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reality. Brahman is absolute existence, whereas the world has a relative existence, and the silver seen in a shell has illusory existence. The world is called unreal or Mayā, because it does not conform to the criterion of reality upheld by him. Real according to Sarkara, is that which is selfexistent, cahngless or uncontradicted. Anything that has a dependent existence, or is subject to change or contradiction, must ipso-facto, be unreal. The unreal for Sarikara, therefore is not only that which is absolutely non-existent, or illusory, like a sky-flower, but also that which is ordinarily believed to be real. Though not absolutely non-existent or illusory, the objects of our common experience are certainly neither selfexistent or immutable. They are all effects of some cause or the other, and have as such a beginning, as well as an end. An effect or changing thing has no nature of its own which it can be said never to part with. 100 Sarkara, therefore, maintained that no effect is a real thing. World and its objects are dependent on cause, hencec canging. What is finite cannot be self-existent. It must be an effect of something?ol and hence, unreal. In this sense, world is called Māyā or Unreal. Thus Māyāyāda should be understood as asserting that the external world of our waking experience has its limited and conditioned reality in the sphere of the Vyävahärika experience and cannot 'usurp' the reality of the Päramärthika experience. Thus, Māyāvāda is not illusionism, we may call it certain kind of relativism. Sarikara, upholding Māyāyāda, maintained the nonduality of Brahman. He points out the truth that there is unity behind diversity. There is unity between Brahman-world and man. Prof. Hiriyanna rightly pointed out that 'the unity of the Absolute Brahman may be compared to the unity of painting, say of a landscape. Looked at as a landscape, it is a plurality, hill, valley, lake and streams, but it's groundthe Substance of which it is constituted is one, viz., the canvas.
NOTES 1. (a) सत्य ज्ञानं अनंतं ब्रह्मति ब्रह्मणो लक्षणार्थ वाक्यम् ।
Taittiriyopanişadbhāşya, Il-1, Ten Principle Upanişads with
Śänkarabhāşya (S. B.), Motilal Banarasidass, Delhi, 1978. (a) na pomenute -Aparokşānubhūti, 24.
Works of Sarkaräcārya, Vanivilas Press, Srirangam. 2. (a) paraldur -Chandogyopanişad-VI-II, 1-2
(b) gata pe geaca 4. SB. Tait, Up. II-6 3. दिग्देशगुणगतिफलभेदशून्य हि परमार्थ सत् अद्वयं ब्रह्म मन्दबुद्धिनां असदिव प्रतिभाति ।
-SB. Chāndogyopanişad-VIII-I-I, Introduction,
