194. Now who is the doer and enjoyer? Is it the immutable Kūṭastha or the reflected consciousness, Cidābhāsa, or a union of the two? Kūṭastha cannot be the enjoyer since it is associationless.
195. Enjoyment signifies the change that results from identification with the sensations of pleasure and pain. If the immutable Kūṭastha is the enjoyer, it becomes mutable, then would it not be self-contradictory?
196. Cidābhāsa is subject to the changing conditions of the intellect, and he undergoes modifications; but Cidābhāsa being illusory exists only by virtue of his real substratum, and therefore he cannot by himself be the enjoyer.
It is not possible to separate Cidābhāsa from its substratum Kūṭastha, to attribute pleasure or pain to it. The Kūṭastha, which is associationless, cannot be the enjoyer; Cidābhāsa, without Kūṭastha, cannot maintain itself, how can it enjoy? So both of them should be taken as the enjoyer. That it is due to a wrong notion is evident.
197. In common parlance, therefore, Cidābhāsa in conjunction with Kūṭastha is considered to be the enjoyer. But the Śruti begins with both the types of Self and concludes that Kūṭastha alone remains.
200. Owing to ignorance the enjoyer superimposes the reality of Kūṭastha on to himself. Consequently he considers his enjoyment to be real and does not want to give it up. The ‘enjoyer’ here means Jīva or Cidābhāsa.
215. ‘That Self which is not subject to experience in any of the three states, which can be called pure consciousness, the witness, the ever blissful, and which is neither the enjoyer nor the enjoyment or the object of enjoyment, That I am.’
216. When the Self has been differentiated in this way, what remains as the enjoyer is Cidābhāsa or Jīva who is also known as the sheath of the intellect, and who is subject to change.
So Cidābhāsa is the enjoyer.
217. This Cidābhāsa is a product of Māyā. Śruti and experience both demonstrate this. The world is a magical show, and Cidābhāsa is included in it.
Cidābhāsa is not transcendentally real. As consciousness he is Kūṭastha, as the antaḥkaraṇa reflecting consciousness he is a product or manifestation of Māyā.
222. Thus the words ‘for whose gratification’ in the first verse, are intended to denote that there is no enjoyer at all, and consequently, to the enlightened there are no bodily miseries.
230. None of these affections are natural to Cidābhāsa. How then can they be attributed to Kūṭastha? The fact is that through the force of ignorance (Avidyā) Cidābhāsa imagines himself to be identified with the three bodies and is affected.
231. Cidābhāsa superimposes on the three bodies the reality of the Kūṭastha and imagines that these three bodies are his real Self.
232. As long as the illusion lasts Cidābhāsa continues to take upon himself the states which the bodies undergo and is affected by them, as an infatuated man feels himself affected when something affects his family.
234. By discrimination ridding himself of all illusion and without caring for himself the Cidābhāsa always thinks of the Kūṭastha. How can he still be subject to the afflictions pertaining to the bodies? The Cidābhāsa knows himself to be unreal, his real nature being Kūṭastha.
236. As a man who has injured another through ignorance humbly begs his forgiveness on realizing his error, so Cidābhāsa submits himself to Kūṭastha.
He gave offence to Kūṭastha by calling It by some other name full of defects! Now he surrenders his sense of separateness and merges in Kūṭastha.
~translation and commentary by Swahananda
Verses 126-251 have dealt with destruction of suffering as a result of knowledge. The seventh state mentioned in verse 33 is now being discussed in 252-298.
