Adwaitham

Adwaitham

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            Since time immemorial, the doctrine of Adwaitham has been amidst us. The essence of Adwaitham is non-duality. It was Sri Adisankara who gave a profound impetus to this philosophy. He was successful in his mission to eradicate a host of other doctrines unrelated to and opposing the vedic culture. Adwaitham grants space to two more doctrines that are equally accepted and followed. They are Dwaitham and Vishistadwaitham. Dwaitham postulates duality - the distinct nature of the Paramaathma and Jivaathma. Vishistadwaitham postulates a scenario, wherein though Paramaathma and Jivaathma are existent, the Paramaathma resides as an inherent force of Jivaathma, without which the Jivaathma is rendered useless.

            It is interesting to observe that Adwaitham acknowledges doctrines that is found to be totally opposing on the face of it. While Adwaitham indicates non-duality, Dwaitham and Vishistadwaitham indicates duality, in varying degrees. The fact is Adwaitham acknowledges the other doctrines, gives them their due space and recognition., and eventually surpass them. If we were to arrange these three doctrines in an order of application and practice, It would be Dwaitham, followed by Vishistadwaitham and finally Adwaitham. It is quite evident that our real time worldly experience indicates the existence of multiple subjects, and a definitive law that applies to their functioning.

            One has to accept without variance that in the material plane of activity, the doctrine of Dwaitham is explicitly evident than the other. This makes us wonder if the remarkable philosophy propounded by an eminent person Sri Adisankara, remains just a philosophy or if at all we humans would be able to achieve any real time benefit out of it. The fact is the sole purpose of every human effort can be achieved in totality only through Adwaitham. The other philosophies Dwaitham and Vishistadwaitham are actually stepping stones to the ultimate truth.

            Consciously or unconsciously, the efforts of every person is focused on achieving peace and happiness. The common man's incessant pursuit of happiness and the most unfortunate reality that there is no single person who is always happy and ever in peace is an indication of the futility of efforts or a misplaced focus. In spite of all this, India has always been identified and recognised as home to eminent people who have understood and put to practice the art of being forever happy and in peace. It hence can be inferred that two categories of people exist - the one who is in persistent search of happiness; and the other who is ever in bliss.

            Happiness is a derivative of materialisation of desires. In the event of non-materialisation of desires, and upon identifying the cause; the reaction shall be anger if we are more powerful than the cause or sorrow if the cause is more powerful than us. It hence can be inferred that desire is the prime propellant of every human activity. Desire is the personification of our attachment to the results of our and other's actions. We remain attached to the results of actions due to our foolish belief that eternal happiness can be gained from external source. The substratum for all this turmoil on the surface is the belief that we are the performer.

            One common ideology of every eminent person who is ever in bliss is humility and absence of the thought of performance. The question of them being incorrect does not arise as they have achieved something that we are yet to - Bliss. Let us try analysing their ideology using Newton's third law of motion. Anyone would accept without variance that every animate and inanimate entity in this universe is ever in motion. The law states that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. If that be the case, a person's tomorrow is dependent on today's events. Then, his today's life is dependent on yesterday's events; and that depends on the day before yesterday's events. This is a chain reaction which logically traces an initial source. Hence free will is absent or negated. The postulate is a predetermined chain of events not controlled by common man as he himself is a part of; and hence victim of the chain reaction.

            The moment we accept that everything in this universe is predetermined, desire loses ground. A desire free mind matures to selflessness and gains stability even during times of psychological turbulence and havoc. The focus hence gets shifted from the competitor to the situation. The scenario till here is the perception of multiple subjects; and a definitive law that reigns; hence Dwaitham. The moment individual effort is nullified in essence and every activity is traced to a source point, the philosophy Dwaitham matures to Vishistadwaitham.

            Every person undergoes three states of existence in the material plane - the state of wake, sleep and dream. A person needs to be awake and alert to perform actions that forms a logical part of the incessant chain reaction discussed and acknowledged earlier. Sleep is the physiological need of the body, a condition that is quite opposite to the waking state of the person. One needs to be awake to perform, and sleep to rejuvenate. Shouldn't these two states suffice for the human being? When our rational minds analyse the need to dream or the existence of the state of dream, it paves way for Vishistadwaitham mature to Adwaitham.

            As in the state of Dwaitham and Vishistadwaitham, we perceive multiple subjects in our dream too. We pass through umpteen number of emotional states while dreaming. However, the end of sleep characterised by our waking up provides us knowledge of the dream we just encountered; and the realisation that the characters we stumbled upon in the dream state are illusionary. What remains is just the singular person who visualised the dream.

            Dwaitham is a state when our minds perceive multiple subjects and a definitive law. When we lose our individual ego, we mature to the state of Vishistadwaitham; however our perception of multiple subjects remain intact, except for the understanding that they are puppets in the dominance of the supreme self. When we are able to unite with the source point effectively, everything except I - the subject; becomes just an illusion - Adwaitham. In the state of Adwaitham the mind dissolves and disappears due to the lack of any object to be perceived. The resultant is eternal peace. The simplest way to dissolve the mind is to surrender it to a Guru.