शिवज्ञानबोध (मेय्कण्डार - शैव सिद्धान्त का आधारभूत दार्शनिक सूत्र ग्रन्थ)

66 SIVAGNANA BOTHAM.
easily shown. For the production of this illusory knowledge
we must have previously possessed a knowledge of two realities
both the shell and silver, and the snake and the rope and an
imperfectly intelligent being, who by either defective vision or
distance or fear &c. mistakes one thing for the other. The silver
and snake, in themselves realities, are not in the shell and rope
respectively but in a defective mind. In the genesis of the Asat,
what supplies the places of silver, shell and defective mind must
be shown. So far as the illusory knowledge of silver is con-
cerned we have traced it to a defective mind. If myself and
my human consciousness, objective and subjective is an illu-
sion, who is the subject of this illusion. Inevitably, God.
Such a God is itself illusory and He could not be self luminous
and Intelligent. The analogy gives us no sense whatever and
though the objection as stated here has often and often been press-
ed, yet we find no book meeting it and we find the analogy
repeated often enough and even by intelligent men, parrot-like.
The nature of Asat is further explained in the illustration, and
the similes given are in themselves real experiences while they
last, and the point of comparison is simply their evanescent and
temporary character.
2. The second Varthika gives one of the many dilemmas
fopnd in this work. If God is knowable by us, it will be easy
enough to know Him and we do not require a superior Light to
guide us to Him. If He is not knowable, then however we might
try, we cannot discover Him, and the worship of God will be all vain
trouble. The meaning being that it is not possible to know with
what is called Pasa and Pasu Guanam i.e., by the human powers
and by the soul itself. The Divine Light (Pathi Gnanam) must
penetrate our soul and then we can discover Him dwelling in our-
selves; and merging our personalities in Him, we become indis-
tinguishable from Him and we cau as it were, call ourselves even
God, in name. At no-time, can we therefore see God face to face