Dr. Vijai S Shankar MD.PhD.
Published on www.academy-advaita.com
The Netherlands
5th December 2015
What life is
“Light and Sound”
The meaning of life has not been found as yet by man, philosophers, the knowledgeable, the religious and the atheists as well. The enlightened, however, have proclaimed that life is a play of light and sound and is illusory. The proclamation is difficult to understand, because light and sound in daily life to man is real and not illusory. The images of subjects, objects seen, and thoughts recognised in daily life by man are real to him and not illusory.
So how could man understand that life is illusory? The only option is to examine and validate to understand the subject and the object seen, spoken and thought of in daily life. The understanding could be later applied to vegetation and animal kingdom.
Sight: What is seen outside is actually a label of an image of subject or object. Every atom of the subject or object seen outside is, however, light. The function of the eye is to receive light-waves from the outside. The light-waves reach the brain whose every atom is light as well.
The same phenomenon happened to the primitive man as well. Light-waves that entered the primitive man’s eyes from outside initially were light-rays that eventually evolved as colours and later as illusory images in the mind. These images evolved as visual, illusory memory.
Later, light in the illusory, coloured images evolved as sounds in the mind. Sounds further evolved as illusory letters and then as illusory words. Illusory, visual memory eventually evolved to form memory of illusory knowledge. Life evolved the movement of the illusory words to be precisely superimposed on illusory images of light. The ego soon evolved to believe the superimposed words on illusory, light images within the mind as actuality or reality.
As life evolved the ego further, the ego believed that the illusory images of light exist outside as reality or actuality. But what existed outside was just light and not images of colour, reality or actuality. Therefore, what is seen outside as a reality or actuality is imagined images of coloured lights with superimposed, illusory words, which are illusory labels man believes he sees as reality or actuality. This implies that what is seen outside is illusory, but is believed to be real or actual.
The above phenomenon is evident in a newborn child. The newborn child is first attracted to colours (visual memory as images) and later to sounds. As evolvement progresses the child responds to singular words (memory as knowledge). Later, the child identifies images outside wrongly, which indicates the movement of words in memory, for example: a cat is identified as a dog, but to the child it is neither right nor wrong. When the movement of words from memory is precisely superimposed on images, correct identification begins, which, on repeated praise from parents that the identification is right, the child’s mind is conditioned to right and wrong.
Speech and thought: Different sounds strike the eardrum and not words. The sound-waves travel through the auditory nerve as light-signals to the brain. These sound-waves evolve as illusory letters and finally as illusory words. When man speaks he utters phonemes of sounds, but these illusory sounds are heard as illusory words in the brain. Therefore, spoken sounds are heard as illusory words. This means that spoken words are not only illusory sounds but are also heard as illusory words. Similarly, thoughts are illusory transformation of illusory, subtle sounds. Similarly, emotions too are illusory thoughts and not reality or actuality. This also implies that sensations are thoughts and not reality or actuality. The thoughts of sensations give rise to an illusion of reality or actuality due to illusory duality.
Man knows only through words that a real action, word or thought has actually happened, only after it happens and never before it actually happens. Man knows as thoughts what he can do, speak or think, but does not know through thoughts the precise moment or the precise action that he will do, speak or think. He only comes to know through thoughts after the action, word or thought happens with certainty. This implies that man is not the doer speaker or thinker, though they do happen, albeit illusory. Therefore, life is illusory and this is what life is. This is why the wise have proclaimed that the world is inside and not outside.
Author: Dr. Vijai S. Shankar
© Copyright V. S. Shankar 2015
Editor’s note;
This article provides an enlightened and very welcome insight into understanding and appreciating the life which every human being lives. Understanding the significance of the evolutionary process, for which man has no responsibility whatsoever, is a huge step, albeit in its early period, towards deconditioning the mind. The description of the child’s entry into the conditioned world of mind is sublime, yet it is appreciated that the tasks assigned to the great Hercules, one of which was the cleaning out of the Augean stables, pale into insignificance next to that being undertaken by Dr. Shankar in cleaning out the conditioned mind. Words can scarcely express the gratitude for such enlightenment.
Julian Capper, UK.