Is the state of faith at the level of chidanti sarva samshya same as that at Nistha stage?
From Advaita Murti Pr
Transcript
This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
A question from Advaita Murthy Prabhu. Is the state of faith at the level of chidyanati sarva samshaya at nishtha stage? Answer.
Yes, in the sense that both are very advanced stages of faith. At the same time, when we have different great Vaishnava authors giving different frameworks of analysis, correlating across them has to be done carefully. Now, if we see this Bhagavatam series of verses, Vidyate hridayo grante chidyanate sarva samshaya, kshiyante chaasya karmani, drishta eva atma nishvare.
So, this is actually describing a stage where, soon after that, when the attachments are cut off and the doubts are removed, kshiyante chaasya karmani, all intuitive activities stop, and drishta eva atma nishvare. At that time, one gets spiritual vision. Now, what is that vision? One sees the Supreme Lord.
One sees the soul as the controller of the body. One sees the soul as connected to the super soul. Basically, one gets spiritual perception.
Now, at the stage of nishtha, does one get spiritual perception? That classification is primarily based on, not atma jnan, it is based on development of love. So, certainly, when one has gone beyond anartha nirutti, spiritual perception will start. However, the perception of Krishna doesn’t start at the nishtha stage directly.
Nakanishad goes to ruchi, asakti, bhava and prema. So, from the ruchi, asakti stages, the glimpses of Krishna, temporary perceptions of Krishna, begin, and then at bhava and prema, they become stabilized, and they become a constant reality eventually. So, if we consider drishta eva atma nishvare, to be seeing the Lord, and we consider that at that particular point, all doubts have been removed, and all attachments have ceased, all freedom activities have stopped, does that happen at the stage of nishtha? All major anarthas go away, but we also know that there are some anarthas that remain.
Some, especially those created by offenses, still remain. So, the categorical word, sarva-samshaya, chittyante sarva-samshaya, which is used in this particular bhakti-bhagavatam verse, in the second chapter of the first scantro, it indicates a very advanced stage. So, if we see sarva-samshaya as a reference to all, all doubts, then it would be advanced to just somewhere in ruchi, bhava, sakti, prema, not just nishtha.
But if we take it in a generic sense, that soon after that spiritual perception comes up, then definitely, nishtha is also spiritual perception in terms of atma-gyan, is definitely there, and that is also there in the bhagavatam verse. So, both are very advanced levels of faith, that which is for sure. Exact correlation will depend on how the terms are seen in their respective contexts and how they are correlated.
Thank you.