Understanding the central faults in the Māyāvāda doctrine

Māyāvāda is a very complex philosophy, and most that come to study it end-up being deluded by the word jugglery. However, there are many points we can study to understand the main faults.

Prabhupada, just as all our previous ācāryas dedicated a lot of effort to dismissing the Māyāvāda doctrine. We are all familiar with many of his arguments. If we are all Brahman as Māyāvādis conclude, and now we are under the illusion of Maya, this means Maya is greater than Brahman, having the power of putting it under illusion.

This is an argument that will convince most good-natured people who are propense to accept the existence of a personal God, but of course Māyāvādis have many other arguments. It is a very complex philosophy, and most who come to study it end up being deluded by the word jugglery. However, there are many points we can study to understand the main faults of the Māyāvāda doctrine without having to study it in minute detail.

One of the central points is the discussion about the nature of the material creation. We all accept that the Supreme Lord, Brahman, is the creator of the cosmic manifestation. This is a central point of the Upaniṣads, and Vyāsadeva himself directly declares in the Vedanta-sūtra: janmādy asya yataḥ, "Brahman, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, is He, from whom everything emanates."

This meaning is confirmed by Srila Vyāsadeva himself in the first verse of the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, which is a purport for this sutra. There, janmādy asya yataḥ is expanded into a beautiful verse that defines the absolute truth as the Supreme Personality of Godhead beyond doubt:

"O my Lord, Śrī Kṛṣṇa, son of Vasudeva, O all-pervading Personality of Godhead, I offer my respectful obeisances unto You. I meditate upon Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa because He is the Absolute Truth and the primeval cause of all causes of the creation, sustenance and destruction of the manifested universes. He is directly and indirectly conscious of all manifestations, and He is independent because there is no other cause beyond Him. It is He only who first imparted the Vedic knowledge unto the heart of Brahmājī, the original living being. By Him even the great sages and demigods are placed into illusion, as one is bewildered by the illusory representations of water seen in fire, or land seen on water. Only because of Him do the material universes, temporarily manifested by the reactions of the three modes of nature, appear factual, although they are unreal. I therefore meditate upon Him, Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa, who is eternally existent in the transcendental abode, which is forever free from the illusory representations of the material world. I meditate upon Him, for He is the Absolute Truth." (SB 1.1.1)

This conclusion, however, raises a very central controversy, which is the discussion about whether Brahman is transformed or not in this process. If everything comes from Brahman and there is nothing apart from Brahman, how can we explain that something is created from Him, without having to accept that Brahman is transformed in the process? Since Brahman is described as eternal and immutable, there can't be any transformation, since transformation would lead to an eventual end, just like we can observe in everything material. Milk, for example, becomes curd, and curd may be transformed into cheese, but once cheese is made, it can be transformed back into milk. Over time, cheese becomes moldy and eventually spoils. If Brahman were to change, it would gradually degrade, like a material object, which is an unacceptable idea.

Vaiṣnavas accept that the energy of the Lord gives birth to the material manifestation without being transformed. This doctrine is called pariṇāma-vāda, or the doctrine of by-products. To understand how it works, we can imagine a mass of Lego blocks that are used to make many toys. Children come to play with these toys, and when they are finished, the toys are disassembled and returned to blocks. The same blocks are later used to make other toys and so on. The blocks are thus permuted, or rearranged into different forms, but there is no transformation: the blocks remain the same.

Similarly, the material energy, the external potency of the Lord, is permuted, or rearranged, into the material universes during the process of creation, and then disassembled back into its constituents in the process of dissolution, and again permuted in the next cycle of creation. The energy is thus never transformed but just assembled into different forms and later again disassembled.

The material universes are thus real, and not false, and the material energy is eternal. The manifestation of the material universes, as well as of different material objects, is thus real, but temporary. None of the toys built using the blocks is false; they exist, but their existence is not eternal.

This understanding allows us to reconcile the idea that the material universes come from the energy of the Lord with the idea that the energy doesn't change.

