he ultimate truth is not dependent on any books or any religion, or God, based on blind belief, or religious rituals.+

The ultimate truth is not dependent on any books or any religion, or God, based on blind belief, or religious rituals. All religions are dependent on their religious scriptures or holy books and their Gods based on blind belief.

Without their religious scriptures, holy books, and gods based on blind faith and blind belief, religion ceases to exist.

Religion holds its scriptures and holy books as proof. The truth is hidden by the universe in which we exist. No books or a Guru can help us to find the truth, which is beyond form, time, and space.

Religious truth is limited by form, time, and space, whereas the ultimate truth is a formless, timeless, and spaceless existence. Thus, religious truth has nothing to do with the ultimate truth.

Even without the scriptures and holy books, we can get the truth of the whole, which is beyond form, time, and space. Self-knowledge or Brahma Gnana or Atma Gnana is not had by resorting to a Guru, nor by the study of scripture, nor by good deeds: it is attained only through inquiry and reasoning inspired by the words of wisdom of Gnanis.

Existence is nondual. Nonduality cannot be described through words, for all uses of language fail to express it. Nonduality is sought to be indicated by mentally negation of duality (all attributes and characteristics).

Sage Sankara pointed out that those rituals could in no way bring about wisdom, much less Moksha.

Sage Sankara says:~ One alone exists, and the rest is all superimposition on that One, due to ignorance.

The seeker must disregard religion and its rituals to search for the ultimate truth. Religion and religious rituals are unsafe rafts for crossing the ocean of ignorance.

Doomed to shipwreck are those who try to cross the ocean of ignorance on these poor rafts or rituals. Ignorant of their own ignorance, yet wise in their own esteem, these deluded people, proud of their vain learning, go round and round like the blind led by the blind.

The essence of Mundaka is: Do not be satisfied with rituals, yoga, etc., which are good in their own way, but inquire. Into what? Brahman and Atman are things you can never see. So do not inquire into them. Inquire into the world around you, which you can see. Science tells you it is passing away every second. Everything is dying repeatedly. Where is it going? Thus, you follow up your inquiry into what you can lay hands on. How can you inquire into Atma, which you cannot see? So, first we deal with the known and seen; this inquiry leads up to the unknown in the end.

Remember:~

The Orthodox person who performs rituals and aspires for rewards will view himself in terms of the caste into which he is born, his age, the stage of his life, his standing in society, etc. And he is required to perform rituals throughout his life. The scriptures dealing with rituals, rewards etc. are therefore addressed to an ignorant person.

The invisible Soul, the  Self, has no attributes or tags. Hence, the person who superimposes all those attributes on the changeless, eternal Soul, the Self, and identifies the Self with the ‘I’ is confusing one for the other; and is, therefore, an ignorant person.

A person who engages in rituals with the notion “I” as the ‘Self’ is ignorant; the ‘I’ itself is an ignorance.  Ignorance can be removed by Self-knowledge.

The seeker of truth must have his belief in one eternal, unchanging reality (Brahman) and the dualistic illusion.

A Gnani drives home the point that Self-knowledge deals not with rituals but with the knowledge of the invisible  Soul, the Self. Sage Sankara gives us an insight into the essential nature of the Self, which is identical with the Absolute, the Brahman.

Sage Sankara: ~ Atman, the  Self, is verily Brahman (God in truth), being equanimous, quiescent, and by nature absolute Existence, Knowledge, and Bliss. Atman is not the body, which is non-existence itself. This is called true Knowledge by the wise.

Realizing the universe is created out of single stuff and that single stuff is the invisible Soul,  the Self, which is present in the form of consciousness, leads to non-dualistic or Advaitic awareness. Advaitic- awareness is freedom or Moksha. Moksha is unity in diversity in the midst of the dualistic illusion.

As regards the rituals, Sage Sankara says, the person who performs rituals and aspires for rewards will view himself in terms of the caste into which he is born, his age, the stage of his life, his standing in society, etc. In addition, he is required to perform rituals throughout his life. However, the  Self has none of those attributes or tags. Hence, the person who superimposes all those attributes on the changeless, eternal Self and identifies the Self with the body is confusing one for the other; and is, therefore, an ignorant person. The scriptures dealing with rituals, rewards, etc., are therefore addressed to an ignorant person.- (11- Adhyasa Bhashya)

The orthodox people only teach and preach their knowledge of ignorance, but none of them wants to know the God in Truth, which is hidden by the dualistic illusion or Maya.

Remember:~

First Mundaka - Chapter 2 (10) - Ignorant fools, regarding sacrifices and humanitarian works as the highest, do not know any higher good. Having enjoyed their reward on the heights of heaven, gained by good works, they still remain in ignorance of the Atman, the real God.

As a person, one performs rituals throughout his life. The person who performs rituals and aspires for rewards will view the world in which he exists as a reality. However, the invisible Soul, the Self' unborn, eternal, hidden by the world in which he exists. From the standpoint of the invisible  Soul, the world in which he exists is merely an illusion.

The scriptures dealing with rituals, rewards, etc., are therefore addressed to an ignorant person.

First Mundaka - Chapter 2 (9) ~ Children, immersed in ignorance in various ways, flatter themselves, saying: We have accomplished life's purpose. Because these performers of karma do not know the Truth owing to their attachment, they fall from heaven, misery-stricken, when the fruit of their work is exhausted.

First Mundaka - Chapter 2 (8) ~ Fools, dwelling in darkness, but wise in their own conceit and puffed up with vain scholarship, wander about, being afflicted by many ills, like blind men led by the blind.

Ish Upanishad declares:~ Those people who have neglected the attainment of Self-knowledge and have thus committed suicide 10/11/12

The religious orthodox people who have neglected the attainment of Self-knowledge and have thus committed suicide, as it were, are doomed to enter those worlds after death.

This is a condemnation of people who do not try to attain Self-knowledge. They are, in a real sense, committing suicide, for what can be worse than being a slave to sense enjoyment, completely oblivious of the real purpose of life, which is to be one ’s own master?

Sage Sankara says:~ “He who knows the Brahman (God in truth) is one and the Self  is another, does not know Brahman.”

Sage Sankara also asserts that the Self is realized when all the effects of ignorance, root, and branch, are burnt down by the fire of Self-knowledge, which arises from discrimination between these two—the Self and the non-Self.

Sage Sankara’s Gnanic path can help the seekers draw and prepare them for the journey to the reality hidden by the dualistic illusion or Maya. : ~ Santthosh Kumaar