Vivekavhudamani- Post 49

मा भैष्ट विद्वंस्तव नास्त्यपायः

संसारसिन्धोस्तरणेऽस्त्युपायः ।

येनैव याता यतयोऽस्य पारं

तमेव मार्गं तव निर्दिशामि ॥ ४३ ॥

ma bhaista vidvaṃstava nastyapayaḥ

saṃsara sindhostaraṇe styupayaḥ |

yenaiva yata yatayo'sya paraṃ

tameva margaṃ tava nirdisami || 43 ||

The Guru said , "Fear not , O learned one! There is no danger for you . There is a way to cross over this ocean of change, I shall instruct you in the very path by which the ancient rishis walked to the beyond." 

First the guru says: ma bhaista; this is the most important statement. Do not be anxious. Do not be worried.

Hey  Vidvan; this is also patting the student, by addressing him: Oh Intelligent One; Oh learned one; the student is really informed and he has done everything correctly. And therefore, he addresses Hey Vidvān.

Tava apayaḥ nasti; there is no danger for you. Because you are imagining the future. 

The perfect disciple, having duly reached the Master's feet, expresses his fears that he will never be able to grow out of the disturbing concepts of time and space which provide for him experiences of unending sorrows of finitude. 

Things change in their relationship to both time and place. Objects remaining the same, they, with reference to different conditions of time and place, react upon the same individual differently. 

These pluralistic experiences produce agitations in the mind and that is indicated in verse 40 by the word, 'samsara duhkha'. When the student reached the Master, he despairingly requested him, 'Condescend to save me, O Lord! and describe in full how to put an end to the misery of this relative existence.' 

The Teacher now gives the answer to the student's question. Psychologically, when a questioner is extremely upset because of some fear or agitation in his mind, he is not in a mood to receive any philosophical idea, even when elaborately explained. 

Therefore, a sympathetic Teacher, if he knows what he is about, will first of all, pacify the student and give him hope and spiritual solace. 

Then alone would he become fit to receive the logical conclusions arrived at by a fully rational philosophy. Most fittingly then, the Master with paternal consideration and love, assures the student that what he fears, is only a myth. 

The Master can clearly see the spiritual destiny and the divine perfection which lie in the innermost core of the disciple. Change is only at the level of the mind and intellect. But when the pure Consciousness, eternal and infinite, functions through these equipments, it gathers into itself a delusive vision which interprets a world in terms of change and plurality. 

Therefore, danger or death is not the phenomenon of the Spirit but only the hallucinations of the mind. Therefore, with all confidence, the Teacher assures the student, 'There is no death for you.' 

Guru says yatayaḥ; many committed seekers; asya param yaata; asya means samsarasya; param means the other shore; yatayaḥ means they have reached. So many sincere seekers of the past have reached the shore of samsara very successfully; you can also reach. 

Tameva margam tava nirdisami; that very same path followed by the traditional people tameva margam- I shall teach you.

Now what the teacher is going to teach the disciple  is not the theory born out of the Teacher's own intellect but it is the path followed by the footprints of the ancient seers, who had themselves crossed over from the finite to the Infinite. 

We are assured that what is to follow now in the Teacher's discourse is an exhaustive discussion upon this sacred path of Self-realization, the authenticity of which has been proclaimed by an endless array of brilliant Rishis of yore.

Love