traditional advaita

Q. Do Neo-advaita teachings point to the same realisation as traditional Advaita Vedanta and Ramana Maharshi?

~ Tom Das ~ 1 Comment

Q. Tom, do you believe that the neo advaita teachings do point to the same realisation as Sri Ramana’s teachings? Because from what I have read of the neo advaita teachings, they do not even point to the Absolute Self in a clear way and are not even talking about the same realisation. They don’t speak of the Absolute Self but “the absolute appearing as the relative” in their words, so I think that following those teachings do not lead to the same realisation.

Tom: I agree, the neo-advaita teachings do not lead to the same genuine realisation in my view. They do not lead to genuine absolute love, non-duality and cessation of suffering. Please see the introductory articles on the tomdas.com homepage and my recommended reading list for more on this.

Q. YOU SAY NEO-ADVAITA CAN SOMETIMES BE HARMFUL. PLEASE CAN YOU EXPLAIN?

~ Tom Das ~ 2 Comments

Tom: it varies. Here in the UK there are quite a lot of neo-advaita teachers and being UK based myself, over the years I have dealt with many people who have been very traumatised by these teachings and I have guided them through the process of undoing many of the false concepts and beliefs present in neo-advaita teachings.

The neo-advaita ‘non-teachings’ can be very abrupt and triggering and not leave (apparent) people with any sense of agency or empowerment to deal with the consequences.

I have seen near psychotic breakdowns, severe anxiety and panic disorder, depersonalisation and derealisation, relationships fall apart, people losing their jobs, lots of confusion and disorientation, depression…

In my experience Neo-advaita tends to be a feel-good teaching in the moment for those it helps, and mainly is for the intellect.

It feels good in the moment but the sense of duality and confusion keeps on returning, and it doesn’t lead to a genuine realisation of truth or love. When one engages with genuine self-enquiry we come to see just how superficial the neo-advaita teachings are

Neo-Advaita is actually far away from the true teachings even though some of the words sound similar. In some ways neo-advaita is more intellectually coherent than true Advaita teachings, but that doesn’t make it true or effective.

In my experience the true teachings, such as the teachings of Sri Ramana Maharshi, guide us directly and unfailingly to realisation, the shortest route so to speak, with the minimal amount of suffering along the way.

Q. CAN YOU EXPLAIN THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN NEO-ADVAITA AND ADVAITA?

~ Tom Das ~ Leave a comment

Tom: Neo Advaita says all is already one, there is already no ego-self, and no need for any practice. In fact, any practice just perpetuates and strengthens the illusory notion of an ego-self. Suffering and worldly happenings are just things that occur to ‘nobody’.

Advaita says all is already one, there is already no ego-self, but due to ignorance there appears to be a world consisting of many people and things, of which you are one. Through self-enquiry, in which one places ones attention onto ones own self, the Subject, and ignores/turns away from objective phenomena, one can destroy this ignorance and realise that the apparent mutiplicity is an unreal illusion and there is only the formless self which is devoid of suffering. It is then seen that ignorance never actually occurred and there were never any actual people or things at all.

My own experience is that neo-advaita, whilst sounding intellectually coherent, does not lead to liberation at all and suffering, duality and egotism all actually continue, whereas Advaita, whilst appearing to be dualistic in some ways, is totally liberating and ends suffering and duality completely. They are actually quite distinct teachings that both claim to be ‘non-duality’.

Note that in my experience many prominent Advaita and Advaita Vedanta teachers actually teach distorted teachings, and that the genuine teachings of Sri Ramana Maharshi are the best teachings I have come across to point the way to liberation.