[Advaita-l] Why only jagat is mithya and jeeva is brahman !!??

[Bhaskar YR]

praNAms
Hare Krishna

Thanks for the clarification.

Hari Hari Hari Bol!!!
bhaskar

From: Praveen R. Bhat [mailto:bhatpraveen at gmail.com]
Sent: Wednesday, March 16, 2016 3:50 PM
To: Bhaskar YR <bhaskar.yr at in.abb.com>
Cc: A discussion group for Advaita Vedanta <advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org>
Subject: Re: [Advaita-l] Why only jagat is mithya and jeeva is brahman !!??

Namaste Bhaskarji,

I'm sorry but I'm not sure if you really read my mail, since I DID NOT disagree with you! Your verbose reply only talks from a Paramarthika angle, where everything is brahman. You did not have to quote several Shruti and bhashyam sentences to prove that, since no one disagrees there. Your question was in the context of Bhagavatpada's half a verse. To convey what you have conveyed, only सर्वम् ब्रह्म एव would have sufficed. He didn't have to bring in 3 different parts and explain the connection between them. Since you have pulled away from your thread, I will try to reply briefly and especially to parts where for some reason, I see you have misquoted my position. That is inline below please...


On Wed, Mar 16, 2016 at 2:31 PM, Bhaskar YR <bhaskar.yr at in.abb.com<mailto:bhaskar.yr at in.abb.com>> wrote:

 >   For all the three questions shruti itself has the answer.

All answers are found in Shruti, but your question was specific to the half verse, which Bhagavatpada says is the essence of all scriptures! That is all I replied on.


The world is कार्यम्/ मिथ्या.

>   The world is kAryaM but I don’t think it is mithyA per se.  Yes, world is mithyA when it is seen aloof from brahman since it cannot have independent existence apart from its kAraNa, but that is not the case in Advaita,
Your words are contradictory. That is the *very definition* of mithyA and I don't think there is any case other than Advaita for mithyA! सदसद्भ्याम् अनिर्वचनीय मिथ्या, all कार्यम् fits in. Is the pot clay? Yes. Is pot real? No. Is it unreal? No. Is it both? No. Is it neither? No. Although it is only clay, but with name and form of a pot. So clayness of pot is real, but name and form is mithyA.

  1.  ब्रह्म is the कारणम्/ सत्यम्.

>   Prabhuji, don’t you get the doubt here how kAraNa brahma can be the creator of kArya jagat which is mithyA??
No. स्वप्नवत्, like a dream. I am real, but my dream that I create is mithyA.


Can we say satya brahma/kAraNa is the creator of this mithyA jagat for which he is at the same time abhinna nimittOpadAna kAraNa??

Yes. As above. For my dream, I am अभिन्ननिमित्तोपादानकारण, yet the dream is मिथ्या, not truly same as me, not truly different.

And if the jagat is mithyA, why shruti saying sarvaM khalvidaM brahma,
Because it only appears to be different, but is not really different in essence. And there is a difference between appearance and essence.


  1.  जीवः ब्रह्म एव = कारणम् एव, न अपरः = न तु कार्यम्. The individual who considers himself as a created just like the world, is not the created. So the relation of the individual is that he is one with the creator and therefore the सत्य्-अधिष्ठान of मिथ्या-जगत्. His complex of body, mind and senses is part of the created world, मिथ्या प्रपञ्च, while he is not.

>   That chaitanya which is there in the jeeva is there in jagat also since he is the Atman for sakala charAchara vastu.
When I say that the individual is the essence, he is consciousness, consciousness is not something that is there in him. While the world is not consciousness, its basis is conscious brahman which is the individual.


Itareya AraNyaka says brahman is there in inert things as well as innerconscious ...


  Don’t you think either we have to call both jeeva & brahma are mithya ( since both are endowed with nAma rUpa upAdhi) or both are satyameva since in their svarUpa both are brahma only??

... no, since having consciousness and being consciousness are two different things. The साक्षी जीव when associated with the दृश्य BMS complex, which is really not different from दृश्य जगत्, considers himself as an individual. However, when he dissociates, and knows he is not the worldly BMS complex, he remains as brahman. This is not true of the world, which includes his BMS complex. By his knowledge, the BMS and the world do not become the cause, they remain the effect. He himself is the cause.
After the dawn of knowledge, at the level of व्यवहार the world still exists *as मिथ्या* for the ज्ञानी, but the जीव exists as one with ब्रह्म, *not as मिथ्या*.

>   What is this jeeva that exists in jnAni when jeeva itself is avidyA kalpita??
Misquoted. There is no *in*. ज्ञानी is जीव is ब्रह्म.


And jeeva itself means identification of an indivisual in his BMI is it not??
That is exactly what is denied by saying there is no individual. I can ask you the same thing. What is identification of an individual? The identity makes an individual; without identity there is no individual, there is only one.


And as you said this BMI of an individual is also part of this mithyA jagat.  Here you are calling one part of the jagat (i.e. jeeva with upAdhi) is satya and other part (jagat outside the karaNa-s of this jeeva) as mithyA.
Misunderstood. It is exactly what I am not doing! I am calling BMS complex as mithyA since it is part of the world and world is mithyA. The individual who thought he was a kAryam is actually kAraNam, He knows that and is no longer an individual, but the whole.


Moreover, jnAni would not see the jagat as mithyA he would look at the jagat as his own Atman nothing else.  Shankara/shruti  clarifies this  at various places. ...Here shankara does not say sarvaM mithyA bhavati ...
Nor is it said that nAmarUpatmakam jagat satyam bhavati anywhere. All that it means is that jnAni sees the world as not existing independent of him.


...And he did not say manu & Aditya are part of the mithyA prapancha.
... manu and Aditya are names and , so mithyA.

jnAni would see the satyatva in everything because for him ‘kArya prapancha’ is ‘vishesha’ darshana of kAraNa svarUpa.  Hence for him the socalled ‘bAhya lOka’ is no more bAhya and mithya, it is satya and Atmameva.  Sa cha bAhyalOkO nAstyasmAkaM AtmavyatiriktaH, sarvaM hi asmAkaM Atmabhutameva sarvasya cha vayaM AtmabhUtaH.  There is nothing that can be called asatyaM, mithyaM etc. when jnAni has this bhUma drushti clarifies again shankara in chAndOgya : sata eva dvaita bhedena anyathAgruhyamANatvAt na asatvaM kasyachit kvachit iti brumaH.
Having said all these, I am not at all claiming both jagat and brahma have the same level of reality, what I am trying to say is since kArya jagat is not abhinna from kAraNa like ring and bracelet not different from gold,
Again, that is the very definition of mithyA. Rings and bracelets are mere names and forms, not having reality of their own, and therefore mithyA! What it means that if you remove goldness from ring and bracelet, there will be no ring or bracelet. If you remove ringness and braceletness from gold, gold still remains. Similarly, the world is made up of names and forms, that do not exist separately from brahman and hence mithyA. Names and forms are not real.

kArya is satyameva in its kAraNa svarUpa.
Neither me nor anyone so far on the thread denies this. The whole problem is jagat is not seen as kAraNasvarUpa, due to name and form, and therefore, mithyA. :)

Kind rgds,
--Praveen R. Bhat
/* Through what should one know That owing to which all this is known! [Br.Up. 4.5.15] */