Paradox of Liberation

Liberation is believed to be the epitome of achievement of the human form. But the phenomenon of Liberation is riddled with a great paradox. The paradox is that the liberated entity disintegrates dissolves and no longer remains to appreciate the state of liberation. The whole exercise of liberation therefore seems to be an exercise in futility when viewed from the standpoint of the individual endeavoring to seek liberation.

Liberation can never be an acquisition of the individual. Because liberation is not of a person, liberation is from a person. It is often said by sages that the search or efforts to seek liberation will end only when the seeker ends.

All attempts made in this direction only further crystallize the identity and discreteness of the seeker. Desire for liberation is an oxymoron, because liberation is an absence of all desires. Does it mean that all endeavors like meditation, devotion and prayer are superfluous?

Sage Ashtavakra said precisely that, liberation is merely blank a way. It need not involve any form of penance, effort or endeavor. The identity of self is totally a creation of the self and a figment of imagination. The name, the form is merely a projection. Liberation is instantaneously becoming aware of the absence of the subject-object dichotomy.

The meaning of the word Ashtavakra is "distorted at eight places". According to legend when Ashtavakra was still in his mother's womb, his father word recites from Vedic scriptures. But his chanting was defective and every time Ashtavakra discerned an error, he would squirm inside the womb. As a result he was born with eight deformities; hence the name. The story is symbolic. The squirming was perhaps at the futility of the chanting. Sage Ashtavakra was a realized soul and his discourse to King Janaka forms the content of the treatise, Ashtavakra Gita that predates the Bhagavad-Gita.

The name Ashtavakra has a far greater significance. Yoga as elucidated by sage Patanjali is consisted of an eight-fold path. Ashtanga Yoga, comprising yama, or restraint, niyama or self-regulation, dhyaan or meditation, pratyaahara, dharana, Samadhi asana and pranayama. The eightfold path leads to Samadhi or liberation. But Ashtavakra said that all endeavors only fortify the identity of the seeker. He said that liberation is the state where ours only serve to underline the ego and are a detriment to liberation. Ashtavakra therefore seems to underline the distortion created by any path of endeavor by the seeker. The philosophy challenges the basic premise that one has to make any effort to seek liberation-for that matter even ashtanga yoga. This is a radical departure from all established thought.

A specific form is merely the all pervading consciousness cleaving itself into a subject and object. It then goes about believing all that is observed as separate and discrete as its own self. The true nature of the self is beyond all identity and ego. It is plain consciousness. The ego is adulteration of this consciousness by total conviction in this fleeting illusory identity. And then the game of seeking begins, like the dog chasing its own tail. Holding on to the illusion of identity, one goes about seeking. The form can never ever seek the formless consciousness of which it is a manifestation. It can only merge and this merger can happen only when the form realizes the futility of all efforts to become the formless.

In the evolutionary order of the incarnations of Vishnu, we find that Vamana is the first incarnation with a human body. By now the animalistic features are discarded and the human being is born. Vamana is not born outside but in the mind of a rakshasa, the demon king Mahabali, who changed his rakshasa nature and adheres to truthfulness and charity. He rises in stature, prepared to sacrifice everything. At Vamana's request, he not only gave all the three worlds he possessed but also allowed him to place his foot on his own head. Thereby Mahabali made the greatest sacrifice the absolute sacrifice of his own ego.