Advaita Vedanta An Introduction Arvind Sharma

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Arvind Sharma, Advaita Vedänta. An Introduction, Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 2004, pp. vii+125. ISBN 81-208-2027-4, Rs 295.00

Reviewed by Kazimieras Seibutis

Sri Aurobindo Cultural Center, Vilnius

Any book about such a challenging matter as Advaita Vedänta is fascinating, therefore it is no wonder that reading a short introduction on the subject by Arvind Sharrna is an exciting experience indeed, not only because the author manages to avoid getting involved in conflicting aspects of different schools of classical intellectual trend of India that is not yet widely known in the West, but also because the subject matter is presented in a condensed and very succinct manner.

Sharma, Birks Professor of Comparative Religion at McGill University, attempts to overcome this challenge by consistently relying on three approaches: scriptural, rational and experiential.

Sharma says that he "tries to accord an independent status to each of these approaches without losing sight of their interconnectedness".

In a short preface prior to the analysis, Sharma calls the readers' attention to a fundamental fact that in the West philosophy represents an intellectual movement which has achieved an independent status by shaking off constrains of theology. 

Meanwhile, within the framework of Indian culture such a divergence between philosophy and religion did not occur, and according to Sharma "the two, even when they become dual, remain undivided." Sharma also draws attention to the concept of jivanmukti and the pivotal idea, which supports the concept of jivanmukti, that the results of one's faith can be attained while still living in this world. 

Sharma goes on saying that according to this notion faith is understood as "faith pending realization — it denotes the trust one must have in order to undertake an experiment, but the outcome of the experiment is independent of such a faith".

In view of this, while toting to define ultimate reality or Brahman, Advaita Vedänta is relying not only on revelation and reason, but also on the teachings of those who achieved the state ofjivanmukti and became jivanmuktas or living embodiments of Brahman.

In the first chapter devoted to a scriptural approach, the author mainly discusses the scriptural authority of Upanisads and the hermeneutical attempts of Advaita Vedänta in a unified way to interpret and harmonize four key statements called mahäväkyas. These are accepted as the authority by other schools of Vedanta as well, but they interpret them using a rather different exegetical clue. Each of the four mahäväkyas has been given a detailed analysis in separate subsections.

Sharma stresses that acceptance of Vedic authority is not as binding for philosophical purposes as it is for social cohesion.

The second chapter explains the subtleties of the rational approach. Using classical examples of a bracelet of silver and silver (rüpyakundalanyäya) and of a rope and a snake (rajjusarpanyäya), the author compares doctrines of Asatkäryaväda and Satkäryaväda. He emphasizes that for a rational presentation of Advaitic ontology we must rely upon the paradoxical logic of contradiction between the non-contradictable and contradictable.

Chapter Three, the last one, contains analysis of experiential approach to the study of Advaita Vedänta. Here Sharma says that our experience of life compels us to take into account all the three states of consciousness as postulated in the revealed scripture. These are waking, dreaming and deep sleep. Invoking the assumption of the triad points out that rationality is only one aspect of manifold mental activities and that it cannot be regarded as encompassing the whole of life. Also, this implies the existence of unchanging consciousness which undergirds the consciousness of change of the three states of consciousness and constitutes the unchanging core of our being — self or ätman, which in turn is identical with Brahman. Trying to underscore this "experientially most resonant dimension of Advaitic nondualism", the author produces some accounts of mystical experience from the hagiographies of the twentieth century yogis Swämi Vivekänanda, Ramana Maharsi and Krishnamurti.

The author expresses hope that his attempt to present Advaita Vedänta with pedagogical variation will be a refreshing one, and surely it will be a useful addition to the literature available on this particular school of Vedänta, especially for students of comparative philosophy of religion.

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Full text of "Advaita Vedanta An Introduction"

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The novelty of this book consists of the 

fact that it introduces the reader to 

the basic tenets of Advaita Vedanta in 

three independent but com¬ 

plementary ways: scripturally, 

rationally and experientially. All the 

three elements are usually found 

intertwined in accounts of Advaita 

Vedanta. They are presented 

distinctly here in the hope that each 

perspective will enrich one’s 

understanding of Advaita Vedanta as 

a whole and also allow the reader to 

form his or her own opinion about the 

relative merits of each approach. 

ADVAITA VEDANTA 

ADVAITA VEDANTA 

An Introduction 

Arvind Sharma 

MOTILAL BANARSIDASS PUBLISHERS 

PRIVATE LIMITED • DELHI 

First Edition: Delhi, 2004 

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Contents 

Preface vii 

Introduction 1 

Religion, Philogophy and Advaita Vedanta 3 

Parti 15-49 

Advaita Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 17 

Part II 51-76 

Advaita Vedanta: A Rational Approach 53 

PartHI 77-110 

Advaita Vedanta: An Experiential Approach 79 

Conclusion 111 

Note 113 

Bibliography 121 

Index 125 

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Preface 

The Biblical recognition of the fact that to the writing of 

books there is no end must surely not be used as an excuse 

for writing books indiscriminately. The readers therefore 

have a right to ask : why another book on Advaita Vedanta? 

Most of the existing books on Advaita Vedanta rely on the 

scriptural approach in presenting it. Some books mix it with 

the rational and experiential approaches as well, without always 

distinguishing clearly between them. This book tries to 

accord an independent status to each of these approaches 

without losing sight of their interconnectedness in the hope 

that the readers will find such a presentation refreshing. 

I hope that this pedagogical variation in the way Advaita 

Vedanta is thematically presented will be welcomed by the 

readers. 

—Arvind Sharma 

INTRODUCTION 

Religion, Philosophy and Advaita Vedanta 

I. Religion and Philosophy in India and the West 

It might be helpful to say a few words about the nature of 

philosophy as it is pursued in India, prior to providing an 

introduction to the school of Indian philosophy known as 

Advaita Vedanta. 

Both Western and Indian philosophers admit that the 

nature of the relationship between philosophy and religion 

follows a different pattern in Western and Indian civilization 

but they tend to differ in their assessment of the significance 

of this divergence. Both accept that philosophy essentially 

consists of a rational investigation into the nature of Reality. 

The nature of the Reality, however, also constitutes, in its own 

way, the subject matter of religion, so the nature of the 

relationship between the two needs to be considered. 

A relationship between religion and philosophy is 

considered peripheral in Western culture for historical and 

philosophical reasons. In the West, philosophy represents an 

intellectual movement which first distinguished itself from 

theology and then proceeded to achieve an independent 

status. This meant that the attitude of Western philosophy 

towards religion came to be marked by indifference, aversion 

and perhaps even rejection. Such a development did not occur 

within Indian culture. Thus, although the distinction between 

philosophy and religion can also be drawn in the Indian 

context, such a distinction therein tends to be analytical 

without being antagonistic. It can even be claimed that the 

4 

Advaila Vedanta 

two, even when they become dual, remain undivided. 

Moreover, the distinction between philosophy and religion 

in the West additionally rests on the distinction between reason 

and faith, with reason constituting the cornerstone of 

philosophy and faith that of religion. This distinction is 

strengthened by the fact that the results of faith are typically 

accessible only posthumously, while the results of rational 

investigation are typically available here and now. 

A separation of philosophy and religion is intellectually 

approved of in the West, as this allows for the pursuit of 

philosophical truths untrammelled by religious scruples. Many 

Indian thinkers, however, take a different view of the matter. 

According to them this divorce of philosophy from religion 

runs the risk of reducing philosophy to a merely intellectual 

pastime, far removed from the kind of ultimate concern which 

should ideally characterise philosophy. In this context they 

make a further point: that although the claims made by Indian 

philosophy may sometimes seem to possess a religious nature, 

they are attainable within this life, and are therefore, in 

principle, verifiable. 

The successful attainment of such results is characterised 

by the term jivanmukti. Not all schools of either Indian 

philosophy, or of Hindu philosophy, make such a claim but 

Advaita Vedanta does'—along with the Hindu systems of 

Sarikhya and Yoga. The claim also characterises much of 

Buddhist and Jaina thought. The term jivanmukti is often 

translated as living liberation, as the word mukti means liberation 

and jivan means while living. The idea underlying jivanmukti 

thus seems to be that one can attain the results of one’s faith 

while still living in this world. There is no reason in principle 

why faith in reason could not also represent such faith. 

These ideas contrast, perhaps even sharply, with those 

found in the thought of other religious systems such as those 

of Christianity and Islam. In Christianity and Islam, specifically 

in their more traditional versions of Catholicism and Sunni 

Islam, the benefits of faith are to be enjoyed in a post-mortem 

Religion, Philosophy and Advaita Vedanta 

5 

existence. That is to say, one does not experience the results 

of one’s faith until after death, or perhaps not even until 

the Day of Judgement, which takes place not at the time of 

one’s death but at the end of the world or of Time itself. 

This leads to the curious situation that one of the questions 

critically debated in those traditions which accept jivanmukti 

is What happens to the liberated one after his or her death” 

rather than “What happens after death”! The grand question 

is not what happens after death as in Christianity and Islam, 

but what happens to the liberated person after his or her 

death. 

It is clear that the concept of faith itself also carries very 

different connotations in the schools which accept jivanmukti, 

compared with those of the West. In schools which accept 

jivanmukti, faith is understood as faith pending realization - it 

denotes the trust one must have in order to undertake an 

experiment, but the outcome of the experiment is 

independent of such faith. It is even possible that the revealed 

results might contribute towards strengthening faith, just as 

one’s faith in science is strengthened when one experimentally 

discovers that water is made of two gases. 

It is in the light of these considerations that Indian thinkers 

take a more positive view of the fact that philosophy and religion 

have not been sundered in India, as in the West. This atdtude 

is also reflected in their treatment of Advaita Vedanta. 

To recapitulate: Philosophy in the Western world consists 

of rational investigation into the nature of reality. For Indian 

philosophers, however, philosophy in the Western world is 

only half of what it should be. They like to say that Western 

philosophy is a purely intellectual activity, and that in the West 

religion and philosophy have been broken apart. In the West, 

then, reason is opposed to faith. This split, they argue, has 

not occurred in the Indian tradition. Thus many schools of 

thought in the Indian religious traditions feel no awkwardness, 

embarrassment or self-consciousness in discussing the ultimate 

nature of reality both from a philosophical and a religious 

perspective. Advaita Vedanta is one such school. 

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Advaita Vedanta 

II. Advaita Vedanta and other Schools of Indian Thought 

Since religion cannot be completely overlooked when 

dealing with philosophy in the Indian context, it is useful to 

draw a distinction between Indian religions and Indie 

religions. The term Indian religions refers to all the religions 

found in India such as Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, 

Sikhism, Judaism, Zoroastrianism, Christianity, Islam and so 

on. The term Indie religions, by contrast, is used to refer 

only to the religions of Indian origin collectively, namely 

Hinduism, Ruddhism, Jainism and Sikhism. Indian 

philosophy, again by contrast, is classically taken to refer to 

the philosophical systems which characterise the Indie 

religions. 

In one classification, which has gained wide acceptance 

since 1900 when it was adopted by Max Mueller, Indian 

philosophy includes nine schools of Indian thought. 2 A school 

of philosophy in India known as darsana, a word which may 

be translated in several ways. It is derived from the verbal 

root which means to see, thereby yielding such meanings as 

insights into reality or worldviews. These nine systems are further 

classified into the non-orthodox and orthodox systems of 

Indian thought as follows: 

Indian Philosophy ( Darsana ) 

Non-Orthodox schools 

of Hindu thought 

Nastika (3) 

Indian Materialism 

Buddhism 

Jainism 

Orthodox Schools of 

Hindu thought 

Astika (6) 

Nyaya 

Vaisesika 

Sankhya 

Yoga 

Mimarhsa 

Vedanta 

Asti in the word astika above means yes and na in the word 

nastika changes the meaning into no. The three non¬ 

orthodox schools of Indie thought do not accept Vedic 

Religion, Philosophy and Advaita Vedanta 

7 

authority; to be nastika is to say no to the Vedas. Astika, then, 

means saying yes to the Vedas. Among the six schools which 

accept Vedic authority, the first four, that is Nyaya, Vaisesika, 

Sankhya and Yoga, indeed accept the authority of the Vedas 

but they do so basically a posteriori rather than a priori. The 

last two schools of Mlmarhsa and Vedanta, however, actually 

base themselves on the Vedas. 

It is obvious that orthodoxy here has been defined from a 

Hindu perspective, and the acceptance of the authority of 

the Vedas, the foundational scriptures of Hinduism, has been 

identified as its hallmark. It should now be added that the 

Mlmarhsa and Vedanta schools are to be further 

distinguished from the above-mentioned astika schools in 

that they not only acknowledge the authority of, but also 

base their teachings on the Vedas. Therefore, in order to 

understand these schools, it is important to understand the 

traditional view of the Vedas. 

The term Veda comes from the root vid, which means to 

know, as in video (to know visually). The Vedas are said to 

have been revealed to or seen by the sages. It is traditionally 

understood that the Vedas are not works of human authors. 

This idea also exists in the Islamic tradition, where the Qur’an 

is understood to have been received by the Prophet Muhammad 

frpm God. In Hindu Vedantic thought, however, even God is 

eliminated as the author. The Vedas are woven into the fabric 

and texture of the universe, which is eternal. This in turn 

means that the Vedas are eternal, and are periodically 

discovered, and not created or invented. 

The Vedas have never been formalised into a closed canon, 

although a certain degree of informal consensus does exist. 

This uncertainty has the subtle effect of making the person 

who speaks with authority more influential than the text. 

Because the Vedas are numerous and the canon loosely 

defined, it stands to reason that one would turn to a person 

Who has experienced jivanmukti for authoritative opinion, 

4'ather than sift through a mass of confusing, indeterminate, 

tecl sometimes contradictory information. 

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Advaila Vedanta 

The Vedas are four in number. Each of the four Vedas 

(Rg, Sama, Yajur, Atharva) can be divided into four different 

layers, just as the Christian Bible ran be divided into two 

layers, the Old Testament and the New. Judaism and 

Christianity differ in that they do not accept the same layer 

as authoritative. In a somewhat similar fashion, Mlmarhsa 

thought regards the earlier parts of the Vedas as of primary 

importance, whereas Vedanta accords greater authority to 

the last layer, consisting of the Upanisads. The Upanisads, 

according to Vedanta, mark the consummation of all the 

previous layers, and thereby reveal the final truth contained 

in the Vedas. 

The basis of the classification of the darsanas, or schools of 

thought, provided above was textual, the text involved being 

the Veda. The point however should not be overstated. As 

already noted, the word astika comes from the verbal root 

which literally means to be or yes it is\ which means that these 

schools have responded with a yes to the question: “do you 

accept the authority of the Vedas?” The six astika schools: 

Nyaya, Vaisesika, Sarikhya, Yoga, Mlmarhsa and Vedanta were 

mentioned earlier. It was also mentioned that the first four 

of these, although they accept Vedic authority, do not base 

.their teaching on the Vedas. These schools simply 

acknowledge the authority of the Vedas, and then proceed to 

go on and do what they like. Because the corpus of Vedic 

scripture is vast, one could justify almost any view, and 

therefore nominally acknowledge the authority of these texts. 

Thus acceptance of Vedic authority is not as binding for 

philosophical purposes as it is for social cohesion. Hence the 

four schools are listed before the two schools of Mlmarhsa and 

Vedanta because they accept Vedic authority only nominally 

and after the three non-orthodox schools because 

nevertheless they do accept it, instead of rejecting the Vedas 

like the three non-orthodox schools. 

III. A Philosophical Explanation of the Classification 

It is also possible to provide a more philosophical justification 

Religion, Philosophy and Advaita Vedanta 

9 

for the nature and order of this system of classification- 

specially from the perspective of Advaita Vedanta, the subject 

of our study. This has to do with the concept of the self or 

atman, which plays such a key role in Advaita Vedanta that 

the system itself has been referred to as atmadvaita. 

One can detect a pattern in the progression of thought 

through these nine schools, if one examines their concept 

of the atman, the self or soul. The materialists believe that 

natural elements suffice to give rise to consciousness in 

human beings. As materialism does not acknowledge an 

atman, the materialists encourage people to live for the 

moment, for death is final. They believe in happiness 

through materialism, in keeping with the maxim: “eat, drink 

and be merry.” Buddhism also does not acknowledge an 

atman but it accepts allied concepts such as a belief in the 

cycle of rebirth. Jainism accepts an atman, but it is considered 

coextensive with the physical body. Nyaya and Vaisesika also 

believe in an atman. However, in these systems although the 

atman does exist, it cannot exhibit consciousness 

independently of accessories, that is, by itself. Sankhya and 

Yoga also believe in an independent atman. But they also 

posit a strict dualism between matter and spirit, although 

the two are not on par. Matter is subservient to spirit and all 

matter is integrated into one category. (In other schools 

matter, is sometimes split into different ultimate parts.) 

However, in these systems, all atmans retain their individuality 

to the very end. They do not merge into one. The concept 

of atman in Advaita Vedanta, however, unites all entities in 

the realm of the spirit into Brahman, just as Sankhya and 

Yoga unite all entities in the realm of matter into prakrti. 

The school of Advaita Vedanta thus arguably represents a 

Culmination of the underlying philosophical thrust around 

the concept of the atman or self as found in Indian philosophy. 

TV. Another Philosophical Explanation of the Classification 

Another philosophical justification of classification can be 

found in the attitudes of the various schools towards the 

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Advaita Vedanta 

relationship between the realms of matter and spirit. Both 

matter and consciousness are equally given in human 

experience: we see material objects all around us, and it is 

immaterial consciousness which enables us to be aware of 

them. 

Since both matter and spirit in this sense are empirically 

given, three fundamental philosophical positions can be 

postulated on this point: (1) that it is matter alone which is 

the ultimate reality, consciousness being its epi-phenomenon, 

a position which may be characterised as materialism, (2) that 

both matter and spirit constitute ultimate reality in their own 

right, a position which may be described as that of 

fundamental dualism (3) or that spirit alone is ultimately real, 

matter being its byproduct, a position which may be 

characterised as idealism. 

In terms of this schema, the classification of the nine schools 

starts with materialism, then moves through the fundamentally 

dualistic schools which accept the reality of both matter and 

spirit, to end with Vedanta which is idealistic in its orientation, 

Advaita Vedanta being specially so. 

V. Advaita Vedanta: What Does it Mean? 

Let us begin with the word Advaita itself, which perhaps 

appears formidably foreign when first encountered. It can 

however be de-exoticised quite easily with the help of a 

brief foray into philology. It can be broken up as a-dvaita. 

The initial a here has the same meaning as the letter a in 

ahistorical, that is, of negating what follows. Thus just as 

ahistorical means not-historical, a-dvaita means rcot-dvaita. 

But what does dvaita mean? This word is etymologically 

connected with the English word dual - a connection which 

can be phonetically heard if one says the two words dvaita 

and dual out aloud. The word dvaita, moreover, not only 

sounds like dual, but shares its meaning as well. Thus dvaita 

means dualism or twoness. 

The word advaita ( a-dvaita ) thus means not-two or non¬ 

dual. 

Religion, Philosophy and Advaita Veddnla 1 1 

The word is however an adjective — so the question arises: 

what is it being applied to? In other words, what is it about 

which this claim is being made that it is not two ? 

So let us put the word advaita on hold for a moment and 

tty to find out what the word which it qualifies means; namely, 

Vedanta. The two can then be brought together again to 

reveal their meaning in its fullness. 

The word Vedanta might also, like the word advaita , 

appear forbiddingly alien at first sight. But once again it yields 

its meaning easily with the help of a mercifully brief excursion 

into philology. 

The word Vedanta is made of two words - veda + anta. 

The word Veda is derived from a root which means to knoio — 

the same root which appears in three English words: wit, 

wisdom and video, that is, to know intelligently (wit); to know 

sagely (wisdom) and to know visually (video). The word Veda, 

derived from the same root vid (to know) as noticed earlier, 

denotes wisdom, that is to say, spiritual wisdom, and by 

implication the texts which embody such wisdom. Thus it is 

that the sacred scriptures of the Hindus are called the Vedas, 

just as the sacred scripture of the Christians is known as the 

Bible, and of the Muslims as the Qur’an. Note that unlike the 

Bible and the Qur’an, the word Veda often takes a plural 

ending. This is so because traditionally one speaks of the 

four Vedas, a fact also noticed earlier. Sometimes, however, 

the word Veda is also used in the singular to refer to the 

Vedas collectively. The fact that, even to begin with, 

Hinduism possesses four sacred books and not just one tells 

us something about the inherently plural ethos of the 

tradition. 

Not only are the Vedas four in number, four layers can be 

identified in each of them. The following chart may help 

clarify the picture in this respect. 

12 

Advaita Vedanta 

Vedas 

Rg Yajur Sama Atharva 

Mantra or 

Sarhhitd — — — — 

Brahmana — — — — 

Aranyaka — — — — 

Upanisad — — — — 

Each of the Vedas contains (1) hymns (many shared by 

them in common) in praise of the gods; (2) prose explanations 

of the ritual use of these hymns; (3) reflections on the 

significance of ritual and (4) secret texts meant to 

communicate the highest mysteries which go beyond ritual 

into the realm of spiritual knowledge. These layers are 

respectively called (1) mantra or samhitd (i.e. hymns, or 

collections of hymns); (2) brahmana (i.e. authoritative 

utterances of priests); (3) aranyakas (i.e. forest-books) and 

(4) upanisads (or mystic texts revealed to disciples as they 

sat up close to the masters). 

The rest of our presentation will focus on the upanisads. 

Because they come at the end of the Vedas, or constitute the 

last of the four layers, they are also called Vedanta, that is, 

Veda’s end. The word anta in Sanskrit has the same meaning 

as the English word end. 

The texts which constitute the Upanisads, or Vedanta, deal 

with the central issues of philosophy: what is the ultimate 

reality about the universe around us and about us who are 

asking this question? And what is the ultimate nature of this 

ultimate reality? 

The Upanisads, (more than two hundred of which have 

been identified, among which close to a dozen or more are 

considered major ones) do not offer, at least on the face of it, 

a single answer to these questions. They are closer to being 

works of religious inspiration than systematic treatises on 

Religion, Philosophy and Advaila Vedanta 

13 

theology, and the inspired statements found therein lend 

themselves to many interpretations. Thus different schools 

of philosophy arose in India out of an attempt to present 

their teachings in a systematic way. These various schools of 

philosophy are known as schools of Vedanta, and they differ 

in their interpretation regarding the final teaching of the 

Upanisads. Thus questions such as: is the ultimate reality 

ultimately personal or impersonal in nature? are answered 

differently by these schools. Similarly, the schools differ in 

the answer they come up with to such questions as: what is 

the relationship of the ultimate reality ( Brahman) to the 

world, or what does Realization consist of. 

Advaita Vedanta is one such school of Vedanta. It is 

labeled Advaita because it does not ultimately regard either 

us or the universe as different from the ultimately reality - 

they are not-two. It prefers to call them not-two rather than 

one. because not-two implies a lack of fundamental division 

to begin with, whereas one may imply the coming together 

of two items that are in fact apart. Hence it prefers to speak 

in terms of an “undivided” ( a-dvaita ) Reality, in preference 

to one Reality, because according to it the positing of such a 

fundamental division is itself a product of error. 

