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Ultimately the Seer Becomes the Seen

The Word ‘Veda’ is derived from the Sanskrit root ‘vid’. The Vedas are the wellsprings of Indian literature springs of Indian literature and philosophy. They consist of: Samhitas or collection of hymns, prayers and sacrificial formulas, Brahmanas, which contain theological matter and the significance of sacrificial rites, and Aranyakas or forest texts and the Upanishads.

The Upanishads are like secret doctrines which are contained in various Vedas and the Brahmanas are independent works and the meditations of forest hermits and ascetics – on God, the world and humankind. Containing samhitas which organised in different schools, these divergent branches are known as Shakhas. Together they form the foundations for sanatan dharm or eternal religion.

The acme of vedas is known as the philosophy of vedant, the spirit of which is based on the teachings of the upanishads. Inspired by the content of the upanishads, philosopher Badarayana wrote some sutras known as Brahma sutras. Since they were unintelligible to most, they were defined and redefined by shankara, Ramanuja and Madhwacharya. Shankaracharya formulated the doctrine of advaita or non-dualism- that only the ultimate principle is real and all other phenomena are ephemeral or maya (that which is not).

For shankara the apparent reality is illusive and the only recourse to dispel this illusion is self-realisation with the help of knowledge. The means to the attainment of knowledge are dispassion, discrimination, propitiating the Lord, implicit faith in the words of the vedas, turning away completely from all sense objects and yearning for liberation from the bondage of ignorance. Shankara’s doctrine of monism is nonnegotiable. According to him, you recognise the implicit nature of Brahmn when you become oblivious of your own material existence. The seer becomes seen. The experiencer and the experience become one.

Ramanuja’s shribhashya is a classic vaishnava text. According to Ramanuja, Brahmn existed before any other type of existence. Vishnu or Brahmn is the cause of all apparent reality. He is free from all imperfection and beyond him there is nothing. Brahmn is the highest spiritual principle and is at the root of all phenomena. For him the material world is achit or unconscious, but because of being an integral part of Vishnu, apparent reality including the human soul, can never be separated from Brahmn. It can’t even offer resistance. Vishnu is full of love for humankind; therefore he incarnates in various forms for the salvation of humans. The individual human soul is supreme Being and yet it has a separate identity. Ramanuja repeatedly said that the individual soul is subject to ignorance and suffering mainly because of ‘unbelief’. For him the means to salvation is not knowledge but faith or love of Vishnu. Ramanuja’s philosophy is known as qualified dualism or vishishta-advaita.

Madhwacharya propounded the theory of dualism. According to him, though Brahmn is the cause of the world, he essentially different from the individual soul.

The differences in these approaches are fundamental, but as long as one is caught in the cycle of birth and death it is fallacious to think that the jiva or the individual soul is identical to the Brahmn. They cannot be coupled together as long as the individual soul is engaged in the pursuit of material happiness. How ever, once ‘jiva’ has transcended all the ordeals of worldly desires, a reunion becomes possible.

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