Upanishads · Yogakuṇḍalinī 3.22
॥
Devanāgarī
विराड्ढिरण्यगर्भश्च ईश्वरश्चेति ते त्रयः । ब्रह्माण्डं चैव पिण्डाण्डं लोका भूरादयः क्रमात्
Transliteration (IAST)
virāḍḍhiraṇyagarbhaśca īśvaraśceti te trayaḥ | brahmāṇḍaṃ caiva piṇḍāṇḍaṃ lokā bhūrādayaḥ kramāt
Word-by-word
SanskritIASTMeaning
विराट् हिरण्य-गर्भः चvirāṭ hiraṇya-garbhaḥ caVirat and Hiranyagarbha, and
ईश्वरः च इति ते त्रयःīśvaraḥ ca iti te trayaḥIshvara, so these three
ब्रह्म-अण्डं च एव पिण्ड-अण्डंbrahma-aṇḍaṃ ca eva piṇḍa-aṇḍaṃand Brahma's egg, and the egg of the body
लोकाः भूः-आदयः क्रमात्lokāḥ bhūḥ-ādayaḥ kramātworlds, beginning with earth, in order
Translation
"Virat, Hiranyagarbha, and Ishvara — these three; and Brahma's egg, and the egg of the body, worlds beginning with earth, in order".
Version
96b7bc00c049 · published Aug 12, 2026, 5:00:00 AM UTC
Available inRUENPage between verses with
The charting continues: to man's three states are matched three kinds of the highest — Virat, "the Diffused"; Hiranyagarbha, "the Golden Womb"; Ishvara, "the Lord." The correspondence is thus: to the waking in man answers Virat in the world, to the dreamer — Hiranyagarbha, to the sleeper — Ishvara. This scheme is accepted in later Vedanta and is a development of the same position of the small and great world discussed when reading the first chapter (1.81).
Worth noting is where Ishvara, "the Lord," ends up in this reckoning. He is placed in correspondence with deep sleep — the state in which nothing is distinguished. Here the Vaishnava side points to a difficulty worth naming. The Lord is one who possesses and knows; and a state in which nothing is distinguished is a state in which there is no possessing and no knowing. This correspondence, then, places the Lord in a category where possession is impossible.
The answer to this is that the discourse concerns non-distinction for us, not for Him. The answer is reasonable; but then the whole correspondence collapses, for it was built on a resemblance of states, not on who sees what. This difficulty has been examined many times in disputes; and every such equation, as noted when reading the first chapter (1.81), rests on resemblance by a negative mark, from which nothing follows.