Why mAyA vAdam

After the first 2 postings in my blog, I have changed the name of my blog to mAyA vAdam. I would like to explain why I did so… :

When I write an article there are essentially 4 items, or as a matter of fact on any aspects of what we do or observe or think or explain or interpret or define…. So on –

1. The actor or observer or thinker or explainer or interpreter or definer
2. The acted upon, the observed or that is thought or explained or interpreted or defined
3. The process of acting, observing, explaining, defining
4. The result of the action, observation, interpretation…

 But there is an underlying 5^th element that distinguishes the four separate entities and also comprehends the collective entity. This 5^th element is hidden and unknown. More so the four elements individually and masks and hides the 5^th element. This 5^th element not only is capable of distinguishing the four elements but it comprises of the four elements. That is the observer, the observed, the process of observation and the result of observation become indistinguishable, from the stand point of the 5^th element. Not only that, all the four elements put together is the fifth element.

That is why Sri Adi Shankara Bhagawatpada declared his cardinal philosophy “Brhma satyam JaganmityA JivO Brhmaiva nAparah. – The Brhman is the only Reality, everything else is mere appearance, the Soul Jiva is identical with Brhman. All your actions, the acted upon, the process of action… are all unreal when viewed from the standpoint of the Absolute.

This is what beautifully questioned and answered in Keno Upanishad:-

By whom impelled soars forth the mind projected?

By whom enjoined goes forth the earliest breathing?

By whom impelled this speech do people utter?

There the eyes go not;

Speech goes not;, nor the mind. 

We know not, we understand not.

It is conceived of by him by whom It is not conceived of. 

He by whom It is conceived of, knows It not.

It is not understood by those who [say they] understand It.

It is understood by those who [say they] understand It not

So if Truth is one, and what we experience in day to day life of the world, that is perceived by our 3 planes of our common knowledge (physical means [Bhur], Intellectual source [Bhuvah], emotional and intuitive[Suvah] looks so real to us, what is true and which is false?. This question has raised in the minds of our great rishis. Truth can not contradict experience. So Shankara explains the apparent contradiction  between Truth and everyday experience, with the concept of MAyA. He says, the external world and all the ‘world’ experience through the 3 means has no reality, they are illusions (mAyA). This illusion gets extinguished once we get the Realization of Brhman. (with the example of rope and the snake). In effect He gives a  thundering declaration that there is No Duality. The explanation of the world as illusion gives the name to his philosophy as “mAyAvAda” or VivartavAda or AnirvacanIya. In other words “the doctrine of the apparent modification of Brhman into this phenomenal world”.

When Shankara says the world is false, he does not mean that it is absolutely nothing, but our experience of the world is liable to be cancelled out by means of knowledge of things as they are. The world has a relative existence, it is a temporary phenomenon, but disappears when true knowledge dawns on us. It is not real from the Absolute standpoint. We can not say ‘mAyA’ exists or does not exist, it is a mystery beyond our common understanding, it is unspeakable (AnirvacanIya)

So whatever I post in this blog – are all superficial, rudimentary, the arguments and counter arguments arising out of this mAyA, it is only a vAdam (discussion / argument) rooted in illusions of me!!

So in essence do not take it seriously, just be a part of this illusory drama