Verse 2.4.180

Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration, Word-for-word and English translation of verse 2.4.180:

मिथ्या-प्रापञ्च-जननी मिथ्या-भ्रान्ति-तमोमयी ।
अतोऽनिरूप्यानित्य्-आद्या जीव-संसार-कारिणी ॥ १८० ॥

mithyā-prāpañca-jananī mithyā-bhrānti-tamomayī |
ato'nirūpyānity-ādyā jīva-saṃsāra-kāriṇī || 180 ||

mithyā–of the illusory world; prapañca–of the five gross elements; jananī–the mother; mithyā-bhrānti–with false delusions; tamaḥmayī–imbued by darkness; ataḥ–then; anirūpyā–indescribable; anityā–transitory; ādyā–original; jīva–the minute spirit souls; saṃsāra–of the cycle of transmigration of species; kāriṇī–the cause.

This inert (jaḍa) Māyā is the mother of the illusory material world. As she is the embodiment of ignorance and delusion, her nature is beyond description. Although she has imprisoned the living beings in the repeated cycle of birth and death from time without beginning, Māyā is destroyed when the living being receives knowledge of his constitutional position, and therefore, she is understood to be non-eternal. She is known as beginningless because she is the shadow of the internal spiritual energy, cit-śakti-māyā.

Commentary: Dig-darśinī-ṭīkā with Bhāvānuvāda

(By Śrīla Sanātana Gosvāmī himself including a deep purport of that commentary)

Now Śrī Nārada speaks three verses, beginning here with mithyā, to introduce the subject matter of the nature and activities of Māyā.

He says, “Māyā, who alone is the mother of the cause (kāraṇa) and effect (kārya) of the illusory material world, generates the delusion of unreality in the form of knowledge and ignorance, liberation and bondage, and other dualities. Being the embodiment of ignorance, she covers knowledge of the Absolute Truth. She is therefore indefinable (anirūpyā) because her form or nature cannot be described. She is also non-eternal (anityā), because when the living being receives knowledge of his constitutional position (svarūpa-jñāna), the influence of Māyā is destroyed for that particular soul. Furthermore, she is the shadow of the spiritual potency (cit-śakti) of the Lord and so is named ādyā, or beginningless. Because she is the cause of the living being’s material existence, she is known as avidyā, or ignorance. By spreading ignorance, she becomes the cause of the repetition of birth and death for a living being within the material world.”