World-view as dream

[Vaidya Sundaram]

namaskaram.
 This discussion seems to have focussed so far only the emphemral appearance
of "objects" per-se in dreams. Is that all there is to dreams? I mean,
dreams are much more than just that, are they not? events, situations, and a
whole lot of "animation" is seen, and some of these are so "far-fethced",
people write whole storeys about them right? While it is true that objects
and their appearance, dominate, one would also have to account for these
right?

Also, take the case of infants - they dream too, and sometime cry or laugh
depending on what they seem to be perceiving in that early stage? While we
cannot ask the infant and get answers on what they are dreaming and hope to
correlate it to the real world, there should be no question that the infant
has not had sufficient exposure to the real world for any dream to happen
right? What is the source of the dream state activity for the infant. Saying
it is because of "perception" of some sort from the womb of the mother is
rather far fetched I think since one has not established what sort of
perception can occur in the womb.

Also, if according to advaita per-se, this "real" world appearance is a
dream that has the brahman for it's substrate, then what is the source for
this dream? There cannot have been a source in the "REAL" state of Brahman
for it is without any upadhis at all.

I have a funny feeling that this is the reason why one postulates avidya to
be anadi in advaita - I mean, any preception which manifests itself in a
mutilated (or embellished) form in the dream state is avidya too right? If
that is the case, then this waking state world we live in too must have some
avidya for its cause, and the source for the dream is not known to have any
starting point and hence this avidya is anaadi too! Am I jumping between two
different concepts, or  ...
I would appreciate if members could point out other references as well in
this regard.

bhava shankara desikame sharaNam
Vaidya.


----- Original Message -----
From: "V. Chandrasekaran" <venkatraman.chandrasekaran at NOKIA.COM>
To: <ADVAITA-L at LISTS.ADVAITA-VEDANTA.ORG>
Sent: Thursday, December 05, 2002 11:48 PM
Subject: Re: World-view as dream


> In dream when we see an *unprecedented* thing, the creation of that image
> can only be due to the sUkshma budhdhi (which is latent during dream
state).
> Hence people of different intellect see different kind of dreams. If this
> is the case with the limited jIva during sleep, we can say that the force
> of mAya acts as the sUkshma budhdhi to the Iswara who pervades all and
acts
> as a single being, and causes this world-view filled with exotic objects.
> Can we?
>
> This way, a new creation/object can be attributed to a creative entity
> which is budhdhi in dream and mAya in waking state. Creation being
anaadhi,
> no primordial material knowledge could be traced as cause. Is this a
correct
> interpretation?
>
> regards,
> -chandrasekaran.
>