these subjects, inasmuch as they are references which pertain to higher experiences
and are completely practical, and are not thoroughly understood by analysis through
the mind.
Such, for example, is the theme of the sutra which we are going to take up now,
which may make some sense to people like us, but has a tremendous sense for a
yogin who is highly advanced. This sutra that follows immediately is one which tells
us that at a certain stage of spiritual experience or attainment in yoga, one can
cognise the nature of the karmas which have given birth to this body. They can be
visualised, and one can do something with them in the appropriate manner by
undergoing experiences of them as quickly as possible. The law of karma is such that
it cannot be expunged or skipped over. Every item of this karma has to be
experienced, and here, there is no question of exemption. Everyone has to pass
through every item or aspect of the karma which has given birth to this particular
body. But when there is an achievement of a sufficiently advanced stage, one can
know how much karma is still remaining. At present, we cannot know it. We are
completely in the dark as to how many years we are going to live in this world. That
ignorance is due to the fact that we cannot know how much karma is still left to be
experienced, or undergone, in this particular physical incarnation.
But a yogin can know how much karma is left. And, for the purpose of the effecting
of a quick salvation, or kaivalya, which is the aim of yoga, he can put an end to these
karmas by experiencing them—or undergoing them. Not, of course, destroying them,
as that cannot be done, but exhausting them through experience. Suppose there is a
group of karmas which may require additional incarnations. For example, certain
types of karmas cannot be undergone through this body. They may require another
type of vehicle altogether. Different sets of karmas, according to their intensity and
peculiar character, demand a particular type of vehicle for expression, just as high
tension wires may be required for strong forces of electricity, and so on. But if the
yogin has a proper cognition of these various aspects of the karmas that have yet to
be undergone before isolation, or kaivalya, is attained, he can exercise a
supernormal power by samyama.
This is something which we cannot understand, as I mentioned already, but one can
easily understand if one reaches that state. The yogin creates artificial bodies, called
nirmana cittas. Independent minds are projected out of the central mind of the
yogin, which prepare for themselves different types of vehicles for the exhaustion of
different kinds of karma. It is, as it were, that he is undergoing various births at one
stroke. Generally there is succession or repetition of the cycle of birth and death,
inasmuch as simultaneous experiences of all karmas is not possible through a single
vehicle. But, if there are very many vehicles, we can carry the entire load in one
stroke.
This creation of artificial vehicles, called nirmana cittas, is done by the yogin by
samyama on the mahatattva. The mahatattva is the reservoir of all cittas, or minds.
All individual minds are emanations of the mahatattva, or the Cosmic Mind. By
drawing sustenance from the Cosmic Mind, one can act in a superhuman manner.
That superhuman method which is adopted by the yogin in such a state is the
peculiar samyama he practises, by which he can split himself into various
personalities and undergo all the karmas simultaneously, so that there is an