Q: What is the proof that the waking world is mithya? Why is the waking world considered to be mithya (from the viewpoint of Atma, Consciousness)?
Vedanta Teacher: Shankara states that the waking world is mithya because it is experienced. His criterion is ‘being experienced, experienceable’. It is like the dream which is experienced and thus is defined as mithya. Similarly, because the waking world is experienceable and experienced, it is also mithya.
Sundari: I am sure that your assertion that Shankara’s criterion for mithya is correct. However, that statement applies only if we are talking about cause and effect. We know that Vedanta provisionally accepts duality in order to negate it with the non-origination teaching.
When you say that Shankara says that the Self, satya, is that which is not experienceable, I am sure he means is as an object of experience. As this is a nondual reality, everything is the Self, including experience. There is only one experience, and that is Consciousness. We are never experiencing anything else. In fact, what Ramana stated when moksa obtained for him, was that he realized that Consciousness, Satya, was his direct experience.
If we are stuck in cause and effect, we will think that the Self is an experience to gain, an object of experience. If we are truly thinking from the nondual perspective, that of the non-origination teaching, then mithya is satya. There can be no other option.
Vedanta Teacher: Shankara’s generalisation is that anything which is experienced by me is mithya simply because I experience it. This generalisation is applied to the dream world which I experience during dream and so the dream is mithya. This generalisation can also be applied to the waking world since I experience a waking world, thus making the waking world to be mithya.
Sundari: See above. Who does the ‘I” refer to in your statements? If the jiva is under the spell of Maya, it experiences the waking world as though it is real, and the dream world as though it is real when it is not real in either state. When the jiva awakes it knows the dream was not real, yet it takes the equally dreamlike world of discrete experiences to be real. It does not know that it is Experience as Existence itself, and not the experiencer.
Vedanta Teacher: Then, what is satyam? Shankara answers that whatever is not experienced by me is satyam.
A possible counter argument can be raised, that whatever is not experienced by me is non-existent, does not exist!
Shankara’s reply is that whatever does exist but is not experienced, is satyam. That is the experiencer, the witness, the subject, drk. Thus, that which is experienced, the object, drshyam, is mithya.
Sundari: Satyam, the subject, is Existence shining as Consciousness. If this is a nondual reality, which we know it is, Existence/Consciousness is the essence of everything, including every experience. But Consciousness is only a knower/experiencer of anything (objects/discrete experiences) when Maya appears, and there is (apparently) something for Consciousness to experience/know. Maya apparently deludes the Self under its spell, and the mind then identifies with objects/experiences instead of as the witness of them.
Yet, the Self can be and is directly experienced in every moment of every day, whether we identify with it as the ego or as Self.
Vedanta Teacher: This principle applies to both the dream world and the waking world. The logic behind this assertion is: whatever has dependent existence and is experienced, is mithya. Whatever has independent existence and cannot be experienced, is satyam.
How does this principle apply to objects whether in the dream world or in the waking world?
Any object of experience can be proven to exist only because of the presence of the subject who experiences the object. The existence of the object is completely dependent on the subject. The existence of anything depends on its ‘knowability’, i.e. it can be known. By whom will it be known? By the subject. Thus, the existence of an object depends on it being known by a knower, an observer, the subject. Conversely, if there is no subject, that object cannot be known, cannot be said to exist. For example, if there is no one present and a tree falls, is there a sound?
How does the subject become aware of the object? The subject is aware of the object because of the presence of Consciousness, Atma, pervading the form of the subject and giving the subject sentience or mindfulness or consciousness by which to know the object.
Thus, any object has an existence dependent on the subject, the observer, the witness. Since the object has a dependent existence, it is mithya. Note: the existence of the subject is not dependent on the object. The subject has existence or presence independent of the object. Whatever has dependent existence is mithya. Whatever has independent existence is satyam.
This is Shankara’s explanation to prove that both the waking world and the dream world are mithya. It is based on experienceability and the dependence of the object on the observer-subject for the existence or presence of the object. In this discussion, the object is the waking world which is proved to be mithya, like the dream world.
Sundari: I agree with all statements, but to the last paragraph, I would add: It would be more appropriate to say that the Self, experiencing only itself, is that which knows the experiencer with reference to the experienced only when Maya is operating. The Self-aware self who does not require the presence of objects (experience) to know itself, appears as an experiencer. But it never actually is an experiencer, unless experiencing refers to its own Self. The only problem with experience is that when ignorance is operating the jiva thinks that the experiencer is different from the experience: that the subject and object are different.
Om and Prem
Sundari
