“Rebirth and death are a sea without shore; the wise cross it by knowledge of the Self.”
— Adi Shankara[apocryphal] Commonly attributed poetic image in later anthologies; no verbatim source identified
Commentary
This image of the ocean of samsara, without shore and crossed only by knowledge of the Self, is a poetic development of a motif found throughout Indian religious literature. It presents rebirth as an endless current from which liberation is a passage, and it expresses Shankara's conviction that release comes through understanding rather than through the accumulation of merit. Eliot Deutsch explains that the image conveys the Advaitin view of samsara as dependent on ignorance, so that its cessation requires a change in cognition. Sengaku Mayeda's work on the attributed devotional literature suggests that such images circulated in popular verse under Shankara's name. Richard King notes that the metaphor of crossing was shared with Buddhist and Jain traditions, and that Shankara adapted it to his non-dual framework. Paul Hacker observes that the poetic language of the verse is typical of the devotional strand that came to be associated with the tradition. The image is securely part of the tradition's imagery and is attributed to Shankara in popular collections.
Commentary
This image of the ocean of samsara, without shore and crossed only by knowledge of the Self, is a poetic development of a motif found throughout Indian religious literature. It presents rebirth as an endless current from which liberation is a passage, and it expresses Shankara's conviction that release comes through understanding rather than through the accumulation of merit. Eliot Deutsch explains that the image conveys the Advaitin view of samsara as dependent on ignorance, so that its cessation requires a change in cognition. Sengaku Mayeda's work on the attributed devotional literature suggests that such images circulated in popular verse under Shankara's name. Richard King notes that the metaphor of crossing was shared with Buddhist and Jain traditions, and that Shankara adapted it to his non-dual framework. Paul Hacker observes that the poetic language of the verse is typical of the devotional strand that came to be associated with the tradition. The image is securely part of the tradition's imagery and is attributed to Shankara in popular collections.