Sage Sankara's Advaitic wisdom ~ Without a Parallel.+

Sage Sankara's  Advaitic wisdom ~ Without a Parallel.  Sage Sankara's wisdom is lofty, sublime, and unique. It is highly interesting, inspiring, and elevating. No other wisdom can stand before it in boldness, depth, and subtle thinking.  Sage Sankara’s wisdom is complete and perfect.

Sage Sankara was a mighty, marvelous genius. He was a profound thinker of the first rank. He was a sage of the highest realization. His wisdom has brought solace, peace, and illumination to countless persons in the world. The Western thinkers bow their heads at the lotus-feet of  Sage Sankara. His wisdom has soothed the sorrows and afflictions of the most forlorn persons and brought hope, joy, wisdom, perfection, freedom, and calmness to many. His wisdom commands the admiration of the whole world.

Biographical anecdotes about his childhood about the crocodile story and the story in Sage   Sankara's life of going to Benares and occupying the body of another man and then having sexual intercourse with his wife is a myth created by orthodoxy hiding the real fact the reason best-known to the orthodoxy. Sage Sankara had the scientific spirit and when told by Saraswathi the woman that he was talking emptily about sex, being a Sanyasi, he at once went to learn the truth by having actual intercourse himself and thus learning by experiment and observation.

Thus,  all the myth about Sage Sankara is nothing to do with the seeker of truth because the seeker is concerned only with the wisdom of the Sage  Sankara.  

Sage Sankara:~ "Though I wear these robes of a Sanyasin, it is only for the sake of bread." (Select Works of Sage Sri, Sankara" also his commentary on Brihad)

Sage Sankara:~  The Gnani "should pass through life", not run away from life, and should take a middle course between seeking worldly honor and worldly abasement. (Chap.3.4.50; Sankara's commentary to Brahma Sutras)

Sage Sankara's work has got two aspects: the practical and the spiritual. He gave religious, ritual, or dogmatic instruction to the populace but pure wisdom only to the few who could rise to it. Hence, the interpretation of his writings by commentators is often confusing because they mix up the two viewpoints. Thus, they may assert that ritual is a means of realizing Brahman, which is absurd.

Sage Sankara varied his practical advice and doctrinal teaching according to the people he was amongst. He never told them to give their particular religion or beliefs or metaphysics completely; he only told them to give up the worst features of abuse: at the same time he showed just one step forward towards the truth.

Sage Sankara was extremely precise and careful in his choice of words. He was no fool in writing.  Sage Sankara did more than write books or initiate Sanyasin: He brought India into unity as a nation. He told people to worship what they wish, remain in their particular religion, caste and creed, but remember also you are part of a larger whole.

The look of an object will depend upon the medium through which the observer views it. In fact, our mental and intellectual conditions will determine the phenomenal world observed and experienced.  The orthodox pundit seeing Sage Sankara will see differently from the A Gnani seeing the same Sage Sankara.  Each one of them interprets the world that they see in terms of their existing knowledge.  The orthodox see Sage Sankara as the founder of their religion and also as a guru of the Advaitic orthodox sect.  A man of truth sees Sage  Sankara not as a guru but as a Gnani. The orthodoxy believes in their experience of birth, life, death, rebirth, and the world as reality. Whereas Gnani sees the world is a mere illusion created out of consciousness.  Thus,  Gnani sees no second thing other than consciousness. The one who treads the path of wisdom gains the knowledge of reality beyond form, time, and space. A  Gnani has delved into and transcended consciously all identification with the experience form, time, and space.

Similarly, orthodoxy has to be bifurcated from philosophy. To know the Non-dualistic wisdom of Sage Sankara, one has to be free from all superstitions and dogmas and orthodoxy and scriptural knowledge.  The seeker has to be more rational and scientific in his attitude.

According to Advaita Vedanta, the Veda addresses itself to two kinds of audiences - the ordinary ones who desire the transitory heaven and other pleasures obtained as a result of ritual sacrifices, and the more advanced seeker who seeks to know Brahman. Thus, the Purva mimam. sa, with its emphasis on the karma kanda of the Vedas, is meant for the first audience, to help lead its followers along the way. However, the Vedanta, with its emphasis on the Jnana Kanda, is meant for those who wish to go beyond such transient pleasures. 

Sage Sankara said: ~ Talk as much philosophy as you like, worship as many gods as you please, observe ceremonies, and sing devotional hymns, but the liberation will never come, even after a hundred aeons, without realizing the Oneness.

Philosophy does not begin with the ultimate truth. The ultimate truth has to be proved, not assumed. Hence, so-called philosophers who take Brahman for granted are not philosophers at all.

Most Advaitin scholars will teach that all is you, but none of them can show that this is so, none has analyzed it scientifically, and none can prove it. Rational proof is required so that one arrives at knowing the ultimate truth or Brahman i.e. Gnana.  Theirs is mere dogma, parrotism, a repetition of what they read in scripture.  Authoritarianism merely assumes as true what another says, but what has yet to be proved.

Sage Sankara’s whole teaching can be summed up into one sentence, ‘There is nothing else but Brahman. He says that Absolute Existence, Absolute Knowledge and Absolute Bliss are real. The universe is not real. He says that Brahma and Atman are one. 

The ultimate and the Absolute Truth is the Self, which is one though appearing as many different individuals. The individual has no reality. Only the Self is real; the rest, mental and physical are but passing appearances. :~Santthosh Kumaar