Are all living beings ultimately identical with Brahman ? Is 

the universe also identical with it? Is there any difference 

between the way the living beings are identical with Brahman 

compared to the way the universe is? If the ultimate reality 

is a single undivided Reality, what reality do the different 

things and different people around us possess? Are they 

defilements or embellishments, and how can they exist 

without involving duality on the part of an undivided reality? 

The school of Advaita Vedanta tries its best to answer these 

questions by relying (1) on revelation, (2) on reason and 

(8) on the teachings of those who are said to be living 

embodiments of the Realization of Brahman or the ultimate 

Reality. 

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PART I  Advaita Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 

The scriptural approach relies on scriptural authority as the 

basis for the claims it makes regarding the nature of the 

ultimate reality. This reality is regularly referred to in the 

Upanisads as Brahman. 

The Upanisads, however, make several pronouncements 

regarding the nature of the objective world, the nature of 

the individual subject and the nature of the ultimate reality 

{Brahman), with the result that “there are great, almost 

insurmountable difficulties in deciding what exactly is the 

teaching of the Upanisads in certain important respects. This 

accounts for the emergence in later times of diverse schools 

of Vedanta, all of which claim to propound the Upanisadic 

teaching”. 3 It is also worth adding that: 

The vagueness of Upanishadic teaching is 

particularly in reference to the relation of 

Brahman to the individual soul on the one hand, 

and to the physical universe on the other. 

Though... statements about their identity are many 

and prominent, those distinguishing them are not 

altogether wanting. The first problem to solve for 

any one attempting to systematize the teaching of 

the Upanishads is accordingly to harmonize these 

two sets of statements. 4 

Each system of Vedanta has evolved its own method of 

harmonizing these statements on the underlying assumption 

(contained in Brahmasiitra 1.1.4) that these Upanisadic 

teachings have to be understood in a unified way. Advaita 

18 

Advaita Vedanta 

Vedanta, as a system of Vedanta, has devised its own 

understanding of the Upanisads in keeping with this 

assumption. 

it was noted above that the Upanisads seem to contain 

two streams of thought: one which recognizes the diversity 

of the objective universe, the subjective individual and the 

ultimate reality ( Brahman) and another which emphasizes 

their unity. The great exponent of Advaita Vedanta : 

Sarhkara recognizes, that there arc two streams of 

thought in the Upanishads; but he thinks that one 

of them, viz. that which affirms the reality of 

diversity, is only a concession to empirical modes 

of thought. All diversity being thus only 

conditionally true, the only teaching of the 

Upanishads, according to him, is that of unity. 

Since, however, there can be no unity apart from 

variety, he does not describe his teaching as 

monism but only as “non-dualism” ( advaita ). 5 

How, it might now be asked, does Sankara achieve such a 

result? 

He achieves this outcome through an exegetical 

manoeuvre according to which the Upanisads are said to 

contain certain key statements called mahavakyas, and 

through the subsequent claim that their teachings as a whole 

are to be understood through the lens of these seminal 

utterances. It is like claiming that if one wants to understand 

the New Testament, this is best done in the light of the 

overarching statement that ‘Jesus is the Messiah”. All other 

parts of the New Testament which do not directly confirm 

this—as when Jesus asks Peter: who do you think I am?—or 

when Jesus wonders on the cross whether God has forsaken 

him—are all to be understood subject to the mahavakya : 

“Jesus is the Messiah”. 

These mahavakyas , in the light of which the Upanisads 

should be understood according to the hermeneutical 

tradition of Advaita Vedanta, are the following: 

Advaita Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 

19 

I. All this is verily Brahman. 

II. I am Brahman. 

III. This Atman is Brahman. 

IV. That thou art. 

To this a fifth is sometimes added: 

V. Brahman is spirit (or consciousness). 

These statements, however, need to be understood with 

extreme exegetical care, for they can be easily 

misunderstood. Indeed these rnahavakyas are accepted as 

authoritative by other schools of Vedanta as well, so it is not 

so much the fact of singling out these statements as 

rnahavakyas as their understanding within Advaita Vedanta, 

which sets this system apart from other schools of Vedanta. 6 

All This is Verily Brahman 

The reader will, for instance, note that this first statement 

identifies the objective universe with Brahman. The reader 

will also note that the second statement (I am Brahman) 

identifies the individual with Brahman. However, the exact 

manner in which the objective universe is held to be identical 

with the Brahman ; and the individual subject (or jiva is held 

to be identical with Brahman, are not identical. 

Before explaining this difference, it is necessary 

to draw attention to an important distinction 

between two types of illusion in common 

experience. A person may fancy that he sees a 

serpent at a distance, while closer scrutiny reveals 

to him that it is only a rope. The latter or 

correcting knowledge, like practically all 

knowledge of the kind, affirms the existence of 

something; but it contradicts that object as which 

(i.e., serpent) that something appeared before. 

He says to himself or feels when he discovers his 

error: “It is a rope, not a serpent.” Again a person 

looking at a white conch through a sheet of yellow 

glass, of whose existence he is not aware, takes it 

20 

Advaila Vedanta 

to be yellow. But a suitable change in his 

standpoint will disclose to him that the yellowness 

belongs to the glass and not to the conch. Here 

also, as in the previous case, the later knowledge 

affirms the existence of some reality; unlike it, 

however, it does not deny the object as which it 

appeared, viz. the conch, but only an aspect of it - 

its yellowness. He still sees it as a conch, but only 

adds that it is white and not yellow. The illusion in 

the first case consists in mistaking a given object 

for another that is not given; in the second, it 

consists merely in attributing to an object which is 

given, a feature that does not really belong to it, 

though it also is presented at the time. But for the 

interposition of the sheet of glass (upadhi) to which 

the yellow actually belongs, there would be no 

illusion at all in the latter case. Now these types of 

illusions serve to illustrate the difference in the 

manner in which, according to Sankara, one and 

the same Brahman comes to appear both as the 

world and as the individual self (jiva). It gives rise 

to the illusion of the world, as the rope does to 

that of a serpent in the first example. 7 

The relationship of the jiva to Brahman, however, must 

be explained with the help of the other example, for the 

‘Jiva is not false or illusory as the world is.” 8 Rather it is “its 

limitations which are false,” 9 and “these limitations, which 

are really its empirical adjuncts, appeared transferred to it, 

as in our second example of illusions, the yellowness of the 

glass appeared transferred to the conch.” 10 As a result: 

The ultimate truth, as realised by a jivanmukta, 

denies the world while affirming the underlying 

reality of Brahman which is given in all 

presentations as positive being (sat) and with which 

we may therefore be said to be constantly, though 

not consciously, in touch. The individual self, on 

Advaita Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 

21 

the other hand, is not illusory in this sense. It is 

Brahman itself appearing through media or 

limiting adjuncts ( upadhi) like the internal organ 

( antahkarana ) which, we may state by the way, are 

all elements pertaining to the physical world and, 

as such, are illusory. Or, to state the same 

otherwise, the individual self when seen sub specie 

aeternitatis, is Brahman itself. When this fact is 

realized in one’s own experience, what is denied 

is not the jivci as a spiritual entity, but only certain 

aspects of it, such as its fmitude and its separateness 

from other selves. Its conception may thereby 

become profoundly transformed, but the 

important point is that it is not negated ( badhita ) 

in the same way in which the physical world is. It 

is, on the other hand, reaffirmed, though only as 

Brahman. We cannot thereby say that the 

individual self is false ( mithya ), as we may that the 

world is false. We can only say that it is not truly 

the agent, the enjoyer, etc." 

The overall picture which emerges on the basis of this 

discussion may be presented succinctly as follows: 

We now know the advaitic world-view in general. 

Brahman is the sole reality, and it appears both as 

the objective universe and as the individual subject. 

The former is an illusory manifestation of 

Brahman, while the latter is Brahman itself 

appearing under the limitations which form part 

of that illusory universe. 12 

I am Brahman 

The second statement, “I am Brahman” must now be 

examined in more detail. The subjective individual - the I - 

is regularly referred to in Advaita as the jivdtman, or jiva for 

short. The importance of this compound form will become 

clear at the end of this exposition, although the term 

22 

Advaila Vedanta 

jivatman will be referred to as jiva, during the exposition for 

the sake of brevity. 

In the case of the distinction between the first two 

mahavakyas —one which identified the Brahman with the 

universe and the other which identified it with the jiva —it 

turned out to be the case that although both were said to be 

identical with Brahman, the exact nature of this identity was 

not identical. The clue to the understanding of the second 

mundvakya and the kind of identity it involves is provided by 

the fact that although the jiva is referred to as anddi, or 

beginningless, from both an empirical and a transcendental 

point of view, this “beginninglessness” in the two cases is not 

identical in nature. 

It was noted earlier that the notion of the jiva is “that of a 

complex ( visista ), and points not only to an element which 

is identical with Brahman, but also to limiting adjuncts like 

the internal organs.” 1 ’ It is important to keep this in mind as 

we proceed. The empirical reality about the jiva consists of 

the fact that it is caught up in the process of samsara, bound 

by its karma, or actions. 

Here no doubt, a question will be asked as to when 

the responsibility for what one does first occurred. 

But such a question is really inadmissible, for it 

takes for granted that there was a time when the 

self was without any disposition whatsoever. Such 

a view of the self is an abstraction as meaningless 

as that of mere disposition which characterises no 

one. The self, as ordinarily known to us, always 

means a self with a certain stock of dispositions; 

and this fact is indicated in Indian expositions by 

describing karma as beginningless (anddi). It 

means that no matter how far back we trace the 

history of an individual, we shall never arrive at a 

stage when he was devoid of all character. 14 

This is one sense in which the jiva is anddi, or beginning¬ 

less. The other sense in which it is anddi, or beginningless, 

Advaita Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 

23 

may be identified by asking the question: does the jlva, in its 

true, nature, undergo any change in the process of being 

involved in the universe? In this context: 

It is desirable to distinguish further between actual 

and apparent change. Actual change ( parinama) 

signifies that when a particular thing is destroyed, 

it does not disappear entirely. A rope when pulled 

to pieces remains as fibres. A pot, when broken, 

exists as potsherds. In apparent transformation 

( vivarta ), on the other hand, the disappearance 

is complete. When the illusion of “serpent” is 

overcome, there will be nothing of zHeft. It remains 

only to add that the jiva is not an effect in either 

of these senses. It is not a real transformation, nor 

even an illusory appearance of Brahman, so that 

no principle of causation is at all involved there. If 

we yet speak of the individual self as born, we only 

mean that its adjuncts like the physical body come 

into being and not the spiritual element in it. 

Hence the jiva is described as beginningless 

( anadi ). It is, as already indicated. Brahman 

appearing in an empirical dress. 15 

The distinction between the nature of this example with 

the one cited earlier should be noted. In the first example 

the difference between the two illusions—of the rope-snake 

and tinted-conch—consisted of the fact that while in the 

case of the rope-snake, what is not given at all (snake) was 

taken as given, in the case of the tinted-conch, only a feature 

of the conch, the yellow-tint was taken as given when not 

given. The conch as such is given forever, and because it is 

'given for ever, no concept of change, whether apparent or 

actual, applies to it. It is not the argument that the white 

conch was transformed into a yellow conch and when the 

error was discovered, was transformed back into a white 

conch, when the yellow colour was removed. The yellow colour 

was never part of the conch. 

24 

Advaita Vedanta 

Anything which is beginninglessness is assumed under 

normal philosophical assumpdons to be endless, i.e. eternal. 

So we discover that the jiva is eternal in two senses: (1) It is 

eternal in the sense that it is part of sarhsara which, as a 

process is eternal, (2) it is etemalin the sense that it is identical 

with Brahman , which is eternal. It is perhaps because it is 

eternal in both the senses that it can be referred to as ji.va.tman. 

As the permanently still witness to its eternally fluctuating 

fortunes the jivdlman is known as the sdksi or witness; the 

permanent as the witness of the constant. 

But this leads to the view that there can be two kinds of 

eternalities. Such indeed is the case. 

In Indian philosophy two kinds of eternity are 

distinguished, a) kutastha nityata and b) 

pravaharupa nityata. A thing is kutastha nitya if it is 

unchanged forever, while a thing is pravaharupa 

nitya if though incessantly changing it does not 

alter its pattern ( niyati ). Roughly speaking, a rock, 

for example, has the former kind of reality, and a 

river the latter kind. The nature of a river is to 

flow incessantly, and so long as it does not swerve 

from this nature of its, it may be said to be mutably 

real ; though not enduringly real as a rock. 16 

The jiva part of jivatman partakes of pravaharupa-nityata, 

and the atman element in it partakes of kutastha-nityata. 

Thus when it is said that “I am Brahman”, it is not the jiva 

but the atman element of the complex which is referred to. 

Be it also noted that the statement “aham brahma asmi,” (I 

am Brahman) while it may lead to the conviction that all 

spirit is one, “leaves out of account the entire physical 

universe” 17 , thereby indicating the importance of the first 

mahavdkya. 

Atman is Brahman 

We turn now to the third mahavdkya : that atman is Brahman. 

Advaita Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 

25 

One may begin by recognizing the importance of this 

identification in the light of Vedic and Upanisadic literature. 

M. Hiriyanna writes: 

Thus Brahman means the eternal principle as 

realized in the world as a whole; and atman, the 

inmost essence of one’s own self. These two 

conceptions—Brahman and atman—are of great 

importance and occur not only independently in 

the literature of this period, but are sometimes 

corelated with each other; and their parallelism is 

pointed out by representing the self of the world 

as related to the physical universe in the same 

manner in which the individual self is related to 

the body. Thus in Atharva Veda, the universal self 

or world-soul is stated to have “the earth for its 

feet, the atmospheric region for its belly, the sky 

for its head, the sun and moon for its eyes and the 

wind for its breath.” 18 

He then goes on to say: 

The two conceptions are also sometimes identified; 

and it is this happy identification of them that 

constitutes the essential teaching of the 

Upanishads. They mean that the principle 

underlying the world as a whole, and that which 

forms the essence of man, are ultimately the same. 

Here ended the long Indian quest for the 

pervasive cause of all things—the search, as the 

Upanishads express it, for “that by knowing which 

all will be known.” Passages descriptive of Brahman 

alone or of atman alone occur frequently in the 

Upanishads; but they are not peculiar to them, 

being also found in the earlier literature. Their 

explicit identification, on the other hand, is 

specifically Upanishadic. 19 

What, however, is the philosophical importance of this 

identification apart from its textual significance? 

26 

Advaita Vedanta 

The answer to this question is best provided by the 

perspective that the search for the ultimate reality in the 

Upanisads followed two routes: an external route and an 

internal route. The external approach was represented by 

the search for the ultimate ground of the external universe. 

The following passage from the Upanisads provides a glimpse 

of such an approach in operation: 

The regressus to Brahma, the ultimate world-ground. 

Then Gargi Vacaknavl questioned him. Yajhavalkya, said 

she, since all this world is woven, warp and woof, on water, on 

what, pray, is the water woven, warp and woof? 

‘On wind, O Gargi.’ 

‘On what then, pray, is the wind woven, warp and woof?’ 

‘On the atmosphere-worlds, O Gargi.’ 

‘On what then, pray, are the atmosphere-worlds woven, 

warp and woof?’ 

‘On the worlds of the Gandharvas, O Gargi.’ 

‘On what then, pray, are the worlds of the Gandharvas 

woven, warp and woof?’ 

‘On the worlds of the sun, O Gargi.’ 

‘On what then, pray, are the worlds of the sun woven, 

warp and woof?’ 

‘On the worlds of the moon, O Gargi.’ 

‘On what then, pray, are the worlds of the moon woven, 

warp and woof?’ 

‘On the worlds of the stars, O Gargi.’ 

‘On what then, pray, are the worlds of the stars woven, 

warp and woof?’ 

‘On the worlds of the Gods, O Gargi.’ 

‘On what then, pray, are the worlds of the Gods woven, 

warp and woof?’ 

‘On the worlds of Indra, O Gargi.’ 

‘On what then, pray, are the worlds of Indra woven, warp 

and woof ?’ 

‘On the worlds of Prajapati, O Gargi.’ 

‘On what then, pray, are the worlds of Prajapati woven, 

warp and woof?’ 

Advaita Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 

27 . 

'On the worlds of Brahma, O GargT.’ 

‘On what then, pray, are the worlds of Brahma woven, 

warp and woof?’ 

Yajnavalkya said: ‘GargT, do not question too much, lest 

your head fall off. In truth, you are questioning too much 

about a divinity about which further questions cannot be 

asked. GargT, do not over-question.’ 

Thereupon GargT VacaknavT held her peace. 20 

The internal route took the form of the search for the 

ultimate ground of one’s being or personality. 

But what was the essential self of man? The term 

introduced into Vedic inquiry was the common 

word for “self,” atman, used generally as a reflexive 

pronoun. From this general usage, atman was given 

a more specific meaning as the essential part of 

man, his basic reality. At times this was taken to be 

the body or the trunk of the body as distinguished 

from the limbs. Gradually, however, the atman was 

distinguished from the gross physical body; it was 

the inner self, the principle or entity that gave man 

his essential nature. 21 

The following Upanisadic passage (Brhadaranyaka 

Upanisad IV. 1-6) also provides a useful scriptural if simple 

illustration of this kind of an internal approach. 

The light of man is the soul 

1. Yajnavalkya came to Janaka, [king] of Videha. He 

thought to himself: I will not talk. 

But [once] when Janaka, [king] of Videha, and 

Yajnavalkya were discussing together at an Agnihotra, 

Yajnavalkya granted the former a boon. He chose 

asking whatever question he wished. He granted it to 

him. So [now] the king, [speaking] first, asked him” 

2. Yajnavalkya, what light does a person here have? 

He has the light of the sun, 0 king, he said, ‘for with the 

28 

Advaita Vedanta 

3. 

sun, indeed, as in his light one sits, moves around, 

does his work, and returns.’ 

‘Quite so, Yajnavalkya. 

‘But when the sun has set, Yajnavalkya, what light does 

a person here have?’ 

‘The moon, indeed, is his light,’ said he, ‘for the 

1 i 1 ww 11 

in his 

4. 

does his work, and returns.’ 

‘Quite so, Yajnavalkya. 

‘But when the sun has set, and the moon has set, what 

light does a person here have?’ 

‘Fire, indeed, is his light,’ said he, ‘for with fire, 

indeed, as in his light one sits, moves around, does his 

work, and returns.’ 

‘Quite so, Yajnavalkya. 

But when the sun has set, Yajnavalkya, and the moon 

has set, and the fire has gone out, what light does a 

person here have?’ 

‘Speech, indeed, is his light,’ said he, ‘for with speech, 

indeed, as in his light one sits, moves around, does his 

work, and returns. Therefore, verily O king, where 

one does not discern even his own hands, when a voice 

is raised, then one goes straight towards it.’ 

‘Quite so, Yajnavalkya. 

But when the sun has set, Yajnavalkya, and the moon 

has set, and the fire has gone out, and speech is 

hushed, what light does a person here have?’ 

‘The soul ( atman ), indeed, is his light,’ said he, ‘for with 

the soul, indeed, as in his light one sits, moves around, 

does his work, and returns. 22 

Elsewhere in the Upanisads a more detailed analysis of 

the human personality is carried out in an attempt to identify 

the atman. One such analysis is characterised by its division 

of the human person into five sheaths, while another focuses 

on the states of consciousness experienced by the human 

being. 

Advaita Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 

29 

The Taittinya Upanisad (2. 1-6) speaks of the five sheaths 

or kosas, which the human personality may be said to consist 

of. “In this passage an attempt is made to analyze man at five 

levels—proceeding from the grosser forms to the subtler, 

and, therefore, more real forms. The real man transcends 

the physical, vital, mental, and intellectual aspects and even 

the beatific aspect. It is in the end suggested that the real 

self of man is identical with Brahman, the ultimate principle, 

the absolute, which is its raison d’etre’.”" 

Similarly, in another account ( Chandogya Upanisad 8: 7- 

12) “the real essential self is successively identified with the 

bodily self, the dream self, and the self in deep sleep, and it 

is suggested that all these three teachings are quite 

inadequate, for none of the three conditions, namely, of 

wakefulness, of dream and of deep sleep, can the nature of 

the self be said to conform.” 24 The point is pressed that “the 

real self is neither body, mind nor complete negation of 

consciousness. The self is certainly conscious but of nothing 

else but itself. It is pure self consciousness as such and it is in 

this condition that it is identical with the highest reality.” 25 

This picture is fully elaborated in the Mandukya Upanisad} 6 

State of Consciousness 

State of Self 

Waking 

Vaisvanara 

Dreaming 

Taijasa 

Deep Sleep 

Prajna 

The Fourth 

Atman 

In the foregoing passages one notices how, as a result of 

going inward within the human personality, the Upanisadic 

seers identified the Atman, as the real self, whether such an 

exercise focused on the constituents of the self (as in the 

case of the five sheaths) or on the states of consciousness 

experienced by the self (namely waking, dreaming and deep 

sleep). One needs to remind oneself now that as a result of 

going outward into the universe, the Upanisadic seers 

identified its real basis as Brahman, while looking inward the 

30 

Advaita Vedanta 

Upanisadic thinker realised the inner self to be Atman}' 

Now the great discovery the Upanisads made was of the 

identity of the ground of the universe with the ground of 

our own being. Ainslie Embree elaborates this point with 

the help of three passages cited below. In the first he 

describes the quest of the ultimate ground of the objective 

universe, in the second of the individual subject. The two 

are brought together in the final passage. 

1) In their quest for some ultimate ground for the 

world of natural phenomena, of time and space, 

and of human existence, the Upanishadic sages 

came to the conception of brahman, an 

undeniable, impersonal, unknowable power. 28 

2) Over against the questions concerning the 

ground of the external world are to be set those 

that probe inward, asking what is meant by the 

concept of the Self. The Self could be identified 

with the physical body, or “food,” as some of the 

Upanishadic thinkers were inclined to say. But 

consciousness, breath, will, all had claims to be 

regarded as the Self, and all were unsatisfactory as 

final definitions. What was needed was something 

that could be identified as being beyond change, 

something that was in fact immortal. This was 

found in the conception of the atman . 29 

3) In the macrocosm of the universe, the sages saw 

brahman-, in the microcosm of their own being they 

saw the atman. The realization that there is no 

distinction between the two, that the ground of 

one’s own being is identical with the ground of 

the universe, is the great discovery of the 

Upanishadic thinkers. “Whoever thus knows, 1 am 

brahman," declares the sage, “becomes this all. 

Even the gods have not the power to prevent him 

from becoming thus, for he thus becomes the self.” 

It should be carefully noted that this is not 

Advaita Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 

31 

described as merging with the divine or union 

between God and man or reaching a state of unity. 

It is rather a recognition that there is no “divine” 

as distinct from the individual, no being over 

against the self, no process of becoming what once 

was not, but only the knowledge of the truth that 

always existed. ,0 

This identification of atman and brahman may be said to 

strengthen both, as it were. M. Hiriyanna points out, for 

instance, that the approach to the ultimate reality via 

Brahman runs into some difficulties: 

Such a principle need not be spiritual in its nature, 

and may well be a material or physical entity. 

