The Three Idiots.

The Ignorant, The Atheist, and

The Skeptic 

Shrimadbhagvad-gita declares :

अज्ञश्चाश्रद्दधानश्च संशयात्मा विनश्यति।।

नायं लोकोऽस्ति न परो न सुखं संशयात्मनः।। 

Vivekachudamani verse 125 describes : 

Self  is the undeniable and indisputable Reality as is described as follows :

अस्ति कश्चित् स्वयं नित्यं 

अहं-प्रत्ययलम्बनः।।

अवस्था-त्रय साक्षी सन् 

पञ्चकोषविलक्षणः।।१२५।।

Everyone spontaneously knows of one's own existence without any doubt.

Everyone also knows without least doubt or suspicion any that the self exists while one is either in a dream, in the waking or in the dreamless sleep state of mind and refers to it as "I" .

And at the same time everyone though unaware , if tries to find out can see for oneself that the physical body is made of food, the vital body which enables the vital functions is made of energy, and the mental body through which one thinks and feels, experiences, remembers and imagines is made of thought. Again the faculty of discrimination, discernment is mode of and made of Intellect while the element of happiness or the joy everyone seeks always is the undeniable and the  underlying ever-present principle.

These 5 sheaths that cover up the simple and pure sense of 

Simple Being and Knowing  where self knows it is, and knowing too is, become the sense  I am someone other  than this world where I as an individual was born, live and shall die someday in the future.

This Being is Knowing and Knowing is Being. This together is Happiness.

Being, Knowing and Happiness is the Self and has nothing what-so-ever common with the three states and the five sheaths described above.

The three states are the waking, the dream and the dreamless sleep. 

The five sheaths are the one made of the food, the one made of the energy, the one made of the mind / thought, the one made of Intellect and the last made of Happiness.

Covered up under and within these five sheaths of body and three states of mind, one becomes the victim of ignorance, has no faith to support on or becomes skeptic.

Though all are convinced and have no ignorance, doubt or suspicion if I exist not, they question the existence of the very source from where this I emerges out when one wakes up from sleep.

The stanza referred to above insists that there is a ever-existent support which gives rise to this persistent I-sense and the same through error of judgement is superimposed upon the pure sense of Being and Knowing.

The ignorant is -

अज्ञ, 

The atheist who doubts is -

अश्रद्दधानः 

And the skeptic is -

संशयात्मा 

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