Each recommended book has a link to purchase. This is activated by clicking on the Title or the book picture (if there is one). If the book is sold by Amazon.com, the picture and title links will take you to their site. If not, they will link to the best other site. If you are based in the UK, please click on 'UK' following the book description (Buy US or UK) and you will be taken to their site to purchase .
Each page of recommendations also has a link to the 'US Advaita Bookstore' and the 'UK Advaita Bookstore'. These are facilities provided by Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk, respectively, but appear as part of this site. They enable you to read the reviews for all of the recommended books (that are sold by them) and buy them, all without leaving this site. In addition to the recommended books, however, I have also endeavoured to group all of the available books by teachers according to their lineage as shown in the Teacher Lineage Charts. This is irrespective of whether I would recommend them or even whether I have read them; it is purely a facility to enable you to find books written according to a particular teaching tradition (in theory!).
This section provides details of recommended books that I have found relevant or helpful in studying Advaita. (A few books are also recommended by other students of Advaita that I have encountered in my Internet travels and an invitation is extended for readers of these pages to
suggest others.)
Before letting you peruse the lists, I cannot resist recounting a story I read recently (from the Ramana Maharshi organisation) indicating what he said about reading lots of books. He asked whether, on looking in the shaving mirror in the morning and seeing that we needed a shave, we would then go to look in lots of other mirrors for confirmation. Similarly, if we read a book explaining that we are not who we thought ourselves to be and that we should endeavour to find the real I, why then read lots of other books telling us the same thing? We should simply start to do something about it now! Just as the mirror cannot shave us, the book cannot enlighten us.
The pages are arranged as follows:
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Advaita - There are traditionally three 'types' of scriptures referenced by this philosophy. They are called the prasthana-traya (prasthAna means 'system' or 'course' in the sense of a journey; traya just means 'threefold').
The first of these is shruti (shruti), which refers to the Vedas, incorporating the Upanishads. Shruti literally means 'hearing' and refers to the belief that the books contain orally transmitted, sacred wisdom from the dawn of time.
The second is smriti (smRRiti) and refers to material 'remembered' and subsequently written down. In practice, it refers to books of law, in the sense of guidance for living, which were written and based upon the knowledge in the Vedas. Most often it is used to refer to just one of these books - the Bhagavad Gita.
Finally, there is nyaya prasthana (nyAya prasthAna), which refers to logical and inferential material based upon the Vedas, of which the best known is the Brahmasutra of Vyasa. This work was extensively commented on by Shankara in the Brahmasutrabhashya (brahmasUtrabhAShya), which analyses the theory and arguments behind Advaita and counters all of the objections that might be posed to that mode of interpretation.
Many of the other classics of Advaita fall into the category of
prakarana grantha (prakaraNa grantha). This is the term used to refer to authoritative commentaries on the scripture but which are not part of the prasthAna traya. It is frequently used in respect of the works attributed to Shankara such as upadesha sAhasrI, vivekachUDAmaNi etc. The word grantha literally means “tying or stringing together” though can itself mean composition or treatise. Other classics such as the Astavakra Gita and Yoga Vasishtha are also recommended. I have also included modern Philosophical or academic treatments of Advaita in this section.
Note that some of the books in this section may be difficult to find. Many are published by Ashrams in India and some of the ones I have purchased in the past were in very limited editions (one as low as only 200 copies). One compensating factor is that the vast majority of these books are published in India and consequently they tend to be relatively cheap.
In respect of Modern and Neo-Advaita, these cover the now classic dialogues of recent sages such as Nisargadatta Maharaj and Ramana Maharshi and selections from the growing numbers of books written by present day satsang teachers, including the more radical, absolutist neo-Advaitins. Ideally, there would be (at least) two sections here, since some teachers would not wish to be associated with the other 'camp', so to speak. But the dividing lines seem to be becoming increasingly hazy these days with some teachers, who might have been considered generally traditional, making statements more usually attributed to neo-Advaitins. Accordingly, I have grouped them all together and hope that I don't upset anyone! Then there are quite a number of general and introductory books on Advaita and finally some which are related to Advaita but may not be strict Advaita teaching.
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Free Books - There are an increasing number of books being made available for free download on the Internet and some of these are excellent. Most are in Adobe’s PDF format, which is clear and readable on a good computer monitor and, of course, printable if you prefer to read in bed or whilst eating your lunch. Many upanishads and other scriptures are available. There are quite a number by recent sages. An outstanding example is the “Notes” of Atmananda Krishna Menon, long unavailable but currently being prepared for a second edition and available for download at this site. Books by Swamis Sivananda and Krishnananda have long been available but Sri Ramanasramam have recently made books on the conversations of Ramana Maharshi available. Also, some modern western teachers make edited satsang material available in this way – Nirmala is a notable example. There are other general books on Advaita and some non-Advaita books which might be of interest.
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Other Philosophies - Western Philosophy - It should not be surprising that some philosophers in the Western tradition reached metaphysical conclusions that are not substantially different from those proposed by Advaita. Many Westerners may also find it valuable to familiarise themselves with the main streams of thinking that form the basis of the outlook that is prevalent in present-day society. (This is unfortunately where most of us start from!) Other Non-dual Philosophies - There are a number of other sources for ideas which are not dissimilar to Advaita. Indeed, it could be argued that the essence of most religions is non-dual. In particular, Taoism, Sufism, Zen, Mahayana Buddhism and Hassidism all contain non-dual elements. There is very little in this section, although it could be very large. The reasons are that I do not read much outside of Advaita and I also want to retain the identity of this site.
- Miscellanous - Science - Some of the latest ideas in theoretical physics can be interpreted as indicating a non-dual reality and there has been no shortage of authors attempting to broadcast this message. Unfortunately, few people are able to really understand the mathematics of multi-dimensions and quantum mechanics, much less relate this to experience and meaning. It does seem that the authors take advantage of our ignorance and attempt to read far more into the science than the theories merit (and I often wonder how much they themselves actually understand). Accordingly, I do not recommend any of the books that I have encountered on this subject. However there are many popular scientific books on other topics and some of these, though not directly relevant to Advaita, can be recommended.
Fiction and Poetry - There are few novels relating to the theme of Advaita but there are some. There are also a number of poets whose work contains clear non-dual messages
Buying Books - This page contains links to sites from which some of the above books may be purchased. Indian publishers in particular are excellent value. Though the quality of books may sometimes be lower than their equivalent Western versions and they may take longer to arrive, their low price more than makes up for this. Some specialist outlets in the UK and US are also listed.
Incidentally, there are other sites that recommend books, such as Spiritual Books Worth Reading. Please
let me know if you are aware of any others that provide recommendations (with justification) on Advaita-related books.
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