Yoga-Vāsiṣṭha 1.27—The Vanity of the World
Channel: Consciousness Research Centre
Date: 30/08/2017

This series is classified Ajata-vāda | Jñāna-yoga | Turīya | Sahasrāra-cakra

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“O sage! This seemingly pleasing but actually unpleasant world has nothing in it that produces tranquility to the soul. After playful boyhood is over, the mind wastes itself in the society of women like a deer fallen into a pit, then the body bends down under old age, and man has only to grieve. As the body is stricken with the frost of old age, its beauty flies away like the bloom of a fading lotus flower, and then the fountain of man’s worldliness dries up. As the body declines, death rejoices. The body grows lean with grey hairs upon the head, just as a vine fades away with flowers upon it. All living creatures are carried away by the stream of greed that flows forever in this world, eroding its bank and upsetting the tree of contentment growing on it.” — 1.27.1-5

“The human body is like a vessel covered with skin floating on the ocean of the world, tossed about by sensual pleasures, swamped by water pressured by its whale-like passions. The world is a wilderness abounding in vines of greed and trees of sensuality, with hundreds of desires as their branches. Our minds are like monkeys that pass their time wandering about this forest without finding fruit. Those who do not yield to grief during troubles, who are not elated with prosperity or smitten at heart by women, are rare in this world. Those who fight boldly in battlefields and withstand war-elephants are not so very brave, in my opinion, as those who withstand the surges of the mind amidst the streams of carnal appetites. I see no deeds in the world that endure to the final liberation of men. Actions proceeding from a fool’s desire for results serve only for their restlessness on earth.” — 1.27.6-10

“Nobody knows the true cause of this mysterious existence. The revolution of the world is like the floating bubbles of rainwater: they appear lasting only to the ignorant observer. The blooming beauty and graces of youth are destined to be snatched away at the approach of old age. The youthful hopes of men fly away like the blooms of lotus buds in winter. The tree ordained to be useful to mankind by the loads of flowers and fruit that it produces, in the end is also fated to be hewn down by a cruel axe. How then can good men expect to avoid the cruel hand of death? Society with relatives is as dangerous as a poisonous plant. It is pleasant for its domestic affections, which in reality are only delusions of the soul. What is there in the world without fault in it? What is there that does not afflict or grieve us? What is born that is not subject to death? What acts are free from deceit?” — 1.27.27-31

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