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So this 18th sutra of the Samadhipada of the Yoga Darshana, Maharshi Patanjali explains the depths of asamprajñāta samādhi. After describing what was, what is the samprajñāta, this is the next sutra. It says that
वि॒रा॒मप्रत्यया॒भ्या॒सपू॒र्वः सं॒स्कारशे॒षोऽ॒न्यः ॥ १.१८॥
Virāma-pratyayābhyāsa-pūrvaḥ saṁskāra-śeṣo'nyaḥ ॥ 1.18 ॥
virāma – pratyaya – abhyāsa – pūrvaḥ – saṁskāra – śeṣaḥ – anyaḥ ||
These are the three words which have their own adjectives and the meanings which will give a clear indication of the experience of asamprajñāta samādhi. Though the name asamprajñāta is not mentioned, but it is suggestive and confirmed by the last word anyaḥ, not the asamprajñāta, that is asamprajñāta.
The word meanings go like this, the virāma. virāma is break, an interval, cessation, stop. Virāma, cessation, a break, an interval, a stop. Pratyaya, as we already knew that pratyaya means an experience or an object. Experience of an object or just an object or just an experience, that is pratyaya. Abhyāsa is a repeated practice. Pūrvaḥ is preceded or accompanied by, preceded or accompanied by. Saṁskāra is a very common well-known word. saṁskāra is impression, effect, tendencies. Śeṣa is residue, remnant. Anyaḥ is the other. So virāma – pratyaya – abhyāsa – pūrvaḥ – saṁskāra – śeṣaḥ.
So there is a virāma in pratyaya. The description of this particular state, as I repeat, though it is not named asamprajñāta, is the stage after asmitā. Because it is anya, the other. After the samprajñāta, still further, still deeper. So this stage after asmitā, really speaking, with all practical implications, we cannot describe it. It is indescribable because there is no asmitā. Though it is indescribable, it has to be pointed, it has to be described, it has to be known. So that the people will be aware that there is a stage like this. There is a thing which exists like this. And that stage, a level, a space which exists like this, which cannot be described. That is asamprajñāta. And virāma pratyaya is actually a nirodha. Because pratyaya is not there. And along with that, vṛtti also is not there. So virāma pratyaya is actually a nirodha. virāma is a break, an interval in pratyaya. pratyaya is an object. When the mind is deeply focused, highly concentrated, deeply involved in the meditation of any object, and all the contents and the constituents and all the guṇas connected to that particular object, as it goes deeper and deeper, and unfoldments keep coming, and as unfoldments keep happening, at one particular stage to the further stage, still further stage, still further stage, though it is continuous, it drops one pratyaya and experience gets into the second and another pratyaya. One pratyaya is dropped, left over, leaves over, and before taking over, entering into the other pratyaya, that gap is the virāma.
For all practical knowledge, we can just hint ourselves that it is the gap between two thoughts. Though thoughts are continuous, the flow of the mind is continuous, it seems, but between the continuity, between the two, at any level, at any stage, at any particular space or the time, between two thoughts, there must be a gap, and there is a gap. That is the virāma pratyaya, virāma of the pratyaya it is. And that difference between virāma pratyaya and vṛtti nirodha, there are two things. Vṛtti nirodha and virāma pratyaya. There is a slight difference, very slight difference. And the difference is, in virāma pratyaya, the gap is there between two pratyayas, and in vṛtti nirodha, the vṛttis have been stopped. So in a way to understand, just for hinting, to understand, it is a partly nirodha, partial nirodha, before it catches the other pratyaya. Similarly, to understand the word anya, remnant, remnant of what? Śeṣa saṁskāra anya - so that remnant, residue, it can be taken as residue, it can be taken as remnant, but saṁskāra śeṣa it is. The leftover saṁskāras, residue of the saṁskāras, residue of the tendencies and the impressions, all saṁskāras have been removed, completely removed, but some last bit is there. It is something like when you clean our rooms, we clean, but at the end, some very small little bit will be left over. That is the saṁskāra śeṣa. The last bit. saṁskāras have gone, but they are in the form of a seed form, bīja rūpa.
That is why many of the śāstras and in the sādhakas it is said that the seeds which are burnt, the seeds which are fried, they will not germinate, really. The saṁskāras are in the seed form. Last, the remnant is left over.
A very beautiful example is given in the commentaries of Ādi Śaṅkara that when you burn a stick or a rope or any object, it is burnt, but the ash will be in that shape. Means if a stick is burnt, the stick is gone, stickness is gone, but the ash will be in that same form. saṁskāra śeṣa is something like that. Saṁskāras are in seed form, unexpressed form. All vṛttis have gone. All functional modifications have gone, but still it is in a seed form, it is not vṛtti.
