Articles

     (An article by Swami Arunachalananda Puri in The Vedanta Kesari - November 2023 issue.)

'ब्रह्म सत्यं जगत् मिथ्या - Brahman is Real, World is unreal'¹ says the famous dictum by Sri Shankaracharya. Vedanta maintains that the general human experience of subject-object divide, i.e. of separation between world and oneself, is a spiritually ignorant outlook. There is an infinite Reality, called Brahman, which is the substratum of the entire world as well as of all living beings; this Reality is Pure Consciousness and Bliss. When a spiritual aspirant realises his or her real Self as this Brahman, the world of multiplicities becomes unreal like a dream and he or she overcomes the subject-object split. Such a seer, for all external appearances, may continue to live a life like any other ordinary human being, but his inner Consciousness is: 'I am all-pervading, world and everyone in it are within Me, I am in all beings'. Srimad Bhagavad Gita puts it thus: 'All beings exist in Me' and 'I am the Self residing in the hearts of all beings'². And Swami Vivekananda, in one of his class talks, puts it as:

Assert what we really are-existence, knowledge, and bliss-being, knowing, and loving.
Meditation is the means of unification of the subject and object.
Meditate: Above, it is full of me; below, it is full of me; in the middle, it is full of me. I am in all beings, and all beings are in me. Om Tat Sat, I am It.
I am existence above mind. I and the one spirit of the universe. I am neither pleasure nor pain.
The body drinks, eats, and so on. I am not the body. I am not mind. I am He.
I am the witness. I look on. When health comes I am the witness. When disease comes I am the witness.
I am Existence, Knowledge, Bliss.³

Until a spiritual aspirant reaches this extraordinary height of Advaita experience, despite being sincere and serious in his spiritual practices, he has to confront the basic dichotomy between his 'inner conviction' and 'outer day-to-day experience'. Aspirants on the spiritual path are yet to transcend the duality of subject-object split, and at the same time they have developed the intellectual conviction moulded by critical analysis of life-experiences as well as by studying scriptures that the world 'as it appears' is unreal. Thus they have to continue their lives in a dualistic world experience and yet at the same time they feel within themselves the utter uselessness of duality-filled life. People who are totally immersed in worldliness and hedonistic materialism remain completely ignorant about their real Self as well as about the real nature of world; they do not face this dichotomy acutely; neither is it felt by the select few who have realised their real nature. Thus we can say that serious spiritual aspirants form a class by themselves. In this article an attempt is made to delve a little deeper into this issue and come to some conclusion that would be helpful for spiritual aspirants.

Need for a Weltanschauung

A well developed Weltanschauung [a particular philosophy or view of life; the world view of an individual or group] guides human life better than bumbling through life buffeted by endless present moment situations. The need for such a Weltanschauung becomes imperative for serious spiritual aspirants. Vedanta scriptures broadly describe three Weltanschauungs:

1. Srishti-Drishti-Vada - world is pre-existing and is the primary reality, while the perceiver of it is secondary and transitory.
2. Drishti-Srishti-Vada - the perceiver is the primary witness of his perceptions, and the perceived world is secondary and transitory.
3. Ajata-Vada - there is no world and no perceiver.

As long as a spiritual aspirant believes in the first view mentioned above, he cannot go deeper into spirituality and has to remain contented at surface level; this is because, in this view, the self remains circumscribed by the body-mind complex and life-vision remains extroverted. Serious spiritual quest begins when the second view is taken as the main focus of life; Swami Yatiswarananda observes:

The world, even if it exists, exists only as a shadow, not as a reality. It is only a figment of the mind. So long as the world is given a primary importance, primary reality, spiritual life can never begin ...
The trouble is that our mind is so out-going that ordinarily, to us the world is real, i.e. primarily real, but, as long as we have this attitude, there can never be any true devotion. God must be more real than the world. As long as we do not even come to doubt the reality of the world, of our waking state, there can never be any real spiritual life.⁴

