The World is Brahman

Nidagha sat beside his teacher, watching the sun set over the mountains. "Master," he said, "you have taught me that Brahman alone is real. Yet here I sit, watching the sun descend, feeling the evening breeze, hearing the birds return to their nests. How does the unchanging Brahman appear as this changing world?"

Ribhu gestured toward the western sky where colors blazed across the horizon. "Tell me, Nidagha, do you see the sun actually moving?"

"Yes, it appears to descend."

"Yet the sun neither rises nor sets. The earth rotates, creating the appearance of movement. What you call sunrise and sunset are names for an appearance, not a reality. Similarly, Brahman neither creates nor becomes the world. The world is an appearance within the unchanging Brahman."

"But what causes this appearance?" Nidagha asked.

"You ask about causation," Ribhu replied. "But causation itself is part of the appearance. Consider your dreams at night. In the dream, there are causes and effects—you dream of walking to a temple, climbing steps, ringing a bell. Within the dream, causation seems real. But upon waking, you recognize that dream-causation was not truly real. There was only the sleeping mind appearing as the entire dream-world with all its apparent causes and effects."

"So waking life is also a dream?"

"Not exactly," said Ribhu. "Do not simply substitute one concept for another. Rather, understand that just as dream-objects have no existence apart from the dreaming mind, world-objects have no existence apart from Brahman. The world is not an illusion to be dismissed—it is Brahman to be recognized."

Nidagha pondered this. "But in dreams, I am ignorant that I am dreaming. In waking, am I similarly ignorant?"

"Excellent question!" Ribhu exclaimed. "This is the crux. In dreams, you take the dream-self to be yourself. In waking, you take the body-mind to be yourself. Both are cases of misidentification. The dreamer can wake up within the dream and recognize that everything is made of mind—we call this lucid dreaming. Similarly, you can 'wake up' within waking life and recognize that everything is made of Brahman—we call this liberation."

"And what happens to the world when this recognition occurs?"

"Nothing happens to the world," Ribhu said gently. "The world does not vanish, change, or improve. What changes is the seeing. Before recognition, you see the world as separate from yourself—as objects to be desired, feared, or ignored. After recognition, you see the world as yourself—as Brahman manifesting in infinite variety while remaining eternally one."

"Then a liberated being still sees the world?"

"The eyes still function. Colors appear. Forms arise and subside. But there is no one who sees as a separate entity. Seeing happens, but without a seer. The apparent multiplicity is known to be the dance of the One. As waves arise in the ocean without the ocean becoming many, as gold takes the form of ornaments without gold becoming multiple, so Brahman appears as this world without becoming multiple."

Nidagha looked again at the sunset. "So this beauty before us..."

"Is Brahman enjoying its own splendor," Ribhu completed. "The seer, the seeing, and the seen are one. When you truly understand that the world is Brahman, you neither renounce it nor grasp at it. You simply recognize it as your own Self, playing in the field of appearances."