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The consequences of the knowledge of the identity
– as Oneness - of Atman and Brahman Adi Shakara’s political role By the druid Finn By
shifting from Shankara’s non-dualist Neti Neti (Not this, Not this) to the druid’s monist Iti Iti (This, This) following the
demolition of his vacuous apophatic non-dual perspective, the entire
scaffolding of "ignorance" as cause of bondage that Shankara spent
a lifetime building effectively collapses. If Atman
= Brahman, hence an absolute identity, then every "this"—every
particle, every sensation, every individual—is the fullness of the Absolute. Hence
the Iti Iti solution logically dismantles Shankara’s specific
definition of Moksha
(liberation): 1. The Redundancy of Liberation If
every Atman is Brahman and we adopt Iti Iti, then liberation isn't
something to be "attained" through knowledge or the removal of a
veil. It is the inescapable state of every "this." ·
Shankara's non-dualist Problem: He needs a
"gap" (Ignorance) to explain why we don't feel liberated. ·
The druid monist Solution: If everything is
"This," the gap is an illusion. You aren't
"liberated" from the world; you are
liberated as the world. The toothache is Brahman; the hunger
is Brahman. 2. Solving the "Non" Problem The
"undefined non" in Advaita is solved by turning it
into a Universal Affirmation. ·
Instead of an apophatic "Not-Two," you have a
kataphatic "All-Is." ·
This removes the need for the "Burnt Rope" or
"Potter's Wheel" nonsense. The Jivanmukta doesn't need to ignore
their body or view it as a "residue." If the body is Iti (This),
and This is Brahman, then the body is not a hindrance to be
explained away—it is the very expression of the Absolute. 3. The Collapse of Pedagogy Shankara’s
pedagogy relies on Sublation (rejecting the lower for the
higher). The druid’s Iti Iti approach
is Integration. ·
In Neti Neti, the
world id discarded to find the Self. ·
In Iti Iti, you
are the Self, and realize the world you
discarded is that Self. 4. The "Moksha Issue" Resolved If and,
then: ·
Moksha is not the end of Dukkha. ·
Moksha is the realization that Dukkha itself
is a manifestation of the Absolute. This actually aligns
more closely with some Tantric schools (like Kashmir Shaivism)
which argue that the world is the "play" (Lila) of
consciousness, rather than a "mistake" (Maya) to be
corrected. The
Logical Comparison
By choosing Iti Iti, the druid essentially argues that the
"problem" of Moksha was only a problem because Shankara insisted on
a dualism between "Truth" and "Appearance." If that
distinction is removed, the "burnt rope" and the "residue"
arguments become unnecessary complications of a simple identity. Shankara’s
true goal was Institutional Preservation. When you
look at Shankara not as a floating "disembodied intellect" but as a
9th-century scholiast caste Brahim priest operating within a rigid social
hierarchy, his logical failures start to look like very successful political
features. 5. The Socio-Economic "Neti Neti" If
Shankara had adopted the Iti Iti (This,
This) solution, he would have effectively nuked the Vedic social order he was
tasked with reviving. ·
The Problem with "Iti Iti": If every
"this"—including the "untouchable," the laborer, and the outcaste—is explicitly and currently
the full manifestation of Brahman, then the Brahmin’s role as a necessary
mediator or a "pure" vessel vanishes. ·
The Utility of Negation: By
defining the world as Maya (illusion) and Moksha as something attained
only through the "Knowledge" of the Vedas, he kept the keys to the
kingdom. You can’t have a priest-class without a "veil" that only
the priests are qualified to explain. 6. Guarding the Veda, Not the Truth Shankara
wasn't a truth "seeker" in the modern sense; he was a Commentator
(Bhashyakara). His job was to reconcile the
messy, contradictory texts of the Veda and the Upanishads into a singular,
unassailable fortress that could beat the Buddhists and others at their own
game. ·
The "burnt rope" and "undefined
non" weren't mistakes; they were shelter. They allowed him to
