Bidyut Mondal

Today, Advaita Vedānta occupied a great area in Indian Philosophy. The fundamental notion of Advaita influences the thought of western thinkers. Even it has a significant impact on the theory of consciousness and the theory of Philosophical Psychology. Nevertheless, it has been a trend to treat Advaita Philosophy just as a spiritualistic one. It seems that there is no moral and virtual impact of Advaita Philosophy. This paper attempts to bring out the excellence and relevance of Advaita Philosophy in providing ground for treating it as one of the best ethical theories. This paper will also focus on those Vedāntic codes, which seem very spiritualistic and will establish that they are not only spiritual but also moral. Most of the time, contemporary Indian Philosophy claims that the way how Materialistic Cāravāka Philosophy is inappropriate; Advaita Philosophy is, in the same way, incomplete to provide a solid ground for moral discourse. Whether Advaita Philosophy does not influence making a man ethical, or does this philosophy fail to bing out of the moral codes and guide a man to be an ethical one? Is there, state forwardly, no scope of morality? This paper is nothing but an analysis to unravel all these difficulties.

Abstract: We see, experience, and live our lives in this empirical world. We, ordinary people, perceive the world as real or sattvāvāna. But, Advaitins say, the world is false, it has no actual existence. So, questions, then, arise, do we live in a falsified universe? Or, do the things which are around us have no essential value? Such questions haunt us to look into the meaning and analysis of the Advaitins, and thus, this paper is nothing but an unraveling interpretation of the meaning of falsity presented by Madhusūdana Sarasvatī in his auspicious text, Advaitasiddhi. Not a single among the five definitions given in the book is his definition of Madhusūdna. He just tried to establish the validity of those definitions. Among the five, Pancapādikākāra wrote the first one. Vivaraṇakāra gave the second and the third. Citsukhācāriya wrote the fourth definition of falsity. And the last, i.e., the fifth definition of falsity, is provided by the author of Makaranda, Ᾱnandavodhācāriya. The first definition of falsity presented in the Advaitasiddhi is sadasattvānadhikaraṇatva. That is to say; the property falsity is not the substratum of either existence (sattvā) or non-existence (asattvā). Here, existence (sattvā) means free from contradiction for all the times, i.e., trikālāvādhyatva and non-existence (asattvā) means being the absence or vyatireka of trikālāvādhyatva. In this sense, Brahman is existent as it has the property trikālāvādhyatva. Brahman is never liable to contradiction, while the hare`s horn, sky-lotus, etc. are non-existent because such things cognize nowhere as trikālāvādhyatva. It has been said in the earlier that the first definition of the falsity would be analyzed, which is discussed and explained in Advaitasiddhi. Regarding the interpretations, the opponent leveled many objections which were subdued by Madhusūdana. Hence, I intend to focus only on the validity of the first definition of falsity by rejecting the opponent’s position.