Verse 123

Samādhi, the fifteenth auxiliary (aṅga), is here defined.

It is the state of changelessness (nirvikāratā), wherein the mind, freed from involvement with objects, immediately takes on the form of Brahman (brahmākāratā). In this state, there are no lingering impressions of the phenomenal world, and no distinctions of meditator (dhyātṛ), object of meditation (dhyeya), or mental modifications (vṛtti).

This is described as vṛtti-vismaraṇa—the forgetting of mental fluctuations—and dvaitān-anusandhāna—non-attention to duality.

Yet a doubt arises: does not mere forgetting of vṛttis amount to ignorance, rather than knowledge? The answer is that simple blankness without realization is indeed ignorance, but when suffused with Brahman-knowledge (ātma-brahma aikya-bodha) it becomes Samādhi.

Thus, Samādhi is jñāna-saṃjñaka—knowledgeful absorption, not unconscious void. It is the luminous shining (sphuraṇa) of consciousness in the form of Brahman. Hence it is said:

“Samādhi is the arising of pure awareness, culminating in the realization of the oneness of the individual and the Supreme.”

• Samādhi is not mere stillness or blankness (which is just tamas/ignorance), but knowledge-suffused stillness.
• It is the culmination of nididhyāsana—where duality is no longer even an “object” of non-attention.
• Samādhi is not about suppressing thoughts but about dissolving the subject-object split into Brahman-awareness.
• This is why Śaṅkara emphasizes it as nirvikāratā and jñāna-saṃjñaka—changeless and knowledge-marked, unlike yogic absorption defined by suppression of mental modes.