From the perspective of absolute Reality, both the views of Srishti-Drishti-Vada as well as Drishti-Srishti-Vada are ultimately false and only the view of Ajata-Vada is the absolute Truth; but for our day-to-day 'experienced-world' point of view, both Srishti-Drishti-Vada and Drishti-Srishti-Vada can be utilised by a spiritual aspirant for his spiritual journey. According to Advaita Vedanta, the perceiver (subject) and the perceived (object), are both mind-waves which apparently divide the undivided homogeneous Reality into 'inner' and 'outer'; both subject as well as object appear and disappear simultaneously. Taking this into account we can say that Srishti-Drishti-Vada, which treats world as primary, can be utilised for spiritual journey to some extent, but in it Brahman/Self, the 'creator' of world and perceiver, has to be given more importance and Bhakti should dominate the mind. And Drishti-Srishti-Vada, which treats the perceiver as primary, is directly useful in making the aspirant introspective quicker than Srishti-Drishti-Vada and in it the 'inner' Self (Atman), which is the 'substratum' for the perceiver and the world perceived, is the focus of spiritual quest with Jnana aspect dominating. A spiritual aspirant should reason within himself and find out which Weltanschauung suits his temperament. With this idea fixed in mind, facing challenges of spiritual life becomes little bit methodical and easier.

Saints on Weltanschauung

It is interesting to study some of the quotations of great spiritual giants in this respect. Swami Vivekananda had said that Sri Ramakrishna was all Bhakti outside and Jnana inside while he himself was all Jnana outside and Bhakti inside! In California Swami Vivekananda said to Mrs. Edith Allen, 'Madam, be broad minded; always see two ways. When I am on the heights I say, "Shivoham, Shivoham: I am He, I am He!" and when I have the stomach ache I say, "Mother have mercy on me!"⁵

It seems for conducting empirical world interactions, Srishti-Drishti-Vada is found to be easier as majority of humanity subscribes to it but for developing inner spiritual strength Drishti-Srishti-Vada is found to be more useful.

Sri Ramana Maharshi, the famous 20th Century Jnani of Tiruvannamalai, stressed the need of self-enquiry to all serious spiritual aspirants. It is a spiritual technique which traces the source of the fundamental 'I' thought in us to the Self/ Atman (i.e. Brahman); every thought in our mind is intrinsically related to the basic 'I'-thought and by continually questioning 'who am I', we are taking ourselves back to our true nature. Here, Drishti-Srishti-Vada is of paramount importance as seen from the following answer to a question given by Sri Ramana Maharshi:

Q: How shall I realise God?
M.: God is an unknown entity. Moreover, He is external. Whereas, the Self is always with you and it is you. Why do you leave out what is intimate and go in for what is external?⁶

Q: Is it possible to gain that consciousness which is beyond thoughts?
M.: Yes. There is only one consciousness, which subsists in the waking, dream and sleep states. In sleep there is no 'I'. The 'I-thought' arises on waking and then the world appears.?⁷

Also:

The entire universe is condensed in the body and the entire body in the Heart. Thus the Heart is the nucleus of the whole universe. This world is not other than the mind, the mind is not other than the Heart; that is the whole truth. ...
The source is a point without any dimensions. It expands as the cosmos on the one hand and as Infinite bliss on the other. That point is the pivot. From it a single vasana starts and expands as the experiencer ('I'), the experience and the experienced (the world).⁸

Also regarding spiritual aspirants choosing a Weltanschauung and subscribing to theories of creation of world, Sri Ramana Maharshi says:

The Vedanta says that the cosmos springs into view simultaneously with the seer. There is no detailed process of creation. This is said to be yugapat srishti (instantaneous creation). It is quite similar to the creations in dream where the experiencer springs up simultaneously with the objects of experience. When this is told, some people are not satisfied for they are so rooted in objective knowledge. They seek to find out how there can be sudden creation. They argue that an effect must be preceded by a cause. In short, they desire an explanation for the existence of the world which they see around them. Then the Srutis try to satisfy their curiosity by such theories of creation. This method of dealing with the subject of creation is called krama srishti (gradual creation). But the true seeker can be content with yugapat srishti instantaneous creation.⁹

Vedanta takes into account the confusion of humanity regarding the world and hence describes krama srishti i.e. Srishti-Drishti-Vada, only to point out the source material of the universe as Pure Consciousness-Bliss i.e. Brahman. The cosmic evolution process is narrated not for its own sake but to stress the material cause of the universe, which is also immanent in the phenomenon. And thus make the spiritual aspirant focus on Self/God and not on the world.

