Bhāṣya

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Bhāṣya

; ; ; ; ; —

In plain words

Now, if the Self has no touch of pleasure, pain, or any other quality, bondage does not exist. And because there is no bondage, there is no liberation either—for only one who is bound can be freed, never one who was unbound to begin with. Nor can bondage and liberation belong to the reflected consciousness, since it lacks any real substance; and the intellect itself, being transient, cannot experience them either. It would follow that all scriptures teaching liberation are rendered entirely pointless. Anticipating this objection, he declares:

Close to the Sanskrit

Now then, since there is no connection of the Self with happiness, misery, etc., bondage does not exist; and from the absence of bondage there is the absence of liberation; for the bound one is released, not the unbound one; likewise, for the reflection of consciousness also, bondage and liberation do not exist, on account of its being unreal; of that intellect too, because of its perishable nature, there is the absence of bondage and liberation; and thereupon the scripture on liberation turns out to be meaningless—in regard to this, he says: