Vivekachudamani

What is bondage?

   The firm belief that one is the body, senses, etc., (the not-self) is bondage. It is due to nescience, i.e. ignorance of one�s real nature. It is the cause of repeated births and deaths and all sorrows. Because of it a person looks upon the unreal body as real and identifies himself with it. He nourishes the body and protects it by indulging in sense pleasures. Just as a silkworm builds a cocoon of silk threads around itself and becomes imprisoned in it, man becomes bound to his body.

( Note. When a person says 'I am stout', 'I am lean', etc, he is really referring to his body as identical with himself. When he says 'I see', 'I hear', 'I taste' and so on, he is identifying himself with his organs of seeing, hearing and tasting. When he says 'I am intelligent' or 'I am dull' he identifies himself with his intellect. All these identifications are totally wrong. The Self is ever pure, untouched by the joys or sorrows of the body and mind).

The not-self is mistaken for the self by everyone because of lack of discrimination between the two, resulting from ignorance. In sloka 140 this is compared to a person mistaking a snake for a rope and taking it in his hand. The usual example of a rope being mistaken for a snake is reversed here to show how disastrous such a mistake is. A man who mistakes a snake for a rope and takes it in his hand is almost certain to be bitten by the snake and lose his life. Mistaking the body, mind, etc., for the self is pointed out to be equally dangerous because one cannot progress spiritually as long as one does not get rid of this wrong notion. Taking the not-self to be the self, i.e. identifying oneself with the body-mind complex is bondage. The concealing power of avidya conceals the atman, like Rahu concealing the sun. Because of this, people are deluded and consider themselves to be nothing other than the body, etc. This gives rise to desire, which is the cause of all misery. The man who is in the grip of the crocodile of delusion is not able to realize the real nature of the self. He drifts in the ocean of samsaara.

An example is given here. Clouds arise when the heat of the sun makes the  water of the ocean evaporate. Thus the sun is the ultimate source of the clouds. The clouds conceal the very same sun from our view. At the same time, we are able to see the clouds only because of the sun behind them. Similarly, Brahman is the source of the world, and the very same world conceals Brahman from us. We are able to experience the world through our sense organs only because of the light of consciousness which is itself Brahman. Just as a wayfarer suffers when the sky is overcast and it is very cold, the man whose self is hidden from him suffers misery.       

   The tree of samsaara is now described. Avidya is the seed of this tree. The shoot is the wrong notion that the body is the self. Desire is the tender sprout. Karma is the water. The body is the trunk. The praanas are the wind. The contacts of the senses with the objects are the tendrils. The sense-objects are the flowers. Suffering is the fruit arising from different karmas. The experiencer is the bird on the tree which eats the fruit.

   The cause of bondage is ignorance of one�s real nature. This ignorance is natural to every one and is without beginning. It continues until it is destroyed by self-knowledge. It is the cause of all suffering in the form of birth, disease, old age, death, etc. This ignorance cannot be destroyed by any missiles, nor by the wind, nor by fire, nor even by the performance of innumerable rituals laid down in the scriptures. It can be destroyed only by the sharp and beautiful sword of discrimination which arises by the grace of the supreme Being. 

   But it should not be thought that the rituals laid down in the scriptures are futile. The performance of these rituals with full faith is essential for attaining purity of mind which is the prerequisite for the dawn of knowledge.

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