claim the world was "not real" (to win the philosophical argument)
while maintaining the Varnasrama Dharma
(the caste system) as "provisionally real" (to win the social
argument). 7. The "Chandala" Incident There is
a famous story in Shankara’s own hagiography where he encounters a Chandala
(outcaste) in Varanasi and tells him to "move aside" to avoid
pollution. The outcaste asks him: "Should I move my body, which is
made of food, or my Self, which is the one Brahman?" ·
Shankara’s Reaction: He
allegedly falls at the man's feet. ·
The Reality: Even after this supposed
"realization," Shankara’s Mathas (monasteries) remained
strictly caste-bound for over a millennium. He essentially "knew"
the truth but "lived" the job. 8. Knowledge as a Gatekeeper By making
Jnana (Intellectual Knowledge) the only path to Moksha, he effectively barred the majority of
the population from liberation. ·
If you don't know Sanskrit, and you aren't
allowed to hear the Veda, you can't have "The Knowledge." ·
If you don't have "The Knowledge," you
are stuck in the "residue." The
Verdict The
monist Iti Iti solution is a "Pauper's Moksha"—it's
democratic, immediate, and requires no priest. Shankara’s Neti Neti is a
"Brahmin’s Moksha"—it's complex, requires specialized training, and
keeps the institution in power. In that
light, the "undefined non" (of non-dualism) isn't a logical
failure; it’s a proprietary trade secret. It keeps the goalpost moving
so the game never has to end. Addendum The cast Brahmin priest’s, Adi Shankara’s, job
wasn't in discovering the nature (as
truth) of reality, but in successfully rebranding the old
Vedic religion into a form that could survive the intellectual onslaught of
the nastika religions? The Ekatva
(monism) Vedanta (“This whole world is Brahman”) which he recovered
and then denied would have destroyed Vedantic and Brahmin tradition and power
and so liberated, given moksha too, India. Had he moved from Advaita (Non-duality
through negation) to Ekatva (Oneness
through total affirmation), he would have changed the entire social
architecture of a civilization. The
druid Finn, by espousing Ekatva
Vedanta, is effectively pointing toward a Radical Immanence.
If the divine is not "beyond" the world but is precisely the
"this-ness" of the world, the gatekeepers lose their keys. 1.
The Power of "Ekatva" vs.
"Advaita" ·
Advaita (Shankara): Works through subtraction. It
creates a "higher" and "lower" truth. This allows a
priest to say, "Yes, Brahman is all, but in the lower truth,
you (for
instance the Shudra and who was “food for the Brahmin”) still owe me service and must
follow caste rules." It’s a logic of exclusion. ·
Ekatva (The Druid): Works through summation.
If there is only Oneness, there is no "lower truth" to hide behind.
The tree, the soil, the outcaste, and the king are not "illusory
reflections" of a distant One; they are the One in its entirety. It’s a
logic of total presence. 2.
Why "Ekatva" Liberates India (and the World) If the Iti Iti (This, This) of Ekatva
had taken hold, the "Moksha"
of
India would have been social and physical, not just mental: ·
The End of Ritual Necessity: If every act is a
movement of Brahman, the specialized fire ritual (Yajna) becomes
redundant. The Druid’s "altar" is the whole earth. ·
The Destruction of Caste: You cannot have
"untouchability" in a system of Ekatva (that is
egalitarian). If
the Atman is Brahman and the body is also Iti (Brahman),
then the "purity" laws Shankara defended become logically
impossible. ·
Nature as Sacred: Unlike Shankara’s view, where nature is
part of the "mistake" of Maya, Ekatva treats the material world as
the "Body of God." This is where the Druidic and the Vedantic "Ekatva" shake hands. 3.
The "Druid" in the Machine By introducing the Druid to
the discussion, a tradition is invoked that (historically and mythologically)
saw the divine in the grove, the stone, and the seasonal cycle. This is the
ultimate threat to a "Family (i.e.
caste) Business" like Shankara’s. ·
Shankara’s Moksha is an exit strategy. ·
Your Ekatva Moksha is an entry
strategy—fully entering into the
"This" without the need for a "Non." 4.