Further, an objective conception like the above is 

little more than a hypothesis to account for the 

origin of the universe; and as there is nothing 

compelling us to regard it as actually existing, there 

being no logical absurdity in denying it. Some 

thinkers already seem to have done so in the 

Upanishadic period and maintained that ‘in the 

beginning this world was just non-being.” 1 

Similarly, the approach to the ultimate reality via atman is 

also not free from difficulties: 

If we start from the idea of the self, instead of that 

of Brahman, we meet with a similar difficulty, for, 

while the self points to what is spiritual and is an 

incontrovertible certainty, it is, as known to us, 

necessarily limited in its nature. Whatever view we 

may take of its nature, it is determined on one 

side by the world of nature, and on the other by 

the other selves. 12 

But when the two are identified they seem to have the 

effect of helping overcome each others’ shortcomings. It 

was pointed out that Brahman as such might appear too 

hypothetical to be real. But by “its identification with atman 

the establishment of the spiritual character of this principle 

32 

Advaita Vedanta 

and the removal of the uncertainty about its existence are 

both accomplished.” 13 Similarly, it was hinted that the atman 

may appear too personal, to the point of being limited, and 

finite, if very real; “it is this deficiency of fmiteness that is 

made good by its identification with Brahman or the all- 

comprehensive first cause of the universe.” 14 

This identification of atman and brahman is capable of 

being interpreted in several ways. Troy Wilson Organ notes 

some of these in the following passage: 

The question to be asked first is about the meaning 

of the connective “is.” The word “is” has at least 

five logically discernible meanings: 1) predication, 

e.g., “This apple is green”; 2) class inclusion, e.g., 

“Fido is a dog”; 3) class membership, e.g., “Brown 

pelicans are vanishing”; 4) equality, e.g., ‘Two and 

two is four”; 5) identity, e.g., ‘TV is [equivalent to] 

4.” Atman is Brahman seems to be a form of idendty 

or equivalence. There are many classes of identity: 

1) absolute physical identity, e.g., “A is identical 

with A”; 2) relative physical identity, e.g., identical 

twins; 3) same entity at various stages of 

development, e.g., Joe Doakes as boy andJ.D. as 

man; 4) same species, e.g., Harry Truman as man 

and Herbert Hoover as man; 5) same being in 

different contexts, e.g., Jane as mother and Jane 

as wife; 6) whole and part, e.g., a cup of water 

dipped from the Atlantic Ocean and the Atlantic 

Ocean; 7) appearance and reality, e.g., a 

photograph and the person of whom it is a 

photograph; 8) the same object considered from 

different perspectives, e.g., the duck-rabbit 

example of perception. Probably the last subclass 

of identity is the identity of Atman and Brahman: 

Atman is Totality viewed internally; Brahman is 

Totality viewed externally. 35 

The main point to note here is that the identity must be 

Advaita Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 

33 

understood ontologically. The passage cited above helps 

explain what is meant by identity. It is equally important to 

realize what is wot meant by identity. First, when it is claimed 

in Advaita Vedanta that Atman is Brahman, it is not claimed 

that Atman becomes Brahman, as, for example, in a moment 

of realization. If anything, the realization consists of the fact 

that Atman is Brahman, was Brahman, and will ever be 

Brahman. The point may be explained with the help of the 

parable “Like the King’s Son,” in which “a prince, brought 

up as a hunter from infancy, discover[s] afterward that he is 

of royal blood. It involves no becoming, for he has always 

been a prince and that all he has to do is to feel or realize 

that he is one.” 56 The metaphysical moral of the whole story 

is that there was never a time when the mountaineer was 

not the Prince. He did not become a Prince when told he 

was one. He already was. He only recognized as a fact 

something that was already true. 

Second, when it is claimed in Advaita Vedanta that Atman 

is Brahman it is not meant that Atman merges into Brahman. 

An example from astronomy will be helpful here. For a long 

time astronomers identified two distant stars—a “morning 

star” and an “evening star,” till it was discovered that both 

were Venus. Did it then mean that the morning star merged 

into the evening star, or the evening star merged into the 

morning star? As both were already and always Venus, 

nothing of this sort can be said to have happened. 

Third, it is sometimes suggested that “ Atman is Brahman 

is not a metaphysical statement but a soteriological 

statement.” 37 Consider the following interpretation offered 

by Rudolph Otto: ‘The word is in the mystical formula of 

identification [Atman is Brahman] has a significance which 

it does not contain in logic. It is no copula as in the sentence: 

s is P; it is no sign of equality in a reversible equation. It is not 

the is of a normal assertion of identity.” In order to suggest 

what the statement is attempting to express, Otto adds, “For 

instance one might say instead of lam Brahman, lam “existed" 

34 

Advaita Vedanta 

by Brahman or essenced by Brahman, or Brahman exists me." 

“The suggestion is intriguing but not acceptable as such 

within Advaita Vedanta. 

Fourth, Atman is Brahman does not mean that Atman is a 

portion of Brahman. The jiva as the embodied Atman may, 

in an extended sense, be said to be comprised in Brahman 

as parts of the universe of which it is the substratum but that 

is as much as one can say, for the truth of the matter is that 

‘just as a pure transparent white crystal is wrongly imagined 

to be red on account of a red flower placed near it, or just as 

the colorless sky is wrongly imagined to be sullied W'ith dirt 

by the ignorant, or just as the rope is wrongly taken to the 

be a snake in the twilight, or just as the shell is mistaken for 

silver, similarly the non-dual Atman and Brahman is wrongly 

imagined to be the empirical self.” 39 Sankara’s comment 

on Brahmasutra 2.3.50 must be employed here to point out 

that “the individual soul is not directly the highest Atman... 

nor is it different from Atman.” It is not the former because 

it is subject to the limiting adjuncts, but it is not different 

for it is also bereft of the limiting adjuncts. All the empirical 

selves are also comprised in Brahman, but the exact nature 

of their relationship is a matter of debate. 40 

That Thou Art 

The fourth mahavakya is: That Thou Art. An analysis of how 

this great utterance is to be understood provides a useful entry 

into the hermeneutics of Vedic statements. 

It was pointed out earlier that, as distinguished from the 

other four orthodox schools of Hindu philosophy, those of 

MImamsa and Vedanta actually base their philosophy on the 

text of the Vedas rather than merely accepting Vedic 

authority as such in common with these other schools. It is 

therefore in these two schools that the issue of Vedic exegesis 

is squarely addressed. The key exegetical question as always 

is: how is the purport of a textual passage to be determined? 

Advaita Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 

35 

The Mlmamsa school of thought reached the conclusion 

that the purport of a textual passage should be determined 

by keeping six factors in mind. This six-fold criteria is 

technically called the sadlinga and is said to consist of the 

following six elements: 

1) unity of the initial and concluding passages 

(upakramopasarhkdraikya ); 2) the recurrence of 

theme ( abhyasa ); 3) the new conclusion sought 

to be brought out ( apiirva ); 4) the fruitfulness of 

such a conclusion ( phala ); 5) the commendation 

or criticism of it throughout ( arthavada ); 6) the 

argument throughout {upapatti). The Advaita 

Vedanta also accepts these criteria as the pramanas 

for finding purport." 

However, although both Mlmamsa and Advaita Vedanta 

accept these criteria, they assign interpretive priority to 

different parts of the Vedas—namely, the earlier sections and 

the latter sections respectively, and this accounts for the fact 

that they arrive at different conclusions regarding the 

purport of the Vedas while applying the same criteria. It 

should not be forgotten, however, that other systems of 

Vedanta besides Advaita also accept these criteria yet reach 

different conclusions regarding even the purport of the 

meaning of the “latter portion” of the Vedas. These 

differences, nevertheless, are the result of differences in 

interpretation of the same Vedic texts, whereas the 

difference between Mimarhsa and Vedanta, and particularly 

Advaita Vedanta, arise from the application of the same 

exegetical criteria to different sets of Vedic texts. 

One may now proceed to examine how Advaitic exegesis 

works by applying it to a particular scriptural passage. The 

passage selected here is a famous one, which occurs in the 

Chnndogya Upanisad. It is in the form of a dialogue between 

a father (Uddalaka) and his son (Svetaketu). The following 

extract provides the setting: 

36 

Advaita Vedanta 

1. Om! Now, there was Svetaketu Aruneya. To him 

his father said: ‘Live the life of a student of sacred 

knowledge. Verily, my dear, from our family there 

is no one unlearned lin the Vedas] ( an-ucya ), a 

Brahman by connection (brahma-bandhu ), as it 

were.’ 

2. He then, having become a pupil at the age of 

twelve, having studied all the Vedas, returned at 

the age of twenty-four, conceited, thinking himself 

learned, proud. 

3. Then his father said to him: ‘Svetaketu, my dear, 

since now you are conceited, think yourself 

learned, and are proud, did you also ask for that 

teaching whereby what has not been heard of 

becomes heard of, what has not been thought of 

becomes thought of, what has not been 

understood becomes understood?’ 

4. ‘How, pray, sir, is that teaching?’ 

5. ‘Just as, my dear, by one piece of clay everything 

made of clay may be known—the modification is 

merely a verbal distinction, a name; the reality is 

just “clay”. 

6. Just as, my dear, by one copper ornament 

everything made of copper may be known—the 

modification is merely a verbal distinction, a name; 

the reality is just “copper”. 

7. Just as, my dear, by one nail scissors everything 

made of iron may be known—the modification is 

merely a verbal distinction, a name; the reality is 

just “iron” so, my dear, is that teaching’. 

8. ‘Verily, those honored men did not know this; 

for, if they had known it, why would they not have 

told me? But do you, sir, tell me it.’ 

So be it, my dear,’ said he. 42 

Advaila Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 

37 

We plug into the ongoing discussion at a point when the 

father is explaining the spiritual import of death to his son: 

9. On this point, my dear, understand that this 

(body) is a sprout which has sprung up. It will not 

be without a root. 

10. Where else could its root be than in water? 

With water, my dear, as a sprout, look for heat as 

the root. With heat, my dear, as a sprout, look for 

Being as the root. All creatures here, my dear, have 

Being as their root, have Being as their abode, have 

Being as their support. 

But how, verily my dear, each of these three 

divinities, upon reaching man, becomes threefold, 

as has previously been said. 

When a person here is deceasing, my dear, his 

voice goes into his mind; his mind, into his breath; 

his breath, into heat; the heat, into the highest 

divinity. 

11. That which is the finest essence— (7) the 

whole world has that is its soul. That is Realty ( satya). 

That is Atman (Soul). That art thou, Svetaketu. 

‘Do you, sir, cause me to understand even more.’ 

‘So be it, my dear,’ said he. 

The reader will notice that the mahavakya under 

discussion: That art thou has made its appearance in this piece 

of dialogue between the father and the son. It will recur 

eight more times and the passages in which it forms the 

concluding statement are reproduced below. In these 

passages, however, the same mahavakya appears in different 

contexts. I shall therefore introduce each occurrence with 

a brief note, indicating the point to look for. In the next 

occurrence, for instance, the metaphor of honey is used. It could 

be argued that, among other things, the passage highlights 

the bliss that flows from the realization of the identity of 

Advaita Vedanta 

88 

Atman and Brahman , symbolised by honey."" 

1. ‘As the bees, my dear, prepare honey by collecting 

the essences of different trees and reducing the 

essence to a unity, 

2. as they are not able to discriminate “1 am the essence 

of this tree,” “I am the essence of that tree”—even so, 

indeed, my dear, all creatures here, though they reach 

Being, know not “We have reached Being.” 

3. Whatever they are in this world, whether tiger, or lion, 

or wolf, or boar, or worm, or fly, or gnat, or mosquito, 

that they become. 

4. That which is the finest essence - this whole world 

has that as its soul. That is Reality. That is Atman (Soul). 

That art thou, Svetaketu. 

‘Do you, sir, cause me to understand even more.’ 

‘So be it, my dear,’ said he. 

In the following passage the metaphor of the ocean is used. It 

has been proposed that the passage hints at the immensity 

of the experience of the ultimate reality. The loss of 

individuality, yet its persistence as universality is hinted at. 44 

The river ceases to be the river, but does not thereby cease 

to be. 

1. ‘These rivers, my dear, flow, the eastern toward the 

east, the western toward the west. They go just from 

the ocean to the ocean. They become the ocean itself. 

As there they know not “I am this one,” “I am that 

one” 

2. Even so, indeed, my dear, all creatures here, though 

they have come forth from Being, know not “We have 

come forth from Being.” Whatever they are in this 

world, whether tiger, or lion, or wolf, or boar, or worm, 

or fly, or gnat, or mosquito, that they become. 

3. That which is the finest essence—this whole world has 

that as its soul. That is Reality. That is Atman (Soul). 

That art thou, Svetaketu. 

Advaita Vedanta; A Scriptural Approach 

39 

‘Do you, sir, cause me to understand even more.’ 

‘So be it, my dear,’ said he. 

In tile following passage the metaphor of the tree has been 

employed. It highlights the intrinsic immanence and 

interpenetration involved in the identification of atman and 

brahman. 

This passage is best understood perhaps in the light of 

the following comment by Heinrich Zimmer: “According to 

this Brahmanical formula, the dialectic of the universe is a 

manifestation of a transcendent, non-dual, trans-dual, yet 

immanent principle, which both gives forth the world of 

names and forms ( namarupa ) and inhabits it as its animating 

principle. The dualism of natura naturans (prakrti) and the 

transcendent immaterial monad ( purusa) is thus itself 

transcended’’. 45 

1. ‘Of this great tree, my dear, if some one should strike 

at the root, it would bleed but still live. If some one 

should strike at its middle, it would bleed, but still 

live. If some one should strike at its top, it would 

bleed, but still live. Being pervaded By Atman (Soul), 

it continues to stand, eagerly drinking in moisture 

and rejoicing. 

2. If the life leaves one branch of it, then it dries up. It 

leaves a second; then that dries up. It leaves a third; 

then that dries up. It leaves the whole; the whole 

dries up. Even so, indeed, my dear, understand,’ said 

he. 

3. ‘Verily, indeed, when life has left it, this body dies. 

The life does not die. 

That which is the finest essence—this whole world has 

that as its soul. That is Reality. That is Atman (Soul). That 

art thou, Svetaketu. 

‘Do you, sir, cause me to understand even more.’ 

‘So be it, my dear,’ said he. 

In the following passage the ‘metaphor of the seed’ is 

40 

Advaila Vedanta 

used. It highlights the subtlety of the identity of Brahman 

and atman\ among other things. J. Brereton summarizes its 

significance as follows: 

First, the passage establishes that the tree grows 

and lives because of an invisible essence. Then, in 

the refrain, it says that everything, the whole world, 

exists by means of such an essence. This essence is 

the truth, for it is lasting and real. It is the self, for 

everything exists with reference to it. Then and 

finally, Uddalaka personalizes the teaching. 

Svetaketu should look upon himself in the same way. 

He, like the tree and the whole world, is pervaded 

by this essence, which is his final reality and his 

true self. 4 " 

There may also be the implication here that “the world 

which has name and form arises from pure being which is 

subtle and does not possess name and form.” 47 The passage 

runs as follows: 

1. ‘Bring hither a fig from there.’ 

‘Here it is, sir.’ 

‘Divide it.’ 

‘It is divided, sir.’ 

‘What do you see there?’ 

‘These rather ( iva) fine seeds, sir.’ 

‘Of these, please ( ahga ), divide one.’ 

‘It is divided, sir.’ 

‘What do you see there?’ 

‘Nothing at all, sir.’ 

2. Then he said to him: ‘Verily, my dear, that finest 

essence which you do not perceive—verily, my dear, 

from that finest essence this great Nyagrodha (sacred 

fig) tree thus arises. 

3. Believe me, my dear,’ said he, ‘that soul which is the 

finest essence - this whole world has that as its soul. 

That is Reality. That is Atman (Soul). That art thou, 

Svetaketu. 

Advaila Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 

41 

Do you, sir, cause me to understand even more.’ 

'So be it, my dear,’ said he. 

The following passage may be read as an answer to the 

question: if Pure Being is the essence of all that exists, why 

is it not perceived?” The answer proposed is through the 

parable of the salt. Just as “we are able to perceive salt in the 

.i rd,_ U .1,-^ ..4- U,, A 

Wdici LLiiiOLigii Ldatcj Liiuugu n^t uy iiitans ui tuucii aitu 

sight even so we will be able to perceive Pure Being by other 

means though it is not obvious to our senses”. 4 " The passage 

hints at the transcendental yet experienceable nature of 

the identity of atman and Brahman. 

1. ‘Place this salt in water. In the morning come unto 

me.’ 

Then he did so. 

Then he said to him: ‘That salt you placed in the water 

last evening—please bring it hither.’ 

Then he grasped for it, but did not find it, as it was 

completely dissolved. 

2. ‘Please take a sip of it from this end,’ said he. ‘How is 

it?’ 

‘Salt.’ 

‘Take a sip from the middle,’ said he. ‘How is it?’ 

‘Salt.’ 

‘Take a sip from that end,’ said he. ‘How is it?’ 

‘Salt.’ 

‘Set it aside. Then come unto me.’ 

He did so, saying, ‘It is always the same.’ 

Then he said to him: ‘Verily, indeed, my dear, you do 

not perceive Being here. Verily, indeed, it is here. 

3. That which is the finest essence—this whole world has 

that as its soul. That is Reality. That is Atman (Soul). 

That art thou, Svetaketu. 

‘Do you, sir, cause me to understand even more.’ 

‘So be it, my dear,’ said he. 

The next passage contains the parable of the blindfolded 

42 

Advaita Vedanta 

person. Since at the moment we are blind to the reality, how 

might we reach it? This passage emphasizes the advisability 

of having a suitable guide or teacher. As Franklin Edgerton 

noted long ago: 

This section contains the beautiful simile of the man 

brought to a strange land and left blindfolded to wander 

about aimlessly, until some one removes his eye-bandage 

and tells him in which direction to go: then he finds his 

way home. Just so a man in this world who has not received 

the true instruction in Upanisadic philosophy wanders 

about aimlessly, his mental eyesight dimmed by the eye- 

bandages of ignorance, until a teacher removes the 

bandage of ignorance and tells him in what direction to 

shape his life’s course; then he will arrive at his true goal. 49 

1. ‘Just as, my dear, one might lead away from the 

Gandharas a person with his eyes bandaged, and then 

abandon him in an uninhabited place; as there he 

might be blown forth either to the east, to the north, 

or to the south, since he has been led off with his eyes 

bandaged and deserted with his eyes bandaged; 

2. as, if one released his bandages and told him, “In that 

direction would be the Gandharas; go in that 

direction!” he would, if he were a sensible man, by 

asking [his way] from village to village, and being 

informed, arrive home at the Gandharas—even so 

here on earth one who has a teacher knows: “I shall 

remain here only so long as I shall not be released [from 

the bonds of ignorance.] Then I shall arrive home.” 

3. That which is the finest essence—this whole world has 

that as its soul. That is Reality. That is Atman (Soul). 

That art thou, Svetaketu. 

‘Do you, sir, cause me to understand even more.’ 

‘So be it, my dear,’ said he. 

In the following passage the significance of this insight in 

the context of the experience of death is explained. The 

implication seems to be that in dying a person, who has 

Advaita Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 

43 

realized the identity of Atman and Brahman, transcends all 

forms of phenomenal existence in a post-mortem state. 

1 . 

‘Also, my dear, around a [deathly] sick person his 

kinsmen gather, and ask, “Do you know me?” So long 

as his voice does not go into his mind, his mind into 

flic Krpiffi 

highest divinity—so long he knows. 

2. Then when his voice goes into his mind, his mind into 

his breath, his breath into heat, the heat into the 

highest divinity—then he knows not. 

3. That which is the finest essence—this whole world has 

that as its soul. That is Reality. That is Atman (Soul). 

That art thou, Svetaketu. 

‘Do you, sir, cause me to understand even more.’ 

‘So be it, my dear,’ said he. 

In the following passage ‘the metaphor of the heated axe 

of the ordeal’ is proposed. It highlights the invulnerability 

conferred by the realization of the identity, through what to 

some might seem a measure of overconfidence in the ability 

of metaphysical reality to affect empirical reality. 50 

1. ‘And also, my dear, they lead up a man seized by the 

hand, and call: “He has stolen! He has committed a 

theft! Heat the axe for him!” If he is the doer thereof, 

thereupon he makes himself ( atmanam ) untrue. 

Speaking untruth, covering himself with untruth, he 

seizes hold of the heated axe and is burned. Then he 

is slain. 

2. But if he is not the doer thereof, thereupon he makes 

himself true. Speaking truth, covering himself with 

truth, he seizes hold of the heated axe and is not 

burned. Then he is released. 

3. As in this case he would not be burned [because of 

i the truth]. So this whole world has that [truth] as its 

i soul. That is Reality. That is atman (Soul). That art 

r thou, Svetaketu. 

44 

Advaita Vedanta 

Then he understood it from him—yea, he understood. ’ 1 

Let us now apply the six-fold criteria to determine the 

import of the culled passages. The first criterion pertains to 

the unity of the initial and concluding passages. The initial 

passage states: “That Art Thou”, and so does the concluding 

passage. The second criterion consists of thematic repetition. 

The statement “That Art Thou” is repeated “nine times” 52 

in the selection. The third criterion consists of novelty. The 

claim “That Art Thou” is novel to the point of being 

sensational. The fourth criterion pertains to the result. The 

acquisition of knowledge, even saving knowledge, is the 

result. The fifth criterion is commendation. Quite obviously 

this insight is commended throughout, and the fact of it 

being dealt with throughout also fulfils the sixth and final 

criterion. Note that the purport is that of the non-duality 

between “That” and “This.” 

Now that the purport has been established, how is it to be 

understood - literally or figuratively? 53 

Sankara takes it primarily in a literal sense, 54 and the point 

is made strongly in Advaita Vedanta that the “sentence 

expresses apposition ( samanadhikarana ) between the two, 

Brahman and the individual soul.” 55 

From the point of view of Advaita Vedanta the fact that 

the two are in apposition is important, because it enables 

one to point out that how the statement may not be (mis-) 

understood. (1) It is not to be understood as a tautology 

because “the Upanisadic sentence removes the delusion of 

difference between Brahman and the individual soul, even 

though their identity is known as soon as the true nature of 

both is known. For, Brahman is the self of all, and the ‘Self 

is not really the body or the ego, but Being.” 56 2) It is not to 

be understood as an identity between two different things as 

cause and effect (“The pot is earthen”) or substance and 

attribute (“The lotus is blue”) because here the identity.of a 

thing with itself is asserted. 3) It is not to be understood as 

an injunction to treat them as such, as for instance in 

Advaiia Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 

45 

meditation, because the sentence has no reference to action. 

It is a statement of fact, not an exhortation. 57 4) It is not to 

be understood as implication. This view “is based on the 

presupposition that words refer directly to substantives and 

not to attributes of substantives, and that when words have 

to refer to attributes they do so by implication.” 58 

A. critic msy ask, ‘If it is said tHat Here tHe identity 

of the substantives only—Brahman and jlva—is 

asserted, how have been they distinguished from 

their attributes?’ An Advaitin may answer that 

other Hindu schools (e.g. that of Ramanuja) also 

accept omniscience etc., as attributes of Brahman 

and ignorance etc., as attributes of jlva. Further, 

as will be shown later, prior to the hearing of That 

Thou art the meanings of Thou and That should 

be clarified (tattvam-padartha-sodhana). When a 

man, who has clarified for himself the meanings of 

these words, hears the sentence That Thou art, he 

will obviously understand that the asserted identity 

is only between the substantives and not between 

the attributes; just as when somebody tells him bring 

the jar, he understands by jar not jarhood, but a 

particular thing. If, then, the question occurs to 

him, what happens to the attributes? scriptural texts, 

supplemented by reasoning, will demonstrate to 

him that they are products of maya. Thus an 

Advaitin can try to rebut this criticism. 59 

Brahman is Spirit 

(Dne “may now examine the fifth mahavakya, that Brahman 

is spirit, i.e., that it is spiritual rather than material in nature. 