In Sri Ramakrishna's teachings we find stress on Bhakti and not on dry intellectual discussions or pursuit of siddhis (extra-sensory powers). Whenever he was asked about essence of spiritual practice or about Vedanta or about siddhis, he would invariably say that "To love God is the essence'. Here we can say that in this way Sri Ramakrishna was pointing to the essential element in Srishti-Drishti-Vada and Drishti-Srishti-Vada-God/Self is more important than world. His following teaching is indicative of this:

Is it possible to understand God's action and His motive? He creates, He preserves, and He destroys. Can we ever understand why He destroys? I say to the Divine Mother: 'O Mother, I do not need to understand. Please give me love for Thy Lotus Feet.' The aim of human life is to attain bhakti. As for other things, the Mother knows best. I have come to the garden to eat mangoes. What is the use of my calculating the number of trees, branches, and leaves? I only eat the mangoes; I don't need to know the number of trees and leaves.¹⁰

Sri Ramakrishna's famous mantra for spiritual aspirants-'Naham Naham, Tuhu Tuhu' i.e. 'not my will but Thy Will be done, O Lord' is a Bhakti technique to overcome the hurdle of ego. It is an indirect way of saying 'Brahman is Real, World is unreal!'

Swami Vivekananda refers to Drishti-Srishti-Vada when he says, 'the world we have been thinking of so long, the world to which we have been clinging so long, is a false world of our own creation. Give that up; open your eyes and see that as such it never existed; it was a dream, Maya.'¹¹

Similarly, Swami Virajananda, the sixth President of the Ramakrishna Order, says, 'The universe and the body are both simultaneously revealed to me. I have no right to say that the body is mine and the universe is not mine. Both are mine because both are revealed to me.'¹²

Spiritual aspirants can find numerous quotations from thousands of saints world over stressing the need to focus more on God and less on world.

Scriptures on Weltanschauung

The three main schools of thought in Vedanta, namely dualism (Dvaita), qualified non-dualism (Vishishtadvaita), and non-dualism (Advaita), can be said to represent Srishti-Drishti-Vada, Drishti-Srishti-Vada, and Ajata-Vada respectively. The sense of reality of the world is most acutely felt in dualism and in Srishti-Drishti-Vada, the same is somewhat reduced in qualified non-dualism and in Drishti-Srishti-Vada, while in Advaita and in Ajata-Vada it can be said to be totally wiped out. Corresponding to these three systems, the following words of Jesus Christ can also be thought of as representative of these three views: 'Father in Heaven' akin to Srishti-Drish- ti-Vada, 'Kingdom of Heaven is Within' to Drishti-Srishti-Vada, and 'I and My Father are One' to Ajata-Vada.

If we study Mandukya Upanishad along with the exhaustive Mandukya Karika on it, then we see that primarily the Upanishad points to Ajata-Vada, and for the sake of meditation/upasana Drishti-Srishti-Vada is elaborated. One of the famous karika (verse) says: 'न निरोधो न चोत्पत्तिर्न बद्धो न च साधक । न मुमुक्षुर्न वै मुक्त एत्येषा परमार्थता ।।; In Truth there is no origination, no dissolution, none in bondage, none striving or aspiring for freedom, and none liberated.'¹³ Another karika says: 'प्रपञ्चो यदि विद्येत निवर्तेत न संशय । मायामात्रमिदं द्वैतमद्वैतं परमार्थतः ।। If the perceived manifold were real then certainly it would disappear. This duality (which is cognized) is mere illusion (Maya). Non-duality is (alone) the Supreme Reality.'¹⁴ Commenting on this karika Sri Shankaracharya says in the beginning, 'This manifold being only a false imagination, like the snake in the rope, does not really exist.'¹⁵ Other scriptural texts that have a similar approach are: Yoga Vasishtha, Ashtavakra Gita, Ribhu Gita etc.

Many Puranas as well as Vaishnava, Shaiva, and Shakta Agamas extol primarily Srishti-Drishti-Vada and try to drill Bhakti in the hearts of spiritual aspirants. Even in Upanishads Srishti-Drishti-Vada is explained, for those who are inclined to think primarily in terms of the phenomenon; the Mundaka Upanishad says: 'तपसा चीयते ब्रह्म ततोऽन्नमभिजायते। अन्नत्प्राणो मनः सत्यं लोकाः कर्मसु चामृतम् ।। Through knowledge Brahman increases in size. From that is born (the unmanifested) food. From food evolves Prana (Hiranyagarbha); (thence the cosmic) mind, (thence) the five elements; (thence) the worlds; (thence) the immortality that is in karmas.'¹⁶ Before starting his commentary on this mantra, Sri Shankaracharya says, 'the universe while emerging out of Brahman, does so in this order of succession and not simultaneously like a handful of jujubes thrown down.'¹⁷ The Taittiriya Upanishad too gives a sequence for manifestation of the phenomenal world: 'तस्माद्वा एतस्मादात्मन आकाशः संभूतः । आकाशद्वायुः। वायोरग्निः । अग्नेरापः । अद्भ्यः पृथिवी । पृथिव्या ओषधयः। ओषधीभ्योऽन्नम्। अन्नात्पुरुषः ।; ... From that Brahman, which is the Self, was produced space. From space emerged air. From air was born fire. From fire was created water. From water sprang up earth. From earth were born the herbs. From the herbs was produced food. From food was born man. ...'¹⁸ As for the Drishti-Srishti-Vada, a karika from Mandukya Karika says, 'कल्पयत्यात्मना आत्मानमात्मा देव: स्वमायया । स एव बुध्यते भेदा वेदान्तनिश्चयः ॥ The self-effulgent Self imagines Itself through Itself by the power of Its own Maya. The Self Itself cognizes the objects. Such is the definite conclusion of Vedanta.'¹⁹ Spiritual aspirants can go through the words of saints and various scriptures carefully to choose a proper Weltanschauung suitable to their temperament.

