Microsoft Word - Taimni - The Science of Yoga.doc

have come face to face with Reality and know this secret, the only method by which
this mystery can be unravelled is to know the Truth which underlies manifestation and
which by its very nature is incommunicable.
As a result of the illusion in which consciousness gets involved it begins to
identify itself with the matter with which it becomes associated. This identification
becomes increasingly fuller as consciousness descends further into matter until the
turning point is reached and the upward climb in the opposite direction begins. The
reverse process of evolution in which consciousness gradually extricates itself, as it
were, from matter results in an increasing realization of its Real nature and ends in
complete Self-realization in Kaivalya. It is this fundamental privation of knowledge of
its Real nature, which begins with the evolutionary cycle, is brought about by the
power of Maya, and ends with the attainment of Liberation in Kaivalya, which is
called Avidya. Avidya has nothing to do with the knowledge which we acquire through
the intellect and which refers to the things concerning the phenomenal worlds. A man
may be a great scholar, a walking encyclopaedia as we say, and yet may be so com-
pletely immersed in the illusions created by the mind that he may stand much below a
simple-minded Sadhaka who is partially aware of the great illusions of the intellect
and the life in these phenomenal worlds. The Avidya of the latter is much less than that
of the former in spite of the tremendous difference in knowledge pertaining to the in-
tellect. This absence of awareness of our true nature results in the inability to distin-
guish between the eternal, pure, blissful Self and the non-eternal, impure and painful
not-Self.
The word ‘eternal’ here means as usual the state of consciousness which is
above the limitation of time as we know it as a succession of phenomena. ‘Pure’ refers
to the purity of consciousness as it exists unaffected and unmodified by matter which
imposes upon it the limitation of the three Gunas and consequent illusions. ‘Blissful’,
of course, refers to the Ananda or bliss of the Atma which is inherent in it and which is
independent of any external source or circumstance. The privation of this Sukha or
blissi which is inevitable when consciousness is identified with matter, is Duhkha or
misery. All these three attributes, which have been mentioned in the distinction be-
tween the Self and the not-Self, are merely illustrative and not exhaustive because it is
impossible to define the nature of the Self and to distinguish it from the not-Self in
terms of the limited conceptions of the intellect. The central idea to be grasped is that
the Atma in its purity is fully conscious of its Real nature. Progressive involution in