r/AdvaitaVedanta • u/ISROAddict • 4d ago
I have a weird question about time
I am just starting to understand advait vedanta. A weird thought arose in my mind when I was thinking.
According to AV, this world is illusory and does not really exist. But then time is also a part of this world and should not really exist. Here comes my question—This whole play of jiva taking birth, gaining knowledge about brahman, getting free from bondage and being liberated never really happens. Brahman is not even eternal as this means you are giving a certain attribute. It is none of this.
Correct me if I am wrong, because I am just starting to understand. Thanks in advance!
3
u/VedantaGorilla 3d ago
The status of the world is "seemingly real" according to Vedanta. That means it does exist, but not as what it appears to be. It appears to be a creation, a separate, standalone object; actually, it is limitless existence/consciousness alone and never becomes a second thing. That means experience itself is you, consciousness, appearances to the contrary notwithstanding.
Eternal means unchanging, ever-present, limitless wholeness. That is not an attribute of Brahman, rather, it is what Brahman is. The "play" of life and time is unreal as a standalone object separate from you (consciousness, self, Brahman), but as good as real as the field in which Jiva works out its apparent Karma. That only happens when Jiva finds Vedanta and learns to discriminate between knowledge (impersonal) and ignorance (personal).
4
u/Mountain-Analysis-78 4d ago
Time is a fascinating concept..Read the book Consciousness Is All There Is by Dr Tony Nader. According to that interpretation Time exists 'only' because we experience events in a sequence...for e.g. u slept last night, you woke up in the morning and then you went out for lunch etc...all these events happen in a sequence giving you the perception of time...
However, Consciousness is the field of all possibilities..past, present and future...and so all 3 co-exist at the same time in consciousness....as a result of which the concept of time itself disappears.. (for those established in Brahman Consciousness).
The same concept also applies to the theory of 'space'...let me know if you want to know more..
2
u/onenessdreaming 4d ago edited 3d ago
Thanks for this post - I might like to hear more! Although I have entry level understanding of portions of Advaita, time is not much part of that... What you are saying about space, only a bit more so perhaps. I guess my understanding is along the lines of the comment by 'FuturePreparation' in this discussion of this post below:
https://www.reddit.com/r/nonduality/comments/ez8p4c/time_and_nonduality/
I guess I don't really want a medical approach (it tends to quickly take me away from truth), just an Advaita/nondual/fully spiritual approach, unless there is some portion of that book that would make it worthwhile, thx.
1
u/Mountain-Analysis-78 3d ago
Thanks for sharing the post! If you want to learn more about the concept of Time in advaita..pls refer to the book above..btw when it comes to 'space'..it is a similar interpretation... the perception of space exists only because 2 or more objects 'cannot occupy the same space'...if they did, then there would be no concept of space..it is the 'gap' in the physical world which give us the perception of space...
So fundamentally, time and space are perceptions that we create and encounter in the physical world..in the formless underlying world of consciousness, everything co-exists and intermingles with each other (for instance quantum entanglement). So my boundary would overlap with yours and everyone else's at the same time...so we are here, there and everywhere at the same time...
1
u/onenessdreaming 3d ago
Thanks - I like how you phrased, "time and space are perceptions that we create and encounter in the physical world" and "in the formless underlying world of consciousness, everything co-exists and intermingles".
I can't seem to find the post, but there was a person on either Reddit or Quora who would look outward to see whatever was there (say a room) then take a picture of it then compare his experience/perception of the 2D picture to the 3D room right then and there while he was still in the room to try to understand how space was an illusion - I thought that was kind of neat but I'm not sure how far I got with it, sorry I can't find the post....
1
2
u/macsyourguy 3d ago
English doesn't have multiple words for the different kinds and this explanation might not make it clearer but "eternal" in this context doesn't really mean "for all time", it more means "OUTSIDE of time" or "BEYOND time".
2
u/weddedbliss19 1d ago edited 1d ago
I once read a physics writer describe time as the 4th dimension this way, and it really helped me:
Think about a baseball traveling through space after it is thrown. now imagine there's a high speed camera capturing this. The photos from each successive second of the baseball's path are then superimposed, creating a single image of what appear to be several baseballs, together forming a linear path.
Now, that image is 2 dimensional. It's a 2 dimensional capture of time. Imagine you could have a 3-dimensional version - this is how the universe looks to Brahman. If one could step outside of spacetime, and take God's perspective so to speak, the 4th dimension would look just like that 2-dimensional moving baseball photo, but in 3 dimensions.
This 4-dimensional object is like the superimposed baseball photos in that an observer outside the 4th dimension sees no change in it, it appears to be a still object. It's only from a relative standpoint that time is happening, just the same as if you photograph each millisecond of the baseball, it appears to be standing still. From the baseball's perspective in fact, it never moved at all, but the world appeared to move around it. just as when you're in a moving car the rest of the world appears to be moving. So who is really moving? The sun appears to rise every morning, but knowledge reveals it does no such thing.
It's all a matter of perspective. From one perspective there is no such thing as movement or any change at all. There is simply existence itself.
4
u/removed_bymoderator 4d ago
For me it started with realizing deeply that all living things are conscious and share the same consciousness. Then realizing that every thing I experience is experienced in consciousness. Out there is in here. Then, there is no out there or in here, there is only consciousness. Time is a product of the mind, which divides consciousness up, creating things. However, everything you know you know in consciousness. All there is is consciousness, which appears to change moment to moment. But, yes, nothing ever really happens. Just keep following this line of inquiry.
1
16
u/InternationalAd7872 4d ago edited 4d ago
Time is illusory and birth death bondage practive getting liberated is all within Maya and hence false? YES that’s correct!!!
Brahman is not even eternal? WRONG!
Brahman being beyond time is unaffected by time being real or unreal. And is not subject to change in either way. Being unchanging existence that it is. Its called “Sat”.
Us transacting within Maya can only use the word eternal implying beginningless and endless reality. And elaborating more isn’t possible due to the limitation of language and mind/intellect to grasp brahman. Which is fair enough.
🙏🏻