4.22 · The Hiding Place

Awareness does not pass into anything; yet when it takes on that form, it knows its own mind.

Word by word

citeḥ

of awareness

apratisaṃkramāyāḥ

which does not move or pass over

tat-ākāra-āpattau

when it takes on that form

sva-buddhi-saṃvedanam

knowing of its own mind

Where it fits

Vyāsa's lead-in is one word: 'How?' How does an unmoving awareness (4.18–4.21) know the mind? It never passes into anything, yet when the form is taken on, it knows its own mind. This returns to 1.4. Commentators differ on whether awareness seems to take the mind's form, or the mind takes awareness's.

Reading

The third step (4.22–4.24) explains how the seer comes to know the mind. Awareness never moves or mixes with anything, yet when it takes on the mind's form, it knows its own mind. Commentators read 'that form' two ways: the passage Vyāsa quotes (usually assigned to Pañcaśikha) has awareness seem to take the mind's form, while Vācaspati has the mind take awareness's form. Vyāsa then quotes a verse: the eternal lies hidden in no underworld or ocean depth, but in the working of the mind, when it is not told apart from the self.

Vyāsa

“The cave where the eternal Brahman lies hidden is not the underworld, nor a cleft in the mountains, nor darkness, nor the depths of the oceans. The sages declare it to be the movement of the intellect, when it is not told apart [from awareness].”

Vyāsa's Yoga-bhāṣya, the oldest commentary. New translation from the Sanskrit, with reference to Woods (1914), p. 333.

Practice

Fill a bowl with water and set it where light falls on it. Watch the reflection move whenever the water moves, while the light itself stays still. Then sit for three minutes and watch your thoughts the same way.

A question to sit with

Where is stillness hiding in your busy mind?

Where commentators disagree

When awareness 'takes on that form', which takes the form of which: awareness of the mind, or the mind of awareness?

Vyāsa, quoting an older teacher

In a passage Woods assigns to Pañcaśikha, the experiencer's power, unchanging and unmixed, seems to pass into the changing mind and takes on the form of its movements, so that it is called a movement of the mind. (Woods 1914, pp. 332–333, n. 4)

Vācaspati Miśra

Reads it the other way: the mind, as a surface that receives awareness's reflection, takes on a likeness of awareness. As clear water makes the still moon seem to quiver, the mind makes awareness seem active and attached. (Woods 1914, p. 333)

Bhoja

Also speaks of reflection: when the understanding, near awareness, takes on its nature, the power of awareness reflected in the mind's movement becomes indistinguishable from it, and the mind then knows itself. (Tatya 1885, p. 160)

Surendranath Dasgupta

Notes that neither the sūtras nor Vyāsa's bhāṣya offer physical illustrations of this reflection as Sāṃkhya did, and holds that the reflection is 'transcendent' and cannot be explained by any physical picture. (Dasgupta 1924, pp. 18, 23)

Key ideas

puruṣa (the seer, the self), citta (the mind-field), vṛtti (movement of the mind)