In order to fully appreciate this mahavakya, three 

realizations need to be made available to our consciousness. 

The first is that both material objects and immaterial 

conspicuousness are equally the components of everyday 

46 

Advaita Vedanta 

existence. This fact is so obvious that it runs the risk of being 

overlooked. Each individual is fully aware of material objects, 

as well as of the immaterial consciousness which characterizes 

the person as an individual subject. In fact every 7 individual 

himself or herself possesses a body and a mind—one material, 

the other immaterial in nature. 

The second point to recognize is that, as pointed out 

earlier, this pervasive fact gives rise to three fundamental 

philosophical positions. Although both matter and immaterial 

consciousness are equally given in human existence, one 

could argue that each could be an epiphenomenon of the 

other. In other words, although both are experienced as 

empirical reality, only one of the two—matter or spirit may 

constitute the ultimate reality. Thus one could argue for 

materialism on the ground that, in the last analysis, 

consciousness is a byproduct of material forces and processes. 

Just as wetness is a quality possessed by none of the two gases 

which compose water, consciousness could emerge as a 

property out of material bases. It could also be argued, from 

the other end of the spectrum, that consciousness is the 

only ultimate reality, and that matter is its product. 

Consciousness could produce matter just as the living body 

produces lifeless nails or hair. A third position, which refuses 

to reduce each to either is also possible —and may be 

described as that of fundamental dualism. It was noted 

earlier that the various schools of Indian Philosophy can be 

arranged on an axis of: 

Materialism. Dualism. Idealism. 

In the usual order of enumeration of these systems one 

starts with the Carvaka school, regularly characterized as 

materialists, and one concludes with the discussion of schools 

of Vedanta which are prevailingly idealistic. This also holds 

true of Advaita Vedanta even more so. 

A third point now requires to be considered: that it is 

difficult to refute the claims of materialism or idealism on 

Advaita Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 

47 

purely logical grounds.™ In other words, we seem to run here 

into the limits of reason, so that the significance to be 

attached to scriptural authority in general, and Advaita 

Vedanta in particular, takes on a new charge. 

With this in mind one may now approach the Advaitic 

position which aligns itself clearly with the ultimate reality 

of the spirit. The following passage provides a remarkably 

clear statement of the Advaitic position on this point: 

The Advaita definitely denies that there can be 

any relation at all between two such disparate 

entities as spirit and matter. But at the same time, 

it cannot be forgotten that our investigation of 

experience leads us to the conclusion that they 

are not only together but are often identified with 

each other as implied, for example, when a person 

says “I am walking.” Here the act of walking is 

obviously a feature characterizing the physical 

body; and yet it is predicated of the person’s self 

which is spiritual. The only explanation conceivable 

is that their association must be a mere appearance 

or, in other words, that the relation between them 

is ultimately false. Sarhkara treats of this point in 

his celebrated preamble to the commentary on 

the Vedanta Sutra, which is very brief and is written 

in what may be described as his “shorthand style.” 

“The self or the I-element," he says there, “is so 

opposed to the not-self or the Thou-element that 

they can never be predicated of each other.” A 

necessary corollary to this conclusion is that one of 

the relata is unreal. Both, of course, cannot be 

regarded as unreal, for in that case, since all the 

three elements—the two relata and the relation— 

become false, and since the idea of falsehood 

necessarily points to a standard of truth, we shall 

have to postulate another reality from the 

viewpoint of which we declare them to be false. 

48 

Advaila Vedanta 

The advaitin therefore takes for granted that it is 

matter which is false. The other alternative would 

Jesuit in materialism, whose untcnability we have 

already seen . 61 

Advaita as pointed out in the passage, also argues against 

materialism. As M. Hiriyanna notes: 

But even at its best the materialistic theory carries 

no conviction with it, since it tries to account for 

the higher principle of mind by the lower one of 

matter. Starting with the existence of matter, it 

explains mind as only a function of it. But in thus 

starting, the theory has already taken for granted 

that there is no mind, although it is as much an 

implication of experience as matter. In fact, we 

have no conception at all of matter, except as it 

appears to an observing mind. Believing in the 

existence of the one thus amounts to believing in 

the existence of the other. The truth that may 

underlie the theory is that all the things of the 

world can finally be brought under a single head, 

but it is wrong to conclude from this that that 

unitary source is necessarily physical. 62 

The statement is not just negative. It can also be argued 

that the spiritual premise about the ultimate reality as 

Brahman is implied in its description as saccidananda. Thus, 

M. Hiriyanna writes: 

The spiritual and unitary character of this absolute 

reality is very well expressed by the classical phrase 

saccidananda. As a single term defining its nature, 

it is met with only in the later Upanishads; but its 

three elements— sat, cit and ananda —are used of 

Brahman, singly and in pairs, even in the earliest 

of them. Sat, which means “being,” points to the 

positive character of Brahman distinguishing it 

from all non-being. But positive entities, to judge 

from our experience, may be spiritual or not. The 

Advailu Vedanta: A Scriptural Approach 49 

next epithet tit, which means “sentience,” show's 

that it is spiritual. The last epithet ananda, which 

stands for “peace,” indicates its unitary and all- 

embracing character, inasmuch as variety is the 

source of all trouble and restlessness. “Fear arises 

from the other,” as a famous Upanishadic saying 

has it. Thus the three epithets together signify that 

Brahman is the sole spiritual reality of the 

Absolute, which comprehends not only all being 

(sat) but also all thought (tit) so that whatever 

partakes of the character of either must eventually 

be traced to it. In other words, it is the source of 

the whole universe, while it is self-existent and self- 

revealing, there being no other entity from which 

it could be derived or by which it might be made 

known. (i:! 

PART II 

Advaita Vedanta: 

A Rational Approach 

i 

We may begin our rational analysis with any object found in 

the universe, even something as simple, as say, bracelet of 

silver, in order to illustrate the rational approach to Advaita 

Vedanta. 

The examination of the bracelet might begin with the 

recognition of the fact that the bracelet is made of silver. It 

has its origin in silver, and as without silver the “bracelet of 

silver” would not exist, silver is the material cause of the 

bracelet. The “bracelet of silver”, in this way of looking at it, is 

thus an effect, with silver as its material cause. 

The next step would now consist of examining the 

relationship of this bracelet, as effect, to silver which is its 

material cause. When the relationship between the two is 

closely examined, some points seem to emerge in clearer view 

as a result of this inquiry. It turns out that the effect is nothing 

more than the cause—that is to say, the bracelet is made of 

nothing other than silver. Note that one is not claiming that 

the bracelet is nothing more than the silver, in the sense that 

it is silver cast in a particular form and can be worn on the 

wrist, in a way plain silver cannot be worn. In this sense the 

bracelet of silver could be taken to mean to be “more” than 

silver. However, one can make bracelets of different shapes 

and sizes out of the same piece of silver but even in the new 

forms the material of which the form is made is nothing other 

than silver. In this sense the effect does not exceed the cause; 

“the effect is nothing more than the cause.” 

54 

Advaita Vedanta 

Moreover, although we might draw a distinction, when 

we speak, between a “bracelet of silver” and silver, as it were, 

the two are really inseparable. Or to put it another way, just 

as an effect is nothing more than the material cause, it is 

also nothing less than it, in the sense that it cannot be 

removed or divorced from it. That is to say, the effect cannot 

exist without the cause; we can separate the idea of the 

bracelet from the bracelet, but we cannot separate the 

bracelet of silver from silver. The bracelet of silver is shot 

through with silver, through and through. 

So the first realization is that the effect is nothing more 

than the material cause, and the second is that the effect is 

inseparable from the material cause. These points are more 

or less obvious but no less significant is a third point—that 

the effect must pre-exist in the material cause. The ‘idea’ 

of a bracelet can exist apart from the material cause, but 

the actual bracelet, as effect, must pre-exist in the material 

cause. If this were not the case, 

then it would in principle be possible to produce 

any effect from any material cause. In fact, we 

cannot even think of a non-[pre]-existent entity 

coming into existence. We can only think of a 

substance changing from one form into another. If 

something non-existent could ever be brought into 

existence, there would be no reason why we could 

not press oil out of sand (where it is non-existent), 

and why we should have to select only a particular 

material, namely oilseed, to produce the particular 

effect oil.” 64 

It might be helpful to locate the discussion somewhat, at 

this stage, both in terms of Indian and Western philosophy. It 

should be clarified, in terms of Western philosophy, that the 

discussion is proceeding by way of material cause in terms of 

Aristotle’s four-fold formulation of material, efficient, formal 

and final causes. From this perspective, for instance, “the 

activity of the efficient cause, the oilman, the potter or the 

Advaita Vedanta: /I Rational Approach 

55 

goldsmith [or the silversmith in the case of the silver bracelet] 

cannot produce any new substance, it only manifests the 

form of the substance concealed in its previous state.” 65 

In terms of Indian philosophy, the context is provided by 

the doctrines of Asatkaryavada and Satkarayavada. According 

to the former view the effect is something “new” and doesn’t 

pre-exist in th 

e material cause. According to the lattei the 

effect pre-exists in the material cause. It should be obvious 

from the trend of the arguments made earlier that Advaita 

Vedanta inclines towards the second view. 

Hindu thinking further diverges in relation to the latter 

view on the point as to whether such effect represents an actual 

or apparent transformation of the material cause. According 

to the Sahkhya school, the effect represents an actual 

transformation of the material cause, as when a piece of silver 

is transformed into bracelet of silver, which it was not before. 

The Advaitin joins issue with the Sahkhya school here 

because to claim that silver has been changed into a “new” 

form in the process implies that what was not has come into 

being—for that is what “new” must mean here; or the claim 

that silver has been transformed into what it was not earlier. 

From this point of view it can be said that according to Advaita, 

Sahkhya fails to realize the full significance of Satkaryavada: 

For, it holds that though the effect exists previously 

in its material cause, there is real change (parinama) 

of the material into the effect, since the material 

assumes a new form. Now this view amounts to the 

confession that this form, which did not exist 

previously, comes into existence. The doctrine of 

Satkarya-vada, that nothing, which didn’t exist 

previously, can come into existence, thus breaks 

down. If the grounds on which that doctrine stands 

are sound, then we must be prepared to accept all 

that logically follows from it, and cannot hold any 

view which implies any violation of this doctrine, 

rationally established. 66 

56 

Advaita Vedanta 

Some have even suggested that the Advaita doctrine 

should, by contrast, be called Satkaranavada, because 

according to the Advaita doctrine that effects can never 

overreach or outreach the cause. 

At stake here is the question : What is the logical, ‘as 

distinguished from the perceptual’, status of change of form 

? Or, m other words, dues change of form amount to change 

of reality ? The reality, which underlies all changes of forms, 

is the substance itself. Change of form doesn’t amount to 

change of substance and if the substance remains the same 

through the various forms it assumes, can the changes be 

said to be real ? As there is no real change in this sense, can 

change be said to be real ? Thus : 

We have no reason, therefore, to interpret the 

perception of a change in form as a change of 

reality. On the contrary, it is found that in spite of 

changes in form a substance is recognized by us as 

the identical entity. Devadatta, sitting, standing or 

lying is recognized as the identical person. How can 

this be, if change in form implied change in 

reality? 67 

In this analysis the rational status of anything characterized 

by a quality, or any form characterized by change, is 

challenged. To go back to the silver bracelet. Thus the silver 

bracelet possesses this quality of having curved. Let us now 

pose the question: what is the relationship of the curve of the 

bracelet to the bracelet ? The curve does not consist of 

anything other than the bracelet itself, i.e.; it characterizes 

nothing else than the bracelet. Nor is the curve separable 

from it materially. Nor could the curve have come into being 

if it had not existed in the bracelet of silver as a potential. 

Thus the quality of the curvature of the silver bracelet has no 

existence apart from the silver bracelet. 

Similarly, the silver bracelet has no existence apart from 

silver, as established earlier. 

Advaita Vedanta: A Rational Approach 

57 

At the heart of the issue lies the question of the 

relationship of the quality to object (curvature to bracelet ) 

or of object to substance ( silver bracelet to silver ). If the 

identity of effect to cause is rejected, although argued for 

by Advaita, then one is left with the following logical options: 

1 ) that the effect is distinct from the cause; or that 2) the 

effect constitutes an identity-cum-difference with the cause. 

Let us now examine these two options. 

We begin by assuming that the effect is distinct from the 

cause. This means that there is one thing called cause and 

another called effect and the two are distinct. If the two are 

distinct, but the cause produces the effect, then they must be 

linked in some way; that is to say, there must be a third entity, 

which links these two entities. But if such be the case then 

We would fail to explain the relation between the 

quality and its substance. For, two distinct realities 

cannot be conceived to be related without the help 

of a third entity to connect them. Now, as soon as 

we think of this third entity (which must be distinct 

from the two terms it attempts to relate) we have to 

think of a fourth relating entity, and also a fifth, 

which would relate the third with each of the first 

two terms respectively. Similarly, these fourth and 

fifth entities would require other similar media for 

relating them to the terms they themselves want to 

relate, and so on. There would then be an infinite 

regress (anavastha). We can thus never come to the 

end of our supposition and there will never be a 

complete explanation of the relation between the 

quality and its substance. In other words, the 

supposition of any distinction in reality between any 

quality and its substance would be logically 

indefensible. So a form cannot be treated as a 

distinct reality, and no change in form can be 

logically accepted as a real change, unless there is 

change in substance. 68 

58 

Advaita Vedanta 

Entity A 

Entity B 

Entity C 

Entity D 

(Connecting A and C) 

Entity E 

(Connecting A to D) 

Entity F 

(Connecting A and E) 

But perhaps treating them as two distinct entities involves 

ontological violence and the relationship is more properly 

conceived of as identity-in-difference. Thus both silver and 

silver-bracelet are after all identical as silver, but the silver- 

bracelet is also different in also being a bracelet. Advaitins 

claim that this is no more logically helpful in solving the issue 

of the relationship between silver-bracelet and silver, than 

treating the two as distinct, although on the face of it seems 

to resolve the problem. If two objects are related by identity- 

cum-difference then it must mean that in some respect they 

are identical and in some respect different. However 

“neither of them can as such be both identical with and 

different from the other. It would mean that M is both N 

and not-N and that N is similarly both M and not-M, which is 

a violation of the law of contradiction. When two things are 

distinct in fact, they cannot be the same.” 69 In other words 

they do not constitute identity-in-difference directly. But as 

M. Hiriyanna points out further: 

Thus we may say that M and N possess one or more 

common feature which may be represented by a 

and, at the same time exhibit differences 

represented by x and y respectively. According to 

this explanation, what is identical is quite distinct 

Advaila Vedanta: A Rational Approach 

59 

from what is different; yet the entities, viz. M and 

N, by virtue of such features, it may be said, are 

identical with and, at the same thing different from 

each other. Such an explanation may seem to solve 

the difficulty, but the solution is only apparent, for 

it merely shifts the difficulty to another set of things. 

It assumes that M and N are characterized by a x 

and a y respectively, and the assumption leaves us 

where we were, for we cannot satisfactorily explain 

the relation between a thing and its so-called 

characteristics. Now the relation between M and a 

x, to take only one of the entities, cannot be identity, 

for then the distinction between a and x would 

vanish, both being identical with the same M; and 

with it also the relation of idendty-in-difference 

between M and N. Nor can a and x be different 

from M, for then their character, whatever it may 

be, will cease to affect M, and therefore also its 

relation to N. So we are driven to think of identity- 

in-difference as the only possible relation between 

these. That is, in explaining the relation in question 

between M and N, we presuppose the same relation 

within each of them; and pursuing the inquiry 

further will only lead to an infinite process. 70 

To illustrate: Let us propose that the color of silver is the 

common property (a) shared by the silver bracelet and silver 

but the differences between them consist of (x) in the form 

of undetermined form of silver as a mere lump and (y) in the 

form of the special shape of the bracelet. 

Now, in the case of silver (M), what is the relationship of 

silver to (a) its color and (x) its indeterminate shape? The 

difference between (a) color and (x) indeterminate shape 

would vanish, if both are identical with the same M (silver). 

Nor can (a) and (x) be different from M, for then they would 

have no connection with M. Hence this relationship too would 

have to be described as identity-cum-difference. 

60 

Advaita Vedanta 

Thus: 

M N 

Silver Silver-bracelet 

Identity-cum-difference 

Color Indeterminate Color Bracelet 

(a) Shape (x) (a) Shape (y) 

Identity-cum-difference Identity-cum-difference 

The characterization (of identity-cum-difference) between 

M and N merely shifts within them, and so down the pike. 

Thus, no logically satisfactory resolution in terms of other 

logical options seems possible. Nevertheless, the change is 

perceived, although it is rationally unexplained and, 

therefore, logically unacceptable. Hence the need to 

characterize it as appearance. The point may be elaborated 

as follows: 

...we have seen that no causation involves any 

change in substance. Hence causation does not 

imply any real change. Moreover, as every change 

is a process of causation; there cannot be any 

change in reality. This amounts to the position that 

though we perceive changes we cannot rationally 

accept them as real. We have therefore to 

understand them in the same way as we do, when 

we perceive an illusory object. We do perceive a 

rainbow, a blue sky, movement of the sun and many 

other things which we cannot believe as real 

because reasoning proves them to be unreal. Such 

a perceived but unreal phenomenon is called an 

appearance and distinguished from reality. On the 

same ground we must call change also an 

appearance and distinguish it from reality. We can 

thus reach, on purely logical grounds supported 

by common observation, the theory of vivarta or 

apparent change, as a rational doctrine required 

for the explanation of the world. 71 

Advaita Vedanta: A Rational Approach 

61 

One might be tempted to argue here in rebuttal, in terms 

of practical rather than pure reason, that the silver-bracelet 

is surely different from plain silver in that it can be worn on 

the wrist in a way one cannot wear plain silver. The Advaitin 

would counter argue that the fact that the bracelet is 

serviceable doesn’t affect the truth of the proposition, no 

more than the apparent movement of the sun across the sky 

can be accepted as real just because it is helpful in organizing 

our daily activities. It is of service too but that doesn’t make 

it true. 

II 

So we started with the examination of the relationship of 

the curve of the silver bracelet to the silver bracelet, 

preceded to an examination of the relationship of silver- 

bracelet to silver and found that the new relationship 

reincarnates the old problem. One might, however, at this 

point raise the following objection—what you say seems to 

hold for the objects in the universe, but does this also hold 

for the universe itself treated as an object, as it were. In 

other words, does what holds for the parts also hold for the 

whole? 

Even this objection can be logically nuanced as follows: 

why speak of the universe, you speak of forms and substance 

but does what you say of forms apply to the substance also? 

Both of these issues may now be dealt with in this section. 

One must begin by recognizing that silver was chosen as a 

substance because, in relation to it, bracelets and other 

ornaments could be viewed as its modifications (vikara) into 

form. 

From a broader perspective, however, even silver is subject 

to modification (vikara). That is, it too is the form of some 

other substance X. Just as the bracelet arose out of silver, was 

in silver in some way before it so arose and dissolved into it 

again, so also silver itself is apparently the form of some 

substance X in which it pre-exists, from which it arises as silver 

and into which it disappears. Or to ring a metaphorical change, 

and talk of a pot of clay rather than a bracelet of silver: 

62 

Advaita Vedanta 

The qualities of a pot have no reality apart from 

the pot, and also that the pot itself has no reality 

apart from its cause, the clay, which is the real 

substance of which the pot is only one form of 

manifestation. But as clay itself is liable to 

modification and may cease to be clay, even it 

cannot be called a real substance; it is only a form 

of manifestation, though more abiding than a pot, 

of some other substance which persists through all 

the modifications of clay, and is also present in what 

clay itself comes from and in what it is changed into, 

after its destruction. If all so-called substances are 

thus liable to modification (vikara), then the 

substance underlying all objects of the world would 

be that which persists through all forms of objects. 

Existence is revealed in the perception of every 

object, whatever be its nature. It can, therefore, be 

called the substance, the material cause, or the 

underlying reality behind the world of objects. 72 

And now when we move to the level of the universe we do 

see a shift and a change in quantity does lead to change in 

quality in a quirky Marxian manner: 

If all so-called substances are liable to modification 

vikara then the substance underlying all the objects 

of the world would be that which persists through 

all forms of objects. And we observe that existence 

(not in any specific form but existence pure and 

simple) is what is common to all forms of objects. 

Existence is revealed in the perception of every 

object, whatever be its nature. It can, therefore, 

be called the substance, the material cause of the 

underlying reality behind the world of objects.” 

The qualitative change in the general conclusion should 

not go unnoticed. The attempt to analyze the nature of 

specific objects in the universe has led to the identification 

Advaita Vedanta: A Rational Approach 

63 

of non-specific existence as the material cause. The material 

cause has turned out to be immaterial existence! But this 

should not be considered unduly abstract. It is the neutral 

or unengaged gear in the car, which allows all specific gears 

to be engaged. 

Ill 

The next logical question to arise in the context is the 

following: this logical analysis pertains to the objective world. 

Does it also apply to the subjective world of the individual? 

Does Advaita Vedanta offer a different rational analysis for 

the internal world of being as opposed to the external? 

This conclusion, that the material cause of the universe is 

immaterial existence, is also applied to the internal states in 

Advaita Vedanta, for these states also exist. 

...when we examine the changing states within our 

minds what we also find there is that every state, 

every idea, whatever its object, exists. Even an 

illusory idea, which lacks an external object, exists 

as an idea ( avagati). A state of deep dreamless sleep 

or of swoon also exists, although no objective 

consciousness is present there. Existence is thus 

found to be the one undeniable reality persisting 

through all states, internal and external. It can, 

therefore, be accepted as the substance, and 

material cause of which all determinate objects and 

mental states are the diverse manifestations. 

We find then that pure existence which is the 

common cause of the entire world is itself formless, 

though appearing in various forms; partless, though 

divisible in different forms; it is infinite though it 

appears in all finite forms. Sankara thus reaches 

the conception of an infinite, indeterminate 

nirvisesa existence as the essence or material cause 

of the world. He calls this Absolute or Brahman. 74 

64 

Advaita Vedanta 

IV 

This is how the rational investigation of everyday reality by 

Advaita leads it to question and then reconfigure the 

conceptual framework with which we operate in everyday life. 

In the course of ordinary living, we draw a sharp distinction 

between our experience of the external universe and our 

own inner life. Advaita Vedanta, however, pools our 

experiences of the external world and the internal world as 

data to be explained in common and is thus counter-intuitive 

in terms of our quotidian philosophical framework. 

It questions this framework at an even deeper level, when 

it raises the question of the relationship of consciousness to 

existence. In terms of our quotidian or even commonsensical 

philosophy of life, we associate “existence” with our experience 

of the external world, and “consciousness” with our experience 

of the internal world. Thus for us external objects “exist” and 

we are “conscious” of our internal states. 

