Liberation comes when atman recognizes its true self as Brahman

[Guest guest]

" I believe in Advaita; I believe in the essential unity of man and

for that matter, for all that lives. Therefore, I believe that if

one man gains spiritually, the whole world gains with him and if one

man fails, the whole world fall to that extent… " (1) With these words

the Father of modern India, Mahatma Gandhi, revealed the thoughts

that were a major influence on him in 1924. However, the ideas he

mentioned date back hundreds of years to the thoughts of an

influential thinker named Sankara, and they also reflect the ideas of

more modern Indian scholars who were shaping and adapting ancient

ideas to a contemporary present. The terms Advaita, which means non-

dualistic, and Vedanta, which literally means the end of the Vedas,

together refer to a series of thinkers and ideas that go back to the

eighth century C.E.

 

The most notable scholar who is usually seen as the originator and

systemizer of Advaita is Sankara (788 – 820 C.E.). The school of

Advaita is described by some as theology and by others as a

philosophy. It seems to have elements of both. There are some

commentators who see Advaita as the culmination not only of Hindu

thought, but also of all religious thought. For example

Satprakashanda, a follower of Vivekananda (1863-1902),

says, " Strictly speaking, Vedanta is not a particular religion but

the common basis of all religions. " (2) While this bit of hubris may

seem far-reaching in its scope, it is a logical entailment of the non-

dualistic system as proposed in Vedanta.

 

Vedanta accepts the scriptural authority of the four Vedas, the

Upanishads, the two great epics, the Mahabharata, and the Ramayana,

and the Brahmasutras. It gives little acknowledgement to the Puranas

and Tantras. In fact, one could argue that in the great ebb and sway

of Hindu thought in general, that the Advaita " revolution " was the

backlash against a major emphasis on idols and " bhakti " devotion to

numerous gods and goddesses. Amidst the huge sea of millions of

deities, Vedanta attempts to synthesize the earlier texts of Hindu

scriptures into an overarching system, which, while not totally

dismissing bhakti, relegates it to a secondary place in favor of a

higher and ultimate unity " behind " or " underneath " all the respective

deities. Advaita was built upon the earlier Mimamsa tradition of

exegesis. This tradition, dating back to the second century C.E.,

stressed the Vedic tradition of dharma, the ritual understanding of

how people are to act in the universe. As Clooney notes, " Ultimately,

the only thing that matters is the event of sacrifice: dharma, the

object of Mimamsa inquiry, is the sum of all right relations, the

activated, fully understood and rightly connected set of all the

small and large activities and things which together constitute the

sacrificial whole. " (3) Even though Advaita is modeled on the same

paradigm, it does break in some significant ways and claims to have

superseded its predecessor. It is often called the Uttara (later)

Mimamsa.

 

Born into a family of Shiva worshipers, Sankara has been transformed

over time into an avatar, a literal incarnation of Shiva himself.

Seen as a child prodigy, his hagiographers state that he had mastered

the four Vedas by the age of eight, the age when boys normally begin

to study the Vedas! Even as a young man he showed his desire to

become a renouncer, a " sannyasin " , and seek " moksha " or liberation

from the wheel of birth, death, and rebirth, or " samsara " . At

sixteen he left his family home and became a sannyasin. For the next

sixteen years he would travel to many parts of India, visiting

temples, reading and studying, debating with different groups and

writing his commentaries. There are several legends about the deal

his parents made to have a son who would do so much but live only a

short life, and Sankara only lived until he was thirty-two. But in

that short time he wrote voluminous commentaries and refuted many

opponents from differing traditions.

 

His teachings on Advaita center on several important ideas. The most

important is " The Brahman is real; the world is unreal.

The " jiva " (individual soul or spirit) is verily Brahman and no

other. " This needs to be unpacked quite a bit. The Vedas teach

about many gods, but to Sankara, the key is Brahman. Using many

Vedic and Upanisadic texts, Sankara argues that all the deities

mentioned in the scriptures are merely hints of the one real god.

When Sankara argues in this way, his point is not that the other gods

are not gods, but rather, they really represent the one true reality

of the universe – Brahman. In the same way, all that appears in the

world to the senses is " unreal " . In this sense, Sankara thought that

the world is " Maya " , the dream or illusion. Maya also means " that

which measures " , and is used in the sense that Maya measures the

unmeasurable, diversifies the undiversified, and changes the

immutable. The world is illusion because of " avidya " or ignorance

of the true nature of things. The jiva is the individual soul

or " atman " . Each bit of the world is atman. So in essence Brahman

really is all that there is, but the individual is blinded by his/her

own ignorance into thinking that he/she, as an individual, is

separate from the universal one. Maya blinds from the true or higher

nature, and through knowledge of the truth " tat tvam asi " (that art

thou) the atman recognizes what is real and Maya has no more power

over the enlightened mind.

 

There are several other important ideas for Sankara. The first is

Nirguna Brahman. By this he meant that Brahman is pure being,

consciousness and bliss (Sat-cit-ananda), and without attributes.

