VBT – Meditation 56.0
ILLUSIONS DECEIVE, COLORS CIRCUMSCRIBE, EVEN DIVISIBLES ARE INDIVISIBLE.
Think Of The World As An Illusion
This is a rare technique, one not much used, but one of the greatest teachers in India, Shankara, has used it, and Shankara has based his whole philosophy on this technique. You know his philosophy of MAYA – illusion. Shankara says everything is illusory. Whatsoever you are seeing, hearing, feeling, all is illusion. It is not real because the real cannot be contacted by senses. You are hearing me and I am seeing you hearing me: it may be just a dream, and there is no way how to judge whether it is a dream or not. I may be just dreaming that you are here listening to me. How am I to know that this is real and not a dream? There is no way.
Chuang Tzu is reported to have said that one night he dreamt that he had become a butterfly. In the morning he was very sad – and he was not a man to have sadness, he was never known to be sad.
His disciples gathered and said, “Chuang Tzu, Master, why are you so sad?”
Chuang Tzu said, “Because of a dream.”
The disciples laughed and said, “Because of a dream you are sad – you who have been always teaching us not to be sad even if the whole world causes you sadness? And just a dream has caused you sadness? What are you talking about?”
Chuang Tzu said, “It is such a dream that it causes me very, very deep confusion, sadness, misery. I dreamt in my dream that I had become a butterfly.”
The disciples said, “What is so puzzling in it?”
Chuang Tzu said, “Now this is the puzzle: if Chuang Tzu can dream that he can become a butterfly, why not the reverse? The butterfly may dream that it has become a Chuang Tzu. So now I am disturbed. What is right and what is wrong? What is real and what is unreal? Was it Chuang Tzu who was dreaming of becoming a butterfly or has the butterfly now gone to sleep and dreamt that it has become a Chuang Tzu? If one is possible, then the other is possible.” And it is said that Chuang Tzu never could get over this puzzle. This remained for his whole life.
How to decide that I am not in a dream talking to you? How to decide that you are not dreaming – I am talking? With senses no decision is possible, because while dreaming, dreams look real – as real as anything. When you dream, you always feel it is real. When dreams can be felt as real, why can reality not be felt as dreams?
Shankara says with senses there is no possibility to know whether the thing confronting you is real or unreal. And if there is no possibility to know whether it is real or unreal, Shankara calls it MAYA: it is an illusion. Illusion doesn’t mean unreal. Illusion means an impossibility to decide whether it is real or unreal – remember this.
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