Śaṅkarācārya, however, used a logical trick in his commentary, equating pariṇāma-vāda with the doctrine of change, arguing that accepting that Brahman creates the material world from His energy implies that the energy is transformed into something else. In this way, he was able to present his vivarta-vāda, or doctrine of illusory transformation of state.

In the vivarta-vāda, the existence of the material world is explained in a very simple way: There is no material world. The material creation exists only under the purview of Maya, illusion. It is the fruit of a misconception. Just like we may mistake a piece of rope on the road for a snake, we think this material world is real, although it doesn't even exist. When we become free from this illusion, or Maya, we see ourselves again as fragments of the eternal Brahman. This is a less developed and much weaker theory, which contradicts both our practical experience and multiple passages of the scriptures, but Śaṅkarācārya was able to defend it using word jugglery.

Vyāsadeva himself refutes the vivarta-vāda when he says "janmādy asya yataḥ". Everything emanates from the Lord means everything comes from His energy. Since the Lord is described as eternal, it means that His energy is also eternal. Since it is described as eternal, it means there is no change or transformation, and since there is no transformation, the creation of the material universe must happen by permutation, or rearrangement of the energy, and not transformation.

Śankarācārya, however, indirectly argued that Vyāsadeva made a mistake, and in this way pushed his theory of illusion, which is directly contradicted by the words "janmādy asya yataḥ".

Prabhupada also makes this point in the Teachings of Lord Caitanya: “The doctrine of by-products, pariṇāma-vāda, is asserted from the very beginning of the Vedānta-sūtra, but Śankarācārya has superficially tried to hide it and establish the doctrine of illusory transformation of state, vivarta-vāda. He also has the audacity to say that Vyāsa is mistaken. All Vedic literatures, including the Purāṇas, confirm that the Supreme Lord is the center of all spiritual energy and variegatedness." (ToLC ch.21)

How exactly the permutation of the energy of the Lord give birth to the cosmic manifestation?

The material creation starts with Lord Mahā-Viṣṇu, who lies on the causal ocean and creates all the innumerable material universes from his external potency. The material elements exist beyond the causal ocean, which is spiritual, and are never touched by the Lord. When the energy is inactive, it is called pradhāna, and when it becomes active after being inseminated by the Lord with the time energy and the souls, it is called mahat-tattva. The two terms thus speak about two stages of the same thing.

Due to the influence of material time (kāla), everything in the material world is created and destroyed, including the material universes themselves. Because of the influence of time, everything here is temporary, and the material universes go through cycles of creation and destruction. When the universes are destroyed, all the souls merge back into the body of Lord Mahā-Viṣṇu and remain dormant until the next material manifestation.

The manifestation of the material universes lasts for 311.04 trillion years. That's the lifespan of Lord Brahma calculated according to our time. This equals one breath of Mahā-Viṣṇu. When He exhales, all universes come out and everything becomes active, and when He inhales, all the universes are destroyed and everything merges back into His body. This lasts for the same period as the material creation (311,04 trillion years). During this time, all the souls stay dormant inside the body of Mahā-Viṣṇu. After this period, He again exhales, and all the universes become active again. We have thus another opportunity to perform material activities, satisfying our material desires, performing devotional service, and eventually going back to Godhead, back to our original position of transcendental loving service. This is a process explained in detail in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, as well as other Puranas.

According to Vyāsadeva, the material world is not false, but it is illusory. This means that the way we see it is different from what it is in reality. This illusion is called Maya. We think we will live forever, but in reality, we all die. We think we are these bodies, that we belong to a certain family or country, although in reality, we are not, and so on. On the other hand, the material energy is originally one of the spiritual potencies of Lord Mahā-Viṣṇu, His external potency. This external potency is like a shadow, which stays behind the Lord. Because the material energy is one of the potencies of the Lord, it can't be false.

Borrowing the arguments of Śankarācārya, one could, however, argue that the idea of the external energy of the Lord passing through so many transformations and resulting in the creation of the material world violates the principle of Brahman being unchangeable, just like when we transform a piece of wood into a table, the original ingredient is transformed into something else, and can't be recovered.

