Suffering that has yet to manifest is to be avoided.

Bryant Commentary:

Past suffering has already been experienced, says Vyāsa, and presently experienced suffering has already activated and is bearing its fruits. Therefore, only suffering accruing in the future, anāgatam, can be avoided, heyam, and it is this suffering that is of concern to the yogī who Vyāsa, in the last verse, considered as sensitive as an eyeball. How can one give up suffering that has yet to come, in other words, suffering that does not yet exist? asks Vijñānabhikṣu rhetorically. By removing its cause, the subject of the next sūtra. Just as the present is the result of previous causes, and was once that which had yet to come, so future suffering has its seeds in the present and past. There are examples of this everywhere, says Vijñānabhikṣu: The earth has the potential to give rise to many effects that are as yet unmanifest, but their seeds lie stored in the present.

“However, the absolute removal of future suffering can be attained only by liberation, say the commentators—removing the identification between puruṣa and prakṛti. Again, this is the standard view: Gautama, the author of the Nyāya Sūtras, states that relief from suffering comes only from liberation (I.1.22). Likewise, Kaṇāda, the author of a series of sūtras foundational to the Vaiśeṣika school of philosophy, states that only when the mind is removed from its objects is one free from pain (V.2.16).

Avidya Is The Breeding Ground For The Others Whether They Be Dormant, Attenuated, Interrupted Or Active

The causes of suffering are not seeing things as they are, the sense of ‘I’, attachment, aversion, and clinging to life.

Ignorance is the fertile soil,
and, as a consequence,
all other obstacles persist.
They may exist in any state – dormant, feeble, intermittent,
or fully operative.

The lack of awareness of Reality, the sense of egoism or ‘I-am-ness’, attractions and repulsions towards objects and the strong desire for life are the great afflictions or causes of all miseries in life.

The five afflictions which disturb the equilibrium of consciousness are: ignorance or lack of wisdom, ego, pride of the ego or the sense of ‘I’, attachment to pleasure, aversion to pain, fear of death and clinging to life.

Ignorance, egoism, attachment, hatred, and clinging to bodily life are the five obstacles.

The misery which is not yet come is to be avoided.

SV Commentary:

Some Karma we have worked out already, some we are working out now in the present, and some is waiting to bear fruit in the future. That which we have worked out already is past and gone.

That which we are experiencing now we will have to work out, and it is only that which is waiting to bear fruit in the future that we can conquer and control, so all our forces should be directed towards the control of that Karma which has not yet borne fruit. That is meant in the previous aphorism, when Patanjali says that these various Samskaras are to be controlled by counteracting waves.

Of tbese, Nescience is the field, the breeding ground for the others that follow, the Egoism, &C., having a four-fold possible mode of their existence, as the dormant, the tenuous, the alternated and tvhe fully operative.

What is dormancy? It is the existence in the mind as power alone in the germinal state. It is awake when it turns its face towards its objects. In the case of him who pclssesses discriminative knowledge, the gerlns of the a>fflictions are singed, and therefore even on the object coming in front, they do not come into operation. How call the burned up seed sprout ? Hence, the wise man whose aiftictions are gone, is said to, have’ had his last birth. It is in him alone that the afflictions pass into the fifth state, that of the ~eed Eeing burnt up; inasmuch aEc the afflictions do exist in tbat state, although their mecl-powel has been bl~rnt up. It is for this reason that th& do not awaken even when an object comes in front of them. This i~ the dcnnancy of tlme whose seedpower has been burnt nh.

Tenuitv is now described. The afflictions become ten~~ous on being cut down by habituation to contrarie.:.

And they are alternated, inasmuch ss they disappear and appear over and over again in the same condition. Anger is not obser~wl to be in operation at the time of attachme~~t~. Anger does not arise when attachment has its play. Nor does it happen that attachment, while manifesting ai tll reference to one object, has cea.sed to exifit altogether with reference ‘to another object. Recmse Chaitra is attached to one wowan, it does llot follow that Ile is averse to otl~ers. The *fact is that in the one hie attachmel~t has manifestecl itself, while in others it can-be active in the future. It is tiris that hec~lnes either donnnnt, tenuous or alternated.

The fully operative is that which has found manifestation in the object.

All these do not pass beyold the sphere of affliction. What ie it . then that is cdled an affliction, whether it be the dormant, the alternated , or the R~lly operative? This i~ true. But they become either alternated ol* anv W one else, only when they appear as so qaalified. As all are removed hy l~abitnntion to contraries, a11 art? manifested bv m the operation of competent causes.

All these aiffictions are the modifications of Nescience only. How ? It is Nescience alone that is the quickness of their life. The afflictions appear only in the form which is put upon an object by Nescience. They are found existing simultaneously with the cognition of the unreal ; and they clisappear when Ne~cience disappears.-

~ Rāma Prasāda translation.