Vivekachudamani
by Shankara | 1921 | 49,785 words | ISBN-13: 9788175051065
The Vivekachudamani is a collection of poetical couplets authored by Shankara around the eighth century. The philosophical school this compilation attempts to expose is called ‘Advaita Vedanta’, or non-dualism, one of the classical orthodox philosophies of Hinduism. The book teaches Viveka: discrimination between the real and the unreal. Shankara d...
Verse 542
क्वचिन्मूढो विद्वान् क्वचिदपि महाराजविभवः
क्वचिद्भ्रान्तः सौम्यः क्वचिदजगराचारकलितः ।
क्वचित्पात्रीभूतः क्वचिदवमतः क्वाप्यविदितः
चरत्येवं प्राज्ञः सततपरमानन्दसुखितः ॥ ५४२ ॥kvacinmūḍho vidvān kvacidapi mahārājavibhavaḥ
kvacidbhrāntaḥ saumyaḥ kvacidajagarācārakalitaḥ |
kvacitpātrībhūtaḥ kvacidavamataḥ kvāpyaviditaḥ
caratyevaṃ prājñaḥ satataparamānandasukhitaḥ || 542 ||542. Sometimes a fool, sometimes a sage, sometimes possessed of regal splendour; sometimes wandering, sometimes behaving like a motionless python, sometimes wearing a benignant expression; sometimes honoured, sometimes insulted, sometimes unknown – thus lives the man of realisation, ever happy with Supreme Bliss.
Notes:
[These are some of the impressions which the phases of a saint’s life produce upon the outside world. People judge him diversely, but he is supremely indifferent to what others think of or do towards him.
Python—which seldom moves but waits for the food to come to it.]