SHANKARACHARYA’S OUTLOOKS ON IMPERMANENCE NATURE OF LIFE AND WORLD AND THE SIGNIFICANCE OF ITS SPIRITUAL VALUES ON THE LIGHT OF HIS FAMOUS VERSE “BRAHMAN SATYA JAGAT MITHYA”

Abstract [English]

Shankaracharya, the great philosopher of Advaita Vedanta is one of the prominent figures in Indian Philosophy, who gives more importance on realizing the spiritual values of life and the world. Generally, values mean some ideas which help us to realize the reality behind the surface. Values are the fundamental beliefs that guide or motivate human actions or attitudes.
The spiritual values of Shankaracharya’s philosophy can be guessed from his famous statement that “Brahma Satyam Jagat Mithya, Jiva Brahmaiva Napara”, which means “Brahma is the only reality, the world is eventually untrue and the individual soul is non-different from Brahma”. Shankaracharya’s ideas of spirituality have great significance for mankind, because it enables a person to realize the true nature of life and world.
According to Shankaracharya, the world is mere appearance and it is not ultimately real. Due to our ignorance we think the unreal world as real. In the real sense, the world is the product of Maya or Avidya. Maya is a power which covers the real nature of the world and projects the unreal as like the activities of a magician.
According to Shankaracharya, like the world our body is also mere appearance. The Soul or Spirit which is behind our body is only real. According to Shankaracharya, there is no separate identity of Soul or Jiva apart from Brahma. Jiva is insensible of the basic solidarity and takes as it were differences to be genuine and wrongly respects himself as specialist and enjoyer.
According to Shankaracharya, ignorance is the cause of bondage. Ignorance is removed by intuition of the identity of the Atman or Self or Brahma is known as liberation or Moksa, which is the result of spiritual realization of life and world.