Oceans And Mirrors
Sunday, May 7th, 2006Brahman is the Reality, the universe is an illusion, the living being is Brahman alone, none else.
The universe is the reflection of a mirror. The Truth is the supreme Brahman, the one without a second.
–Sri Adi Shankaracharya
Two metaphors for describing the phenomena of duality dominate nondual traditions: those of oceans and mirrors. More transcendental traditions, such as Advaita Vedanta, tend to use the metaphor of the mirror to emphasize the illusory, ephemeral nature of the everyday, dualistic world. The world and the objects of the world are said to be mere appearances in a mirror.
Practitioners and theorists have been arguing for centuries about the status of the manifest world in Advaita Vedanta. But rather than working ourselves into an interpretive fever, it is more important to understand the general idea that dualistic experience is considered to be a degradation of Reality, an untruth. Liberation consists of divesting oneself of this burden of maya. Regardless of the philosophical arguments, within transcendental Advaitist philosophy, there is a strong preference for mental experience and experiences of oneness.
Abhinavagupta, the great philosopher and Siddha of Kashmir Shaivism, rejected reflectionist models of the world. Ok, the messy truth is he sometimes used mirror metaphors, but he had much more affinity for the ocean.
Abhinavagupta was into simplicity. He was one of those original thinkers who wasn’t afraid to sweep away the clutter of conceptual complications and get down to ordinariness, the truly amazing basics.
Abhinavagupta said, in effect, why bother with the whole illusionism thing. The world is more ordinary than this. Introducing the idea that something is illusion and something else is Reality is unnecessary, and, in the end, dualistic.
Abhinavagupta wanted to articulate the understanding gained through Tantrik sadhana that the world is not a veil of appearances, but an ocean of appearings.
Waves (duality) are of the same base as the ocean. They express an essential mode of being ocean. Waves are ocean, and, at the same time, are somewhat distinct from the ocean. Waves are kind of individual and kind of infinite. When you think about it, where does a wave really end?
Abhinavagupta said that there is one world process, a process of infinite potential, or freedom, whose essential nature is to manifest itself as a variety of appearings that arise and subside. We don’t need any more complicated conceptual apparatus than this.
Most often, Abhinavagupta describes the world as flashing forth. The manifest world is an original flash in every moment, a direct expression of the whole, not a reflection. This correlates to the yogic perception of the world as a living web or ocean of light.
Abhinavagupta pointed out that yogis can cause objects to appear and disappear. In fact, they can sometimes cause themselves to disappear and reappear. There are many accounts of such events, and I am sure some readers of Living Tantra have witnessed this, or know people who have.
Why is this possible? Adepts have realized themselves as nondifferent from the world process. They are manifesting, or demanifesting, in exactly the same way that all appearings manifest or demanifest.
What these phenomena teach us is that the world process has everything to do with awareness. The yogic process is self-realization and self-realization leads one to discover the capacity to create and decreate. World “stuff” is self “stuff.” The whole notion that awareness is distinct from stuff (energy) breaks down.
So, we are back to Shiva and Shakti and their inseparability.
Abhinavagupta’s View is neither idealist (only mind or consciousness exists) or materialist (everything must have a material cause). He (and we) can’t choose between these two stances because yogic experience proves that awareness and materiality are inseparable. There is not awareness on the one hand and stuff on the other. There is just one world of consciousness, energy, and its various appearings.
In Kashmir Shaivism, the word maya means capacity for diversity rather than veiling or illusion. The general tone is that of appreciating and enjoying the spectacular diversity of the world, surfing the waves, rather than damning the mirror.
But before we leave the mirror metaphor behind, I want to mention a couple of ways in which it is put to good use.
The
Dzogchen master, Chogyal Namkhai Norbu, uses the mirror metaphor
differently from the Advaitists. He emphasizes the mirror’s infinite
potential to manifest. As do reflections in a mirror, the everyday
world arises from a base of infinite potential. The mirror does not
accept or reject, embrace or repulse. It calmly hosts all arisings. The
base, infinite potential, is the essence of everything that appears in
the mirror. We practice, and we begin to consciously embody the
understanding that we also have this inherent capacity for
openness.
Within all nondual traditions, including Advaita
Vedanta, the mirror metaphor is used to describe the supreme moment of
self-recognition, or recognition of one’s true nature. The Guru serves
as a mirror, showing us our “true face.” In Tantrik, Daoist and
Dzogchen traditions, reflective metals and mirrors are used in sadhana and are sometimes worn by teachers to remind students of
the function of the teacher-student relationship. Looking into the
surface of water may also be a practice of self-reflection, bringing us around to the idea of water as mirror. See, there are no absolute oppositions!
Tantra is very comfortable with paradox, contradiction, sort ofs, something-or-others, and in betweens. It has to be this way because of the nature of our world. Tantra teaches us to be available to the whole of Reality, not just the oneness thing. Sometimes we have a reaction to this and hear only what we are used to hearing, not what is really being conveyed.
The trick is to listen openly for the fresh View and not get stuck in dogmatic thinking. Feel for the tone, the wisdom sense. And of course, the vital point is to make the effort to gain embodied understanding of the world process through one’s practice.
OM Shanti,
Shambhavi
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