Maya

[Guest guest]

Bose: When the Upanishads say that all is Brahman, how

can we say, like Shankara, that this world is mithya

or illusory?

 

Bhagavan: Shankara also said that this world is

Brahman or the Self. What he objected to is one's

imagining that the Self is limited by the names and

forms that constitute the world. He only said that the

world does not exist apart from Brahman. Brahman or

the Self is like the screen and the world is like the

pictures on it. You can see the pictures only so long

as there is a screen. But when the seer himself

becomes the screen only the Self remains. Kaivalya

Navaneetha has asked and answered six questions about

maya. They are instructive.

 

The first question is: What is maya? And the answer

is: It is anirvachaniya or indescribable.

 

The second question is: To whom does it come? And the

answer is: To the mind or ego who feels that he is a

separate entity, who thinks: 'I do this' or 'this is

mine'.

 

The third question is: Where does it come from and how

did it originate?

 

And the answer is: Nobody can say.

 

The fourth question is: How did it arise? And the

answer is: Through non-vichara, through failure to

ask: Who am I?

 

The fifth question is: If the Self and Maya both

exists does not this invalidate the theory of Advaita?

The answer is: It need not, since maya is dependent on

the Self as the picture is on the screen. The picture

is not real in the sense that the screen is real.

 

The sixth question is: If the Self and maya are one,

could it not be argued that the Self is the nature of

maya, that is illusory? And the answer is: No; the

Self can be capable of producing illusion without

being illusory. A conjuror may create for our

entertainment the illusion of people, animals and

things, and we see all of them as clearly as we see

him; but after the performance he alone remains and

all the visions he had created have disappeared. He is

not a part of the illusion but is real and solid.

 

>From Day by Day with Bhagavan

 

 

 

 

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