ramana Maharshi, who once translated thi
s text, repeatedly has spoken about Shuddha Sattva and about the purification (shuddhi) of the mind.18 For instance he said:
“Of these three [gunas] the rajas and tamas aspects cling to and identify with the body. The remaining one, which is pure sattva, is alone the natural characteristic of the mind, and this stands clinging to the reality. However, in the pure sattvic state, the ‘I’- thought is no longer really a thought, it is the Heart itself … The state in which the pure sattva mind shines clinging to the Self is called aham sphurana [that is, I-I].”19
All passages in which Ramana was speaking about the aspect of cleansing (shuddha and shuddhi) could be considered as pointing to a kind of in-between level. Once, talking about the transition from sleep to the waking state, he emphasized the importance of a transition stage for realisation as well:
“The Self is pure consciousness in sleep; it evolves as aham (‘I’) without the idam (‘this’) in the transition stage; and manifests as aham (‘I’) and idam (‘this’) in the waking state. The individual’s experience is by means of aham (‘I’) only. So he must aim at realisation in the way indicated (i.e., by means of the transitional ‘I’). Otherwise the sleep-experience does not matter to him. If the transitional ‘I’ be realized, the substratum is found, and that leads to the goal.” 20
It is interesting to mention a passage in which Atmananda too uses a terminology of three stages. He does so in reply to a question about sphurana:
“The natural state of the ‘I’-Principle in man is unmanifested. This becomes manifest, in the case of human activities, in three distinct stages: 1. The unmanifested state of luminosity itself. 2. Becoming manifest as ‘I know I am’ or as Self-luminosity. 3. Becoming manifested as objects. The second of the above three stages is not recognized at all by the ordinary man. But the Jnani alone recognizes it and perceives it clearly sometimes, before a perception. From the first stage to the second is only a subjective change to ‘I am’, without losing its identity. This is called sphurana. It has no object, but it has become self-luminous. That is all. When the ‘I’-Principle comes to the third stage of perception, it becomes manifested as a jiva. … The ‘I’-Principle is pure and attributeless, and is added on to the attribute every time. In other words the unmanifested ‘I’-Principle first prepares itself to manifest by adopting the subjective change as ‘I know I am’, then takes on the attribute and becomes clearly manifested.”21
The Knowing Quality Is What Liberates
Unmixed sattva, pure Beingness quality, is a reflection of Absolute Reality or Absolute Awareness. It is like a totally clear mirror: the beingness quality which, as a mirror of Absolute Awareness, is itself the ‘knowing quality’. As Nisargadatta’s linguistic usage sometimes tends to emphasize that consciousness only exists thanks to the body (he often plainly indicated consciousness as being a product of the body), the confusion may sometimes arise that consciousness is actually only something chemical or biological. Of course that is not true. In the next quotation something entirely different is stressed, and as far as I am concerned touches the core:
“The moon dancing on the water is seen in the water, but it is caused by the moon in the sky and not by the water.”22
In other words: the Light dancing in the body is experienced in the body (as consciousness), however, this is caused by the Light and not by the body. Should this not be the case, freedom would not be inherently given but superimposed and dependent on conditional factors such as prarabdha (karma to be worked out in this lifetime).
Therefore, consciousness exists thanks to the Light, Absolute Awareness. Consciousness is Its reflection – even if indeed the fact remains that such a reflection of the Absolute Light can only exist when a physical body makes such a mirror possible. It is Light itself, but in the experiential sense of the word. If you look within consciousness to see what enables consciousness to be, you will notice that it is the Light which facilitates it, the bestowing, knowing source of everything. It is not ‘a’ light, an observable source from which a radiance can be noticed,* but incomprehensible, untraceable Light. It is ‘That’ which makes everything else possible, and imparts reality to our present consciousness.
It is true this ‘consciousness’ in the way Nisargadatta uses it, is just as unreal in the ultimate sense as mind. However, by abiding and resting in this in-between level, you can gradually recognize what always already is real within this consciousness: the knowing element, the shuddha sattva element. In this way you can also recognize that this is the liberating element, because the knowing element is not attached to anything. Like the contemporary Dzogchen-teacher Tsoknyi Rinpoche says, “The knowing quality itself remains undistracted.”23 In other words, attention can be distracted, but the knowing quality enabling attention can not.