In this context Advaitic rationality raises the question: What 

is the criterion of consciousness? Note the Advaitin answer to 

the parallel question: What is the criterion of existence? is 

the following: that which is perceived. The totally non-existent 

—the barren woman’s son and the horns of a hare—cannot 

be perceived. Let a similar question now be posed in relation 

to consciousness. 

But what is the criterion of consciousness? A mental 

state is conscious, because its existence is self- 

revealing. But when we perceive the external world 

its existence also reveals itself. The power of 

appearing bhati is common to both internal and 

external forms of existence; and it can, therefore, 

be argued that existence which is common to the 

internal and external world must posses the power 

of revealing itself. Therefore, it is more reasonable 

to hold that Absolute existence is of the nature of 

self-revealing consciousness. In fact, a little 

reflection shows that self-revelation may even be 

Advaita Vedanta: A Rational Approach 

65 

taken as the differential that distinguishes 

existence from non-existence. What is non¬ 

existent (e.g. the son of a barren woman) cannot 

even appear or reveal itself for a moment . 75 

The gulf we tend to sense between existence and 

consciousness is bridged in Advaita Vedanta by arguing that 

when we speak of the existence of the silver-bracelet it boils 

down to the consciousness of the existence of the silver- 

bracelet and that we would not be able to speak of the 

existence of silver apart from the consciousness of its existence. 

In terms of another metaphor: 

Wherever there is appearance of existence there 

is awareness invariably present. Even an external 

object, say clay, which appears to us is presented by 

an awareness of clay (mrt-buddhi). When we 

perceive clay becoming a pot, our clay-consciousness 

turns into pot-consciousness (ghata buddhi). An 

imaginary object is just the idea of the object, and 

so also is an illusory object. So we find that awareness 

pervades all forms of existence known to us. 

By a series of arguments like these Sankara reaches 

logically what he accepts on the authority of the 

revealed texts, namely that the world originates 

from Brahman, which is Absolute Existence and 

Consciousness and that Brahman has the power of 

manifesting itself in diverse apparent form, without 

really undergoing any modification . 76 

V 

The tenor of our analysis of the world, however, has so far 

taken the smooth and easy route. We started out with the 

curve of the silver-bracelet, and moved through on to silver 

and to that substance of which the silver might only be one 

form, and ended up by identifying general existence as the 

material cause of the universe. 

66 

Advaila Vedanta 

But the course of the universe is not that smooth. For one 

thing we find one experience of existence contradicted by 

another. What we thought was a snake turns out to be a rope. 

Similarly, the universe doesn’t consist of just silver-bracelets 

or silver. It contains many other objects. In other words, our 

analysis of the universe needs to be made more complex by 

incorporating two new features of our experience into it: (1) 

the contradictability of objects and 2) the immense variety of 

objects. The question we must now answer is : how do these 

twin considerations affect the logic of the arguments advanced 

so far ? 

We argued earlier from form to substance in a seamless 

way—but forms can contradict or replace one another over 

time and they vary in space. What bearing then do these factors 

have on the logical outcome of our discussion? 

When experiences contradict one another, then the 

contradicting form takes precedence over or is considered 

more real than the contradicted form. Thus normal waking 

state is considered more real than dream state and within 

waking state, as when a piece of shell is experienced as silver, 

the contradicting experience (here shell) is considered more 

real than the contradicted experience (here silver). 

But in spite of such contradictions among the 

different forms, existence or (consciousness) as 

such remains uncontradicted. When we disbelieve 

an illusory serpent we only deny that the existence 

there is of a form of a serpent, but we do not deny 

that there is some existence. Again, even when we 

deny a dream object, we don’t deny that the 

experience or idea existed. And when we think of a 

time or place where nothing exists, we are thinking 

of the existence of at least that time or place. So 

existence, in some form or another, is as wide as 

thought and we cannot conceive of the absence 

or denial of existence. This universal, pure 

existence (or consciousness ) is thus the only thing 

Aavaita Vedanta: A Rational Approach 

67 

whose contradiction is unthinkable. Sankara calls 

it, therefore, supreme reality (Paramarthika satta.) 

He thus logically arrives also at his conception of 

reality as that which persists uncontradicted through 

all forms of existence in all place and times. 77 

Rut on what logical basis, we might wish .to ask, was the 

contradicting experience considered superior to the 

contradicted, experience? A little reflection leads to the 

conclusion that the contradicting experience is considered 

more real than the contradicted experience, because it 

endures longer than the contradicted experience. Thus 

waking state outlasts the dreaming state, and the experience 

of the rope lasts longer than that of the serpent. 

This provides a clue to the Advaitic concept of reality 

namely, that that which persists is real. One is led in this 

direction by an examination of both the original argument 

and the complications introduced into it in this section. Thus, 

to revert to the original argument, the silver in a sense is more 

real since the bracelet was a form of it and the substance X, of 

which silver might be the form, is more real than silver because 

each respectively endures longer, and existence itself—pure 

indeterminate existence—was identified as the material cause 

of the universe because it was the most enduring of all. 

This thrust is confirmed when one takes the fact that forms 

might contradict one another into account—as when the 

experience of a snake is contradicted by it turning out to a 

rope, or dream experience by waking experience. Existence 

as such persists through them also. 

As for the diversity of objects exhibited by the universe, it 

needs to be noted that they are all undergoing modification, 

although at different rates. Even more important than the 

difference in the rate at which they are undergoing 

modification is the fact that they are all undergoing 

modification. Now 

This theoretical possibility of change in perception, 

and of consequent contradiction, then makes the 

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Advaita Vedanta 

status of every particular object precarious, in 

respect of its reality. We can never be absolutely 

certain that what appears now as pot will not appear 

otherwise later. We see, therefore, how different 

particular forms of existence, like pot and cloth, 

weaken and undermine each other’s claim to 

indubitable reality. If, however, these claimed only 

pure existence, and not existence of particular 

forms, their claims would not have been mutually 

exclusive. The rival claims of particulars as 

particular existents thus prevent them from having 

the position of indubitable reality such as pure 

existence enjoys. 78 

VI 

The upshot of such a rational analysis of the objective universe 

along Advaitic lines leads one to the following conclusion: 

On such rational grounds Sankara grades and 

classifies common experience. As we saw, he first 

of all, distinguishes all objects of possible and actual 

experience from utter unreality, like the child of 

the barren mother. The former again are classed 

under there heads : 1) those that only appear 

momentarily in illusions and dreams, but are 

contradicted by waking experience, 2) those that 

appear in normal waking experience—the 

particular and changing objects, which form the 

basis of our ordinary life and practice, but which 

are still not acceptable to reason as completely real 

(because they exhibit contradiction or are open to 

future contradiction), and 3) pure existence which 

reveals itself through all experience, and is neither 

contradicted nor contradictable. 79 

How is such a world, the world not only of common 

experience, but one in which common experience is rationally 

described? 

Advaita Vedanta: A Rational Approach 

69 

The world is thus not a homogeneous conception, 

and if, in spite of this, one insists on being told 

what such a world, as a whole is, the fairest reply 

can only be, what Sankara gives, namely that is 

indescribable ( anirvacaniya ) either as real or as 

unreal. But if the word world is confined only to 

the second aspect, it would be again fair to say, 

that the world is real only for practical purpose, 

more real than the first and less real than the third 

kind of existence. But if the world is taken in the 

third sense, Sankara would emphatically assert that 

the world is eternally real. As he puts it : “As the 

cause, Brahman, doesn’t lack existence at any time, 

past, present or future, so does the world not lack 

existence in any of the three periods of time.” 

Again, “ All particular modes of existence with 

different names and forms as real as existence, 

but unreal as particulars.” st> 

VII 

So much of the objective world—what now of the individual 

subject? 

The rational analysis of the individual subject in Advaita 

seems to follow three routes: 1) an analysis of the subject’s 

experience of itself; 2) an analysis of the subject’s experience 

of the states in which it exists in the world and 3) and analysis 

of the subject in the light of its relation to the external world. 

The subject’s experience of itself is usually described 

through the use of the personal pronoun “I”. One way in which 

Advaita arrives at its concept of the individual is through a 

rational analysis of this linguistic phenomenon. 

The word “I” can be employed in various ways and if the 

common denominator underlying these various uses could 

be identified, then one might have here the key by turning 

which the secrets of the self may be unlocked. Some of such 

uses of the “I” may be listed as follows: 

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Advaita Vedanta 

1. I am tall 

2. I see you 

3. I walk home 

4. I think of it 

’5. I feel he is wrong 

6. I will do it 

7. I know, I just know 

The first use refers to the body. So the “I” possesses a body. 

Thus people say: ‘I am tali’, ‘I am short’, ‘I am fat;, T am 

thin’ and so on. 

The second use refers to an organ of perception—the eye. 

One also says: I hear, I touch, I taste, and I smell. Thus the 

organs of perception located in the body and their function 

are some of the things the “I” identifies with. It does the same 

when it says: I balance myself on a beam. 

The third use refers to an organ of action, that of 

locomotion. One also says: I talk, I grasp, I empty my bladder, 

and I have sex. Thus the organs of ac tion located in the body 

and their function are some of the other things the “I” 

identifies with. 

The fourth, fifth, and sixth uses point to the psyche in its 

three dimensions of thinking, feeling and willing. The “I” 

identifies itself with each of these. 

The seventh use points to the sense of intuition possessed 

by us—a sense of knowing somewhat different from our usual 

way of knowing things. The I identifies with it too. 

Now what persists through all these states as a common 

denominator? One might be tempted to say the body, but 

the body could not identify with any of the descriptions offered 

earlier, were it not conscious. Neither would the mind be able 

to identify with any were it not conscious. In fact, the 

identification of the / with any of the descriptions offered 

earlier presuppose consciousness. Thus 

Consciousness is, therefore, the essence of the self 

in whichever form it may appear. But it is not 

consciousness of any particular form, but simple 

Advaita Vedanta: A Rational Approach 

71 

consciousness common to all its forms. Such 

consciousness is also pure existence since existence 

persists throughout all forms of consciousness. The 

different particular and changing forms of 

consciousness can be shown, from their 

contradictory natures, to be mere appearance, in 

the same way as the different forms of existence 

were shown to be so before. 81 

There arc ostensibly moments, however, when 

consciousness is not present, as when we swoon or are asleep. 

At these moments, however, our sense of / also disappears. 

Thus the correlation between / and /-consciousness in terms 

of our conscious self is obvious. But what when we are 

dreaming? We are not conscious of our body when we are 

dreaming, although consciousness in some form is present. 

In deep sleep it seems to be absent at first sight. 

This brings us to the second approach adopted in Advaita 

for identifying the nature of the self. All of us assert that I am 

awake, I dreamt, and I slept. Thus the / clearly persists 

through these three states of waking, dreaming and deep 

sleep. But does consciousness persist through these three 

states? According to Advaita an analysis of these three states 

reveals that consciousness does persist through them. 

Moreover, as a bonus, this analysis also enables us to identify 

the nature of this consciousness more clearly, if we argue as 

follows: 

The essence of the self must remain in all these or 

the self would cease to be. But what do we find 

common to all these states ? In the first state there 

is consciousness of external objects; in the second 

also there is consciousness, but of internal objects 

present only to the dreamer. In the third state no 

objects appear, but here is no cessation of 

consciousness, for otherwise the subsequent 

memory of that state , as one of peace and freedom 

from worries, would not be possible. The persistent 

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Advaita Vedanta 

factor then is consciousness, but not necessarily of 

any object. This shows again that the essence of 

self is pure consciousness without necessary 

relation to objects. 82 

The identification of objectless consciousness through the 

rational analysis of deep sleep is very important from the point 

of view of Advaita. Normally, we always associate consciousness 

with an object but the phenomenon of deep sleep reveals 

that although consciousness need not always be associated 

with an object, it must always be associated with the subject. 

The third approach to the individual subject identified in 

Advaita enables one to say more about the nature of pure 

consciousness. In this approach that fact that the individual 

subject stands face-to-face with a world of objects is subjected 

to radical rational scrutiny. The first result of such an 

investigation is the reconfiguration of the concept of subject 

and object as commonly understood in philosophy as follows: 

The cognitive situation is usually taken to involve a 

subject and object. The Advaitin substitutes for them 

drk and drsya, the former meaning the self or what 

reveals and the latter, what is revealed. The reason 

for this substitution is that the other division is not 

logically quite satisfactory. The subject includes not 

only drk but also drsya. It is really a complex of the 

self and the not self. This is clear from statements 

like I know myself-,, where myself refers to some 

thought or feeling or, as Hume said, ‘some 

particular perception or other, of heat or cold, light 

or shade, love or hatred, pain or pleasure.’ These 

perceptions, being observable, are drsya and 

necessarily point to some center of consciousness 

beyond them. 85 

The drk or the individual subject, as the center of pure 

consciousness, upon analysis, displays certain striking 

properties. 

Advaila Vedanta: /I Rational Approach 

73 

It is impossible to think of the absence of drk —as 

having ceased to be or as not having yet come to 

be, for that thought itself would imply the presence 

of drk. Hence drk, in some sense, should be regarded 

as having neither beginning nor end, and therefore 

as eternal or timeless. 

...We have seen that ark cannot have internal parts. 

It cannot be externally related to other drks, for a 

similar reason, viz., that it is not possible to think of 

any dividing line between them. The only way in 

which we can distinguish between one drk and 

another is by reference to their content or the 

objects they reveal. In themselves, they are 

indistinguishable. That is, drk is one or, more strictly, 

not many. 84 

In this way the pure subject is not only external and one, it 

can also be considered all-comprehensive, if the drsya is 

considered dependent on the drk and therefore accounted 

for by drk, for then drk becomes “all-comprehensive, in the 

sense that there is nothing outside it”, directly or indirectly. 

VIII 

The concept of contradiction plays a special role in logical 

analysis. We would do well, therefore, to analyze its role in 

Advaitic rationality. 

In terms of pragmatic reason, Advaitic thinking would 

distinguish between contradiction between one thought and 

another, and between thought and practice. One could 

think of a situation, for instance, in which an individual is 

constantly changing his pattern of thought, so that what one 

says today may contradict what one said fifteen days ago. 

However, one might yet, in both these phases, be consistent 

in terms of thought and practice. Suppose, for instance, that 

fifteen days ago a person believed in violence and also behaved 

violently. Now, fifteen days later, the same person comes to 

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Advaita Vedanta 

believe in non-violence and also behaves non-violently. Then 

over this fifteen-day period he would have exhibited 

contradiction at the level of thought and also at the level of 

practice, but not at the level of the relationship between 

thought and practice. In terms of practical reason, as it were, 

one could display a pattern of four possibilities. 1) 

contradiction between thought and thought ; 2) 

contradiction between practice and practice; 3) thought 

contradicted by practice (when one thinks oneself to be 

detached and may not be) and 4) practice contradicted by 

thought (one may actually be modest and not think of 

oneself as such, as part of being modest!) . Then there is 

the case of th ejivanmukta, a case in which such contradictions 

might be considered unthinkable. This is then how the 

discussion of contradiction might well proceed in terms of 

Advaitic ethics and soteriology. 

In the realm of Advaitic epistemology and ontology, 

however, the discussion of contradiction must be set on a 

different course. The referents of contradiction here are 

thought and experience. In terms of these referents one can 

again came up with a four-fold pattern; 1) the contradiction 

of one experience by another; 2) the contradiction of one 

thought by another; 3) the contradiction of thought by 

experience and 4) the contradiction of experience by thought. 

An example of the contradiction of one experience by 

another is provided by the experience of what was thought to 

be snake turning out to be a rope. The experience of the 

rope contradicts the experience of the snake. Similarly, the 

experience of waking contradicts the experience of sleep. 

Note, however, that while in the first case the contradicting 

experience of the rope falsified the contradicted 

experience; this cannot be said of the contradiction involved 

in the waking and sleeping states. One can either accept 

both on their face value, or claim that each falsifies the other. 

This is possible because they belong to two different kinds 

of consciousness, unlike the case of the rope-snake example. 

Advaita Vedanta: A Rational Approach 

75 

An example of the contradiction of one thought by 

another is provided when it is argued that the effect and 

(material) cause may be two distinct entities. This is 

contradicted by the thought that the two distinct entities 

require a third entity to relate them, but then this third 

entity will have to be related by a fourth and fifth entity to 

the first and so forth, leading to infinite regress. 

The example of the contradiction of thought by experience 

will be provided by the case in which one might think it 

unthinkable that one could experience a state in which one 

is neither aware of oneself nor of the world. Yet the experience 

of dreamless sleep provides precisely an example of such a 

state, and so might samadhi. 

The example of the contradiction of experience by thought 

is provided by the apparent movement of the sun across the 

sky. It is given by experience but contradicted by astronomical 

knowledge. 

For the rational presentation of Advaitic ontology, however, 

this grid has to be ratched up a notch to another level: to the 

contradiction between the non-contradictable and the 

contradictable. 

It was mentioned earlier how “universal, pure existence 

(or consciousness) is the only thing whose contradiction is 

unthinkable. Sankara calls it, therefore, Supreme reality 

(Paramarthika Satta). He thus logically arrives also at this 

conception of reality as that which persists uncontradicted 

through all forms of existence in all places and times.” 22 As 

distinguished from such existence in general, existence in 

the particular suffers from a liability. “About any definite or 

particular form of existence, which may appear in our 

experience, we can never be certain that it may not be 

supplanted by a contradictory experience arising in future. 

So the theoretical or logical possibility of it being contradicted 

is always there.” 86 

The distinction between the contradiction of snake by 

rope; and of sleep by waking become relevant when it is 

Advaita Vedanta 

claimed that rationally speaking, even two objects like pot 

ghata and cloth pata falsify each other. 

Rope and snake experienced in the same waking state as 

distinct objects do not falsify each other; when the same object 

which was perceived as a snake turns out to be a rope, one 

(snake) is falsified by the other (rope); waking and dreaming 

may be credibly said to falsify' each other but they belong to 

two different orders of experience. It is true that both pot 

and cloth may be falsified, as particulars, in relation to 

universal existence but they can be said to mutually falsify 

each other only from the perspective of universal existence, 

as the uncontadictable reality in the light of which not only 

are both contradicted but also mutually so, even though they 

are at the same ontological level. In other works, change 

involves the possibility of contradiction, possible change 

therefore involves the possibility of contradiction but note 

that experientially the pot can never change into cloth because 

of acceptance of satkaryavada. From the point of view of 

satkaryavada both effects are false and doubly so but only 

mutually in relation to the highest level. 

The paradox is that although logically the pot and cloth 

falsify each other on account of changeability, experientially 

they cannot change into each other. Logic from the highest 

level delimits experience of particulars, while logic at the same 

level limits experience to particulars. The rope can apparently 

turn into a snake but can the pot turn into cloth? No, but 

what they do is “weaken and undermine each other’s claim 

to indubitable reality” by reinforcing each other’s 

particularity. 

PART III 

Advaita Vedanta: 

An Experiential Approach 

The experiential approach to the study of Advaita Vedanta 

provides a third possible way of approaching the subject. An 

initial validation for such an approach is provided by an 

attempt to answer the following question : Why should not a 

rational approach suffice either by itself, or in combination 

with the scriptural approach, to provide an introduction to 

Advaita Vedanta? Of course from a certain point of view it 

can. In fact, either the scriptural or the rational could suffice 

by itself for that matter. However, a more comprehensive 

perspective might lead one to conclude otherwise. Our 

experience of life reveals that life is characterized by three 

states of consciousness—waking, dreaming and deep sleep. 

A philosophy of life must take all three into account and 

account for all three. Rationality, however, is a characteristic 

of human mind only during the waking state, although 

mental activity in some form is common to both the waking 

state and the dreaming state. In the state of deep sleep, 

even mental activity, or at least conscious mental activity, 

also ceases. Thus rationality only characterizes a part of life; 

can it be used to account for the whole of life? The same 

argument can be given another form in terms of conscious 

mental activity, even during the waking state. Mental activity, 

in the waking state, also includes aesthetic and emotional 

experience. Thus rationality is only one, if privileged, aspect 

of this manifold mental activity. We give premium to 

rationality because we associate it with the philosophical 

enterprise in which we are engaged. Thus, its role gives it a 

certain status in view of the nature of the task we are engaged 

in but it is useful to be reminded of the fact that there is 

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Advaita Vedanta 

more to life than logic. What an electrifying insight this must 

have been before it became a cliche. 

How then might Advaita Vedanta be presented, if it took 

all the states of existence and not just one (of which the 

experience of rationality is so striking a feature) into account? 

II 

One important feature of the experiential exposition of 

Advaita Vedanta is to question the finality of the distinction 

between waking and dreaming and deep sleep. In our 

everyday approach to life, if we were asked to pair out any 

two of them and separate the one left out as an indication 

in our judgement of their relative importance, then nine 

times out of ten we will be inclined to pair dreaming and 

deep sleep as one unit, and separate the waking state as the 

one in which we are really alive. The waking state lies at the 

center of our life. After all, we live from day-to-day, not night- 

to-night. The night is spent in repose and in experiencing 

the states of dreaming and deep sleep. 

The Advaita approach to the matter, however, is more 

inclined to pair the states of waking and dreaming, and 

prefers to separate deep sleep from them for reasons which 

will now be explained. Advaita Vedanta is inclined to pair 

the waking and dreaming states together, notwithstanding 

their differences, because both of them are equally 

characterized by mental activity. According to the Advaitic 

view our concepts of space, time and causality differ in the 

waking and dreaming states, in contrast to the common view 

that these concepts are present in the waking state and absent 

in the dreaming state. According to Advaitins the only real 

difference between the two is duration—waking is a longer 

stretch of dreaming and that is why in the waking state we 

can recall we slept but not vice versa. 

Many thinkers—both Eastern and Western—have felt that 

drawing a firm distinction between waking and dreaming 

presents difficulties. Among Western thinkers Descartes and 

Pascal may be specially mentioned. Descartes wrote: 

Advaita Vedanta: An Experiential Approach 

81 

When I consider the matter carefully, I do not find 

a single characteristic by means of which I can 

certainly determine whether I am awake or 

whether I am dreaming. The vision of a dream 

and the experience of my waking state are so much 

alike that I am completely puzzled and I don’t 

reallv know if I am not dreaming at this moment. 87 

And Pascal said : 

If a dream comes to us every night we should be as 

much occupied with it as by the thing we see every 

day, and if an artisan were certain that he would 

dream every night for twelve hours that he was a 

king, then he would be just as happy who dreams 

every night for twelve hours that he is an artisan. 88 

In the East, the Indian king Janaka and the Chinese 

philosopher Chuang Tzu were baffled, it seems, by similar 

experiences. There was once a famous Indian king called 

Janaka. “King Janaka had a dream that he was a beggar. On 

his waking up he asked his guru ‘Am I a king dreaming of 

being a beggar or a beggar dreaming of being a king?” 89 

Chuang Tzu (c. 369-286 B.C ), second in importance only 

to Lao Tzu as a representative of Taoism, raises for “epistemo¬ 

logy... the ultimately unanswerable question”: 90 

Once upon a time, Chuang Chou [ i.e. Chuang 

Tzu] dreamed that he was a butterfly, a butterfly 

fluttering about, enjoying it. It did not know that 

it was Chuang Chou again. But he didn’t know 

whether he was Chuang Chou who had dreamed 

that he was a butterfly, or whether he was a 

butterfly dreaming that he was Chuang Chou. 

