‘Shanta’ is the fourteenth chapter. Shanti and shanta are different words. Shanti is a state, shanta is a quality of one’s very nature. This distinction is a feature of Sanskrit grammar. In Nagarjuna’s (second century) Mula-Madhyamaka-Karika, ‘shantam’ is a key word, and the philosophical center of the Buddhist doctrine of emptiness. Ashtavakra’s shanta and Nagarjuna’s shantam both reach the same truth, each along its own path.Textual context
शान्त
Peaceful · 4 shlokas
Four short shlokas from Janaka. They dwell on what remains. A shapeless calm that lies beneath every action.
In the fourteenth chapter the word “shanta” returns, now carrying a deeper meaning. Peace has many layers, and Ashtavakra shows it as a gradual unveiling. What the first pada of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras (second century BCE) describes as “vritti-nirodha,” the stilling of the mind’s movements, has an early glimpse here.
So far
After Yathasukha comes “Shanta.” It is a deeper state than simple peace.
निद्रितो बोधित इव क्षीणसंस्मरणो हि सः॥
nidrito bodhita iva kṣīṇa-saṁsmaraṇo hi saḥ
Meaning“One whose mind is empty by its very nature, and who through carelessness sometimes even forms a notion of things, is like a person waking from sleep whose remembrance of it has grown faint.”
For the reader“Kshina-samsmarana,” faded remembrance. This weakness of memory is of an unusual kind. The sage’s ruminating memory runs low. An event happens, and it is over. Going back to it again and again? No.
क्व शास्त्रं क्व च विज्ञानं यदा मे गलिता स्पृहा॥
kva śāstraṁ kva ca vijñānaṁ yadā me galitā spṛhā
Meaning“Where is wealth, where are friends, where are the robbers of my senses, where is scripture, where is knowledge, once my longing (desire) has melted away?”
For the reader“Where even is scripture?” This is a very strong statement. The seeker holds tight even to the scriptures. For the sage, though, the scriptures too were a “means to an end.” The end is reached now, so what need is there for the means?
नैराश्ये बन्धमोक्षे च न चिन्ता मुक्तये मम॥
nairāśye bandha-mokṣe ca na cintā muktaye mama
Meaning“Having known the witness-Self, the Supreme Self, the Lord, and having found dispassion (desirelessness) toward bondage and liberation, I have no concern for freedom.”
For the reader“I want liberation” is useful only up to the point where recognition arrives. Once recognition comes, “I want liberation” is itself just a wave. You are already on the shore.
भ्रान्तस्येव दशास्तास्तास्तादृशा एव जानते॥
bhrāntasyeva daśās tās tās tādṛśā eva jānate
Meaning“Empty of all deliberation within, moving freely without, seeming as if deluded: the many states of such a one can be known only by those (the sages) who are like him.”
For the readerChapter 14 ends. “Tadrisha eva janate,” “only those like him know.” That is, only a sage recognizes a sage. Everyone else will watch and judge. There is no effort to stop them.