Ashtavakra Gita 1.12
Ashtavakra Gita 1.12 is a verse from chapter 1 (The witness). The sage Ashtavakra speaks it to King Janaka. In plain English it says: "The Self is the witness: all-pervading, whole, one, free, awareness itself, without action, unattached, without wanting, at peace. Only through error does it seem caught in worldly life."
Ashtavakra, to King Janaka
आत्मा साक्षी विभुः पूर्ण एको मुक्तश्चिदक्रियः ।असङ्गो निःस्पृहः शान्तो भ्रमात्संसारवानिव ॥
ātmā sākṣī vibhuḥ pūrṇa eko muktaścidakriyaḥ |asaṅgo niḥspṛhaḥ śānto bhramātsaṃsāravāniva ||
The Self is the witness: all-pervading, whole, one, free, awareness itself, without action, unattached, without wanting, at peace. Only through error does it seem caught in worldly life.
What to notice
Ten qualities of the Self are listed, and then one word explains why we miss them: bhramāt, through error.
Word by word
- ātmā
- the Self
- sākṣī
- witness
- vibhuḥ
- all-pervading
- pūrṇaḥ
- whole, full
- ekaḥ
- one
- muktaḥ
- free
- cit
- awareness
- akriyaḥ
- without action
- asaṅgaḥ
- unattached
- niḥspṛhaḥ
- without wanting
- śāntaḥ
- at peace
- bhramāt
- through error
- saṃsāravān iva
- as if caught in worldly life
Reading the verse
The verse is almost a list, and its rhythm is part of its meaning. The Self is the witness, all-pervading, whole, one, free, awareness, without action, unattached, without wanting, at peace. Each word answers a fear the ordinary self lives with. The small self feels incomplete, and the Self is pūrṇa, whole. It feels isolated, and the Self is vibhu, everywhere. It feels busy and pulled, and the Self is akriya and asaṅga, inactive and unattached. Then comes the hinge: bhramāt saṃsāravān iva, through error it seems to be caught in saṃsāra. The word iva, as if, carries the whole argument. In Advaita the Self was never bound and then rescued. The binding is an appearance, like the blue of the sky, which you can see clearly and which is not a property of space. Reading the list slowly, one word per breath, is a traditional way to use a verse like this. Each word is checked against your own experience before moving on.
Same thread in the Bhagavad Gita
Bhagavad Gita 13.23Krishna names the Supreme Self in the body as the witness, the one who permits and sustains.Chapter 1, The witness: Janaka asks how to know, how to be free and how to let go, and Ashtavakra answers that he is already the free witness of everything.
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Sources and method
Sanskrit from the common text of the Ashtavakra Gita, also called the Ashtavakra Samhita. Where our source had obvious typing errors we restored the standard reading and listed each change in our review notes. IAST is generated from the Devanagari. The English, the word meanings and the notes are Wisdom's own, written in the Advaita tradition of Shankara's school, the line followed by commentators such as Swami Nityaswarupananda and Swami Chinmayananda, with Lala Baij Nath's public-domain translation of 1907 as a reference.
Wisdom translation, edited by Ankur Shukla. Commentary AI-drafted, human review pending.