Alston on Shankara toc

Shankara on Avidya (nescience)

Shankara on the Absolute as Lord

Shankara on the Unmoving Mover

Shankara on the Deeper Levels

Shankara on Cause, Effect, and the Absolute

Shankara on Vedic revelation

Shankara on Name and Form

Shankara on Adhyaropa and Apavada

Shankara on Defining the Absolute

Shankara on Satyam Jñānam Anantam Brahma

Shankara on Bliss

Shankara on Creation Texts

Shankara on Gaudapada's Acosmic Doctrines

On Shankara. Snippets on Shankara's Identity and True Works (plus Alston Info)

On Shankara: Gaudapada and Madhyamika Teaching

On Shankara: Schools of Advaita

On Shankara and Satcitananda

Shankara on the Soul

Shankara on the Intellect

Shankara on Soul and Lord

A. J. Alston Bibliography:

Shankara on the Absolute: Shankara Source Book Volume One Kindle Edition

Shankara on the Creation: Shankara Source Book Volume Two Kindle Edition

Shankara on the Soul: Shankara Source Book Volume Three Kindle Edition

The Thousand Teachings of Shankara: Upadeshasahasri

Shankara on Soul and Lord

A. J. Alston:

There are texts in the Upanishads and in the Epics and Purāṇas, including the Gītā, which imply that the individual soul is different from the Lord and that he should approach Him in devotion and that he may perhaps attain to Him or to ‘his world’ through his grace.

For Śaṅkara, these texts had validity within the world of nescience. But if they were to be taken as the final truth, they would conflict with the other texts speaking of the utter transcendence of the one and only non-dual Self, bereft of all duality and all empirically knowable characters.

While the individual soul in its true nature is identical with (is nothing other than) the Lord, the Lord in his true nature is not identical with the individual soul in its individual nature. In particular, the Lord is not in his true nature the transmigrant. The individual soul is dependent on the Lord for his power to act.

The relation between the individual soul and the Lord appears different from different standpoints. From the standpoint of nescience they may seem different, and identity with the Lord then appears to be a ‘goal’ that has to be ‘attained’.

From the standpoint of knowledge, this identity is a fact. Bondage and liberation, in turn, depend on whether the student feels himself to be different from or identical with the Lord.

~Alston, 'Shankara and the Soul', pp. 70-1

Shankara on the Intellect

A. J. Alston:

Our experiences force us to conclude that an unchanging, self-luminous principle must exist within the individual as the Witness of his passing states of experience.

Further it is the presence of this light which unifies and organizes the psychic and physical functions and enables perception and other cognitive acts to take place.

The mind and senses are composed of the material elements, and there must exist some self-luminous light perceiving them if there is to be experience at all.

The intellect is the chief instrument of this self-luminous principle in the case of the waking experience of an ordinary unenlightened man.

The intellect is the special and most intimate instrument of the Self in empirical knowledge. The intellect is lit by the light of the Self, and objects are lit by the intellect through the medium of the senses, and require to be so lit in order to be perceived at all.

The light of the Self within is reflected in the intellect, and this reflected light is passed on, by contact (samparka), to the lower mind, senses and the body.

People identify themselves with this or that aspect of the psycho-physical organism, depending on how far their powers of discrimination have developed and rescued them from crude self-identification with the body.

As long as there is failure to discriminate the Self from the intellect, the Self appears ‘like’ the appearances that come before it. But in truth it is pure light and does not really act or move.

~Alston, 'Shankara on the Soul' pp. 56-7

Tapovan on Sannyasa

So sannyāsa cannot be inactivity or meaningless activity. It ought to induce man to engage himself in some ceaseless activity. 

Sannyāsa implies realisation of Truth and the dissemination of the way to ensure that realisation. For intelligent people, it means also the study and the teaching of philosophical works.

If these principles are strictly followed, nobody can gainsay that it is harmful. On the contrary, it will be for the good of himself and for others. 

If sannyāsins thus perform their duties – activities befitting them and are to be performed by them – activities impossible for others to perform – they will not be subjected to criticism and insult as idlers and do-nothing fellows.

from Ishvara Darsana p.197

Shankara on the Soul

A. J. Alston:

The soul is the immutable Consciousness viewed in association with superimposed limiting adjuncts (upādhi),1 and this Consciousness, appearances notwithstanding, is also present in dreamless sleep. The connection of the immutable Consciousness with superimposed adjuncts is due to nescience.

The adjuncts in which the Self is apparently enclosed to form the multiplicity of individual souls derive from name and form as their material cause, and how the Self is in its true nature unborn and immutable, while only the adjuncts, like the gross material body, come into being and pass away.

The immutable Consciousness is said to be reflected in its closest and most immediate adjunct, the mind with its ego-notion. Śaṅkara regarded the use of the reflection-analogy as indispensable for explaining the facts of experience, and for reconciling the fact that the experiences of each individual soul are private to himself with the presence of one Self as the reality in all.

