Chapter-6: The Self Supreme
Introduction
The entire song of Aṣṭāvakra is conceived in the form of a dialogue between himself and his royal disciple, Janaka. We, as students, aspiring to comprehend the vision of Vedānta of the non-dual Self, are staggered at the vision Aṣṭāvakra points out. We get dumbfounded at the giddy heights to which the uncompromising pure vision of Janaka lifts us.
In Chapter-4 Janaka asserts that the Lord of the Universe can do as he pleases. In the next, Chapter-5, Ashtavakra does not disagree, but in terse four verses points to the next step Laya (Dissolution). In this next Chapter-6, Janaka says “I know that already,” matching him in style and number of verses.
In the previous chapter, Saint Aṣṭāvakra had prescribed the path of laya-yoga, but here his disciple, the royal seer, Janaka complains that in his vision of the Supreme Self, he finds nothing to dissolve! What can there be in the one non-dual Self other than Itself for us to dissolve? It is beyond everything – ‘Beyond the beyond’ (prakṛteḥ paraḥ; parāt-paraḥ). Even the very effort at laya-yoga declares the existence of ‘ignorance’.
The Self in this absolute sense is the theme of discussion in this chapter. The Self is indicated here as the cosmic space and the universe a pot in it; once the Self is realised, the universe cannot ever condition the Infinite Self.
In Aṣṭāvakra Gītā the transcendence and the immanence of the Self are equally emphasised; this is the grand style of the Gītā philosophy: ‘All in the one Self, and the one Self in all’. In such a state no ‘laya’ can be practised. To pursue laya-yoga a residual amount of ignorance is necessary to maintain in the seeker the witnessing ego, to strive for the dissolution of itself in the Supreme Self.
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