Between Chuang Chou and the butterfly there 

must he some distinction. This is what is called 

the transformation of things. 91 

In a less celebrated and more elaborate passage Chuang 

Tzu further considers the plausibility of the dream-like nature 

of life. 

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Advaila Vedanta 

Those who dream of a merry drinking party may 

the next morning wail and weep. Those who 

dream of wailing and weeping may in the morning 

go off gaily to hunt. While they dream they do not 

know that they are dreaming. In their dream, they 

may even try to interpret their dream. Only when 

they have awakened do they begin to know that 

they have dreamed. By and by comes a great 

awakening, and then we shall know that it has all 

been a great dream. Yet all the while the fools 

think that they are awake; this they are sure of. 

With minute nicety, they discriminate between 

princes and grooms. How stupid! Confucius and 

you are both in a dream. And when I say that you 

are in a dream, this is also a dream. This way of 

talking may be called paradoxical. If after ten 

thousand generations we could once meet a great 

sage who knew how to explain the paradox, it 

would be as though we met him after only one 

morning or one evening. 92 

A similar tendency to treat the waking state as analogous 

to dreaming also appears in Buddhist thought, as the 

following passage indicates: 

‘The senses are as though illusions and their objects 

as dreams. For instance a sleeping man might 

dream that he had made love to a beautiful 

country girl, and he might remember her when 

he awoke. WTiat do you think ...does the beautiful 

girl he dreamed of really exist?” 

“No, Lord.” 

“And would the man be wise to remember the 

girl of his dreams, or to believe that he had really 

made love to her ?” 

“No, Lord, because she doesn’t really exist at all, 

how could he have made love to her—though of 

Advaita Vedanta: An Experiential Approach 

83 

course he might think he did under the influence 

of weakness or fatigue.” 

“In just the same way a foolish and ignorant man 

of the world sees pleasant forms and believes in 

their existence. Hence he is pleased, and so he 

feels passion and acts accordingly 91 ’ 

Mystics even more than philosophers are inclined to 

disregard the distinction, at some level, between waking and 

dreaming, as in the following story narrated by Sri Ramakrsna 

Paramhamsa (1836-1886): 

A son was born to a king. He was the only child 

and was therefore the apple of the eye of both the 

king and queen. The prince became a favorite with 

all and as he grew older he was taught all the arts 

and the sciences. One day, all of a sudden, the 

prince fell ill. The malady went on getting worse 

and even the best physician of the kingdom found 

that all treatments were of no avail. Both the king 

and the queen never left his side day and night 

and the most competent physician and nurses 

continuously attended him. The king was 

exhausted by his constant vigil and one night he 

could not resist falling asleep. He was awakened 

by the sound of crying and weeping and learnt 

that prince had passed away while he was asleep. 

The king sat as if he was stupefied, without 

speaking a single word. The queen asked him how 

it was that on the passing away of the only a child 

whom he loved so much there was not a single 

drop of tears in his eyes. The king said, ‘Oh queen, 

when I fell asleep I dreamt that I had become a 

monarch of a large kingdom, much larger than 

mine, and the father of seven worthy and ideal 

princes, each of whom was well trained in the art 

of administration. I handed over the charge of my 

kingdom to them and thereafter I was spending 

Advaita Vedanta 

8'i 

my days in peace and happiness with you. And now 

this tragedy has taken place and I am unable to 

make up my mind whether I should lament for 

the child that has left us today or whether I should 

mourn the loss of the seven sons and a vast 

kingdom: I see no difference in the two bereave¬ 

ments and to me the world has become nothing 

but a dream’. 94 

Ramana Maharsi (d. 1950) asserts even more directly the 

elusiveness of the distinction. 

All that we see is a dream, whether we see it in the 

dream state or waking state. On account of some 

arbitrary standards about the duration of the 

experience and so on, we call one experience a 

dream and another waking experience. With 

reference to reality both the experiences are 

unreal. A man might have such an experience as 

getting anugrah (grace) in his dream and the 

effects and influence of it on his entire subsequent 

life may be so profound and so abiding that one 

cannot call it unreal, while calling real some trifling 

incident in the waking life that just flits by is causal 

and of no moment and is soon forgotten. Once I 

had an experience, a vision or a dream whatever 

you may call it. I and some others including 

Chadwick who had a walk on the hill. Returning 

we were walking along a huge street with great 

buildings on either side. Showing the street and 

the buildings, I asked Chadwick and others 

whether anybody could say that what we were 

seeing was dream and they all replied, What fool 

■will say so ? and we walked along and entered the 

hall and the vision or dream ceased, or [we] woke 

up. What are we to call this? 95 

A story told about the fifth Sikh Guru, Guru Arjun (1563- 

1606) also makes a similar point. It is said that a king came 

to visit him but 

Advaita Vedanta: An Experiential Approach 

85 

when he heard the musicians hymning the Guru’s 

composition saying “O friend, the Writ thy God 

has written out for thee can be obliterated not”, 

he became anxious in the mind. On being 

questioned, the Guru explained to the visitor that 

the Writ that God writes is based upon one’s own 

deeds. This gravely disappointed the King who 

asked:—“If such be the case what is the need of 

the Guru’s Grace or even of doing or being good, 

if what has to happen must come to pass.” The 

Guru replied:—-“Of this we would talk tomorrow.” 

In the night, the King dreamt that he had become 

a sweeper, clothed in tatters, dealing with filth all 

the time and living the life of a miserable wretch. 

He woke up, disturbed, in the morning and told 

the Guru so. The Guru replied: “O devotee, you 

slept as a King and in the dream became a poor 

wretch. Your dream-state was as valid at the time 

of your dreaming, as is your kingly state which you 

really possess. Such is the nature of the Guru’s 

Grace that no matter what your past or present, 

you pass through, and are affected by it, only as 

one passes through a dream, till one’s self awakens 

to realise the essential kingly nature of one’s 

soul”. 96 

The state of deep sleep presents a radical contrast to the 

states of waking and dreaming. The most striking features 

of this contrast are two-fold: (1) that in deep sleep one loses 

awareness of both oneself and of the world—outer as well as 

inner. In the waking state, one is aware of the world of 

external objects; in the dream state, one is aware of a world 

of external objects also (which upon waking are discovered 

to have been inner); but this crucial distinction disappears 

in deep sleep. (2) Although one thus undergoes loss of 

individuality in deep sleep yet upon waking one identifies 

oneself with the same person who went to sleep. This 

establishes that identity can survive loss of individuality. These 

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two facts—that in deep sleep one loses all sense of 

individuality (as well as of the world) and further that despite 

this lapse in individuality one doesn’t suffer loss of identity— 

are considered such sensational features of deep sleep that 

they—for the Advaitin—place deep sleep in a category by 

itself, in comparison with waking and dreaming taken 

together. 

III 

We revert now to the discussion of three states as separate 

ones, after noticing that the analysis of deep sleep leads us 

to the conclusion that there must be some entity which 

survives discontinuity as sharp as the one involved in the state 

of deep sleep* wherein even our sense of individuality is 

lost. We are now led to a larger question: what constitutes 

the underlying link even between the two different senses 

of individualities experienced by us in the waking and 

dreaming state respectively? Thus there is something which 

underlies and sustains both the changing individualities in 

waking and dreaming states, and the loss of individuality as 

such in the state of deep sleep. 

One, thus, arrives at the concept of the pure subject, in 

the absence of which the three separate states couldn’t 

possibly constitute the experience of a single person. 

This is the experiential counterpart to the scriptural saksi 

and the rational drk. 

IV 

Another way of approaching Advaita Vedanta experientially 

is to view the hierarchy of the three states—listed in that 

order as waking, dreaming and deep sleep—in two different 

but complementary ways. 

One can employ the analysis of the three states in order 

to indicate both the nature of this pure subject, and how it 

might be discovered. This dual thrust of the fresh analysis of 

the three states is the clear implication, for instance, of some 

of the remarks by Ramana Mahar?i. On the one hand, he 

Advaila Vedanta: An Experiential Approach 

87 

admits that, in a sense, the state of deep sleep is closer to 

the state of the pure subject as “the sleep state is free from 

thoughts and their impression on the individual.” 97 Yet, at 

the same time, he warns that one should not “therefore desire 

to be always in sleep” because the “incentive to realize” the 

self “can arise only in the waking state and efforts can only 

be made when one is awake.” 98 

This distinction between what is to be realized and how it 

is to be realized is crucial to an understanding of the way 

these three states of waking, dreaming and deep sleep are 

approached in experiential Advaita. In effect, Ramana, and 

earlier thinkers of Advaita, set up these three states in a 

pattern of opposing hierarchies (somewhat like structure 

and anti-structure). One may designate them as a theoretical 

and the practical approaches to the issue. “The theoretical 

approach shows us where we want to go, i.e., to the 

interiorisation and the unification of consciousness, while 

the practical approach indicates the means to achieve that 

end, i.e., through Advaitic knowledge or yogic will.” 99 

The theoretical approach may be elaborated first. It could 

be argued that as one moves from the waking states 

progressively to dreaming and deep sleep in the world of 

ordinary experience, consciousness becomes increasingly 

rarefied in the empirical subject. In the waking state, objects 

are experienced in the external world. In the dreaming 

state, objects become a product of the person’s interior 

consciousness. In deep sleep, the distinction between the 

subject and the object dissolves—even the internal division 

within a dream between the experiencing subject and the 

experienced object vanishes. All that is left is the sleeping 

person. But as on waking up the person remembers having 

slept, there must have been some conscious subject that 

witnessed the unconsciousness of sleep. This pure subject 

has to be realized. Its realization is said to put an end to all 

unhappiness. Such is the Advaitin claim, that except for one 

who experientially comes to “know” this pure subject, which 

is known solely by means of itself “on account of its self- 

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luminosity”, according to Ramana “every man, from king to 

peasant has a certain account of sorrow. Even in cases where 

it seems absent it is only a time factor that makes you think 

so —sooner or later it comes.’’ 1 " That is, until Self-realization 

is achieved. 

This analysis is suggestive in several ways. First, it suggests 

that a radical discontinuity is involved in realizing the pure 

subject, on account of its purity: its total absence of any 

relationship with any object as in deep sleep, as distinguished 

from its interiorised relationship as in dreams or an external 

relation as in the waking state. Thus the knowledge of the 

pure subject is categorically different from the knowledge 

or absence of it which arises in a subject-object context, even 

though this latter type of knowledge is itself qualitatively 

different in waking, dreaming and deep sleep. Second, as 

the realization of pure subjectivity entails the total elimination 

of any form of object-contextuality, the realization of the 

pure subject is a purely negative enterprise, in the sense 

that all objects have to be eliminated at all levels—including 

the possibility of a subject in a state of relation to no objects. 

The subject must be just that. “When non-self disappears, 

the self alone remains. To make room it is enough that 

cramping is removed. Space is not brought in afresh. Say 

more space is there even in cramping.” 101 This passage serves 

to explain the comment that while in ordinary experience 

the “true self-cannot be known, it doesn’t therefore remain 

unrealized, for it is self-revealing. In fact it can never be 

wholly suppressed.” 102 It is in this sense perhaps that one 

must understand Ramana’s remark: “The feeling that I have 

not realized is the obstruction to realization. In fact, it is 

already realized...”” 103 

The practical approach toward the realization of the self 

and its relation to the three states of waking, dreaming and 

deep sleep may now be examined. Any effort at realization 

involves volition, so from a practical point of view the 

hierarchy must now be reversed: no volition is possible in 

deep sleep, perhaps more in dreaming but most in the 

waking state. 

Advaita Vedanta: An Experiential Approach 

89 

The overall point may be graphically presented as follows: 

Deep Sleep 

Dreaming 

Waking 

The three states in terms 

of unification of 

consciousness 

Waking 

Dreaming 

Deep Sleep 

The three states in 

terms of degrees of 

volition in Consciousness 

The special point to note is that one cannot just jump 

from one pyramid to the other. It is somewhat like the 

experience in mountaineering, when we may be standing 

on a cliff atop one mountain and within close reach of 

another mountain. It would be foolhardy, however, to just 

try to jump from the top of a cliff on to the other mountain. 

One must come down all the way and then climb to the top 

of the other. 

V 

What, it might be asked, is the exact nature of the problem 

towards solving which efforts must be directed in the waking 

state? 

The problem is best illustrated with the help of an 

example. Let us take the case of a young lady who is in love 

with her beau and goes out to buy a nice dress to please him. 

She brings that dress home and places it on the table. She 

then reclines on the chair and begins to speculate on the 

romantic possibilities this addition to her wardrobe could 

set in motion. 

She imagines how she will wear the dress in the evening 

and go out for a candle-lit dinner with her friend. She will 

iron the dress with particular care and wear a perfume with 

it. She imagines the possibility of spilling wine on it and 

spoiling the dress (God forbid), and how she will preserve it 

and after years of marriage still keep it though it may be 

worn out by then, and how she will show it to her daughter 

as the dress she wore on the evening her husband proposed 

to her. While she is thus thinking, the phone rings and she 

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Advaila Vedanta 

talks to her friend about this fabulous dress she bought in 

the morning, describing in great detail the way it came to 

be purchased. 

Throughout this series of events the actual dress has simply 

been lying on the table. So all her experiences don’t really 

pertain to the dress but to the dress-thought. When she 

thinks of wearing the dress it is really the dress-thought she 

is concerned with—the dress as such is merely lying on the 

table. The web of romantic associations she has woven are 

also woven not around the dress itself, which just lies as an 

item on the table, but around the dress-thought, in her mind. 

When she talks with her friend on the phone she really talks 

of the dress-thought, not the dress itself, which lies on the 

table and is indifferent to the vicissitudes of fortune the 

dress-thought is undergoing. The moment the lady stops 

thinking or talking of the dress-thought—which is what is 

really involved in the thinking or talking about it rather than 

the dress itself—the dress-thought may be said to go back 

into the dress. 

This example serves to illustrate several aspects of the 

problem at hand. It is the Advaitin contention that what we 

are concerned with in the process of ordinary living is not 

the real /but the I-thought, just as what the lady was concerned 

with in exploring her romantic situation was the dress- 

thought and not the dress, even though she may find it 

difficult to draw this distinction. Although the dress as dress- 

thought was the object of so much activity, the dress as such 

just lay passively on the table. It is the Advaitin contention 

that just as it was not the dress but the dress-thought which 

ran the young lady’s life for a while, it is not pure subject— 

the pure I —but the /- thought which runs our lives, divorced 

from the real I but deriving its existence from it, just as the 

dress-thought is divorced from the dress and yet derives its 

existence from it! This I-thought is also called the ego and it 

is said that “those alone who have found out the real nature 

of the ego have seen reality. They will have no more doubts 

or anxiety. ” 104 Even this point can be clarified analogically: 

Advaila Vedanta: An Experiential Approach 

91 

just as once one has discovered the nature of the dress- 

thought—which one constantly confused with the dress 

itself—one would also discover the real nature of the dress 

as such, unclouded by the dress-thought. 

In Advaita, it is said that realization of one’s true nature 

entails realizing how the I-thought rises from the real /. ‘To 

say / am this or I am ihat there must be the I. This / is only 

the ego or the I-thought is therefore the root-thought ...find 

out its source. Then all these [other thoughts] will vanish 

and the pure self will remain over .”" 15 Similarly one is told 

that the ego proceeds from the self as a spark from fire. 

“The spark is called the ego. In the case of the ignorant 

man it identifies itself with an object simultaneously with its 

rise. It cannot remain independent of such association with 

objects If its objectifying tendency is killed it remains pure 

and also merges into the source .”" 1 ' 1 This point can also be 

made in relation to the analogy of the dress-thought and 

the dress. When we perceive the dress qua dress without 

dress-thoughts, one can describe the process as either tracing 

dress-thoughts back to their source, the dress, or making 

dress-thoughts merge into the dress. 

Just as one needed to distinguish between the dress and 

the dress-thought, one needs to distinguish between the I 

and the I-thought. “You must distinguish between the I, pure 

in itself, and the I- thought .” 107 “If you stay as the /, your 

being alone, without thought, the /-thought will disappear 

and the delusion will vanish forever .” 108 

This raises the interesting question: are there two Is ? The 

parallel question in terms of the analogy would be—are there 

two dresses ? There is only one dress. Similarly, there is only 

one I. But just as the dress gives rise to the dress-thought, 

the I-thought emerges from the I. Or, one can even say that 

once the dress-thought has arisen, several dress-thoughts in 

various phases arise based on the original dress-thought. 

Thus the sequence runs as follows: dress > dress-thought > 

dress thoughts. This helps explain the following: “The I of 

the dream has vanished. Another I speaks of the dream. 

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Advaita Vedanta 

This / was not in the dream. Both the r s are unreal. There 

is the substratum of the mind which continues all along, 

giving rise to so many scenes. With every thought rises /, and 

with its disappearance the I disappears too. So the Is are 

born, and die every moment ,’’" 11 like dress-thoughts 

emerging from moment to moment. Once one knows that 

the dress is lying safely on the table the vicissitudes of the 

dress-thoughts cease to be a cause for concern. 

There are other ways as well in which the analogy of the 

dress and dress-thought is illuminating. For instance, it is 

said in Advaita : “That which makes the enquiry is the ego. 

The / about which the inquiry is made is also the ego. As a 

result of the enquiry the ego ceases to exist .”" 0 Parallel: 

starting as we do from the realm of the dress-thought, it is 

the dress-thought, which inquires into itself. Then it realizes 

it is just the dress-thought and disappears, yielding place to 

the actual dress lying on the table. Again, in Advaita one is 

encouraged to enquire who undergoes the vicissitudes of 

life and discover that only the ego is affected by them, not 

the self, and that “the ego is non-existent.” Parallel: the dress- 

thoughts undergo all the vicissitudes, they do not bind the 

dress itself and the dress-thoughts are non-existent in the 

sense that what really exists is only the dress. Again it is said: 

“Reality is simply the loss of ego.”"' Parallel: the recognition 

of the reality of the dress is simply the loss of dress-thoughts. 

Thus the analogy is helpful in many ways. Let me close by 

poindng out two more instances in which it is helpful in a 

much more dynamic sense—in shedding light on the actual 

pursuit of the spiritual goal. 

It is sometimes said that the realization could be sudden 

or gradual, that is, taking time to steady itself. At times 

Ramana said that “there are no degrees of liberation ,”" 2 

and at other times that “realization takes time to steady 

itself .”" 3 This could also be understood in terms of our 

analogy. Let us imagine that the young lady in the parable is 

suddenly told that her beau has run off with someone else! If 

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93 

the lady is shocked to her sense by this revelation the dress 

would immediately become a piece of cloth for her—the 

dress-thoughts would disappear. If, however, she still retained 

affection for the heel who left her, dress-thoughts might 

still occasionally arise from the dress and may only gradually 

subside till the dress become just a piece of cloth (that is, till 

she finds another beau). 

It is also sometimes said that realization is not possible so 

long as one is “aware of an /”; it is only possible upon “being 

the /’. So long as one has thoughts of the dress, one is in a 

sense in a state of alienation from the dress and still in the 

realm of dress-thoughts. But when the dress becomes the 

dress —that is, when all dress-thought disappear, then alone 

it is in its natural and primal state. 

The process of realization may be said to consist of three 

stages. In the first stage one is aware of only the I-thought to 

begin with. One is so carried away by this identification with 

the I-thought to begin with that one doesn’t know there is an 

underlying real / which is quite different from the I-thought, 

although the source of it. In other words, the pure subject, 

though ever present, is never known because of one’s 

identification of existence with the three states of 

consciousness which conceal the pure witness. One must, in 

the second stage, lose sight of the world to experience the 

pure subject. As Ramana explains in this catechetical series: 

When will the realization of the self be gained ? 

When the world, which is what is seen as, has been 

removed, there will be realization of the self which 

is the seer. 

Will there not be the realization of the self—even while 

the world is there (taken as real)? There will not be . 114 

In the third stage, once the pure subject is realized, the 

world is again seen but now as part of the self and not apart 

from it as was the case in the beginning. In terms of our 

analogy one begins with the young lady with her mind full 

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Advuiia Vedanta 

of dress-thoughts. In stage two she experiences the actual 

dress to be worn. She cannot see it unless the dress-thoughts 

depart from the mind, so that she can see and experience 

the actual dress. While actually experiencing it ever, the 

thought “this is the dress” is a distraction from it. Finally, 

emerging from the absorption in the dress she can again 

lose herself in dress-thoughts going down the aisle but she is 

aware of the relationship of these dress thoughts to the real 

dress, which was not the case the first time. 

The relation between the dress and the dress-thought 

continues to possess considerable illustrative and therefore 

explanatory power. This becomes apparent, when we explore 

the nature of the /-thought as analyzed in Advaita Vedanta a 

little further. When the “I” thought arises in the context of 

person, it is worth noting that it often takes the form “I-am- 

the-body ”. 113 That is to say—it is not a vague free-floating “I” 

thought and it has a definite if fully undetermined referent. 

Similarly, the dress-thought, in relation to the dress, is not a 

dress thought in general, but assumes the form of “a dress- 

thought” rather than “dress thought” in general, or a 

collection of dresses as it were. “Is there not a name for the 

body? It is that which we take as the name of that particular 

person. When asked who you are, one says, I am Rama. If 

someone calls Rama, that person alone looks back. While 

other bodies have other names, this particular body becomes 

Rama ”" 6 Similarly, other chains of dress thoughts may have 

their own identities, and may arise in different contexts, 

but this chain of dress-thought possesses its own identity— 

and destiny. 

The metaphor on hand can even be developed to indicate 

the relation between the various sheaths mentioned in the 

Upanisads, and its relation to the I and the I-thought. In 

accordance with the doctrine of the various kosas or sheaths, 

an individual is presented as “sheathed” in five of them— 

and at their core lies the true atman or I. But empirically, 

the person exists as an entity covered in these sheaths and 

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95 

generated by an “I-thought”. The person is like the young 

lady wrapped up in the dress, but still carried away by the 

“dress-thought” into the reverie she is in. In fact one can 

come to point even more directly here, by undertaking a 

simple exercise. Please sit down at a desk quietly and just 

think of yourself as someone sitting down by the desk quietly. 

What you have in your mind is an 1-thought of yourself sitting 

down by the desk. Similarly, the young lady sitting by herselt 

thinking of doing all kinds of things with the dress on, is 

trafficking in the dress-thought just as we traffic in I-thought. 

