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Different States of jiva

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Narasimhan B • May 25, 1999 


              Sri:
           Om Namo Narayanaya.
AzhvAr tiruvaDigaLE SaraNam; emberumAnAr tiruvaDigaLE SaraNam
dEsikan tiruvaDigaLE SaraNam:Sri Andavan tiruvaDigale saranam:

Respectful Bagavathas of this wonderful forum,
Please accept my most humble obeisance at all your feet.
I am a regular reader of this forum and i am slowly trying to understand the 
Sri Ramanuja philosophy through all of your wonderful mails.
I never tried to ask a question because I don't know anything much
and I am in my learning phase. one of my friend who is much interested in 
understanding our vedic knowledge has sent  me this question to present to 
all of you. I hope some of you can give answers to his question.
adiyen
Narasimha dasan

Question from my friend L.Harikumar.:


This question is from the Mandukya upanishad.It talks about four terms
visva,taijasa ,prajna and turiya. Sripada Sankara interprets them as the
four states of the jiva.Turiya is considered as the state of self
realisation(in which the jiva realises its identity with the Supreme
Brahman) and prajna as the deep sleep state,taijasa as the dream state
and visva as the waking state in which the jiva enjoys gross
objects.Here the turiya stage is interpreted to convey that the jiva
realises himself as the all pervading impersonal Brahman.
Sripada Madhvacharya interprets them as the four forms of God(Vishnu),
with names visva,taijasa,prajna and turiya,controlling the jivas in all
these states,by residing in four different parts of the body of the
living entity.In the Brahmopanishad, visva(jagrata) is said to be
located in the neck,taijasa (svapna)in the eye,prajna(sushupti) in the
heart and turiya in the brahmarandra(topmost protion of the
skull).Madhva quotes this as reference in his mandukyopanishad bhashya.
In the Narasimha uttaratapani upanishad also there is description of all
these stages and the mantras from the Mandukya upanishad are repeated
and it is said that the Turiya which conveys the Omkara is to be
realised.Here the four stages are respectively called as the
jagrata,svapna,sushupti and turiya respectively. As I'm not having the
commentary on these upanishads as per vishishtadvaitic point of view, I 
humbly request the members of this forum to enlighten me  in the above 
questions regarding these four states by explaining the vishishtadvaita 
coception of these four terms.I've come across a term in vishnu sahasranama 
"chaturatma". Is there any connection between this name and
the four terms mentioned above?
Your humble servant,
L.Harikumar.


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