M vedanta/aparokshanubhuti/aparokshanubhuti.tex → vedanta/aparokshanubhuti/aparokshanubhuti.tex

@@ -1408,4 +1408,57 @@ and the object, the knower and the known, not even the thought of the Self and
 the not-Self, is possible, as all thought implies duality whereas the Âtman is
 non-dual.}
 
+\begin{oframed}
+
+    \texthindi{निराभासः} is an important and meaning-packed word.  The mind has a
+    special quality where it can reflect consciousness. Whatever whe think of
+    in the mind or whatever appears in the mind is illumined by the reflected
+    consciousness. The analogy here is - the Pure Consciousness is like the sun
+    and the mind is like a polished mirror and we can direct the sunlight using
+    the mirror whereever we like. That's the quality of the mind. It can
+    redirect the light of the consciousness wherever it likes. The
+    consciousness we all experience, the feeling of being aware is the
+    reflected consiousness.
+
+    Whatever we hear, see, taste, etc creates waves in our minds called
+    \texthindi{वृित्ति}
+    . To know something we need the reflected consiousness and
+    \texthindi{वृित्ति}
+    . With the absence of either, we cannot have knowledge about anything. When we
+    see a table, the image of a table is created in our minds, that is
+    \texthindi{वृित्ति}
+    and we come to know about the table because of our reflected consciousness
+    - now we have the knowledge of the table.
+    Arrising of the
+    \texthindi{वृित्ति}
+    is called
+    \texthindi{विृत्तिव्याप्ति}
+    . Illumination of the
+    \texthindi{वृित्ति}
+    by the reflected consciousness is called
+    \texthindi{फलव्याप्ति}
+    . Continuing with our analog of the mirror and the sun - we know that to
+    know something we focus the beam of sunlight onto the object we would like
+    to know about. Now what if we want to know the sun? Do we point the
+    reflected beam onto the sun? That sounds so foolish. That's the problem
+    with knowing Brahman as well. Brahman is the source of consciousness, tiny
+    bit of which we reflect onto this world with our little minds.
+    So what do we do to know 'the sun'? -  we just look at it. Just like a
+    little reflected beam pointed back at the sun in order to see the sun
+    doesn't make any sense, in the same way our minds do not require focus
+    upon Brahman in order to know Brahman. This just means that to know
+    Brahman is no ordinary Knowledge. To sum up - we do need
+    \texthindi{वृित्ति}
+    but not
+    \texthindi{फलव्याप्ति}
+    to know Brahman. The mind has to think about god but we do not require that
+    reflected consciousness. This is what is meant by
+    \texthindi{निराभासः}
+    - without reflection.
+    To have the
+    \texthindi{वृित्ति}
+    of Brahman we need to focus on it - look within, using spiritual practices.
+
+\end{oframed}
+
 \end{document}