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The Fourth Lesson: The Vedanta System.1183
To begin with, the Vedanta postulates the existence of that, or Brahman,
as the Only Reality and Only Existence. It accepts the Inner Teachings (see
the second lesson) regarding the report of the intellect regarding that,
and embodies these Inner Teachings in its fundamental axioms. This One
Reality, or Brahman, is held to be “One and Universal”; “Infinite and Eternal”;
“Indivisible” and incapable of separation.
This being so, the theories of “manifestation” must be abandoned, and the
term “reflection” or “appearance” substituted, for if the One is indivisible,
and incapable of separation—and as there is nothing else but the One to
manifest—then it follows that all manifestation must be illusory, and nothing
but a reflection or an appearance. In other words, all outside and apart from
the One must be merely “Ideals” of the One, or else nothing at all. An “Idea,”
you know, is “the image of an object formed in the mind”; and “Ideal” means
“existing in idea or thought.” So, with this bold conception, the Vedantists
brushed away all the previous conceptions and theories, including that
of Kapila with his individual Purushas, or spirits, and his Prakriti, or Nature,
holding that even these “aspects” or “principles” must be merely ideals and
existing merely “in the mind of the One.” But at the same time it accepted all
of the existing conceptions and theories of the other schools, provisionally,
and allowed the converts to retain them, holding that these conceptions
were useful in helping the undeveloped minds to think of the One the best
they knew how, and leading up to a point when they could conceive of the
One divested from these misconceptions of Maya occasioned by Avidya,
or Ignorance. And so, in the end, we see that the efforts of the Vedanta
teachers must be directed toward explaining the nature and characteristics
of this baleful Maya, which so distorts the Truth that it is not recognized—
that causes the “piece of rope on the ground to be mistaken for the snake,”
arousing all the terrors and horror that the real snake would have caused.
For in the understanding of Maya, and the escape from its entanglements,
lies the Road to Freedom and Emancipation of the Spirit whose eyes are
blinded with the smoked-glasses of Maya.