Ashtavakra Gita
‘Ashtavakra Gita’ is one of the advaitic masterpieces. Without mincing matters it comes out with the advaitic truth, the whole truth and nothing but advaita which is the Truth. This book embodies Ashtavakra’s teaching to King Janaka which vouched him Self-Knowledge between the time he placed one foot upon the stirrup of his horse and lifted himself to place the other foot on the other stirrup.
However, as can be seen from the following quote, Bhagavan Ramana said that there is no time involved at all in Self-Knowledge.
“…. When I entered the hall the story of how the Ashtavakra Gita came to be taught was being recounted in English for the benefit of the above Raja and other visitors. After the story was read out, Bhagavan said, ‘Because Brahma Jnana is not something external, which is somewhere faraway where you can go and get it, you cannot say that it will take so long or so short a time to attain it. It is always with you. . . . All that is necessary is to surrender yourself completely to the Guru, to surrender your notion of ‘I’ and ‘mine’ ….”
- Devaraja Mudaliar in Day by Day with Bhagavan, dated 31.3.1945 (Afternoon)
Of course, that is what King Janaka did. He surrendered his notion of ‘I’ and ‘mine’ to Sage Ashtavakra. Has not Bhagavan said that surrender and Self-enquiry are the only two ways to Self-Realisation?
Bhagavan has also made other references to this great book.
Sri Ramakrishna persuaded Narendra to read ‘Ashtavakra Gita’ which had a stupendous impact on the young devotee who later flowered into Swami Vivekananda, the doughty Advaitic evangelist.
The present upload of this Gita is in Sanskrit, English and Tamil in sound and script. The Sanskrit script is in Bhagavan’s own handwriting cut out from an Archival Publication of the Ashram.
Note on Texts of Ashtavakra Gita
Sanskrit - Text: In the Handwriting of Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi
Tamil - Translation: By Sri Viswanatha Swami
English - Translation based on: 1. Swamy Nithya Swarupananda, John Richards, Hari Prasad Shastri