This Satcitananda is not three qualities or attributes of Brahman;

rather it is " its essential nature. Looked at ontologically, we

realize the Being or " Sat' aspect of Brahman. From the

epistemological viewpoint, Brahman is revealed as " chit " or

consciousness. And from the point of view of the highest value

Brahman is " ananda " or bliss itself. " (4) The idea of nirguna Brahman

is in direct contrast with Saguna Brahman or God with attributes. In

bhakti devotion it is common to speak of the grace, mercy, love, or

anger of the deity. Many of the deities were known for

their " specialties " in that they fulfilled certain roles for their

devotees. For example, Ganesha the elephant-headed deity was (and

is) prayed to for help in starting new endeavors, as Ganesha will

clear the path of all obstacles. Brahman for Sankara was beyond all

these worldly things. The attributes of Ganesha were of Maya; they

were not the ultimate reality. Brahman is also beyond form

(nirakar). Brahman could not be perceived in the world of forms.

This was quite radical in a time of overwhelming idol devotion.

 

Brahman also involves transcendentally. Brahman is the all-pervading

Self immanent in the phenomenal world. In this sense Nirguna Brahman

is manifested as Saguna Brahman in relation to the created universe.

So Sankara could argue that Nirguna Brahman was " present " in all of

creation but not in the sense of reality, but " behind " or underneath

the false perception of reality – maya.

 

The goal of life is to realize or recognize the unity of Brahman and

the identification of the individual self with the ultimate self.

This one thing should dominate one's life. There are different

methods of recognition of the true reality, but the ultimate path for

Sankara is that of self-knowledge (jnana) through textual study and

meditative experience. Moksha or liberation comes in the ultimate

sense when the atman/jiva recognizes its true self. Man must realize

this liberation intuitively because Brahman is without physical

senses. This also cannot be done by reason, whose only role is to

show the impermanence of Maya. This liberation is not attained by

works or devotion but rather through wisdom and realization. Once

liberated, the atman is released from Maya and is absorbed into

Brahman consciousness. The individual is under bondage and

liberation does not literally cause he/she to be absorbed, because

that would mean that there is change in Brahman. The famous

illustration is that of the " snake-rope " . One thinks one sees a

snake but the illusion vanishes when one realizes the true nature of

the rope. But there still are physical consequences in Maya, such as

shortness of breath from fear and so on.

 

Others think that Sankara saw the soul or atman also as an

impermanent entity. As in Theravada Buddhism, Menon sees that " The

Jiva is the Self immanent in the material mind, but it is not itself

the Self…the Self has no individuality or manifoldness or limitations

and admits of no divisions. " (5) So absorption (atman returning to

Brahman as the drop into the ocean) is really a metaphor for a change

of thinking.

 

What about all the changes in the world? How is it that the world

has a beginning and ages and seems to be changing if in fact Brahman

does not change? Shankara replied to these questions:

 

To the ordinary ignorant people, - who under the influence of avidya

resolve the underlying unity into the multiplicity of the changes and

thus identifies the two, - the multiplicity of the changes is the

only Reality. But those who have realized the truth that the

underlying is untouched by the evolving multiplicity of changes – do

not regard these changes as something separate and apart from

Brahman, do not look upon them as so many independent and self-

sufficient things complete in themselves… (6)

 

Sankara thus has set up in essence a two-tiered universe. The lower

tier consists of Maya brought about by avidya. For this reason, the

physical universe appears the way it does. People trapped in this

tier by their ignorance think that they exist as separate atmans.

But ultimately enlightened souls are liberated from their ignorance

and " sees " that this world can be transcended and not ultimate, and

finally recognized that they are not separate but rather identical to

Brahman. In this moment their consciousness changes and they now

still may live on in the second tier, but remain unaffected by all

that happens in it. Good, evil, life, death, and all the rest have

lost their hold on them. The upper tier is pure being, consciousness

and bliss. This is the true and ultimate reality of Brahman. One

famous Advaita illustration is the ocean and raindrops. The

hydration cycle pulls the water from the ocean and the clouds move

the water over land. Then the water is released as rain drops to

fall to the ground. But somewhere in the process the individual

drops forgets that they were part of the ocean. They were mistakenly

thinking that they were individual drops. So the raindrops fall and

then sweep into streams and rivers and finally return to the ocean.

It is their return to the ocean, which is moksha and Samadhi

(absorption into Brahman) all at once. They don't change and become

the ocean. They merely lose their illusory bondage and return to

their pristine state.

 

Bill Honsberger

ADVAITA VEDANTA: A SURVEY OF THE ROOTS AND THE FRUIT OF A MOVEMENT

 

Endnotes

1) Rukmani. Shankaracharya. P.1

2) Satprakashananda. Swami Vivekananda's Contribution to the present

age. P.112

3) Clooney. Theology after Vedanta. P.24

4) Rukmani. P.60

5) Menon. The Pure Principle. P.26

6) Vidyaratna. Adwaita Philosophy. P.173