I do not know who is ignorant or not, but I believe that conciousness/awareness is a part of body, it is due to chemical reactions and electrical impulses, it arises with the body and dissipates with it. I do not describe Brahman as sat-chit-ananda. For me, Brahman is physical energy (heat, light, magnetism, electricity, etc., and now gravity too). Mass/substance/material is just a form of energy (E=mc squared).
Hello Aupmanyav. So, Shankara is your Guru? But I see that Shankara's teachings and your beliefs clash head-on.
In Viveka Chudamani, wherefrom the advaitic "Brahma satyam, jagan-mithya, jeevo Brahmaiva na parah" (Brahman is the Truth. Jiva is none other than the Brahman) comes, its author Shri Shankara teaches about Brahman and about Atman. The 'Viveka' means the correct discrimination. The treatise teaches about the discrimination between atman and non-atman.
True, as a conclusion, Shankara reiterates, the teaching of Mandukya kArikA:
574. There is neither death nor birth, neither a bound nor a struggling soul, neither a seeker after Liberation nor a liberated one – this is the ultimate truth.
But there ends the similarity. The verse 574 above declares the param-arthika truth, the absolute truth. But Shankara is emphatic that the knowledge of the paramarthika is gained through proper discrimination of Atman and Non Atman (Self and Non Self). In this regards, Shankara's teachings about God, about Atman-Brahman, are summarised through passages of Viveka Chudamani.
About God: Shankara begins with a bow and prayer to God, as below.
1. I bow to Govinda, whose nature is Bliss Supreme, who is the Sadguru, who can be known only from the import of all Vedanta, and who is beyond the reach of speech and mind.
Then he clarifies that the Atman-Brahman is the Seer-Knower, of all objects of senses and is distinct from them. Brahman is defined as Existence-Knowledge-Bliss (Sat-Chit-Ananda). Brahman is defined as eternal essence of awareness of three states existence, namely: Waking, Dreaming, Sleeping. This eternal Seer-Knower and substratum of all knowing is never born and thus never dies.
Wherever Shankara teaches just the opposite of what Aup. would like us to believe, I have used red highlighted font below.
101. Blindness, weakness and sharpness are conditions of the eye, due merely to its fitness or defectiveness; so are deafness, dumbness, etc., of the ear and so forth – but never of the Atman, the Knower.
124. Now I am going to tell thee of the real nature of the supreme Self, realising which man is freed from bondage and attains Liberation.
125. There is the Absolute Entity, the eternal substratum of the consciousness of egoism, the witness of the three states, and distinct from the five sheaths or coverings:
126. Which knows everything that happens in the waking state, in dream and in profound sleep; which is aware of the presence or absence of the mind and its functions; and which is the background of the notion of egoism. – This is That.
127. Which Itself sees all, but which no one beholds, which illumines the intellect etc., but which they cannot illumine. – This is That.
130. By which everything from egoism down to the body, the sense-objects and pleasure etc., is known as palpably as a jar – for It is the essence of Eternal Knowledge !
134. It is neither born nor dies, It neither grows nor decays, nor does It undergo any change, being eternal. It does not cease to exist even when this body is destroyed, like the sky in a jar (after it is broken), for It is independent.
135. The Supreme Self, different from the Prakriti and its modifications, of the essence of Pure Knowledge, and Absolute, directly manifests this entire gross and subtle universe, in the waking and other states, as the substratum of the persistent sense of egoism, and manifests Itself as the Witness of the Buddhi, the determinative faculty.
154. This body of ours is the product of food and comprises the material sheath; it lives on food and dies without it; it is a mass of skin, flesh, blood, bones and filth, and can never be the eternally pure, self-existent Atman.
157. That the Atman as the abiding Reality is different from the body, its characteristics, its activities, its states, etc., of which It is the witness, is self-evident.
189. The self-effulgent Atman, which is Pure Knowledge, shines in the midst of the Pranas, within the heart. Though immutable, It becomes the agent and experiencer owing to Its superimposition, the knowledge sheath.
211. This self-effulgent Atman which is distinct from the five sheaths, the Witness of the three states, the Real, the Changeless, the Untainted, the everlasting Bliss – is to be realised by the wise man as his own Self.
216. This Atman is a self-cognised entity because It is cognised by Itself. Hence the individual soul is itself and directly the Supreme Brahman, and nothing else.
217. That which clearly manifests Itself in the states of wakefulness, dream and profound sleep; which is inwardly perceived in the mind in various forms as an unbroken series of egoistic impressions; which witnesses the egoism, the Buddhi, etc., which are of diverse forms and modifications; and which makes Itself felt as the Existence-Knowledge-Bliss Absolute; know thou this Atman, thy own Self, within thy heart.
220-222. Similarly, discarding the body, the Buddhi and the reflection of the Chit in it, and realising the Witness, the Self, the Knowledge Absolute, the cause of the manifestation of everything, which is hidden in the recesses of the Buddhi, is distinct from the gross and subtle, eternal, omnipresent, all-pervading and extremely subtle, and which has neither interior nor exterior and is identical with one self – fully realising this true nature of oneself, one becomes free from sin, taint, death and grief, and becomes the embodiment of Bliss. Illumined himself, he is afraid of none. For a seeker after Liberation there is no other way to the breaking of the bonds of transmigration than the realisation of the truth of one’s own Self.
225. Brahman is Existence, Knowledge, Infinity, pure, supreme, self-existent, eternal and indivisible Bliss, not different (in reality) from the individual soul, and devoid of interior or exterior. It is (ever) triumphant.
263. That beyond which there is nothing; which shines even above Maya, which again is superior to its effect, the universe; the inmost Self of all, free from differentiation; the Real Self, the Existence-Knowledge-Bliss Absolute; infinite and immutable – that Brahman art thou, meditate on this in thy mind.
290. Transferring the identification now rooted in the body to the Atman, the Existence-Knowledge-Bliss Absolute, and discarding the subtle body, be thou ever alone, independent.
291. That in which there is this reflection of the universe, as of a city in a mirror – that Brahman art thou; knowing this thou wilt attain the consummation of thy life.
292. That which is real and one’s own primeval Essence, that Knowledge and Bliss Absolute, the One without a second, which is beyond form and activity – attaining That one should cease to identify oneself with one’s false bodies, like an actor giving up his assumed mask.
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