Another useful analogy for explaining the apparent individuation of the Self as the multiplicity of individual souls is that of the apparent separation of individual parcels of the ether of space within various pots.

The reflection-analogy, which is much the more important for Śaṅkara, as later sections will show, has the incidental advantage of suggesting to the beginner on the practical path that, even if he cannot attain to the Absolute at a single leap, he can acquire a higher degree of awareness of the presence of the Absolute in the course of daily life through purification of the mind, the medium in which its light is reflected.

~Alston, Shankara on the Soul, pp8,9

Snippets from Satprakashananda (wip)

1. ajñāna or avidyā

Brahman as controlling mayā is Iśvara. Brahman as controlled by mayā is jīva. From the position of the jīva, this mysterious principle, māyā, is designated as ajñāna or avidyā, which is usually translated as ignorance or nescience. But ajñāna or avidyā does not mean the absence or the negation, but the reverse, of knowledge. It is antiknowledge, which terminates with the knowledge of Reality.

2. mithyā

Since the world of becoming is indescribable (anirvacanīya) either as real (sat) or as unreal (asat), it is characterized in Vedantic terminology as mithyā, which does not mean, as is often misconceived, "unreal" but "other than real and unreal" (sadasad-vilaksņa). The manifold has an apparent existence grounded on the Supreme Being like the illusory appearance of a serpent on a rope.

3. Māyā

That which is real in Māyā is the Reality in and through Māyā. Yet the Reality is not seen, and hence that which is seen is unreal and it has no real independent existence of itself, but is dependent upon the Real for its existence. Māyā then is a paradox - real, yet not real; an illusion, yet not an illusion. He who knows the Real sees in Māyā not illusion but Reality. He who knows not the Real sees in Māyā illusion and thinks it real. ~Vivekananda (as quoted by S)

Column Advaita Style

1. Saints Say

If a dry sponge is a dead sponge and a wet sponge is a live sponge, consciousness gives existence to the material world and not vice versa.

The intent of an evolutionary universe is not to produce consciousness but reflect consciousness in a more subtle manner.

The subtle body is like a mirror. In reality, there is no mirror. People live and die in Maya while the saints go marching on.

2. To the Truth

This hydroscopic universe appears in absolute consciousness. Consciousness pervades this absorbent world like Vishnu do.

If God is a concept, so is your person. Atheism is only halfway to the truth. Halfway to the truth is a perilous lie.

The body is the bodhi tree. The mind is a mirror. If Bodhi is unborn, where does all the dust go?

3. View from Mesa Arch 2008

Artificial intelligence is neither intelligence nor art.

Only love reveals truth and beauty.

Between the desert and dark clouds is the rain of Ramana Maharshi like a Doric column.

~sr12

Canyonlands 2008

Artificial intelligence is neither intelligence nor art.

Only love reveals truth and beauty.

Between the desert and dark clouds is the rain of Ramana Maharshi.

To the Truth

This hydroscopic universe appears in absolute consciousness. Consciousness pervades this absorbent world like Vishnu do.

If God is a concept, so is your person. Atheism is only halfway to the truth. Halfway to the truth is a perilous lie.

The body is the bodhi tree. The mind is a mirror. Bodhi is unborn. Where does the dust collect?

Ode Hymn Song Silence

1. New Ode to Satcitananda

Satcitananda are not three attributes of Absolute Brahman but that essence expressed three ways: consciousness, existence, holistic bliss infinity.

These three expressions are the nondual trinity of negative capability — Absolute Brahman is neither non-existent, unaware, nor limited.

Atman neither exists nor doesn't exist, is neither aware nor unaware. Atman is the principle of existence and the ground of consciousness, unlimited.

2. Hymn to Isvara

Absolute Brahman is Brahman without attributes – Nirguna Brahman. Saguna Brahman is Brahman with attributes, God, Isvara and its sword of Maya.

Maya is beginningless. Maya is intelligent. Duality is the mark of Maya. The laws of science are the works of Maya. The puzzles of the universe are the sword play of Maya.

The ignorance of Avidya is Maya mixed with busyness and inertia. Wisdom is Maya mixed with effortless non-doing and intuitive non-knowing. That is the will of Isvara.

3. Sun Song

The source of the sun is a black hole to big science.

The source of the sun god is consciousness-existence in maya.

In reality, the sun is an appearance in and of the self-luminous Self.

4. Voice of the Silence

In Acadia National Park, on the western slope of Cadillac Mountain, I watch the sun set like a nuclear power plant over Eagle Lake 1999.

From a park bench in the Santa Lucia Mountains of Big Sur on the grounds of New Camaldoli Hermitage, I watch the vast Pacific like Merton in Asia.

shizukesa ya
iwa ni shimi-iru
semi no koe

~Basho

~sr11