Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi Complete ... - BrahminVoice.org

Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi
4th February, 1938
Talk 451.
Mr. S. S. Suryanarayana Sastri, Reader in Philosophy, Madras
University, arrived this night. He had a doubt which he said had
been cleared on reading Sarma’s commentary on “Knowledge of
Self”. The doubt was:
How can the world be an imagination or a thought? Thought is a function
of the mind. The mind is located in the brain. The brain is within the skull
of a human being, who is only an infinitesimal part of the universe. How
then can the universe be contained in the cells of the brain?
Sri Bhagavan answered saying: So long as the mind is considered to
be an entity of the kind described, the doubt will persist. But what
is mind? Let us consider. The world is seen when the man wakes
up from sleep. It comes after the ‘I-thought’. The head rises up. So
the mind has become active. What is the world? It is objects spread
out in space. Who comprehends it? The mind. Is not the mind,
which comprehends space, itself space (akasa)? The space is physical
ether (bhootakasa). The mind is mental ether (manakasa) which is
contained in transcendental ether (chidakasa). The mind is thus the
ether principle, akasa tattva. Being the principle of knowledge (jnana
sattva), it is identified with ether (akasa) by metaphysics. Considering
it to be ether (akasa), there will be no difficulty in reconciling the
apparent contradiction in the question. Pure mind (suddha manas) is
ether (akasa). The dynamic and dull (rajas and tamas) aspects operate
as gross objects, etc. Thus the whole universe is only mental.
Again, consider a man who dreams. He goes to sleep in a room with
doors closed so that nothing can intrude on him while asleep. He
closes his eyes when sleeping so that he does not see any object. Yet
when he dreams he sees a whole region in which people live and move
about with himself among them. Did this panorama get in through the
doors? It was simply unfolded to him by his brain. Is it the sleeper’s
brain or in the brain of the dream individual? It is in the sleeper’s
brain. How does it hold this vast country in its tiny cells? This must
explain the oft-repeated statement that the whole universe is a mere
thought or a series of thoughts.
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