WITH HANDS AND FEET EVERYWHERE — It is easier to describe an unmanifest power for the comprehension of students of lesser calibre, when the unknown principle is defined in terms of the known. Though the hands and legs of the living creatures are made up of inert matter, they seem to be quite conscious and vital in their movements. This Principle of Consciousness, functioning behind them all, everywhere, is one and the same Self, the Supreme Brahman, indicated by the expression “POSSESSING HANDS AND FEET EVERYWHERE.” Every eye, head and mouth functions in the world because of the Life that pulsates through it. Life is one everywhere. Therefore, that Life Principle is described here as “EVERYWHERE POSSESSING EYES AND EARS AND MOUTHS.” All activities of perception, feeling and thinking are successively pursued only as long as Life presides over the body, and therefore, the One Life is defined here as “EVERYWHERE POSSESSING EYES, ETC.”

THAT EXISTS PERVADING ALL — If this Principle of Consciousness is defined as functioning through known physical equipments, the student may doubt that Life, like stars studding the sky, expresses itself only wherever equipments function. To remove this fallacious idea, it is rightly said that the Truth, the Principle of Consciousness, “EXISTS PERVADING ALL.” This is reminiscent of the famous hymn to the Cosmic-man (Purusha Sooktam) in the Rig Veda.

CONTINUING THE DESCRIPTION OF THE ETERNAL TRUTH THE LORD SAYS:

Tat, That-the Knowable; sarvatah-pani-padam, which has hands and feet everywhere-. The existence of the Knower of the field is revealed through th adjuncts in the form of the organs of all creatures. And the Knower of the field is spoken of as such because of the limiting adjuncts of the field. The field, too, is diversely differentiated as hands, feet, etc. All diversity in the Knower of the field, caused by the differences in the adjunct-the field-, is certainly unreal. Hence, by denying it, the nature of the Knowable has been stated, in, ‘That is called neither being nor non-being.’ Although the unreal form is caused by the limiting adjuncts, still, for the comprehension of Its existence it is said, ‘(It) has hands and feet everywhere, etc., by assuming this as a quality of the Knowable. Thus, as is well known, there is saying of the people versed in tradition, ‘The Transcendental is described with the help of superimposition and its refutation’. Everywhere the hands, feet, etc., which are perceived as limbs of all bodies, perform, their duties due to the presence of the power of the Knowable (Brahman). Thus the grounds for the inference of the existence of the Knowable are metaphorically spoken of as belonging to the Knowable. The others have to be explained similarly. That Knowable has hands and feet everwhere. That which has eyes, heads, and mouths everywhere is sarvatoksi-siro-mukham. That which has ears every-where is sarvatah-srutimat: sruti means the organs of hearing; that which has it is sruti-mat. Tisthati, It exists, remains established; loke, in the multititude of creatures; avrtya, by pervading; sarvam, them all. With this purpose is view, that as a result of the superimposition of the organs like hands, feet, etc., which are adjuncts, there may not be the misconception that the Knowable is possessed of them (adjuncts), the (next) verse is begun: