Sage Sankara said: ~ Worship as many Gods as
you please, observe ceremonies, and sing devotional hymns, but the liberation
will never come, even after a hundred aeons, without realizing the Oneness.
No religious God can exist
apart from the Soul, which is present in the form of consciousness.
According to Advaita
Vedanta, the Veda addresses itself to two kinds of audiences - the ordinary
ones who desire the transitory heaven and other pleasures obtained as a result
of ritual sacrifices, and the more advanced seeker who seeks to know Brahman.
Thus,
the Purva mimam. sa, with its emphasis on the karma kanda of the Vedas, is meant
for the first audience, to help lead its followers along the way. However, the
Vedanta, with its emphasis on the jnana kanda, is meant for those who wish to
go beyond such transient pleasures.
All the religious Gods with
form and attributes cease to exist without the dualistic illusion.
Rig Veda: ~ The Atman is the cause;
Atman is the support of all that exists in this universe. May ye never turn
away from the Atman, the Self. May ye never accept another God in place of the
Atman nor worship other than the Atman?" (10:48, 5)
How can you worship God?
That implies two ~ the worshipper and the worshipped, whereas God is
nondual. One can worship his idea of God only or realize his unity with it when
he can’t worship it as apart.
When Upanishads and Vedas
declare that, “God is in the form of the Athma, and God is indeed Athma itself”
then why accept another God in place of the Atman nor worship other than the
Atman.
God has to be realized not
worshipped.
Advaitic Orthodoxy
misinterpreted Sage Sankara and
presented only the religious side of his teaching as the highest doctrine.
Thus, people are misled. The orthodoxy is based on rituals and mythical Gods and
Karma. Advaitic wisdom of Sage Sankara is
nothing to with Advaitic orthodoxy.
Let Advaitic wisdom
annihilate ignorance (I) and reveal Soul, the Self the God in truth. Let your
ears become deaf to the untruth propagated by the religion as a reality; enable
you to realize the truth hidden by the ignorance (I). Let your eyes become
blind to illusion to receive the Soul as the Self as it is in the midst of the
dualistic illusion.
Sage Sankara makes a distinction
between the Nondualistic view and the dualistic view of the universe.
Genuine philosophy must be
independent of religion, that in Sage Sankara himself the Saguna
Brahman or a personal God is only a part of the phenomenal (if not illusory)
world and the Nirguna Brahman is the only reality and has nothing to do with
religion.
The Brahma Sutras
together with Sage Sankara's commentary
thereon do not contain the higher wisdom. They are intended for those who are
incapable of thinking rationally.
Sage Sankara's commentary on the Brahma
Sutras is not on a philosophical basis but on an orthodox and mystic basis,
with an appeal to the Vedas as a final authority.
In Brahma Sutra Sage Sankara takes the position that
there is another entity outside us, i.e. the wall really exists separately from
the mind. This was because Sage Sankara explains
in Manduka that those who study the Sutras are orthodox minds, intellectual
children, hence his popular viewpoint to assist them. These people are afraid
to go deeper because it means being heroic enough to refuse to accept Sruti,
and God's authority, in case they mean punishment by God. A Gnani says the
scriptures for children, but wise seekers will think rationally.
In Brahma Sutras Sage Sankara takes for granted, and assumes that a world was created: He there mixes dogmatic theology with
philosophy.
That God created the
world is an absolute lie, nevertheless one will find Sage Sankara (in his commentary on
Vedanta Sutras) clearly says this! He has to adapt his teachings to his
audience, reserving the highest for philosophical minds.
The text of Brahma Sutras
is based on religion and dogmatism, but in the commentary Sage Sankara cleverly introduced some
philosophy. If it is objected that a number of Upanishads are equally dogmatic
because they also begin by assuming Brahman, only a few Upanishads do not but
prove Brahman at the end of a train of proof.
Scholars' translation of
Brahma Sutras in Sacred Books of East must be read cautiously as he has not
understood its highest sense, e.g. for Advaita, they wrongly put
"Unity" instead of “Non-duality.
"
Sage Sankara gave religion and
scholasticism and yoga no less than philosophy, to the seeking world. He was
great enough to be able to do so. His commentary on Manduka is pure philosophy,
but many of his other books are presented from a religious standpoint to help
those who cannot rise up to philosophy.
Remember: ~
All the orthodox ideas were rejected by Sage Sankara. There is no need to
indulge in rituals, to realize the ultimate truth or Brahman. There is no
need to study philosophy, to realize the ultimate truth or Brahman
then why do you indulge in studying philosophy.
Sage Sankara pokes fun at ascetics and
points out that all their austerities do not cause desires to go (Altar
Flowers" Page 205, v.2 P.207 v.4)
Sage Sankara pointed out that those rituals
could in no way bring about wisdom, much less moksha.
Sage Sankara says the rewards of the
rituals are not a matter of direct realization. Advaitic wisdom is based on
personal realization.
The orthodox Advaitin
believes that rituals alone would lead one to higher levels of attainment.
Further, the deities would reward only those entitled to perform the rituals
alone. The entitlement involved caste, creed, and other parameters.
The scriptural authority and
value of rituals are part of the Advaitic orthodoxy, which is meant for
ignorant people.
The Advaitic wisdom of Sage Sankara is nothing to do with religion, caste, rituals, worship, yoga, and other practices. Therefore an
obvious disparity between Sage Sankara‘s path of
Gnana and the path of Karma. The path of Gnana is meant for the advanced seeker of
truth and the path of Karma is meant for the ignorant populace.
Even Sage Sankara appear and tell the
orthodox people the path of orthodoxy is the path of ignorance, they will not
be able to drop their inherited samskara or conditioning, which they think is
the only way to reach heaven and reap happy life in the next life.
As regards the rituals, Sage Sankara says, the person who
performs rituals and aspires for rewards will view himself in terms of the
caste into which he is born, his age, the stage of his life, and his standing in
society, etc. In addition, he is required to perform rituals all through his
life. However, the Self has none of those attributes or tags. Hence, the person
who superimposes all those attributes on the changeless, eternal Self and
identifies the ‘Self’ with the body is confusing one for the other; and is,
therefore, an ignorant person. The scriptures dealing with rituals, rewards, etc. are therefore addressed to an ignorant person.- (11- Adhyasa
Bhashya)
The orthodox people only
teach and preach their knowledge of ignorance but none of them wants to know the
God in Truth, which is hidden by the dualistic illusion or Maya.
Remember: ~
First Mundaka - Chapter 2
(10) - Ignorant fools, regarding sacrifices and humanitarian works as
the highest, do not know any higher good. Having enjoyed their reward on the
heights of heaven, gained by good works, they still remain in ignorance of the
Atman the real God.
As a person, one performs
rituals throughout his life. The person who performs rituals and aspires for
rewards will view the world in which he exists as a reality. However, the Soul,
the Self unborn eternal hidden by the world in which he exists. From the
standpoint of the Soul, the world in which he exists is merely an illusion.
The scriptures dealing with
rituals, rewards, etc. are therefore addressed to an ignorant person.
First Mundaka - Chapter 2 (9) ~ Children, immersed in
ignorance in various ways, flatter themselves, saying: We have accomplished
life's purpose. Because these performers of karma do not know the Truth owing
to their attachment, they fall from heaven, misery-stricken, when the fruit of
their work is exhausted.
First Mundaka - Chapter 2 (8)
~ Fools,
dwelling in darkness, but wise in their own conceit and puffed up with vain
scholarship, wander about, being afflicted by many ills, like blind men led by
the blind.
Ish Upanishad says:~ Those people who have
neglected the attainment of Self-knowledge and have thus committed suicide.- 10/11/12
The religious orthodox
people who have neglected the attainment of Self-knowledge and have thus
committed suicide, as it were, are doomed to enter those worlds after death.
This is a condemnation of
people who do not try to attain Self-knowledge. They are, in a real sense,
committing suicide, for what can be worse than being a slave to sense
enjoyment, completely oblivious of the real purpose of life, which is to be
one’s, own master?
Sage Sankara says “he who knows the
Brahman (God) is one and the ‘Self’ is another, does not know Brahman (God).”
Sage Sankara also asserts that the Self is
realized when All the effects of ignorance, root, and branch, are burnt down by
the fire of Self- knowledge, which arises from discrimination between these
two—the Self and the non-Self.
Sage Sankara’s Gnanic path can help the
seekers draw and prepare them for the journey to the reality hidden by the
dualistic illusion or Maya.
Remember:~
Sage Sankara says rituals and rites
such as yajna or fire rituals are meant for the ignorant populace. Sage Sankara asserts that will not prepare
the mindset for the journey to Self-knowledge.
Moral, ethics, love
compassion, code of conduct, celibacy, karma, sin, temple worship, ancestor
worship, heaven, an nd hell are concerned with the one which is born, lives, and
dies in the world.
Moral, ethics, love
compassion, code of conduct, celibacy, karma, sin, temple worship, ancestor
worship, heaven, and hell have nothing to with the Soul, the Self because it is
unborn and eternal. It is unborn eternal because it is ever formless, timeless, and
spaceless existence.
Religion and yoga prevent
seekers from attaining Self- knowledge.
According to Sage Sankara Atman, the unchanging
entity itself is the ultimate reality or Brahman. Atman alone is real, while
the universe is unreal. : ~ Santthosh Kumaar
