Discriminating Between
Dualism and Non Dualism
What has been understood traditionally as "non dual" Realization is not always what Shankara and the Sages represented in IS mean by "non dual".
Shankara's "point of view" is clear in the following quotation from Viveka Chudamani, one of the principal treatises traditionally attributed to him:
Give up identification with (the physical body and its) family, clan, name, form, and stage of life. These are based on nothing better than a rotting corpse.
Give up also the attributes of the subtle body, such as the feeling that one does acts and enjoys individual experiences. Realize your true nature as undifferentiated unbroken bliss.
(The Crest Jewel of Wisdom [Viveka Chudamani],
attributed to Shri Shankacharya,
translated by A. J. Alston
[Shanti Sadan, London, 1997], 176)
Shankara is indicating here that true Realization is beyond both the gross and the subtle dimensions. In his understanding, there is no "one" left in the Realized state, but only the One Reality.
In contrast, other traditions and texts speak of a dualistic Realization — the continuance of a conscious distinction between the individual self and the Absolute, even in the experience of union, expressed through such typical phrasings as "the self and world are, themselves, Divine", indicating that there is some "one" (or a "self" ) that is presumed to "survive" in the Realized state.
In His Instruction on how to apply the tool of the seven stages of life to understanding the traditions, Adi Da Samraj points to just such differences as this.
In Avatar Adi Da's seven stages paradigm, Shankara represents the sixth stage "point of view", while the "point of view" that "the self and the world are, themselves, Divine" is describing a Realization of the fifth stage type.
As Avatar Adi Da points out, that fifth stage "point of view" is not, in fact, non dual — even though it may seem to be so, and is often claimed to be so.
Adi Da Samraj found Himself at the crux of this debate in His last dialogue with Swami Muktananda. After His Re Awakening to the "Bright", Adi Da Samraj looked for any traditional parallels or indicators by which to understand His Realization.
But apart from the previously mentioned references made by Ramana Maharshi, He found none. And so, when Swami Muktananda visited California toward the end of 1970, Adi Da Samraj was moved to communicate to His Guru what had occurred in His case, to see if Swami Muktananda would confirm its validity.
On that occasion, He found Swami Muktananda unwilling to engage the subject directly, and so, in 1973, after He had begun to Teach, Adi Da Samraj made a pilgrimage to India with the intention of asking for a formal audience with Swami Muktananda in which to settle the matter.
On August 7, at Ganeshpuri, Avatar Adi Da approached Swami Muktananda in the presence of a few people, including Professor Jain (the translator), and Amma — two of Swami Muktananda's principal devotees.
Adi Da Samraj bowed and offered a gift at the feet of His Guru (a finely made pith helmet). Then Professor Jain read the questions, submitted by Adi Da Samraj the previous day, asking if Swami Muktananda could acknowledge the role of the heart on the right in Ultimate Realization, and the potential connection between the heart and the sahasrar.
In his responses, Swami Muktananda remained firm in the traditional "point of view" of the Yogis — that all the forms of esoteric practice, including Jnana Yoga (or the Yoga of Transcendental Knowledge, as opposed to subtle experience) all lead to the same goal, which is at the sahasrar, the absolute seat of Realization.
"The Divinity dwelling in the sahasrar is the Supreme Divinity," he said. At the same time, Swami Muktananda reiterated His own understanding of Enlightenment as a vision at the ajna chakra — the "blue pearl", which he assumed to be the "bindu", or point of origin, from which all thoughts and forms appear to arise as an endless emanation of the Divine.
"The mind", he said, "is nothing but the Lord."
This "point of view", as Adi Da Samraj points out, is not an expression of non duality either as the sixth stage Realizers, such as Shankara, express it, or as Avatar Adi Da Himself expresses it, in terms of the seventh stage of life.
In the fifth stage "point of view" there are two realities — the world and the Divine, but the world is deemed to be made of the same "stuff" as the Divine.
The sixth stage traditions insist that Reality is only Transcendental — the Very Self, or Nirvanic Truth, inherently One, and that the world is mere illusion, not real, not in fact existing.
This is the fundamental philosophy of non dualism as declared in the traditional texts in this book — both the Advaitic texts and the Buddhist texts.
Adi Da Samraj supports this basic sixth stage understanding and Realization as the pinnacle of the Great Tradition. However, as He has Revealed, in the seventh stage of life there is a further unfolding of Truth.
The fact that conditions appear to exist ceases to be an issue that must be resolved — either by declaring conditions to be "Divine" in the fifth stage manner, or by seeking to turn away from conditions and affirm the exclusive Reality of Consciousness, in the sixth stage manner.
Next: When Adi Da Samraj Re-Awakened to the "Bright"