Experiential Advaita also draws a distinction between what 

is called manolaya and manonasa. The first term stands for 

the temporary suspension of mental activity and the second 

term for final elimination of mental activity as an obstacle to 

self-realization. The distinction is important in experiential 

Advaita because it is on the basis of this distinction that it 

distinguishes its own samadhi from that which results from 

the practice of Yoga. Ramana Maharsi explains the point as 

follows: 

In deep sleep the mind is merged and not 

destroyed. That which merges reappears. It may 

happen in meditation also. But the mind which is 

destroyed cannot reappear. The yogi’s aim must 

be to destroy it and not to sink into laya. In the 

peace of meditation, laya sometimes ensues but it 

is not enough. It must be supplemented by other 

practices for destroying the mind. Some people 

have gone into yogic samadhi with a trifling 

thought and after a long time awakened in the 

trail of the same thought. In the meantime 

generations have passed in the world. Such a yogi 

has not destroyed his mind. The true destruction 

of the mind is the non- recognition of it as being 

apart from the Self. 117 

The metaphor of the dress is useful here. So long as the 

idea of the wedding persists, the dress-thoughts will continue 

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Advaila Vedanta 

to reappear even if they disappear for a while, but once the 

idea of wedding is abandoned altogether, the dress-thoughts 

will cease and stop interfering with one’s perception of the 

dress as such. 

We often talk of the mind. It is one of the claims of 

experiential Advaita that the concept the mind doesn’t bear 

scrutiny. 

What is the mind? The reply which Bhagavan 

[Ramana Maharsi] gives us is thaL mind is nothing 

but (a bundle of) thoughts. If one investigates what 

this mind is, keeping off all thoughts, he will find 

that there is no such thing as mind. 118 

The link between the I and the 1-thought is the mind. When 

it is claimed that there is no mind what is meant is that there 

is no mind apart from the thoughts, just as there is no river 

apart from its flow. Similarly, then, there is no dress-thought 

apart from the bundle of thoughts which have arisen from 

the dress or flow from it. And further: just as if one probed 

these “dress-thoughts” uninterruptedly one will be led back 

to the dress, so also the uninterrupted interrogation of I- 

thoughts will jolt one back to the true /. 

At another level the whole metaphor of the dress and 

dress-thought in a way helps elaborate the way the subtle 

body is said to operate in the psychology of Advaita Vedanta. 

The following account is self-explanatory in this respect. 

Let it not be considered that the mind takes a subtle 

body only in dreams. The same phenomenon takes 

place even in the waking state during flights of 

the mind, for instance in a revery. Suppose we sit 

and imagine in the waking state that we travel to 

far off countries, meet a friend there, talk with 

him or undergo all the vicissitudes of life. The 

mentally projected body in which we seem to 

undergo all these experiences is also our subtle 

body. We know that these subtle bodies we take 

up now and then are transient. When one wakes 

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97 

up from a dream, the dream body is gone. In the 

same way the body assumed in day-dreams 

(reveries) is also found to be false, i.e. these bodies 

are the false forms that come to and go away from 

us. Because we exist even in the absence of these 

bodies, they are not WE." 9 

In the course of developing this illustration so far we have 

focused on the emergence of the dress-thought (and then 

even dress-thoughts) from the dress as an example of how 

the I-thought (and then even the many I-thoughts) can arise 

from the real “I”. With a little shift in focus, however, the 

application of this I metaphor to our existential situation 

can also be enlarged. In order to see how this might be 

possible let’s go back to the young lady who imagines wearing 

the dress she has bought when she goes out with her beau 

for the candle-light dinner. 

Let us now visualize her imagining this scene while relaxing 

in her room—that she is sitting next to her beau on a table in 

the restaurant in the dress she has bought. Now note that 

not only is she wearing a dress-thought as she imagines herself 

in the restaurant, she herself, as she imagines herself in the 

restaurant, is not she herself but a thought of herself. For 

she, as she really is, is sitting right there in the room! So it is 

a she-thought (and not she, although the she-thought 

proceeds from her) who is wearing the dress-thought! Now 

note that the dress-thought is an object and she-thought is a 

subject, and the sAe-thought is also wearing the dress-thought— 

that is—the object and subject are interacting but in a world 

of thought —so that their interaction also partakes of the same 

character. The ontological status of all of them, though 

derivative, is the same! This is how Advaita Vedanta is able 

to combine an empirical realism with a transcendental 

idealism. 

Or to put the matter more philosophically: a major issue this 

school of thought has to contend with is not an unexpected 

one: how to reconcile its claim of a metaphysical non-dual reality 

with the apparent plurality of our empirical existence. 

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Advaita Vedanta 

Here is a glimpse of the ways in which such a reconciliation 

might be proposed. The range of our experience in the 

empirical world is vertiginously diverse, but a little reflection 

suggests that all of it occurs in one of three states of 

consciousness: when one is awake, when one is dreaming 

and while one is in deep sleep. These three states of 

experience provide a useful handle for talking of our 

empirical world because all the varied experiences we have 

in this world can be slotted as falling within one of these 

three states of consciousness. Now in the waking state physical 

objects are real (at the empirical level). It can thus be 

described as sat or real. Compared to them objects and persons 

encountered in a dream are merely mental in nature and it 

can thus be described as tit, or characterized by immaterial 

conscious-ness. Finally, the experience of deep sleep is 

universally considered restful, blissful and happy. Thus this state 

of consciousness qualifies as dnanda or bliss. Thus the empirical 

reality we experience can be described as follows: 

Waking Sat 

Dreaming Cit 

Deep Sleep Ananda 

Readers will recall, however, that the ultimate reality, at 

the transcendental level, was also described in part I of this 

book as saccidananda Brahman, where Brahman denoted the 

ultimate reality to which the words sat (reality), cit 

(consciousness) and dnanda (bliss) are applied as ways of 

orienting ourselves towards it. 

In other words, the question we are dealing with may be 

rephrased as follows: what is the relationship of the ultimate 

reality as sat, cit and dnanda and our experience of the 

empirical world, which is also capable of being so described. 

The question may be answered with the help of a chart. 

Sat, Cit, Ananda, 

Brahman 

Sat 

Waking 

Git 

Dreaming 

World 

Ananda 

Deep Sleep 

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99 

How could the horizontal line become the vertical, in other 

words? Just as a straight rod appears bent when placed in a 

tub full of water, say Advaita Vedanta. That is to say, there is 

something in the nature of the empirical world which 

apparently distorts the ultimate reality when viewed in 

relation with it. The word used to denote this something in 

Advaita Vedanta is maya or avidya. 

But matters get straightened out when one achieves 

enlightenment. One way of moving towards such 

enlightenment or Realisation is to ask the question: if I 

undergo the experience of waking, dreaming and deep 

sleep which as states of consciousness differ so radically from 

one another, then how do I retain my sense of identity 

despite undergoing these different states of experience, and 

the different experiences I have within these states of 

waking, dreaming and deep sleep. There must be some 

unchanging consciousness in me which undergirds my 

consciousness of change of these states of consciousness and 

the changes within them. Such unchanging consciousness 

is called dtman in Advaita Vedanta—which constitutes the 

unchanging core of our being. 

According to Advaita Vedanta this dtman is identical with 

Brahman. They are not two. It is this understanding of non¬ 

dualism—that the dtman and Brahman are not two distinct 

entities but identically one—which represents experientially 

the most resonant dimension of Advaitic non-dualism. This is 

the truth but somehow it has become warped and it is the 

goal of Advaita Vedanta to help us straighten it out. 

VI 

In analysing the experiential approach so far we have stuck 

to the experience of ordinary human beings. It may not be 

out of place now at least to refer to the experiences of an 

extraordinary kind which have a bearing on Advaita Vedanta. 

We have some accounts of mystical experiences of the 

Advaitic variety from the accounts of the lives of mystics of 

the twentieth century, which bear on the present discussion. 

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Advaita Vedanta 

They are such as are best shared rather than explained. 

The first of these is from the life of Swami Vivekananda 

(1863-1902) who bore the name Narendra Nath Dutt, or 

Naren for short, before he became a monk. He ultimately 

came to acknowledge Sri Ramakrsna Paramhamsa(1836- 

1886) as his master. The relevance of the following account 

of a spiritual incident between the two will not be lost on 

students of Advaita Vedanta. 

Thus one day the Master told Narendranath many 

things indicating the oneness ofjlva and Brahman 

of the non-dual philosophy. He heard those words, 

undoubtedly with attention, but he could not 

comprehend them and went to Hazra at the end 

of the Master’s talk. Smoking and discussing those 

things again with Hazra, he said, ‘Can it ever be 

possible that the waterpot is God, the cup is God, 

whatever we see and all of us are God?’ Shri Hazra 

also joined Narendra in thus ridiculing the idea 

and both of them burst into laughter. The Master 

was till then in the state of partial external 

consciousness. Hearing Narendra laugh, he came 

out of his room like a boy with his wearing cloth in 

his armpit and, coming to them smiling, said 

affectionately, ‘What are you both talking about?’ 

He then touched Narendra and went into 

samadhi. 

Narendra said to us afterwards, ‘There was a 

complete revolution in the state of my mind in a 

moment at the wonderful touch of the Master. I 

was aghast to see actually that there was nothing 

in the whole universe except God. But I remained 

silent in spite of seeing it, wondering how long 

that state would last. But that inebriation did not 

at all diminish that day. I returned home; it was all 

the same there; it seemed to me that all that I saw 

was He. I sat far my meal when I saw that all -food, 

Advaita Vedanta: An Experiential Approach 

101 

plate, the one who was serving as well as myself— 

were nothing but He. I took a mouthful or two 

and sat quiet. My mother’s affectionate words— 

“why do you sit quiet; why don’t you eat?”— 

brought me to consciousness and I began eating 

again. Thus, I had that experience at the time of 

eating or drinking, sitting or lying, going to the 

college or taking a stroll. I was always overwhelmed 

with a sort of indescribable intoxication. When I 

walked along the streets and saw a carriage coming 

along before me I did not feel inclined, as at other 

times, to move away, lest it should collide with me. 

For, I thought, “I am also that and nothing but 

that”. My hands and feet always remained 

insensible at that time. I felt no satisfaction 

whatever when I took my food. It seemed to me as 

if some one else was eating the meal... When that 

overwhelming intoxication diminished a little, the 

world appeared to me to be a dream. Going for a 

walk on the bank of the Hedua tank, I knocked 

my head against the iron railings round it to see 

whether what I saw were dream-rails or actual ones. 

On account of the insensibility of my hands and 

feet I was afraid whether I was not going to have 

paralysis. I could not escape that terrible 

intoxicating mood and overwhelming condition 

for some time. When I came to the normal state, I 

thought that that was indication of non-dual 

knowledge. So what is written in the Sastras about 

it is by no means untrue. Since then I could never 

doubt the truth of non-duality. 120 

The second account is drawn from the life of Ramana 

Maharsi (1879-1950) who is regarded as one of the great 

Advaitins of our age. He underwent the following precocious 

experience in 1896. 

It was about six weeks before I left Madurai for good 

102 

Advaita Vedanta 

that the great change in my life took place. It was 

so sudden. One day I sat alone on the first floor of 

my uncle’s house. I was in my usual health. I seldom 

had any illness. I was a heavy sleeper. When I was at 

Dindigul in 1891 a huge crowd had gathered close 

to the room where I slept and tried to rouse me by 

shouting and knocking at uie door, all in vain, and 

it was only by their getting into my room and giving 

me a violent shake that I was roused from my torpor. 

This heavy sleep was rather a proof of good health. 

I was also subject to fits of half-awake sleep at night. 

My wily playmates, afraid to trifle with me when I 

was awake, would go to me when I was asleep, rouse 

me, take me all round the playground, beat me, 

cuff me, sport with me, and bring me back to my 

bed—and all the while I would put up with 

everything with a meekness, humility, forgiveness, 

and passivity unknown to my waking state. When 

the morning broke I had no remembrance of the 

night’s experiences. But these fits did not render 

me weaker or less fit for life and were hardly to be 

considered a disease. So, on that day as I sat alone 

there was nothing wrong with my health. But 

sudden and unmistakable fear of death seized me. 

I felt I was going to die. Why I should have so felt 

cannot now be explained by anything felt in my 

body. Nor could 1 explain it to myself then. I did 

not however trouble myself to discover if the fear 

was well grounded. I felt I was going to die, and at 

once set about thinking out what I should do. I did 

not care to consult doctors or elders or even friends. 

I felt I had to solve the problem myself then and 

there. 

The shock of fear of death made me at once 

introspective, or introverted. I said to myself mentally, 

i.e., without uttering the words—‘Now, death has 

come. What does it mean? What is it that is dying? 

Advaila Vedanta: An Experiential Approach 

103 

This body dies.’ I at once dramatised the scene of 

death. I extended my limbs and held them rigid 

as though rigor-mortis had set in. I imitated a corpse 

to lend an air of reality to my further investigation, 

I held my breath and kept my mouth closed, 

pressing the lips together so that no sound might 

escape. Let not the word I or any other word be 

uttered! Well then, said I to myself, ‘this body is 

dead. It will be carried stiff to the burning ground 

and there burnt and reduced to ashes. But with 

the death of this body, am “I” dead? Is the body 

“I”? This body is silent and inert. But I feel the full 

force of my personality and even the sound “I” 

within myself,—apart from the body. So “I” am a 

spirit, a thing transcending the body. The material 

body dies, but the spirit transcending it cannot be 

touched by death. I am therefore the deathless 

spirit.’ All this was not a mere intellectual process, 

but flashed before me vividly as living truth, 

something which I perceived immediately, without 

any argument almost. 1 was something very real, 

the only real thing in that state, and all the 

conscious activity that was connected with my body 

was centred on that. The / or my self was holding 

the focus of attention by a powerful fascination 

from that time forwards. Fear of death had 

vanished at once and forever. Absorption in the 

self has continued from that moment right up to 

this time. Other thoughts may come and go like 

the various notes of a musician, but the /continues 

like the basic or fundamental sruti note which 

accompanies and blends with all other notes. 

Whether the body was engaged in talking, reading, 

or anything else, I was still centred on I. Previous 

to that crisis I had no clear perception of myself 

and was not consciously attracted to it. I had felt 

no direct perceptible interest in it, much less any 

104 

Advaita Vedanta 

permanent disposition to dwell upon it. The 

consequences of this new habit were soon noticed 

in my life. 121 

Paul Brunton offers the following abbreviated account. 

Maharsi told once how he got realization. On the 

day his father died he felt puzzled by death and 

pondered over it, whilst his mother and brothers 

wept. He thought for hours and after the corpse 

was cremated he got by analysis to the point of 

perceiving that it was the / which makes the body 

to see, to run, to walk and to eat. “I now know this 

/but my father’s / has left the body”. 122 

The third account is the report of a talk byj. Krishnamurti 

(1895-1986). Whether Krishnamurti should be installed in 

the Advaitic pantheon is a matter of debate, therefore a 

word of explanation might be required by way justifying the 

inclusion of the excerpt. One of the chief tenets of Advaita 

Vedanta, as scripturally propounded, is the claim that 

realization is achieved not by action {karma) but jnana 

(insight); that what transcends action cannot be achieved 

by action. The following discourse of Krishnamurti is 

potentially illuminating in this respect. 

Krishnamurti : For most of us, our whole life is based 

on effort, some kind of volition. And we cannot 

conceive of an action that is not based on it. Our 

social, economic, and so-called spiritual life, is a 

series of efforts, always culminating in a certain 

result. We think effort is essential. So we are now 

going to find out if it is possible to live differently, 

without this constant battle. 

Why do we make effort? Put simply, it is in order 

to achieve a result, to become something, to reach 

a goal, isn’t it? If we do not make an effort, we 

think we shall stagnate. We have an idea about 

the goal towards which we are constantly striving; 

Advaita Vedanta: An Experiential Approach 

105 

and this striving has become part of our life. If we 

want to alter, to bring about a radical change in 

ourselves, we make a tremendous effort to 

eliminate old habits, to resist the habitual 

environmental influences, and so on. So we are 

used to this series of efforts in order to find or 

achieve something, in order to live at all. 

Now, is not all such effort the activity of the self? Is 

not effort self-centred activity? And, if we make 

an effort from the centre of the self, it must 

inevitably produce more conflict, more confusion, 

more misery. Yet we keep on making effort after 

effort; and very few of us realize that the self- 

centred activity of effort does not clear up any of 

our problems. On the contrary, it increases our 

confusion and our misery and our sorrow. Or we 

know this, and yet continue hoping somehow to 

break through this self-centred activity of effort, 

the action of the will. 

This is our problem—Is it possible to understand 

anything without effort? Is it possible to see what 

is real, what is true, without introducing the action 

of the will, which is essentially based on the self, 

the me? And if we do not make an effort, is there 

not a danger of deterioration, of going to sleep, 

of stagnation? Perhaps, as I am talking, we can 

experiment with this individually, and see how far 

we can go through this question. For I feel that 

what brings happiness, quietness, tranquillity of the 

mind, does not come through any effort. A truth 

is not perceived through any volition, through any 

action of will. And if we can go into it very carefully 

and diligently, perhaps we shall find the answer. 

How do we react when a truth is presented? Take, 

for example, the problem of fear. We realize that 

our activity and our being and our whole existence 

106 

Advaita Vedanta 

would be fundamentally altered if there was no fear 

of any kind in us. We may see that, we may see the 

truth of it; and thereby there is freedom from fear. 

But for most of us, when a fact, a truth, is put before 

us, what is our immediate response? Please, 

experiment with what I am saying; please do not 

merely listen. Watch your own reactions; and find 

out what happens when a truth, a fact, is out before 

you—such as ‘any dependence in relationship 

destroys relationship’. Now, when a statement of 

that kind is made, what is your response? Do you 

see, are you aware of, the truth of it, and does 

dependency thereby cease? Or have you an idea 

about the fact? Here is a statement of truth. Do we 

experience the truth of it, or do we create an idea 

about it? 

If we can understand this process of the creation 

of idea, then we shall perhaps understand the 

whole process of effort. Because once we have 

created the idea, then effort comes into being. 

Then the problem arises, what to do, how to act? 

That is, we see that psychological dependence on 

another is a form of self-fulfilment; it is not love; 

in it there is conflict, fear, the desire to fulfil 

oneself through another, jealousy, and so on, 

which corrode. We see that psychological 

dependence on another embraces all these facts. 

Then, we proceed to create the idea, do we not? 

We do not directly experience the fact, the truth 

of it; but, we look at it, and then create an idea of 

how to be free from dependence. We see the 

implications of psychological dependence, and 

then we create the idea of how to be free from it. 

We do not directly experience the truth, which is 

the liberating factor. But out of the experience of 

looking at that fact we create an idea. We are 

incapable of looking at it directly, without ideation. 

Advaita Vedanta: An Experiential Approach 

107 

Then, having created the idea, we proceed to carry 

out that idea into action. Then we try to bridge 

the gap between idea and action—in which effort 

is involved. 

So can we not look at the truth without creating 

ideas? It is almost instinctive with most of us: when 

ccsm utfiirsrr 

jouie l.llllig 

iv.uiatv.ij 

create an idea about it. And I think if we can 

understand why we do this so instinctively, almost 

unconsciously, then perhaps we shall understand 

if it is possible to be free from effort. 

Why then do we create ideas about truth? Surely 

that is important to find out, is it not? Either we 

see the truth nakedly, as it is, or we do not. But 

why do we have a picture about it, a symbol, a word, 

an image, which necessitates a postponement, the 

hope of an eventual result? So can we hesitantly 

and guardedly go into this process of why the mind 

creates the image, the idea—that I must be this or 

that, that I must be free from dependence, and 

so on? We know very well that when we see 

something very clearly, experience it directly, 

there is a freedom from it. It is that immediacy 

that is vital, not the picture or the symbol of the 

truth—on which all systems and philosophies and 

deteriorating organizations are built. So is it not 

important to find out why the mind, instead of 

seeing the thing directly and simply, and 

experiencing the truth of it immediately, creates 

an idea about it? 

I do not know if you have thought about this. It 

may perhaps be something new. And to find the 

truth of it, please do not merely resist. Do not say, 

‘What would happen if the mind did not create 

the idea? It is its function to create ideas, to 

verbalize, to recall memories, to recognize, to 

108 

Advaila Vedanta 

calculate’. We know that. But the mind is not free; 

and it is only when the mind is capable of looking 

at the truth totally, completely, without any barrier, 

that there is freedom. 

So our problem is—why does the mind, instead of 

seeing the thing immediately and experiencing it 

directly, indulge in sll tHese idecis. Is this not one 

of the habits of the mind? Something is presented 

to us, and immediately there is the old habit of 

creating an idea, a theory about it. And the mind 

likes to live in habit. Because without habit the 

mind is lost. If there is not a routine, a habitual 

response to which it has become accustomed, it 

feels confused, uncertain. 

That is one aspect. Also, does not the mind seek a 

result? Because in the result is permanence. And 

the mind hates to be uncertain. It is always seeking 

security in different forms—through beliefs, through 

knowledge, through experience. And when that is 

quesdoned there is a disturbance, anxiety. And so 

the mind, avoiding uncertainty, seeks security for 

itself by making efforts to achieve a result. 

I hope you are actually observing your own minds 

in operation. If you are not, then you will not 

experience, your mind will remain on the verbal 

level. But—if I may suggest—if you can observe 

your own mind in operation, and watch how it 

thinks, how it reacts, when a truth is out before it, 

then you will experience step-by-step what I am 

talking about. Then there will be an extraordinary 

experience. And it is this direct approach, this 

direct experience of what truth is that is so 

essential for bringing about a creative life. 

So why does the mind create these ideas, instead 

of directly experiencing? Why does the mind 

Advaita Vedanta: An Experiential Approach 

109 

intervene? As we have said, it is habit. Also, the 

mind wants to achieve a result. We all want to 

achieve a result. In listening to me, are you looking 

for a result? You are, aren’t you? The mind is 

seeking a result; it sees that dependence is 

destructive, and therefore it wants to be free of it. 

Rut the very desire to be free creates the idea. 

The mind is not free; but the desire to be free 

creates the idea of freedom as the goal towards 

which it must work. And thereby effort comes into 

being. And that effort is self-centred; it does not 

bring freedom. Instead of depending on a person, 

you depend on an idea or on an image. So your 

effort is only self-enclosing; it is not liberating. 

Now, can the mind, realizing that it is caught in 

habit, be free from habit—not have an idea that it 

should achieve freedom as an eventual goal, but 

see the truth that the mind is caught in habit, 

directly experience it? And, similarly, can the mind 

see that it is pursuing incessantly a permanence 

for itself, a goal that it must achieve, a God, a truth, 

a virtue, a state of being, or whatever, and is 

thereby bringing about this action of will, with all 

its complications? And when we see that, is it not 

possible to experience the truth of something 

directly without all the paraphernalia of 

verbalization? You may objectively see a fact, in that 

there is no ideation, no creation of idea, symbol, 

desire. But subjectively, inwardly, it is entirely 

different. Because there we want a result; there is 

the craving to be something, to achieve, to 

become—in which all effort is born. 

I feel that to see what is true from moment to 

moment, without any effort, but directly to 

experience it, is the only creative existence. Because 

it is only in moments of complete tranquillity that 

10 

Advaita Vedanta 

you discover something—not when you are making 

an effort, whether it is under the microscope or 

inwardly. It is only when the mind is not agitated, 

not caught in habit, not trying to achieve a result, 

not trying to become something—it is only when it 

is not doing these things, when it is really tranquil, 

when there is no effort, no movement—that there 

is a possibility of discovering something new. 