The ‘Causal Body’
‘Distraction of attention’ means that you are being withdrawn from Experience Itself to fascinating experiences, which for their part divert and drag you into the next riveting subject or matter. This is what the bottom part of the pill in the picture illustrates. This bottom part is a pointer to the cause of multiplicity (the multiple bubbles underneath the pill), hence the name ‘causal body’ for it. As already mentioned in a quote by Maharaj in chapter 3, simplicity or singularity is very hard to endure. Experience Itself, without something to be experienced, is hard to sustain. The thirst for experiencing something is inbuilt from birth. And when you experience something, you soon want more of it (or, if it is negative, less of it). It seems there is always something more pleasant or beautiful to be experienced than what is actually occurring. This incessant thirst retains an element of seduction, something which tempts us.
Seduction may sound moralistic, however it is a term that covers this phenomenon very well. In the words of Nisargadatta:
“If you get involved with the flow of Maya there will be misery. Do you understand what the flow is? All that Maya, the activities. You try to derive pleasure from the activities; this is the product of beingness. Be still in your beingness.”24
In fact seduction amounts to the suggestion that you should have to go somewhere; that you should be different, better, further, more free. The bottom part of the pill indicates ‘going to’ instead of ‘abiding’.
One could say that ‘letting you be carried away by that which seduces’ comes down to giving credence to the power of your past, to the power of the latent tendencies, the vasanas, instead of enduring that you remain still within the present touch, the present form. The binding aspect of the ‘I am’ principle consists in the creation of a personal history, the creation of an ‘I’-figure, a form that has to persist. The binding force itself has often been called ‘causal body’, which means a kind of storehouse of the latent tendencies, and the primordial beginning of individuality, of a jiva.*
‘Fascination’ also is a good description for this binding aspect. This word means enchantment, dazzle etcetera; in fascination you are in fact captivated, tied up.† Because objectless abiding is hard to sustain, we would rather see ourselves being hooked on an object, which gives us something to hold onto. We are fascinated by our own creative power: our mind is a master in creating and we are fascinated by its products, all of its stories. In fascination lies the seduction. Being fascinated means non-understanding – we are being continually lured away from Understanding (Jnana), the Understanding that we are, and always have been, free – the freedom of Light itself.
In the Advaita tradition this non-understanding or ignorance (a-jnana) is also referred to as the ‘causal body’ we just mentioned. It is the ‘causing’ element in the Self. It is the very beginning of a series; it is something that comprises a sequel. It is that within us which causes now the creation of a form, and which seduces us to maintain and consolidate this form. It seduces us into not recognizing this form as ‘mere present form of Consciousness’, which means something which dies immediately afterwards and is replaced again by another form. So this creating forms and not recognizing them as Conscio
usness is what is meant by the term ‘causal’. The causal body brings about your losing sight of the fact that you are always new, also now, also now. ‘I am’ is an ever fresh beginning. The bringing about of not recognizing this occurs through the latent tendencies, which make you cling to the manifestations as soon as they are there, so that the form can continue to exist.
The term causal shows that it is the cause of something else: it does not abide in what it is itself. Just as the upper part of the pill can be briefly called ‘shuddha sattva’, the bottom part can condensedly best be referred to as the ‘causal body’. On this ‘body’ Nisargadatta says,
“There is something that may be called the memory body, or causal body, a record of all that was thought, wanted and done. It is like a cloud of images held together.”25
This holding together of images by means of the tendencies (samskaras or vasanas) which it contains, triggers the suggestion that you are a person, an individual or ‘soul’. This suggestion leads us to identify ourselves with this one individual, who seems to be separated from other individuals (as indicated by the bubbles underneath the pill). In the Advaita tradition the ‘germ of jiva-ness’, the primordial suggestion that you are an individual or soul (jiva), is regarded more or less synonymous with the causal body of the Self. Ramana Maharshi too, showed that the germ of the jiva in fact is similar to the most refined of the three bodies, that catalyst which has the power to suggest or create:
“Man has three bodies, the gross one made of the five elements; the sukshma or subtle one made of manas and prana; and the jiva.”26
Jiva is a term which is often used ambiguously. This also occurs in the traditional Advaita scriptures: it is applied both for an ‘eternal (i.e. real) soul’, which by mistake does not see its own true nature, as well as for the mistake itself, that is, the assumption of being someone separate, one individual (jiva) divided from others. We would do well, as far as I am concerned, to limit ourselves in our linguistic usage to the latter. Ramana frankly said:
I is a Door Page 5