[Advaita-l] mithya and maya

[vaidehi chaitanya]

dear michel, hari om

in fact i read some of the discussions on maya through this discussion
forum. now, in the first place all these discussions by you as well as
others treat maya as an entity which has existence - SAT. please see, if it
were to be real (SAT) then, it can not change or disappear. if it is unreal
it doesn't exist. At one and the same time if some thing seems to exist and
not-exist, how can you attribute Reality to it and treat it as a entity? it
is here that Shankaracharyaji excels bringing in the concept of maya which
is not there yet to serve the purpose of explaining the cause of creation.
for this, in Advaita vedanta sastra, an example is used: three sons of a
father inherited one third share each of the entire property which was 17
horses. now, the question was how to divide equally among the three? then a
passerby helped them by including his horse to the 17 to make the number 18.
now, he told them to divide among them selves equally. after the division is
over, he took his horse back. in the process, neither the external person
lost his horse nor the three brothers had difficulty in sharing.  like wise
maya is only a concept brought in to explain the seemingly created universe.
nothing whatso ever happens to the SAT - reality. hence, maya is an to be
treated as an independent entity. if done so, it amounts to negating the
very nature of reality as unchanging.

hence, the discussions should take a shift from treating maya as an
independent entity to maya as a concept brought in to expalin to our weak
minds the REALITY - SAT which changeless, eternal and all pervasive.

hari om

vaidehi chaitanya
acharaya
chinmaya mission, mysore

On Tue, Jan 6, 2009 at 6:16 PM, Michael Shepherd <
michael at shepherd87.fsnet.co.uk> wrote:

> I'm curious to understand how maayaa, as the magic of Creation, should have
> come, in time,  to be regarded as a veil, an obstacle, in 'seeing through
> mithya'.. why did the 'wonder' disappear from maayaa ?!
>
> Some commentators on Shankara seem to blame him for making maayaa seem like
> this, an obstacle to be overcome by jnana rather than by bhakta..
>
> Could you explain how this misunderstanding was inevitable in some minds ?
>
> Michael Shepherd
>
>
>
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