All students of advaita know that every ‘thing’ is brahman. And they know that ‘I am brahman’. It is therefore a trivial mathematical reduction to say that everything is me. But there is a danger here. Some people conclude that the world is an appearance that ‘I’ create in some way; that the world ‘is’ because I perceive it. In this way, such people claim that advaita is equivalent to the subjective idealism of the Western philosopher Berkeley, who said “to be is to be perceived” (esse est percipi). This, of course, is a denial of the separate existence of matter and this might naïvely be thought to be equivalent to the Advaitin concept of mithyA.

 (Note that the word ‘ idealism’ has nothing to do with aiming for perfection, but means that things have no reality in themselves, only existing as ideas in mind.)

From the point of view of absolute reality, there is only brahman. But then there is nothing to talk about! Such a discussion is only meaningful from the standpoint of empirical reality – our everyday world. If subjective idealism were true, the world would cease to exist when we go to sleep and would have to be created anew on awakening. Berkeley got around this sort of problem by claiming that the world continues to exist because it is perceived by God. And again, one might be tempted to claim that this parallels advaita in that we claim that the world is a creation of Ishvara, rather than the individual. This is not quite the case. In advaita, objects really do exist. Ishvara is the material cause, as well as the efficient cause of the universe. The point is that the substratum of their existence is brahman alone. In the case of Berkeley, however, the objects only exist in the mind of God, as it were.

 Greg Goode, who studied Berkeley for his doctorate, believes that Berkeley's last book may well have resolved his views to match those of advaita, but there were very few copies of that book ever made and it has not been possible to confirm this.

 Advaita, then, does not claim that objects have no reality separate from the subject at the level of the world. In this sense, it is a realist philosophy and not an idealist one. This is highlighted by the following very interesting analysis, which I recently came across in one of the talks by Swami Paramarthananda on the Brahma Sutra.

 Our principal pramANa, or source of knowledge, is pratyakSha or perception. When we see something for the first time, we see it in the present and, as a result of the examination of its various attributes, we conclude what it is. We can call this ‘cognition’. At some time in the future, we may encounter an object. By comparing its attributes in the present with remembered attributes from the past (as retrieved from the memory), we may be forced to conclude that this object is the same one that we saw in the past. This is called ‘recognition’ – seeing the object again. This fact of recognition is effectively a refutation of idealism (which is also the philosophy of the yogachAra or vij~nAna vAda Buddhists, a branch of Mahayana Buddhism). If the object that is seen now is the same object as the one that was seen in the past, then clearly it has a real existence and is not only an appearance in mind (which might otherwise be called a figment of the imagination).

 You can read a bit more about Berkeley and his place in the pantheon in my series on an overview of Western philosophy in a month or two. And there is a series of essays from Chittaranjan Naik on ‘A Realist View of Advaita’ - http://advaita-academy.org/talks/A-Realist-view-of-Advaita.ashx

I'm somewhat reluctant to write any article on such a subject. After all, I am not a Hindu, nor even Indian, and consequently know practically nothing about this topic. I suppose therefore that I should begin by politely suggesting that any Hindu or Indian should not read any further or, perhaps better, should read what I write with a benevolent attitude and simply advise me (by personal e-mail) of any misguided mistakes that I might make (or politely respond to this blog, of course). But it occurs to me that many Westerners, and hence many readers, will be in a similar situation to myself. And this gives me the temerity to write what follows.

 What prompts me to write is that I've recently come across two references to terms which I've encountered many times before but never really understood. And I found these quite interesting.

 The first of these refers to the ash spot which we may often see placed upon the forehead of some Indians. (And here, of course, my profound ignorance is already beginning to show! I appreciate that, almost certainly, this symbol may only be used by followers of Shiva, who have qualified in some way. No doubt I will receive some e-mails informing me of the precise nature of this!)

 The term which is used for the spot is vibhUti. This word is also used in the context of bhakti, as in the vibhUti of the Lord, meaning the splendor or glory of the Lord. It also means abundant and mighty, having the sort of power normally held only by a God. It can also mean riches and prosperity. One interesting and surprising fact about its use here is that the ash actually comes from burning cow dung, although other substances may be added prior to burning. (It may even be eaten, according to Wikipedia, which states that, in devotional ceremonies, a small ball of cow dung, together with a flower is used to represent the god gaNesha to protect the house. A new ball is used each day and these are collected and then burnt to produce the ash.) The mark itself is called a tilaka, and such a mark may also be made with various pigments or sandalwood. It is particularly relevant in worship related to Shiva, being applied to the spot between the eyebrows, said to be the ‘third eye’.

 It is, however, the symbolism referred to by Swami Paramarthananda which I found particularly revelatory. This is that the ash spot symbolizes brahman. The reason is actually quite straightforward. The ash is what remains when the form of the starting substance has been destroyed (i.e. by fire). It is the ultimate condition, when all of the transient attributes have disappeared. In a sense, therefore, the ash is the reality or substratum of the object. The external appearance, the name and form of the object, is only transitory and disappears when subjected to fire (maybe the fire symbolizes spiritual cleansing or Self-knowledge?) In the same way, the entire creation is mithyA – name and form only. And, upon its destruction in pralaya, only brahman remains. And of course, there only ever was brahman. Brahman, like the ash, never changes.

 Another word that I came across a number of times in Swami Paramarthananda’s talks always sounded to me like ‘solid grammar’. I understood that it was regarded as holy by vaishnava-s – worshippers of Vishnu – in the same way that idols are treated by some religions. I tried to look it up in Monier-Williams or Wikipedia but, since I had no idea of how it was spelt, I didn’t have much success. And then (I think) I recently encountered it in Swami Dayananda’s commentary on the Mundaka Upanishad (this is brilliant and I will be writing a review of it in due course). It is in fact shAlagrAma and refers to a particular form of black stone containing an ammonite, which is principally found in the river close to the town of the same name. The town, in turn, is named after the shAla tree, Shorea robusta, whose leaves are used for plates and bowls in Northern India. The corresponding symbol for worshippers of Shiva (shaiva-s) is the li~Nga, which is also a stone, sometimes carved and resembling a phallus. It should be noted, however, that there is no sexual connotation for Hindus, just as there is none in the minds of Christians for the spire of a Western church. The word li~Nga means mark or sign and the stone functions as a means for focusing the attention and meditating on the formless God.

 Shankara himself is traditionally believed to have been born of Shaiva parents and even considered by some to be an incarnation of Shiva, but (I understand) he refers in his commentaries more to Vaishnava rituals if anything. Of course, in the end, one must come to Self-knowledge, which transcends all preparatory bhakti and karmic paths, so that whichever preliminary approach is used, according to Advaita that is fine!

 (At least that is my understanding. I await the knowledgeable responses of some Indian readers with trepidation!)