The Cost of the "Family Business" Adi Shankara won the
intellectual war because his system was portable and institutional. You
can build a monastery (Matha) around a negation. It’s much harder for
an elite class to control a population that believes they are already, in
their current skin and current work, the absolute totality. Shankara didn't
"liberate" India; he stabilized it. He traded the
"Truth", hence
lied, for
"Order." 5. Shankara’s deception Shankara’s apophatic lie, namely Advaita, was
politically expedient. Ekatva has no politcal
utility. Hence Shankara saved the day for ordered cultural continuance. It was the case of the useful lie versus the useless
truth. The saffron and the silk off
the Shankara’s philosophy have been stripped to reveal a Cultural
Survival Protocol. By framing Shankara’s seemingly meaningful
non-dual solution as the Useful Lie vs. the Useless
Truth (of the monist druid) the exact reason why "Ekatva" (the Druidic Oneness)
remains a fringe or "lost" realization has been identified while
Advaita became a global empire. 6.
The Political Utility of the verbal "Fog" Shankara’s lie (as verbal
fog) wasn't a conspiracy hatched in a dark room; it was the natural
selection of ideas. ·
Ordered Continuance: A society needs boundaries, hierarchies,
and a "goal" (all dualist) to move toward. ·
The Function of the deception as fog: If you define the
negation (the "Non"), you provide a clear target for the ego to
chase. "I am working toward the Non-Dual
state." This creates a path, a curriculum, a hierarchy of students and
masters, and a reason to keep the temples open. ·
The "Lie" of Duality (Shankara’s a cosmeticized
non-duality): By
pretending there is a "before" (bondage) and an "after"
(liberation), Shankara gave people a ladder. Even if the ladder is made of
smoke, it gives the culture something to climb. To wit, “Better a useless
game than no game at all!” 7.
Why the Truth is "Useless" Ekatva (monism) is
"useless" in the strictly political sense because it is unmanageable. ·
If everyone is already Brahman (Iti Iti), you can’t threaten them with
bad karma, you can’t promise them a better rebirth, and you can’t sell them a
technique for liberation. ·
Economic Collapse of the Soul: Ekatva is a "buy-out" of the
spiritual market. If the Truth is that there is no gap to close, then the
priest, the monk, and the guru are out of a job. ·
Social Chaos: Total immanence (everything is God, hence
the absolute equality of all emergents) is a nightmare for an
"ordered cultural continuance." If the outcaste is literally as
divine as the priest right now, the social friction becomes
explosive. 8.
The Druid’s Perspective: The Unordered Truth The "Useless
Truth" is the reality of the druid’s Grove (and druidism). In a forest, there is no
"higher" or "lower" truth—there is just the relentless,
singular expression of life. ·
Shankara’s Neti Neti tries
to prune the forest into a garden with a "King’s Path." ·
The druid’s Ekatva is
the forest itself, which doesn't care about the path. 9.
The Result: A Civilization of "Waiting" Because India chose
Shankara’s Useful
Lie, it
lives in a world of Deferred Liberation. ·
Always "waiting" for the veil to lift. ·
Always "practicing" to reach a state that we
theoretically already are. ·
Always bathing in the Ganges. ·
Always accepting the "residue" of suffering
as an ontological necessity because the alternative—realizing it’s all Iti Iti—would require us to take
total responsibility for the "This" we are currently standing in. The Final Logic: Shankara’s ‘non-dual’
"Family Business" won because it provided a social glue that
the raw, unrefined Truth of Ekatva lacks. Ekatva is the "Useless
Truth" because by not differentiating it cannot be used to govern
others—only to be oneself. In the end the "Moksha" Shankara defined was actually just a psychological release valve—a
way to let people feel "free" in their minds so they wouldn't
revolt against their actual chains? Adi Shankara’s “Family
Business” The Redundant
Negation and Its Management Shankara’s defeat by the
Chandala |