Conclusion

In Vedanta, the absolute Reality (infinite Pure Consciousness-Bliss i.e. Brahman) is the only substratum existing; names and forms, time and space, world and souls are appearances in It. Also the waking, dream, and deep-sleep states of a soul (sthani or soul experiencing these states, technically called vishwa, taijasa, and prajna respectively) and corresponding waking world, dream world, and 'world-less void' of deep-sleep (sthan or sphere of activity, technically called virat, hiranyagarbha, and ishwara respectively) are too imagined in Brahman. Thus ultimately 'Ajata-Vada' alone can be said to be true, while 'Srishti-Drishti-Vada' and 'Drishti-Srishti-Vada' are imagined appearances in Brahman. Keeping this supreme knowledge in mind, spiritual aspirants should decide which Weltanschauung can best guide their spiritual journey.

The importance of proper Weltanschauung in all walks of life, especially so for spiritual aspirants, cannot be overemphasized. The following words of Swami Vivekananda highlight this. Swamiji mentions about his interaction with Robert Green Ingersoll, the famous 19th Century agnostic speaker:

In America there was a great agnostic, a very noble man, a very good man, and a very fine speaker. He lectured on religion, which he said was of no use; why bother our heads about other worlds? He employed this simile: we have an orange here, and we want to squeeze all the juice out of it. I met him once and said, 'I agree with you entirely. I have some fruit, and I too want to squeeze out the juice. Our difference lies in the choice of the fruit. You want an orange, and I prefer a mango. You think it is enough to live here and eat and drink and have a little scientific knowledge. ... I want to understand the heart of things, the very kernel itself. Your study is the manifestation of life, mine is the life itself. ... I must know the heart of this life, its very essence, what it is, not only how it works and what are its manifestations. I want the why of everything, I leave the how to children.²⁰

Also Swami Vivekananda highlights the importance of a goal in life, 'If a man with an ideal makes a thousand mistakes, I am sure that the man without an ideal makes fifty thousand. Therefore, it is better to have an ideal.'²¹ Let every human being, and especially every spiritual aspirant, have a Weltanschauung that would take him or her closer to God or Self.

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References:

1. Vivekachudamani, 20
2. Srimad Bhagawad-Gita, IX.4, X.20
3. Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda (9 Vols.), Advaita Ashrama (Dec 2002), Vol VI P91
4. Class-Talk notes 'Readings on Drg-Drsya Viveka' by Swami Yatiswarananda, P15-16
5. Complete Works, 9.406
6. Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi, Talk No. 106 (29th November 1935).
7. Ibid., Talk No. 43 (28th March 1935).
8. Ibid., Talk No. 616 (23-28 January 1939).
9. Ibid., Talk No. 651 (23th March 1939).
10. The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, 177 (December 1882).
11. Complete Works, 2.147.
12. 'Louis Films Archives' at http://youtu.be/6KxfCe5no3s.
13. Mandukya Karika, 2.32.
14. Ibid., Chapter I, Karika 17, trans. Swami Nikhilananda.
15. The Mandukya Upanishad with Gaudapada's Karika, trans. Swami Nikhilananda, 1.17.
16. Mundaka Upanishad, I.i.8; trans. Swami Gambhirananda.
17. Swami Gambhirananda, Eight Upanishads (Vol II), I.i.8.
18. Taittiriya Upanishad, II.i.1; trans. Swami Gambhirananda.
19. Mandukya Karika, 2.12; trans. Swami Gambhirananda.
20. Marie Louise Burke, Swami Vivekananda in the West – New Discoveries, 1.158.
21. Complete Works, 2.152.

--- @Holy Trio