Adi Shankara’s view of consciousness and knowledge

Adi Shankara’s view of consciousness and knowledge centers on this tension:
there is only one reality, yet there are two ways of knowing it — one that keeps you bound in illusion, and one that sets you free.

Let’s unpack his theory step-by-step.

---

🕉️ 1. The One Reality: Brahman as Pure Consciousness

For Shankara, Brahman is the reality — infinite, formless, unchanging awareness.
Everything else (the universe, your body, your thoughts) arises within that awareness, like waves on the ocean.

He said Brahman is:

• Sat – pure being

• Chit – pure consciousness

• Ananda – pure bliss

This is not a thing that’s conscious — it is consciousness itself.
You don’t have awareness; you are awareness.

“Brahman is the light that makes both knowledge and ignorance possible.”

---

🧠 2. The Two Ways of Knowing Reality

Shankara divided knowledge into two distinct levels — lower (vyavaharika) and higher (paramarthika) truth.
Both are valid, but they operate in different dimensions of understanding.

(a) Lower / Relative Knowledge — Aparā Vidyā

This is everyday, sensory, and conceptual knowledge — the world of names, forms, and distinctions.
It includes science, logic, rituals, even religious belief.

• It’s practical and useful for navigating the world.

• But it’s based on perception and thought — and both are limited.

• It sees difference: you and me, subject and object, God and soul.

So within this “lower” frame, the world seems undeniably real — just as a dream seems real while you’re dreaming.

(b) Higher / Absolute Knowledge — Parā Vidyā

This is knowledge by direct realization, not by sensory input or reasoning.
It’s the moment of awakening when you recognize:

“I am not this body or mind — I am the infinite consciousness in which they appear.”

This knowledge doesn’t come from the mind — it happens when the mind falls silent.

When this insight dawns, the apparent duality between knower and known collapses.
There is only the shining self-awareness of Brahman — no observer, no object, no division.

---

🪞 3. Consciousness as the Only Knower

Shankara said that all forms of knowledge depend on consciousness but consciousness itself depends on nothing.

• You can know sound only because awareness hears it.

• You can know thought only because awareness notices it.

• But you can never stand outside awareness to observe it — it is the ever-present witness (sakshi).

Thus, the knower and the known are never truly separate; both arise in and as consciousness.
All distinctions (self/other, true/false, sacred/profane) exist only at the level of the mind.
From the higher standpoint, they are superimpositions (adhyasa) on the one reality.

---

🪶 4. The Rope and the Snake

Shankara often used this parable:
You see a rope in dim light and mistake it for a snake.
Your body reacts with fear.
But once you bring light and see clearly, the snake vanishes — the rope was there all along.

Likewise, ignorance (avidya) makes you mistake the world of appearances for the ultimate reality.
When the light of knowledge (jnana) arises, you realize that Brahman alone ever existed.
The snake wasn’t destroyed — it was never there to begin with.

---

🔄 5. From Knowing About to Knowing As

• Lower knowing: “I know Brahman exists.” (conceptual)

• Higher knowing: “I am Brahman.” (experiential)

The first happens through thought.
The second happens when thought dissolves.

---

💫 In Short

“The world is unreal only until Brahman is known;
after realization, the world is seen as Brahman.”

So, there’s only one reality, but two ways of experiencing it:

1. Through the senses and intellect → fragmented illusion.

2. Through pure awareness → indivisible wholeness.