However, that's not the case. A lump of clay may be shaped into different forms and transformed into different types of pots, and later brought back to its original form when the pots are broken and the powder mixed with water. The resulting clay could again be molded into different pots, and so on, in an unlimited cycle. In this case, the shape changes, but the structure of the ingredient doesn't, since it can be brought back to its original form at any moment.

Srila Prabhupada explains that this process of shaping the external potency into different forms, or pariṇāma-vāda is the correct understanding and the conclusion of Srila Vyāsadeva. However, Śankarācārya, anxious to advance his theory of illusion, dismissed this doctrine of by-products by mischaracterizing it as a doctrine of change and advocated instead his theory of illusion or vivarta-vāda, in which the material manifestation is false, a fruit of illusion. Just like one may see a rope on the road and confuse it with a snake when in reality there is no snake, a soul thinks the material manifestation exists when under the influence of illusion, but when attaining liberation, sees that in reality there is no material world. In this way, in advancing his theory, Śankarācārya tactfully accused Vyāsadeva of being mistaken.

This was necessary because when the sutra is accepted at face value, "janmādy asya yataḥ" implies that the Supreme Brahman has transcendental potencies and is the creator of the material universes, which in turn implies that Brahman is a conscious being. If Śankarācārya accepted these two truths, it would be impossible for him to advance his impersonal doctrine and fulfill his mission of bringing people back to the Vedas.

He thus tactfully accused Vyāsadeva of being wrong in his conclusion, and concluded that in reality, there is no material world; everything is just the fruit of illusion caused by the covering of Maya. In this way, there is no necessity to accept that Brahman creates anything, because nothing factually exists apart from the qualityless Brahman.

One could argue that this theory implies that parts of Brahman fall under the influence of illusion, becoming individual souls, but a Māyāvādi would reply that Brahman is indivisible and without internal differentiation. In this way, Brahman can’t be broken into pieces. They explain that the jīvas are Brahman reflected in ignorance (avidyā-upādhi) and not broken parts of Brahman, just like the sun being simultaneously reflected in many pots with water.

This argument has, however, many faults. If Brahman is undifferentiated and indivisible, and the whole monistic theory is based on the conclusion that nothing exists apart from Brahman, how can ignorance appear in front, on top or around Brahman and reflect it? If Maya reflects Brahman, creating a separate reality, even if illusory, this means something exists outside Brahman, contradicting the very foundation of the monistic doctrine of Śaṅkarācārya. And if Maya comes from Brahman, then Maya can’t be false, since Brahman is real, and therefore anything that comes from it must be also real. A dream or a computer game may be illusory, but they are not unreal. They factually exist as a product of something that is real: the mind in the case of the dream, or a computer in the case of the game.

Confronted with this argument, a Māyāvādi could insist in the fallacy of avidyā being indefinable: not real, not unreal, and not in between. In his Vivekacūḍāmaṇi, verse 109, for example, Śankarācārya wrote:

sannāpyasannāpyubhayātmikā no
bhinnāpyabhinnāpyubhayātmikā no
sāngāpyanaṅgā hyubhayātmikā no
mahādbhutānirvacanīyarūpā

“Māyā is neither existent nor non-existent, nor a combination of the two. It is not separate nor unseparated from Brahman, and not in between. It is not broken in parts or devoid of parts, therefore it cannot be described in words.”

As you can see, this is a circular argument. Whenever pressed to commit to a conclusion, a Mayavadi refuses to commit, running in circle around the idea of things being undefinable, indescribable, and so on, juggling with words in a way that appear attractive to the unintelligent. This is again a testament to the strategy adopted by Śankarācārya to confuse the atheists, fulfilling his mission of attracting people back to the Vedas, but keeping the envious away from Krsna, offering a philosophy that could distract the envious and unintelligent.

Behind all the world jugglery, the Māyāvāda doctrine is a flawed philosophy that contradicts itself by propounding monism, while at the same time implying the existence of a separate force, Maya, that has the power to subjugate Brahman, putting it under illusion, a contradiction Śankarācārya tactfully tries to hide by explaining Maya as indefinable in advancing his vivārta-vada.

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