Advaita is not a religion or religious sect or philosophy. Advaita is the nature of the Atman or God. Advaita is nothing but the ultimate truth or Brahman or God in truth.
Religion and mysticism are so much preferred to Advaitic Gnana because you have only to imagine, not to inquire. The first is easy, the second is hard.
There is in religion the element of imagination. People think that religion which they like better, which gives them satisfaction, which pleases their taste, is true! Such is the limited view of the ignorant populace but a Gnani discards these. How do they know that what has given them peace and satisfaction is the truth?
Religion and mysticism are a species of mesmerism affecting a weaker or impressionable mindset.
Thus the panoply of a Guru’s religious robes creates an unconscious suggestion in weaker minds of superior power or magical knowledge. Similarly, visitors to ashrams are suggested to think they experience great peace because they are unconsciously hypnotized into believing that will happen. But when a strong and philosophic-minded person meets a Guru or visits an ashram, he is entirely unaffected.
The truth of religion and its idea of God can only be proved by physical strength or imagination, or power of the weapon or worldly power, never by reason.
Remember:~
People like religion because religion belongs to the world of sentiments and emotions. You will always find it in primitive times, as now, linked with music, dancing, and art--both emotional expressions.
Religion changes as it appeals to different emotions. You will find at one pole the nude saint is admired; at the other, the gorgeously-dressed Godmen is revered. Religious believers take their feelings as truth whereas a Gnani takes his reasoned judgment, which will be the same under test everywhere in the world.
Religion is the truth of the ignorant populace. Advaita is the universal truth. The religious people who treat the subject of God usually write the largest books without knowing what God is supposed to be in actuality according to their own scriptures. This is because they have a plethora of words only to offer. Belief in religious prohibitions arises out of fear of God's punishment.
Every religionist has a different idea of God. Every man has a different idea of the real. Hence, there is a need for definition before the study.
There is nothing so absurd that men have not worshipped in religion, nor sacrificial forms of worship so cruel which have not been indulged in. And every imaginable face has been given to God from the tribal to artists; some have made him with wild faces, some with present-looking faces.
Those whose minds are agitated, troubled, and unhappy find tranquility at Ashrams, because there was a sorrowful disturbance of the mind, probably over women or money, etc. But that is because they do not know the truth and they mistake this peace for Brahman. It merely indicates the state of mind possessed on arrival at Ashram; they had a mental disease and the ashram cured it for the time. There was no permanent cure however without the Advaitic Gnana, and religion and yoga do not yield Advaitic Gnana.
Unless a man is a fool, he will never be an atheist. How does an atheist know that God does not exist? It is for every one of us to realize what God is supposed to be in actuality.
Each caste and sect concocts a God to suit its own purposes. Such concocted Gods are merely a superstition.
It is impossible to prove the existence of God by any reasoning because religious Gods are based on the belief not based on truth.
It is easier for people to remain in the religious fold. After all, it makes no demand on the intelligent because it simply requires belief propagated by it.
Religion is so strong and popular because it is easier to accept belief it is difficult to seek the truth hidden by ignorance.
Has it ever struck religious believers to doubt whether their religion is true? Religious believers never use their reason because they start and conclude that their religion alone is true because they never question.
You may believe in a position, but you are required to prove the truth of your belief. A belief is a feeling, and the ultimate truth is the true knowledge.
Theological philosophers say God is a perfect being, but they have never known God and never proved his existence; hence their ascription of perfection to God is purely self-imagined.
According to their imagination, is the paradise or heaven of religious believers, but where people have little thinking capacity, they begin to disbelieve through the contradictions of various contending orthodox claims and descriptions.
Remember:~
Mystics see visions of Gods and Goddesses and adapt according to their own religious conditioning.
The garbage of religious beliefs dogmas superstition is confounded with the human imagination. The glory of the religious Gods is hyped and obscured by so much tinsel and commercialism.
Spirituality is not theology. Advaita is not a philosophy but Advaita is the ultimate truth or Brahman or God. Advaita is Self-knowledge or Brahma Gnana or Atma Gnana or knowledge of the Spirit or God in truth.
The word “Advaita” is one without the second. Advaita essentially refers to the Atman and the whole existence. Advaita is the fullness of consciousness without the division of form, time, and space.
Theology has nothing to do with spirituality. Advaita is pure spirituality. The theological Advaita has nothing to do with the Advaitic wisdom, which is based on the Spirit or Atman.
Theological Advaita is conceptual having its own doctrine has nothing to do with the Gnanic Advaita because Gnanic Advaita is Self-knowledge or Brahma Gnana or Atma Gnana.
Both approaches are not workable together because the theological Advaita is based on the birth entity (ego) Gnanic Advaita is based on the Atman (Soul).
Thus, the theological Advaita has to be discarded without mercy to get Advaitic Gnana.
“Advaita” is a term used variously to express the unity of reality. Advaita is unity in diversity.
The seeker has to begin by defining "What is real?" "What is unreal?, to establish Advaitic reality by sheer reasoning alone.
Reasoning is the right way to realize the truth, which is beyond form, time, and space. People must first know what is the truth? and what is untruth’.
For religion, you can interpret texts as you like, in whatever way that pleases you, you simply imagine away.
Sage Sankara’s Advaitic wisdom is not a teaching or philosophy but Advaita is the universal wisdom. Advaitic wisdom is neither a teaching nor a theory but it is merely guidance to those who are seriously seeking the ultimate truth or Brahman.
Grasp the ultimate truth anytime, at any age, if the seeker has the spiritual maturity and capacity to grasp it.