Vṛtti means when it becomes functional, active, modified, but it is in the seed form. A tree rises from a seed and that is the saṁskāra śeṣa. So, saṁskāra śeṣa is the absence of mental modifications and its practice consists in repetition, abhyāsa, over and over again. And based on that abhyāsa, a continuous, regular abhyāsa, regular practice proceeds this saṁskāra śeṣa. So to have saṁskāra śeṣa, or for the removal of all the saṁskāras, just a little bit is available for that state to come, unexpressed state of the saṁskāras, there is abhyāsa pūrva. abhyāsa is very much necessary for that. And that is why very important dimension is told here. And that śeṣa is out of the dropping of the pratyaya, of the previous practice. And traditionally, the technical words are used here, it is virāma pratyaya, or a virāma before a pratyaya comes.
So basically, virāma pratyaya means cessation of pratyaya itself. There is no pratyaya there. There is no object, there is no experience, there is no experience of the object.And there is no object to be experienced. And that is the state of virāma, and that is technically named as virāma pratyaya.
Similarly, abhyāsa pūrva means preceded by practice. Practice of what? Practice of holding the mind in the sealed form. And this phrase therefore, serves to emphasize the fact that asamprajñāta samādhi can be practiced only after the prolonged practice of samprajñāta samādhi. Abhyāsa pūrva, a long practice of samprajñāta samādhi, that last pratyaya is given up. And there is no change in this condition of the mind, except disappearance of pratyaya. That's why the difference between samprajñāta and the asamprajñāta is the difference of existence of pratyaya. In samprajñāta there is pratyaya, the experience or the object. But in asamprajñāta there is no experience, there is no object. But if there is no experience, how do we know that there was an experience? That is the beauty of asamprajñāta samādhi. The bow and the arrow type, every successive asamprajñāta samādhi is a precursor for the nirbīja samādhi, which alone gives an abstracted vision of the reality.
That we must be very clear in understanding. Swami Vivekananda beautifully describes again this asamprajñāta samādhi in his own very eloquent way. Swami ji, I quote Swami ji, there is another samādhi, which is attained by the constant practice of cessation of all mental activity, in which the citta retains only the unmanifested expressions.
In asamprajñāta samādhi, where the mind has succeeded only in quelling the waves in the citta and holding them down, they are still there in the form of tendencies, saṁskāras, and these tendencies will become waves again when the time comes. But when you have destroyed all these tendencies, almost destroyed the mind, then it has become seedless, nirbīja. There are no more seeds in the mind out of which to manufacture again and again this plant of life, this ceaseless round of birth and death.
How beautifully Vivekananda says that to be out of this cycle of birth and death is possible. It is in our hand. It is in our own hand in this life alone. This life alone at this moment alone and we have the tools to handle, tools to achieve. This is one of the most important suggestion, dimension, contribution of the Yoga Darshana that the beauty of life, the worth of life, the value of life is in our hands. It is we who are the moulders. It is we who are the sculptors of our life. It moulds as we wish.
So the ultimate, the total citta vṛtti nirodhaḥ is in our hand. When all the mental processes have stopped and only saṁskāras remain, means saṁskāras are not in the active state. The samādhi of the mind thus inhibited is the asamprajñāta. The means to it is the higher detachment.
And let us remember, no meditation of an object be a means there. So the meditations which we make on the idea of stopping are absent there. But there is a state like that can be affirmed only by experience and because we are experiencing it.
So we are able to understand it. We are able to feel it. And we are able to have it. Though it is a void of an object. But the practice of this finally leads to that particular state where there are absence of the objects. And that is the asamprajñāta samādhi.
We need not be afraid and feel that it is not possible. It is something very beyond, unable. No, it is not that. We are experiencing that. Many times we pass through it. Many times we feel, we feel that joy, that experience of absolute object and experienceless state. That is asamprajñāta samādhi. And then further into it, Patanjali explains various other dimensions of the further processes involved in that which we shall see in our continuity of understanding Yoga Sutras.
Om Śāntiḥ Śāntiḥ Śāntiḥ. - ॐ शान्तिः शान्तिः शान्तिः||
To Be Continued..
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These are transcription of session delivered by Vice-President of Vivekananda Rock Memorial & Vivekananda Kendra, Sri M. Hanumantha Rao Ji.
Audio Link - https://youtu.be/R0olYNKj8kY?si=6Z3Vni_fqh6ZwDJjRead n Get Articles, Magazines, Books @ http://prakashan.vivekanandakendra.org
मुक्तसंग्ङोऽनहंवादी धृत्युत्साहसमन्वित:।
सिद्धयसिद्धयोर्निर्विकार: कर्ता सात्त्विक उच्यते ॥१८.२६॥
Freed from attachment, non-egoistic, endowed with courage and enthusiasm and unperturbed by success or failure, the worker is known as a pure (Sattvika) one. Four outstanding and essential qualities of a worker. - Bhagwad Gita : XVIII-26
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