D.: When all the thoughts are banished and the mind is still or enters into a state of nothingness or emptiness, what is the nature of effort needed on the part of the “seeker” to have a pratyakshabhāva of the “sought” (e.g., seeing a mango as a mango)?
M.: Who sees nothingness or emptiness? What is ? Do you call perception of mango pratyaksha? It involves the play of karana, , and kārya (action, doer and deed). So it is relative and not absolute. Because you see a thing now you say there is nothing afterwards. Both are functions of the mind. What lies behind both these assertions is pratyaksha. There is indriya pratyaksha (directly perceived by senses), mānasa pratyaksha (directly perceived by the mind) and sākshāt pratyaksha (realised as the very Being). The last alone is true. The others are relative and untrue.
D.: If no effort is needed, can the perpetuated state of emptiness of mind be called the state of realisation?
M.: Effort is needed so long as there is mind. The state of emptiness has been the bone of contention in all philosophies.
D.: Is there anything like pratyakshabhāva in the state of realisation or is realisation merely felt or experienced as the very Being or Sthiti of the soul.
M.: is very Being and it is not feeling, etc.
D.: Until the seeker realizes that he is the sought the above questions arise for him (the former).
M.: True. See if you are the seeker. The Self is often mistaken for the knower. Is there not the Self in deep sleep, i.e., nescience? Therefore the Self is beyond knower and knowledge. These doubts are in the realm of mind. To speak from this point of view, the advice is to keep the mind clear, and when and are wiped off, then the mind alone exists. So the ‘I’ vanishes in the satva (oon ādal kān).
Jnāna chakshus does not mean that it is an organ of perception like the other sense-organs. Jnānameva chakshuh. Television, etc., are not functions of jnāna chakshus. So long as there is a subject and also an object it is only relative knowledge. lies beyond relative knowledge. It is absolute.
The Self is the source of subject and object. Now ignorance prevailing, the subject is taken to be the source. The subject is the knower and forms one of the triads whose components cannot exist independent of one another. So the subject or the knower cannot be the ultimate Reality. Reality lies beyond subject and object. When realised there will be no room for doubt.
The heart knot is snapped; doubts are set at rest. That is called and not what you are thinking of. Avidyā nāsa is alone Self-Realisation. Self-Realisation is only aupachārika. Self-Realisation is only a euphemism for elimination of ignorance.