The Light of all Lights
न तत्र सूर्यो भाति न चन्द्रतारकं
नेमा विद्युतो भान्ति कुतोऽयमग्निः ।
तमेव भान्तमनुभाति सर्वं
तस्य भासा सर्वमिदं विभाति ॥ १५॥
इति काठकोपनिषदि द्वितीयाध्याये द्वितीया वल्ली ॥
na tatra sūryo bhāti na candratārakaṃ
nemā vidyuto bhānti kuto’yamagniḥ .
tameva bhāntamanubhāti sarvaṃ
tasya bhāsā sarvamidaṃ vibhāti .. 15..
iti kāṭhakopaniṣadi dvitīyādhyāye dvitīyā vallī ..
The sun does not shine there, nor the moon and the stars, nor these lightnings-not to speak of this fire. He shining, everything shines after Him. By His light all this is lighted.
Commentary:
This light of the Atman is such that the sun cannot shine there. If millions of suns were to shine, it would not be equal to That, what to say of lesser lights like the moon, stars, fire, etc. Every light is illumined by That light. Which light can illumine That light? We breathe because of the breath of that Breathless Being. We exist because of that Supreme Existence. Every-thing depends on That; how could they derive vitality from anything else? In that Supreme Life, this so-called sun of empirical life, this moon or mind, or the fire of human desire, do not shine. All these are mockeries before the Atman. Our intellect, even that of a genius, all that we regard as the highest in us, are matchless before the Atman. All these values are borrowed from that Supreme Value, and there is nothing here if what is borrowed is returned to it. The empirical values and realities of the world are reflections of the paramarthika satta, or the Eternal Reality.
These three realities—pratibhasika, vyavaharika and paramarthika—are not three realities, but three expressions of the One Reality. Just as light can pass through a clear, coloured or broken glass and get reflected accordingly, the One Reality can reveal itself in different ways. But all these degrees of reality—matter, body, mind, earth, water, fire, air, ether, etc.—are subtleties, varying in intensity, of the same Reality. All lights come from that One Light. That is the joy which sustains us. That is the ocean of ambrosia which is not the lifeless nectar of the celestials, but a conscious one. In this mantra is a description of the Satchidananda Atman.
Swami Vivekananda Says —
What poetry in the world can be more sublime than this! “There the sun cannot illumine, nor the moon, nor the stars, there this flash of lightning cannot illumine; what to speak of this mortal fire!” Such poetry you find nowhere else.[Source]
Where to find Him in the external world, where to find Him in the suns, and moons, and stars? There the sun cannot illumine, nor the moon, nor the stars, the flash of lightning cannot illumine the place; what to speak of this mortal fire? He shining, everything else shines. It is His light that they have borrowed, and He is shining through them.[Source]