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Advaita for the 21st Century

The Divine Misconception:
Traditional Advaita (Oneness) versus Neo-Advaita
Tony Parsons

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It has recently been argued that Traditional Oneness is somehow better than Neo-Oneness, or even Pseudo-Oneness. The strangeness of this idea exposes the foolishness of trying to give title to that which is limitless.

The cunning and manipulative guru mind inevitably objectifies verbal expression, and out of that objectifying arises a plethora of dogmatic movements all claiming supreme understanding of that which cannot be understood.

As a consequence, so-called Traditional Advaita, for instance, is just another established religion with a proliferation of teachings and literature, all of which very successfully and consistently miss the mark. It stands alongside Christianity and Buddhism as one of the many systems of personal indoctrination promising the eventual spiritual fulfilment. To quote from The Open Secret “To translate the inexpressible into the doctrinal is to attempt to transform a song of freedom into a dogma of limitation. When the bird has flown, the essence of its song is often mislaid and all we are left with is an empty cage.”

The teaching of “Traditional Advaita” has no relevance to liberation because it is born out of a fundamental misconception. Its logical and sensibly progressive recommendations include meditation, self-enquiry, self-restraint, and to quote “the renunciation of the ego and all desire”. Of course there is nothing right or wrong with the idea of desiring to renounce desire. However, these idealistic recommendations and teachings are based on the fundamental misconception that there is such a thing as a separate individual with free will and the choice to become.

The belief that there is a separate seeker (subject) who can choose to attain or become worthy of something called enlightenment (object) is a direct denial of abiding oneness (Advaita).

Within the hypnotic dream of separation, the prevailing perception is that of the seeker and the sought. The ignorance of this perception continues in the search for enlightenment, and inevitably the dreamseeker is attracted to a dreamteaching which upholds and encourages the same premise of personal discipline and sacrifice (seeking) leading to the eventual goal of enlightenment (the sought).

The recommendation to cultivate understanding and refine something called “the mind” (?) is hugely attractive to the dreamseeker because it prolongs the very worthy search and thrives on logic, detachment, complication, endeavour, hierarchy and exclusivity.

Trying to understand oneness is as futile as trying to fall in love with an inch.

There is no possibility of teaching oneness. However, the sharing can bring a rediscovery of that which is already known.

If we are to believe recent descriptions of something called “Neo-Advaita” as being “the forcing of the truth(?) on unprepared minds” or “advising people to stop seeking” or suggesting to people that they are “nothing but the mind itself”, these teachings, if they exist, are equally as dualistic as the “traditional Advaita” they were born out of.

This confusion is of course as much an expression of oneness as the clarity which exposes it.

All of this silly circus is simply the eternal play of oneness apparently seeking itself. It is the wonderful cosmic joke oneness plays on itself by pretending to be an individual seeking something called “not being an individual”.

When it is suddenly and directly rediscovered by no-one that liberation brings with it the realisation that there is nothing to seek and no-one to become liberated, then there is much laughter . . .

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Page last updated: 10-Jul-2012