Surely, that is freedom from the self, that is the 

abnegation of the me —and not the outward 

symbols, whether you possess this or that virtue or 

not. But freedom comes into being only when you 

understand your own processes, conscious as well 

as unconscious. It is possible only when we go fully 

into the different processes of the mind. And as 

most of us live in a state of tension, in constant 

effort, it is essential to understand the complexity 

of effort, to see the truth that effort does not bring 

virtue, that effort is not love, that effort does not 

bring about the freedom that truth alone can 

give—which is direct experiencing. For that, one 

has to understand the mind, one’s own mind— 

not somebody else’s mind, not what somebody else 

says about it. You may read all the volumes ever 

written but they will be utterly useless. For you 

must observe your own mind, and penetrate it 

more and more deeply, and experience the thing 

directly as you go along. Because there is the living 

quality, not in the things of the mind. And the 

mind, to find its own processes, must not be 

enclosed by its own habits, but must be free 

occasionally to look. Therefore, it is important to 

understand this whole process of effort. For effort 

does not bring about freedom. Effort is only more 

and more self-enclosing, more and more 

destructive, outwardly as well as inwardly, in 

relationship with one or with many. 123 

Conclusion 

A verse, popular in India, claims to summarize the teachings 

of the school of Advaita Vedanta in just half of a verse: 

Brahman is real; the world is an illusory appearance; 

and the individual soul (jiva) [in its true character] 

is Brahman alone, none other. 124 

Or to put the matter more formally: 

The non-duality of Brahman, the non-reality of the 

world, and the non-difference of the soul [Atman] 

from Brahman—these constitute the teaching of 

Advaita. 125 

The reader would have noticed that whether we approach 

Advaita Vedanta scripturally, or rationally, or experientially, 

in the end one finds oneself face-to-face with the pedagogical 

structure which bears a family-resemblance to this statement. 

While following the scriptural approach one starts out with 

Brahman and Atman and has to confront the issue of their 

identity in the face of the apparent plurality which 

characterizes our life. In adopting the rational approach one 

starts out with the world—or an object of the world—and 

finds oneself confronting indeterminate existence. In 

adopting the experiential approach one starts out with oneself 

only to see one’s self facing experiential dissolution. In all 

three cases one finds oneself at an interface between reality 

and unreality—but an unreality which cannot be severed from 

Reality and vice versa, as it were. 

The aim of this book was not much to convey the technical 

details of the system of philosophy of Advaita Vedanta, on 

112 Advaiia Vedanta 

which many books exist, as to convey its spirit, for it is as 

much a spirituality as a philosophy. Whether it has succeeded 

in this is for the reader to decide. 

Notes 

1. Andrew O. Fort, fivanmukti in Transformation: Embodied Liberation in 

Advaita and Neo-Vedanta (Albany, N.Y.: State University of New York 

Press, 1998). 

2. Wilhelm Halbfass, India and Europe: An Essay in Understanding (Albany, 

N.Y.: State University of New York Press, 1988) p. 353. 

3. M. Hiriyanna, The Essentials of Indian Philosophy, (London: George Allen 

& Unwin, 1949) p. 19. 

4. Ibid., p. 152. 

5. Ibid., p. 154. 

6. For a good discussion of this point see John Grimes, Problems and 

Perspectives in Religious Discourse: Advaita Vedanta Implications (Albany, 

N.Y.: State University of New York Press, 1994). 

7. Ibid.,p. 156-157, 

8. Ibid, p. 157-158. 

9. Ibid, p. 158. 

10. Ibid. 

11. Ibid., p. 157. 

12. Ibid., p. 158. 

13. Ibid. 

14. Ibid., p. 47-48. 

15. Ibid., p. 159-160. 

16. K. Satchidananda Murty, Revelation and Reason in Advait a Vedanta. (Delhi: 

Motilal Banarsidass, 1974) p. 40. 

17. M. Hiriyanna, Indian Philosophical Studies. (Mysore: Kavyalaya Publishers, 

1957) p. 89. 

18. M. Hiriyanna, The Essentials of Indian Philosophy, p. 21. 

19. Ibid. 

20. Robert Ernest Hume, tr. The Thirteen Principal Upanishads. (London: 

Oxford University Press, 1968) p. 113-114. 

21. Thomas J. Hopkins, The Hindu Religious Tradition (Encino, California 

and Belmont, California: Dickenson Publishing Company, Inc., 1971) 

p. 37. 

22. Robert Ernest Hume, tr., op. til., p, 132-133. 

114 

Advaila Vedanta 

23. Ainslie T. Embree, ed., Sources of Indian Tradition (second edition) (New 

York: Columbia University Press, 1988) Vol. I, p. 32. 

24. Ibid., p. 33 

25. Ibid. 

26. S. Radhakrishnan, The Principal Upanisads. (Atlantic Heights, NJ: 

Humanities Press, 1992) p. 695-705. 

27. Ibid., p. 36. 

28. Ainslie T. Embree, ed., The Hindu Tradition (New York: Random House, 

1972) p. 52. 

29. Ibid., p. 55. 

30. Ibid., p. 55. 

31. Ibid, p. 21. 

32. Ibid., p. 22. 

33. Ibid., p. 22. 

34. Ibid. 

35. Troy Wilson Organ, Hinduism: Its Historical Development^ Woodbury, 

N.Y.: Barron’s Educational Series, 1974) p. 114. 

36. M. Hiriyanna, Outlines of Indian Philosophy, p. 378. 

37. Troy Wilson Organ, Hinduism: Its Historical Development, p. 114. 

38. Ibid., p.114-115. 

39. Chandradhar Sharma, A Critical Survey of Indian Philosophy (London: 

Rider, 1960) p. 282-283. 

40. I incorporate material here, which also appears in Arvind Sharma, The 

Philosophy of Religion and Advaila Vedanta: A Comparative Study of Religion 

and Reason (University Park, Pennsylvania: The Pennsylvania State 

University Press, 1995) p. 97-99. 

41. Satchidananda Murty, Revelation and Reason in Advaita Vedanta, p. 81. 

42. Robert Ernest Hume, op. cit. p. 240-241. 

43. See the discussion of the Honey-Doctrine (madhu-vidya), R.E. Hume, 

op. cit., p. 102-105. 

44. M. Hiriyanna, The Essentials of Indian Philosophy, p. 157. 

45. Heinrich Zimmer, Philosophies of India. (Edited by Joseph Campbell. 

New York: Princeton University Press, 1969) p. 337-338. 

46. Patrick Olivelle, The Early Upanisads (New York: Oxford University Press, 

1998) p. 561. 

47. S. Radhakrishnan, ed., op. cit., p. 462. 

48. Ibid., p. 463. 

49. Franklin Edgerton, “Studies in the Veda "Journal of the American Oriental 

Society 35:242 (1915). 

50. In the case of some ordeals it is possible to propose a psychological 

basis for the confidence that the innocent party may get acquitted, 

although it is doubtful if it applies here: 

Notes 

115 

Specially interesting is the ordeal of the ploughshare, in which the 

accused man had to touch a red-hot iron ploughshare with his tongue; 

if it was not burned he was deemed innocent—psychologically a fairly 

sound test of his own confidence in the result: since if he had a guilty 

conscience his salivary glands would not function properly, and his 

tongue would be burnt." (A.L. Basham, The Wonder that was India [New 

Delhi; Rupa & Co., 1999] p.l 17.) Curiously enough, a similar claim is 

made in a similar context in Islamic mysticism, as in the Upanisadic 

passage, see Reynold A. Nicholson, The Mystics of Islam (Harmondsworth: 

Penguin, 1889 [1914]) p. 182-183. 

51. Ibid., p. 245-250, with subheadings removed. 

52. Sacchidananda Murty, op. cit., p. 89. 

53. Ibid., Chapter VI passim. 

54. Ibid., p. 89-90,97. 

55. Ibid., p. 92. 

56. Ibid., p. 93. 

57. Ibid., p. 93. 

58. Ibid., p. 96. 

59. Ibid., p. 98. 

60. See Arvind Sharma, The Philosophy of Religion and Advaila Vedanta: A 

Comparative Study in Religion and Reason, p. 46-47. 

61. M. Hiriyanna, The Essentials of Indian Philosophy. P. 160-161. 

62. Ibid., p. 59. 

63. Ibid., p. 22-23. 

64. Satischandra Chatterjee and Dhirendramohan Datta, An Introduction 

to Indian Philosophy (Calcutta: University of Calcutta, 1950) p. 382. 

65. Ibid., p. 382. 

66. Ibid. 

67. Ibid., p.383. 

68. Ibid., p. 383. 

69. M. Hiriyanna, Outlines of Indian Philosophy (London; George Allen & 

Unwin, 1932) p. 370. 

70. M. Hiriyanna, Outlines of Indian Philosophy p. 370-371. 

71. Satishchandra Chatterjee and Dhirendramohan Datta, op. cit., p. 383- 

384. 

72. Ibid., p.384. 

73. Ibid. 

74. Ibid., p. 385. 

75. Ibid. 

76. Ibid., diacritics supplied. 

77. Ibid., p. 386-387. 

78. Ibid., p.388. 

116 

Advaita Vedanta 

79. find., p. 392. 

80. Ibid. 

81. Ibid., p. 467. “This conclusion is further supported by the linguistic 

cxpiessiuu 'my body', ‘my sense', 'my intellect’, 'etc. which show that 

the self can alienate itself from there ( body, sense, etc.) and treat them 

as external objects distinct from itself. These cannot, therefore, be 

regarded as the real essence of the self. It is true, one also sometimes 

says, ‘my consciousness.’ But such an expression cannot be taken 

literally, as implying a distinction between the self ( as possessor )and 

consciousness ( as possessed). For, if the self tries to distinguish itself 

from consciousness, it only assumes the form of distinguishing 

consciousness. Consciousness thus proves inseparable and 

indistinguishable from the self. So ‘my consciousness’ must be taken in 

the metaphorical sense. The possessive case here doesn’t really imply 

distinction, but rather identity or apposition ( as in ‘The city of 

London’). By comparing and analyzing the different meanings of the 

self expressed by T and ‘mine’ we discover thus pure consciousness as 

the real essence of the self’ ibid., p. 407-408). 

82. Ibid., p. 408. 

83. M. Hiriyanna, Indian Philosophical Studies ( Mysore : Kavyalaya Publishers, 

1957 )p. 135. 

84. Ibid.,p. 135-136. 

85. Satishchandra Chatterjee and Dhirendramohan Datta, op. til., p. 387. 

86. Ibid. 

87. Quoted in P. Sankaranarayanan, What is Advaita? (Bombay: Bharatiya 

Vidya Bhavan, 1970) p. 46. 

88. Ibid., p. 47. 

89. Maurice Frydman, tr., I Am That: Conversations With Sri Nisargadatta 

Maharaj (Bombay: Chetana, 1973) Part I, p. 263. 

90. John A. Hutchinson, Paths of Faith (New York: McGraw-Hill Book 

Company, 1969) p. 222. 

91. Wm. Theodore de Bary ed., Sources of Chinese Tradition (New York: 

Columbia University Press, 1960) Vol. I, p. 73. 

92. Ibid., p.72. 

93. Ainslie T. Embree, ed.. Sources of Indian Tradition (second edition) (New 

York: Columbia University Press, 1988) Vol. I p. 175-176. 

94. Swami Sambuddhananda, Vedanta Through Stories (Bombay: Sri 

Ramakrishna Ashram, 1959) pp. 44-45. 

95. A. Devaraja Mudaliar, compiler, Gems From Bhagavan 

(Tiruvannamalai:Sri Ramanasramam, 1985) p. 24-25. 

96. Gopal Singh, The Religion of the Sikhs (Bombay: Asia Publishing House, 

1971) p.93-94. 

97. Talks With Sri Ramana Maharshi (Tiruvannamalai: Sri Ramanasramam, 

1984) p. 563. 

Notes 

117 

98 find 

99. William M. Indich, Consciousness in Advaita Vedanta (Delhi: Motilal 

Banarsidass, 1980) p. 65. 

100. Paul Brunton, Conscious Immortality (Tiruvannamaalai: Sri 

Ramanasramam, 1984) p. 127. 

101. Ibid., p. 184. 

102. M. Hiriyanna, Essentials of Indian Philosophy, p. 166. 

103. Ibid., p. i 16. 

104. A. Devaraja Mudaliar, compiler, op. tit., p. 35. 

105. Paul Brunton, op. til., p. 91. 

106. David Godman, ed.. The Teachings of Sri Ramana Maharshi (New York: 

Arkana, 1985) p. 53. 

107. Ibid., p. 52. 

108. Ibid. 

109. Swami Rajeswarananda, compiler, Erase The Ego (Bombay: Bharatiya 

Vidya Bhavan, 1974) p. 39. 

110. A. Devaraja Mudaliar, compiler, op. tit., p. 17. 

111. Swami Rajeswarananda, compiler, op. tit., p. 55. 

112. Arthur Osborne, ed., The Teachings o/Bhagavan Ramana Maharshi in his 

Own Words (Tiruvannamalai: T.N. Venkataraman, 1971) p. 249. 

113. Ibid., p.228. 

114. T.M.P. Mahadevan.tr., WhoAmP (Tiruvannamalai: Sri Ramanasramam, 

1976) p. 2. 

115. Sadhu Om, The Path of Shri Ramana (Kanpur: The City Book House, 

1971) p. 28. 

116. Ibid., p. 32. 

117. David Godman, ed., op. tit., p. 158. 

118. Sadhu Om, op. tit., p. 26. 

119. Sadhu Om, op. tit., p. 46. 

120. Swami Saradananda, Sri Ramakrishna: The Great Master (Madras: 

RamakrishnaMath, 1952) pp. 128-129. 

121. B.V. Narsimha Swami, Self-Realization: The Life and Teachings ofSriRamana 

Maharishi. (Tiruvannamalai: Sri Ramanasramam, 1985; first published 

1931) p. 20. 

122. Paul Brunton, op. tit., p. 68. 

123. J. Krishnamurd, On Truth. (San Francisco: Harper, 1995) pp. 24-29. 

124. T.M.P. Mahadevan, Outlines of Hinduism (Bombay: Chetana Limited, 

1971 [1956]) p. 141. 

125. Ibid. 

Bibliography 

Basham, A.L. The Wonder That Was India, Rupa & Co, New Delhi, 1999 

[1954], 

Brunton, Paul. Conscious Immortality, Sri Ramanasramam, Tiruvannamalai, 

1984. 

Chatterjee, Satischandra, and Dhirendramohan Datta. An Introduction to 

Indian Philosophy, University of Calcutta, Calcutta, 1950. 

De Bary., Wm. Theodore, Ed. Sources of Chinese Tradition, Columbia University 

Press, New York, 1960. 

Edgertion, Franklin. “Studies in Veda”, Journal of the American Oriental Society, 

35:242,1915. 

Embree, Ainslie T., Ed. Sources of Indian Tradition (second edition), Columbia 

University Press, New York, 1988. 

Fort, Andrew O.Jtvanmukti in Transformation: Embodied Liberation in Advaita 

and neo-Vedanta, Albany, State University of New York Press, N.Y. 1998. 

Frydman, Maurice, Tr. I Am That: Conversations urith Sri Nisaragadatta Maharaj, 

Part I, Chetana, Bombay, 1973. 

Godman, David, Ed. The Teachings of Sri Raman Maharshi, Arkana, New York, 

1985. 

Halbfass, Wilhelm. India and Europe: An Essay in Understanding, Albany, State 

University of New York Press, N. Y., 1988. 

Hiriyanna, M. Indian Philosophical Studies, Kavyalaya Publishers, Mysore, 1957. 

-. The Essentials of Indian Philosophy, George Allen & Unwin, London, 1949. 

-. Outlines of Indian Philosophy, George Allen & Unwin, London, 1932. 

Hopkins, Thomas J. The Hindu Religious Tradition, Encino, California and 

Belmont, Dickenson Publishing Company, California, 1971. 

Hume, Robert Ernest. The Thirteen Principal Upanishads, Oxford University 

Press, London, 1968. 

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Hutchinson, John A. Paths of Faith, McGraw-Hill Book Company, New York, 

1969. 

Indirh, William M. Consciousness in Advaita Vedanta, Motilal Banarsidass, 

Delhi, 1980. 

Krishnamurti.J. On Truth, Harper, San Francisco, 1995. 

Mahadevan, T. M. P., Tr. Who Am I f Sri Ramanasramam, Tiruvannamalai, 

1976. 

-. Outlines of Hinduism, Chetana Limited, Bombay, 1971 [1956]. 

-. Talks With Sri Ramana Maharshi, Sri Ramanasramam, Tiruvannamalai, 

1984. 

Mudaliar, A. Devaraj (compiler). Gems From Bhagvan, Sri Ramanasramam, 

Tiruvannamalai, 1985. 

Murty, K_ Satchidananda. Revelation and Reason in Advaita Vedanta, Motilal 

Banarsidass, Delhi, 1974. 

Nicholson, Reynold A. The Mystics of Islam, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1914 

[1889], 

Olivelle, Patrick. The Early Upanisads, Oxford University Press, New York, 

1998. 

Om, Sadhu. The Path ofShri Ramana, The City Book House, Kanpur, 1971. 

Organ, Troy Wilson. Hinduism: Its Historical Development, Woodbury, Barron’s 

Educational Series, N. Y., 1974. 

Osborne, Arthur, Ed. The Teachings of Bhagavan Ramana Maharshi in His 

Own Words, T. N. Venkataraman, Tiruvannamalai, 1071. 

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Swami Rajeswarananda (compiler). Erase the Ego. Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, 

Bombay, 1974. 

Swami Sambuddhananda. Vedanta Through Stories, Sri Ramakrishna Ashram, 

Bombay, 1959. 

Sankaranarayanan, P. What is Advaita ? Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, Bombay, 

1970. 

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Princeton University Press, New York, 1969. 

Index 

A 

Astika&S 

Atman9, 24, 28, 30, 33, 43,99 

Advaita Vedanta 10-13 

Advaita 18 

Antahkarana 21 

Anadi 22-23 

Asatkaryavada 55 

Anavastha 57 

Aniruacaniya 69 

Avidyd 99 

B 

Brahmasutra 17, 34 

Brahman 19 

Brhadaranyaka upani$ad 27 

Brereton, J. 40 

Buddish 83 

Brunton, Paul 104 

c 

Chandogya Upani$ad 29,35 

Causation 53 ff, 

Consciousness 70,100-101 

Chuanglzu 81 

Contradiction 67, 74 

D 

Darsana 6,8 

ZM 72-73,86 

Drsya 72 - 73 

Descartes 80 

Dress metaphor 89 - 94 

Dreaming 80 ff 

Deep sleep 85 - 86 

E 

Edgerton, Franklin 42 

Experience 79 ff 

Existence 62 

Experential approach 79 ff 

Exbree, Ainslie 30 

F 

Falsification 74,76 

Five sheaths 29,94 

Father and Son 36 

Fire 28 

God 31,100 

G 

Gargi 26 - 27 

Guru Arsun 84 

Gandharas 42 

Gandharvas 26 

H 

Hiriyanna, M 31, 48, 58 

124 

Advaita Vedanta 

Hume 72 

History 10 

Hinduism 6 

I 

I-Th ought 90 - 92 

India 3 

Islam 4 

Identity-cum-Difference 57 - 59 

J 

Jivanmukti 4 - 5 

Jiva 19, 20, 24, 34,45 

JIvatman 21 

Janaka27, 81 

Jivanmukla 74 

Jnana 104 

K 

Karma 22 

Kosa 94 

Krishnamurti 104 

King 81,83 

L 

Liiiga 35 

Life-Its Three States 79 - 80 

Logic 79 - 80 

Laya 95 

Limitations 20 

M 

Mahavakya 18 ff. 

Mandukya Upanisad 29 

Mimamsa 35 

Materialism 46,48 

Maya. 45,99 

Mueller, Max 6 

N 

Nityata24 

Nine Schools 6 

Niyati 24 

Name and Form 36, 39 

o 

Organ, Troy Wilson 32 

Otto, Rudolph 33 

Ocean, Mataphor of 38 

Origin of Karma 22 

P 

Pascal 81 

Parinama 23, 55 

Pramanas 35 

Prakrti9 

Q 

Questioning 26 - 28 

Quantity 62 

Quality 46,57 

Questions in Advaita Vedanta 13 

Qur'an 7 

R 

Religion and Philosophy 3 - 4 

Ramakrsna 83,100 

Ramana Maharsi 84, 86 - 88, 93, 95, 

96,101 

Rational Approach 53 ff 

Rationality 79 

Ramanuja 45 

Index 

125 

s 

V 

Sankara 18,44,47,63,65,68,69,75 

Vedanta 11 

.Sal 20 

Vedas 12 

Samsara 22 

Vikdra 61-62 

Sadlihga 35 

Vivaria 23 

Qi'otnl/otn A A 

k_» » V- IU1\V- tu »/ X X 

T ~ on 

V ISlflU 

Saccidananda 48 

Vivekananda 100 

Satkaryavada 55, 76 

Sdthkhya 55 

w 

Sattd 67, 75 

West 4-5 

Samadhi 75, 95 

World 68 

Saksi 86 

Worlds 26-27 

Scriptural Approach 17 ff 

Waking State 89 - 80 

T 

Taittiriya Upani$ad 29 

Time and Eternity 24 

Truth 43 

Text and Interpretation 34 ff 

U 

Upanisads 12,17,25,28 

Upadhi 20-21 

Uddalaka 35 

Upapatti 35 

X 

X and Y 59 

X substance 67 

Y 

Yajnavalkya 26 - 28 

Yoga 4, 6 

z 

Zimmer, Heinrich 39 

Arvind Sharma is the 

Birks Professor of 

Comparative Religion in 

the faculty of Religious 

Studies at McGill 

University; and was the 

first Infinity Foundation Visiting 

Professor of Indie Studies at Harvard 

University. His previous works on 

Advaita Vedanta include: The 

Experiential Dimension of Advaita Vedanta 

(1993); The Philosophy of Religion and 

Advaita Vedanta (1995); and The Rope 

and the Snake: A Metaphorical Exploration 

of Advaita Vedanta (1997). 

He lives in Montreal, Canada. 

The history of the Vedanta school is well-known since the time of 

Sankara but its prehistory before Sankara is quite obscure. However, 

there is a period of a thousand years between the compilation of 

the major Upanisads to Sankara without loss of the tradition of the 

Upanisads; there appeared many philosophers and dogmaticians, 

although their thoughts are not clearly known. 

The author made clear the details of the pre-Sankara Vedanta 

philosophy, utilizing not only Sanskrit materials, but also Pali, Prakrit 

as well as Tibetan and Chinese sources. In this respect, this epoch- 

making work was awarded the Imperial Prize by the Japan Academy. 

Parts One and Two will be important literature indispensable 

not only to those, who are specialists in the study of Vedanta but 

also to those engaged in the study of Indian thought in general. 

Part Two is a complete English translation of Vols. Ill and IV of 

the Japanese version, with many additions and revisions done by 

the author himself. 

This is a unique work discussing the teachings of four of the great 

Advaita Acaryas: Gaudapada, Sankara, and his two disciples, 

Suresvara and Padmapada. 

The author combines close textual scholarship with the 

perspective of one is a teacher (Acarya) within the tradition of 

Advaita. This work will prove useful for the student who wishes to 

obtain clear and detailed information about these four Acaryas, and 

it will also be of value to one who is seeking to develop their own 

spirituality within the Advaita tradition. 

E-mail: mlbd@vsnl.com 

Website: www.mlbd.com 

Rs. 295 Code: 20274 

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