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Samsara & Moksha: Lunar-Solar Reality

One of the most widely recognized features of Hinduism is the doctrine of reincarnation or Samsara, the endless cycle of birth-death-and-rebirth, within which all forms of life are fixed. The sadhu in his quest towards the transcendent seeks release from the ever-revolving cycle through various forms of religious discipline. We are told in the Chandogya Upanishad (here translated by Swami Swahananda) that at death the religious soul may traverse either one of two possible paths:

Among them, those who know thus… who are devoted to faith and austerity in the forest - they go to light; from light to day… to the bright fortnight…to those six months during which the sun travels northward; from the months to the year… to the sun… to the moon… to the lightning. (From the region of Brahman) a person ‘Purusha’, who is other than human, (comes and) causes them, existing there, to attain Brahman. This is the path of the gods. But those who live in villages (as householders) practice sacrifices and works of public utility and gift, go to smoke… to night… to dark fortnight… to those months during which the sun travels southward. From there they do not reach the year (like those going the path of the gods). From the months, (they go) to the region of the fathers… to Akasa… to the moon. This (i.e. this moon) is King Soma (the king of the Brahmanas). This is the food of the deities. This the deities eat. Residing in that (region of the moon) till they have exhausted (the results of action) they then return again the same way as they came (by the path being mentioned)… …then they are reborn in this world as rice and barely, herbs and trees, sesamum plants and beans… Among them, those who have good residual results of action here (earned in this world) …quickly reach a good womb, the womb of a Brahmana, or Kshatriya or a Vaisya… (5.1-7)

The first path is known as Moksha, or mukti, the ‘solar way’, and unlike its alternative, there is no return or rebirth. This is because those who have achieved Moksha have been disengaged from the cycle of Samsara, the ‘lunar way’, and have transcended all the various levels of existence recognized within Hinduism to meet with the Light that never fades, identified in the Upanishads, with the Light that shines within us all.

The “non-human person” who enables those who take the ‘solar’ path to attain Moksha, is first mentioned in the Rig Veda. There we learn that the entire universe, throughout time, is a single being known as Purusha, the primal man. He is the ruler of immortality, and all beings, whether mortal or immortal, form his body of a thousand heads, a thousand eyes, and a thousand feet. At the beginning of time, the gods sacrificed Purusha as a sacrifice to himself. The divine scriptures sprang into existence, together with earth, sky and space, while every living creature and the four orders of society were born from the divided parts of his body. Furthermore, the sacrifice of Purusha is the archetype for all Vedic sacrifice, and holds the universe together.

Now then, the fact that the sun, while rising, enters into the eastern direction, thereby it absorbs into its rays all the creatures in the east. That it enters into the south, that it enters into the west, that it enters into the north, that it reaches the nadir and the zenith, that it enters the intermediate points of the zodiac, that it illumines all, thereby it absorbs all living things into its rays.

Prasna Upanishad 1:6 Emphasis mine

In the Prasna Upanishad, the great sage Pippalada (The Pipal is the sacred fig tree beneath which the Buddha sat gaining enlightenment, mentioned in my previous post), teaching the way of the sun and moon (1.1-12), states ;“ he who meditates upon the Supreme Purusha, through use of the sacred syllable AUM will enter the region of the sun, and be set free from evil like a snake who sheds its skin” (5.5). AUM is both the imminent and transcendent ‘word of God.’ In the Mandukya Upanishad, we are told that; “AUM, the indestructible word that is also the universe, is understood as past, present, and future, as well as eternity beyond three-fold time. All this is truly AUM” (1.1).

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