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Yoga as
Philosophy and Religion
The Yoga which, after weakening
the hold of the afflictions and causing the real truth to dawn upon
our mental vision, gradually leads us towards the attainment of
our final goal, is only possible for the last two kinds of minds
and is of two kinds:
(1) samprajnata (cognitive) and
(2) asamprajnata (ultra-cognitive).
The samprajnata Yoga is that in
which the mind is concentrated upon some object, external or internal,
in such a way that it does not oscillate or move from one object
to another, but remains fixed and settled in the object that it
holds before itself. At first, the Yogin holds a gross material
object before his view, but when he can make himself steady in doing
this, he tries with the subtle tanmatras, the five causes of the
grosser elements, and when he is successful in this he takes his
internal senses as his object and last of all, when he has fully
succeeded in these attempts, he takes the great egohood as his object,
in which stage his object gradually loses all its determinate character
and he is said to be in a state of suppression in himself, although
devoid of any object. This state, like the other previous states
of the samprajnata type, is a positive state of the mind and not
a mere state of vacuity of objects or negativity. In this state,
all determinate character of the states disappears and their potencies
only remain alive. In the first stages of a Yogin practicing samadhi
conscious states of the lower stages often intervene, but gradually,
as the mind becomes fixed, the potencies of the lower stages are
overcome by the potencies of this stage, so that the mind flows
in a calm current and at last the higher prajna dawns, whereupon
the potencies of this state also are burnt and extinguished, the
citta returns back to its own primal cause, prakrti, and purusha
attains absolute freedom.
The first four stages of the samprajnata
state are called madhumati, madhupratika, vishoka and the samskarashesha
and also vitarkanugata, vicharanugata, anandanugata and asmitanugata.
True knowledge begins to dawn from the first stage of this samprajnata
state, and when the Yogin reaches the last stage the knowledge reaches
its culminating point, but still so long as the potencies of the
lower stages of relative knowledge remain, the knowledge cannot
obtain absolute certainty and permanency, as it will always be threatened
with a possible encroachment by the other states, of the past phenomenal
activity now existing as the subconscious. But the last stage of
asamprajnata samadhi represents the stage in which the ordinary
consciousness has been altogether surpassed and the mind is in its
own true infinite aspect, and the potencies of the stages in which
the mind was full of finite knowledge are also burnt, so that with
the return of the citta to its primal cause, final emancipation
is effected. The last state of samprajnata samadhi is called samskarashesha,
only because here the residua of the potencies of subconscious thought
only remain and the actual states of consciousness become all extinct.
It is now easy to see that no mind which is not in the ekagra or
one-pointed state can be fit for the asamprajnata samadhi in which
it has to settle itself on one object and that alone. So also no
mind which has not risen to the state of highest suppression is
fit for the asamprajnata or nirvija state.
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