Thou art That #155, #156, #157

 

It has been said before that the benefit derived from (the proximity of) the Self is that it appears conscious like the former.  Being a revealer the intellect, like light and so on, pervades objects such as jars etc.

Just as a jar placed in the sun may be said to be brought to light, so, an object in the intellect may be said to be brought under its cognizance.  This bringing to cognizance is nothing but being pervaded by the intellect.  Objects become pervaded by the intellect one after another.

The intellect pervades an object (and assumes its form) when the object is revealed through the help  (i.e., the reflection) of the Self.  Like time and space the all-pervading Self can have no order or succession (in pervading objects).  (#155, 156, 157 Chap. XVIII ‘Thou art That’ Upadesa Sahasri)

Pervasion being an action must be performed by the intellect.  As previously noted the intellect has action but no consciousness.  That is supplied by the Self which due to its closeness to the intellect reflects consciousness on to it.  Thus the intellect appears to be conscious and directed towards an object.  As the individual subject (Jiva) is located in the material universe of space and time its attention flows sequentially.

In these expressions of the subject/object nexus the analogy of reflection is required to do a lot of work.  The core truth for advaita is that everything is within Consciousness.  There is the tantric saying ‘what is here is there, what is not here is not anywhere’.