And I am not talking about just the neo-vedantists, but the originals as well. Even though it seems to be one of the major movements that made Bharat convert back to Hinduism from Buddhism, there are many problems with it as well. It claims to be non-dual but has fostered the worst distinction between Brahman and Maya, and created the branch of illusionism that haunts Indian spirituality to this day, though now reduced, which has also fostered an escapist tendency. The terminology of illusion is so strong that many of our saints went on to declare even the Body of bliss as one of the final illusions. The Mother called this movement “misplaced mysticism”, I believe.
The Advaitans and Shankaracharya also seemed to always (and he confesses this after he gets the vision of the Mother) argue with a touch of meanness and trying to win an argument and use all the mental gymnastics to prove his theory right, like Sri Aurobindo wrote(I am paraphrasing) -he was always seemed to be trying to justify his position. He also seemed to be casteist enough that Shiva himself had to come as a Chandal to teach him. Finally, the Divine Mother had to come herself to humble him because of all the propaganda he spewed against Shakti as illusory maya, and then, after he got a vision of the Mother, he went on to write the Devi Apradha Kshama Stotram.
Shankaracharya and his people also seemed to be the least Stylish in their clothes and way of living (Mother warned that it was the Asura who fooled India into giving away the quality of beauty, and this philosophy seems to be the action point of that Asura). All the others- Buddhists, Kashmiri Shaivas, Vaishnavas, Shaktas, and the southern Shaivas, etc., seemed to build majestic centres or temples and had an eye for beauty, but the Advaitins don’t seem to show that same eye for beauty and sense of fashion as well. If the world is an illusion, then why focus on beauty? Its just a wicked trap to keep you stuck to this world, and similarly why focus on all other things that give us perfection over mastering nature like Science, Education, wealth, War, and Kingdom management, etc as he even writes that the Bhagwad Gita talks about Bramha Sansyasa or something, which is the polar opposite of the Karmayoga and inner Tyaga that it teaches. This seems to be the perfect philosophy to weaken the nation.
But then the songs he wrote are quite good; Kal Bhairav ashtakam, Bhavani ashtakam, Mahishasura Mardini stotram, etc. It’s interesting how someone can have a sense of beauty in one aspect but completely ignore or cause problems in other aspects.
The current Shankaracharyas also seemed to be quite problematic in the Ram Mandir consecration. And when we come to the Neo Advaita Vedantists, the less we speak, the better, as Sri Aurobindo himself chose to write it down about how absurd it is.
It has tried to discard all mystical elements and Gods as just pure symbolism and believes only in a subjective idealism kind of philosophy; it thinks the saints mad in the Divine ecstasy who were singing about God were just singing about the witness consciousness of the surface existence as it doesn’t even believe or know that even the Advaitans experienced Brahman as a very concrete and beyond worldly experience of the Self which made the world seem illusory but these guys dont even believe in anything other worldly and quite paradoxically seem to accept only those things that the materialists experience as true that being whatever is perceived from the senses and mind at most; so they don’t even have that excuse to call the world an illusion and yet they do purely out of a philosophical enquiry.
It seems to me that for India to progress it would have to not just give up the neo vedanta movement but even give up worshipping Adi Shankara as a hero; but to give him the place of a crucial and perhaps great instrument used by the Divine to bring a certain change in Bharat, a seer, who realized God in one extreme aspect or method, but recognizing that his theory is not the totality of existence. That is what seems to be, according to my very small, limited perspective. Please correct me if I am wrong!
I very much share your insight. Adwait Vedanta, for that matter, all the different schools of Vedanta err by taking one particular realisation to be the ultimate. In doing so, they almost unwittingly discredit or discard other equally important and powerful realisations that are needed to complete the picture. It leaves many unanswered questions, especially about the wherefore and the why of creation, as well as the purpose of even the validity of individual existence. It closes the entire chapter of creation with an abrupt full stop halfway through. Illusionism explains nothing; if anything, it makes the puzzle more puzzling. The biggest gulf it leaves is between the Creator and the Creation. Yes, it is high time India stepped out of this snare of a misguided mysticism that discards the baby with the bathwater. It is time to revert back to the original, more powerful and wider Hinduism of Sri Krishna and Sri Aurobindo.
Affectionately,
Alok Da
