Vedantic thought can be classified into three schools - Advaita, Vishishtadvaita and Dvaita.  “Tat tvam asi” or “Thou art that” is a sentence found in the Vedanta (literally means the end of the Vedas). The Advaitists take this as proof of the rightness of their philosophy that God and the self are one, there being no difference between the two. The followers of the Vishishtadvaita school interpret this statement to mean that the self is a part of the Supreme. The Dvaitists take the entire statement, split it appropriately as “sa atma-atat tvam asi” which would mean “Thou art not that” and contend that it is their philosophy which distinguishes between God and the self, which is right.   Though these three schools of thought are prevalent in the Vedanta, they were resurrected a few centuries ago. Adi Sankara was a strong proponent of Advaita, Ramanuja advocated the philosophy of Vishishtdvaita while Madhwacharya founded the Dvaita tradition.    There is a beautiful anecdote in the scriptures denoting the Dvaita, Vishishtadvaita and Advaita philosophies translated as dualism, qualified monism and non-dualism respectively. There have always been differences between these but Sri Ramakrishna Paramhamsa referred to this incident to point out that these philosophies may sound contradictory but are not actually so.    ‘One day, Lord Rama asked Hanuman, in which form he saw Rama. Hanuman’s reply was “When I see myself as a physical being, you are the master, I am the servant. When I consider myself as an individual being, you are the whole, I am one of your parts. And when I perceive myself as the Atman, I am one with you.”    So it is evident that there need be no clash between these seemingly different ideas. The same person may unwittingly follow these three different viewpoints at different times as indicated by Hanuman. It may also be a spiritual progression for a person who believes in a separate being called God, then feels that he is a part of Him and finally realises that he is one with God.  “Philosophy I know not, Spirituality is not … [Read more...]