sristhi—God’s creation. God creates the world, and the world that is created by God,
or Ishvara, is the real nature of the world. But the way in which it is presented to the
minds is a little different. That manner in which the object of the world, Ishvara
sristhi, is presented to the minds of individuals is called jiva sristhi, or the
individual’s creation. It is not that we perceive the world in the same way as God
perceives things. I perceive a table, and God also perceives it. But there is a difference
in the conception and the perception on account of the position of the perceiver. The
Supreme Perceiver, who is God, is cosmical and, therefore, his reaction to things is
quite different from the individualistic reactions of persons like us, who are placed
outside the realm of the objects.
The existence of an object is to be distinguished from the value that is attached to it.
What is called Ishvara sristhi is the existence of the object, and the value that is
recognised is the jiva sristhi. Gold—a lump of gold, for instance—is Ishvara sristhi,
we may say. It exists by itself. But that it has a value—the value that we attach to gold,
the meaning that is seen or significance that is there—is a manufacture, or product,
of the individual’s mind. Every other relationship is of that nature. A human being, as
he or she is there independently, may be said to be Ishvara sristhi. But the way in
which there is reaction among individuals, and the relationship that is there as an
outcome of this individual reaction, is jiva sristhi.
Thus, there is a confused perception of an object when the mind starts operating in
respect of an object. Neither is it a perception in a vacuum based on nothing, so that
we can say the mind is simply imagining something there, nor is it true that the
object is as it is perceived. We are in a very difficult situation. We do not know what
we are seeing. We are seeing something, and by the perception thereof we recognise,
or anticipate, or infer the existence of something behind this perception. Yoga, in
samyama, wants to break through this complex which is there between the
perceiving subject and the object as it is. This complex, when it is broken, results in
identity. That identity is the object of the practice of samyama.
Now we come back to the sutra of Patanjali where he makes out that the object is not
created by the mind. It has a status of its own, and what status it has, we have already
tried to see. Again he repeats, in the subsequent sutra, that the impression made by
the object upon the mind is the cause of the mental cognition of the object. And,
inasmuch as the mind is not able to function independent of the vrittis or its
psychoses, it cannot have a uniform perception of objects. The perception is always
variegated. The mind is a subject of perception from the point of view of all
individuals, but it is also an object from the point of view of a higher level of vision.
Sadā jñātaḥ cittavṛttayaḥ tatprabhoḥ puruṣasya apariṇāmitvāt (IV.18). The purusha, who
is supreme and absolute, is the knower of even the vrittis of the mind; therefore, the
purusha is all-knowing, while the minds of the individuals are not all-knowing. The
minds are limited to the particular vrittis which they are undergoing at different
times and, therefore, they have only conditioned knowledge of things limited to the
capacity of their own vrittis. But the purusha has omniscience because the purusha
is unconditioned. The purusha’s knowledge is not a knowledge through the vrittis or
psychoses of the mind. There is no mind in the purusha. The difference between the
individual jiva, or the ordinary mind that cognises things, and the purusha who is
aware of all things is that while the purusha is a transcendent being, independent of
mental operation, the minds require the help of the purusha in being aware of