Adi Sankaracharya’s VIVEKACHUDAMANI Translated by Swami MadhavanandaPublished by Advaita Ashram, Kolkatta 1. I bow to Govinda, whose nature is Bliss Supreme, who is the Sadguru, who can be known only from the import of all Vedanta, and who is beyond the reach of speech and mind. 2. For all beings a human birth is difficult…

51. A father has got his sons and others to free him from his debts, but he has got none but himself to remove his bondage. 52. Trouble such as that caused by a load on the head can be removed by others, but none but one’s own self can put a stop to the…

101. Blindness, weakness and sharpness are conditions of the eye, due merely to its fitness or defectiveness; so are deafness,dumbness, etc., of the ear and so forth– but never of the Atman, the Knower. 102. Inhalation and exhalation, yawning, sneezing, secretion, leaving this body, etc., are called by experts functions of Prana and the rest,…

150. On the removal of that sedge the perfectly pure water that allays the pangs of thirst and gives immediate joy, appears unobstructed before the man. 151. When all the five sheaths have been eliminated, the Self of man appears– pure, ofthe essence of everlasting and unalloyed bliss, indwelling, supreme and self-effulgent. 152. To remove…

200-201. Previous non-existence, even though beginningless, is observed to have an end. So the Jivahood which is imagined to be in the Atman through its relation with superimposed attributes such as the Buddhi, is not real; whereas the other (the Atman) is essentially different from it. The relation between the Atman and the Buddhi is…

251. All modifications of clay, such as the jar, which are always accepted by the mind as real, are (in reality) nothing but clay. Similarly, this entire universe which is produced from the real Brahman, is Brahman Itself and nothing but That. Because there is nothing else whatever but Brahman, and That is the only…

301. That which has been created by the Buddhi extremely deluded by Nescience, and which is perceived in this body as “I am such and such”– when that egoism is totally destroyed, one attains an unobstructed identity with Brahman. 302. The treasure of the Bliss of Brahman is coiled round by the mighty and dreadful…

351. The Supreme Self is ever of the nature of eternal, indivisible knowledge, one without a second, the Witness of the Buddhi and the rest, distinct from the gross and subtle, the implied meaning of the term and idea “I”, the embodiment of inward, eternal bliss. 352. The wise man, discriminating thus the real and…

401. In the One Entity which is changeless, formless and Absolute, and which is perfectly all-pervading and motionless like the ocean after the dissolution of the universe, whence can there be any diversity? 402. Where the root of delusion is dissolved like darkness in light– in the supreme Reality, the One without a second, the…

451. The work which has fashioned this body prior to the dawning of knowledge, is not destroyed by that knowledge without yielding its fruits, like the arrow shot at an object. 452. The arrow which is shot at an object with the idea that it is a tiger, does not, when that object is perceived…