Sage Sankara says: ~ VC-47 All the effects of ignorance, root, and branch, are burnt down by the fire of knowledge, which arises from discrimination between these two—the Self and the not-Self.
It really depends on his inborn natural capacity to understand and assimilate it. Sage Sankara’s wisdom is a Self-examiner, to test oneself to discover how near to Gnana he has approached what progress has already been made on the path, and what still remains to be done. It sets up a criterion for Self-judgement. There are millions in search of truth but one in a million will be able to grasp it.
Without Sage Sankara, there is no Advaita (nonduality). Since people believe Advaitic orthodoxy is the tool to acquire Advaitic wisdom there is a lot of confusion. Advaitic orthodoxy has nothing to do with Advaitic wisdom of Sage Sankara.
I am highlighting all the obstacles, which is blocking one from realizing the ultimate truth or Brahman. There are so many non-dualistic masters of the East and also from the West who expound the Advaitic or non-dualistic knowledge but none of them are helpful to reach the ultimate end.
One has to know and realize his innermost Self is the Soul and identify it as his true identity to find liberation from the bondage of the illusion of birth, life, death, and world(duality). The goal of our life is to find and realize our identity with our Soul, which is the Self.
Sage Sankara said:~ Neither by the practice of yoga nor philosophy, nor by good works nor by learning, does liberation come, but only through the realization that Atman and Brahman are one in no other way. (1) Vivekachoodamani v 56, pg. 25
To come to a more precise understanding of what non-duality is or might mean, we must return to the original linguistic and philosophic backgrounds from which the word has been translated into English.
If we limit a probe of the meaning of non-duality to Hindu Sanskrit literature, we find that the most frequently used term is “Advaita.
Advaita” is not a religious concept. Advaita is the nature of the existence hidden by the form, time, and space. The seeker has to attempt to rule out from the start a false understanding of reality by a perfect understanding of ‘what is what’.
The Advaita is hidden by the Dvaita. Advaita is the Soul, which is present in the form of consciousness. Dvaita is the universe.
Advaita is basically a denial; it is literally the negation of the Dvaita. That means whatever remains by negating the universe by realizing the universe is created out of single clay and that clay is the Soul, which is present in the form of the consciousness, the hidden truth by Dvaita uncovered. The consciousness is the cause of the universe and it, itself is uncaused.
Remember: ~
The proof is the main thing in pursuit of truth.
“How God can exist without man’s existence?”
How can the world exist without man’s existence?
Thus, man has to exist first to say God and the world exists. Thus, the seeker has to verify his own existence to realize the fact that, all three states are unreal, from the standpoint of the Soul, the ‘Self.
God is universal because God is impersonal. God does not belong to any religion because religious Gods are personal.
How can you see God without knowing what God is in actuality? When the ‘Self is not you how can you find God within you? God is not within you. Those who say God is within you just propagating half-baked knowledge.
First, realize the ‘Self is not within you. You are bound by the experience of the birth, life, death, and the world whereas the ‘Self is birthless and deathless because it is ever formless, timeless, and spaceless existence.
The Soul is the Self. The Soul is present in the form of Consciousness. Consciousness is the cause of the world in which you exist and it, itself is uncaused. Consciousness is the ultimate truth or Brahman or God in truth.
From the standpoint of the Soul, the Self the world in which you exist is merely an illusion. Thus, the world in which exists hides the Soul, which is the real God.
Till you think the ‘Soul, the innermost Self’ is within you, you will never be able to realize God. God is not limited to you but it pervades in everything and everywhere in the world in which you exist.
Bhagavad Gita says: ~ Brahmano hi pratisthaham- Brahman (God) is considered the all-pervading consciousness which is the basis of all the animate and inanimate entities and material (Gita 14.27)
If God is Spirit, then how does the man know God created the world? There is no proof. If man had seen God creating the world, he could admit it, but how could he have seen God before he came into existence? (i.e. were created).
The Spirit is the root element of the universe. The Spirit is present in the form of the Soul, the innermost Self. The Soul is present in the form of consciousness.
From the Spirit, the universe comes into existence. In the Spirit, the universe resides. And into the Spirit, the universe is dissolved. The Spirit is the parent of all that is there is.
Brihadaranyaka Upanishad: ~ Brahman (God) is present in the form of the Athma, and it is indeed Athma itself’.
Thus it refers to a formless and attributeless God, which is the Atman (Soul), the ‘Self’ within the false experience. Thus it indicates clearly all the Gods with form and attributes are mere imaginations based on the false ‘Self’. Thus, Atman or Soul, the ‘Self’ is God in truth.
Sage Sankara’s Supreme Brahman is impersonal, Nirguna (without Gunas or attributes), Nirakara (formless), Nirvisesha (without special characteristics), immutable, eternal, and Akarta (non-agent). It is above all needs and desires. It is always the Witnessing Subject. It can never become an object as it is beyond the reach of the senses. Brahman is non-dual, one without a second. It has no other besides it. It is destitute of difference, either external or internal. Brahman cannot be described because the description implies a distinction. Brahman cannot be distinguished from any other than It. In Brahman, there is not a distinction between substance and attribute. Sat-Chit-Ananda constitutes the very essence or Svarupa of Brahman, and not just Its attributes. The Nirguna Brahman of Sage Sankara is impersonal.
The God you see and meet and in your vision is not God in truth but a hallucination.
How can you see and meet God without knowing what God is in actuality? Praying and meditating on God without knowing what God really is, leads to hallucination. The world in which you exist hides God. Thus, Self-realization is necessary to realize ‘what God is in actuality. : ~ Santthosh Kumaar
