Vision is of two kinds-phenomenal
and eternal. The former is a modification of the
mind when it stretches out through the eyes.
It is dependent on the objects perceived.
It has a beginning and an end. But the latter
is the very nature of the Self, just as heat
and light are the very nature of the sun.
The Self is said to be a seer, hearer, thinker,
etc, only when it it is associated with the
respective limiting adjuncts such as the eye,
ear, mind, etc. Br.up.3.4.2.S.B--- dr.shtiH
iti dvividhaa bhavati laukikii paaramaarthikii cha------- vidyate iti cha.
Vision is of two kinds, phenomenal and real. Phenomenal vision
is an action of the mind when connected with
the eye. It is an act and has therefore a beginning and an end.
But the vision that belongs
to the Self is like the heat and light of
fire, being the very essence of the witness; it has neither beginnig nor
end. The ordinary or phenomenal
vision, however, is coloured by the objects
seen through the eye. It begins when
the
eye comes into contact with the object and
ends when the contact ends. The eternal
vision of the Self is only metaphorically
spoken of as the witness. It is a witness
only
when it is looked upon as associated with
the limiting adjuncts, namely, the
mind,
body, etc. By itself it is only pure consciousness
and cannot be described even as a
witness.
The Process of Visual perception
The process of visual perception, according
to
Advaita Vedanta, is described in chapter 1
of Vedaanta Paribhaashaa thus. Just
as the water in a tank, issuing through a hole, enters,
through a channel, a number of fields and assumes the shapes of those fields,
so also the luminous mind, stretching out through
the eye, goes to the space occupied by
objects and becomes modified into the forms of those objects. Such a modification
is called a vr.tti of the mind. The same fact
is also stated in Panchadas'i, 4.27, 28 and
29, based on S'rii S'ankara's Upades'asaahasrii, Metrical portion, chapter
14, verses 3 & 4.
The whole process of visual
perception consists of the following steps:
-- (1) The mind stretches out through the
eye, reaches the object and takes the form
of the object. This is called a vr.tti or
mode of the mind. (2) The mental mode removes
the veil of ignorance that hides the object.
(3) Consciousness underlying the object,
being manifest through the mental mode, illumines
the object. (4) The mental mode associates the object-consciousness with
the subject-consciousness. (5) The subject perceives the object. Consciousness
manifest through the mental mode coincident
with the object serves as the knowledge of
the object. This is known as phala (fruit),
being the resultant knowledge. The mind has
three main divisions in this process,
namely, (1) the part within the body, (2)
the part that extends from the body to the
object perceived, (3) the part that coincides
with the object. The first part above is
known as pramaataa and the consciousness manifest
in it is called pramaata-chaitanya. This is the perceiver. The consciousness
manifest in the second part is called
pramaaNa- chaitanya, or the means of knowledge.
The conciousness manifest in the
third part is pramiti-chaitanya or percept.
The object peceived is called prameya.
Since the third part of the mind mentioned
above coincides with the object, prameya-chaitanya, or the consciousness
underlying the object and pramiti-chaitanya become identical. The point
to be kept in mind here is that all objects in this world
are superimposed on Consciousness, i.e. Brahman.
All objects are covered by a
veil of ignorance, which has to be removed
for seeing the object. It is only
consciousness that reveals the objects, since
the objects themseves are non-luminous.