Course XXXIV - Teaching 10: Vedanta

Of those systems generally following the idea of a theology of the existence, we should mainly emphasize the Vedanta in the East, while also it has reappeared in the West, being specially focused at present on the so-called J. P. Sartre’s existentialism.
Vedanta system deserves special attention in the wake of its antiquity, perfect structure, and wide acceptance and dissemination in present India.
Vedanta system –named after “the last Veda”– is specially based on the last part of Vedas, that is, the Upanishads. We are told its origin is immemorial, and Vyasa, a legendary master, the alleged composer; but others feel that Badarayana is the father of this system; ultimately this would mean that Vedanta really was before Buddhism.
A Vedantin is highly tolerant, recognizes the whole first part of Vedas and accepts it, but he mainly studies the Upanishads, particularly and entirely in connection with the Absolute One, or Brahman, and his phenomenal manifestation.
This system is essentially rational and not founded on faith at all; so, it is satisfactory for all those science-minded spirits, who are seeking their own liberation with a systematic and scientific study of the phenomenal and multiple world in relation to the One.
The said aspect caused this system to be extremely wide and universal, and adapted to momentary particular needs of each individual.
Basically, it states there is only one Reality. All the rest is illusion.
As you see, so wide formulation is flexible and tends to accept any doctrine because one can ever discover something of truth in any doctrine, even though it later states nothing is true, except the only Reality.
As you know, doctrines about the existence hold that the Universe and individual souls emerge as an emanation of the Absolute Brahman, but they do not clarify much how this can be like that.
Vedantins, to the point of being quite idealistic, sustain the only Reality; so, all the rest is illusion or manifestation of the One as multiple, but without an effective and real division.
An illusory universe is the result of ignorance produced by Maya, or illusory appearance. So, instead of existing a manifestation, there is only certain reflection or appearance, because nothing exists, except this unique Reality.
Of diverse Vedanta schools, the Advaita School is the most important.
Its thought has been summed up with the following words: “Brahman is true; the world is false; the soul is Brahman and nothing else”.
As you see, thought became bolder, and instead of individual spirits that lose their identity and freedom by forming an illusory Universe, in Advaita it is Maya that wraps up Brahman. They state Brahman forms an illusory Universe that chains him by “imagining” himself detached as infinite spirits. The Infinite, immersed in a “reverie” of phenomenal world, imagines to be infinite spirit instead of constituting the only Being.
So, as you see, the whole manifestation is illusory.
Brahman –God– us the only Reality, being indivisible, immutable and unique; the whole phenomenal Universe is fictitious, delusion resulting from a reverie of God, manifested as the illusory separateness of the sensory Universe.
Souls are also illusory in the mind of God, who sees Himself infinitely reflected on the deceitful Maya, and imagines to be multiple and watches Himself with innumerable eyes reflecting Himself.
So, individual souls never stop being Brahman, although while they do not get rid of the phenomenal world, persist in their mistake of being just an illusory Brahman’s reflection or similarity.
So, these fictitious reflections combined constitute the manifestation of Brahman, identified with innumerable forms and personages that only exist in His own imagination.
Individual souls, such as they appear, can escape from the phenomenal world and from the delusion of Maya by recognizing their identity with Brahman.
A soul can become free and again conscious of his true being through real knowledge, that is, through recognition.
Advaitins do not entirely agree with the general doctrine as for the concept of Brahman, as absolute Essence and Substance.
In their view, over and above it means Absolute Existence, absolute knowledge, absolute Happiness, highest fullness.
As for the concept about Maya, it should not be interpreted as delusion or ignorance of individual souls. Even though it is impossible to explain her how, Maya comes up in the beginning of creative activity, and they describe it as the shadow of Brahman, which disappears as the cycle is over. Brahman produces Maya and that is why she appears as being real, even though is not so; for this motive, Advaitins see the material cause of the phenomenal Universe in Maya. In fact, Maya is not “something”, –it is the cover of something.
The phenomenal Universe is not reduced to the nothing in the doctrine of non-existence, –it is the illusory appearance of certain underlying reality; that is why, they consider it is real for practical purposes, even though they know it is just an essentially illusory appearance.
This doctrine opens to man a quite wide field of activities, as much in the objective as in the subjective field. It removes any negativity and drives man to act and improve through constant efforts. But in this activity of life, this doctrine keeps always up high his standard of idealistic postulates, because it preserves ever alive the concept about the essentially divine origin of the soul by recalling men that “only Brahman is true, and the world is false”.