Death and Brahmanubhava…are they similar?
When you are alive, there is a body, and experience thro’ the body, experience of the world, and there is a sense of duality. There is a feeling that I am embodied, I am within the body, for the Self. Obviously, in death, the body is dropped. There is liberation, freedom. Can this be a state of liberation? Can this be a state of Mukthi? Can this be a Brahmanubhava?
Advaita vedanta doesn’t agree with this. First of all, It
It is like this. I am sitting in this room. There is space in the room. Without space, I cannot be there. Within me, there is space also. Within me and without me there is space. But, space is not trapped within me. Because, my body cannot limit the space, the body cannot cut the space. The Self, Atma, Consciousness is subtler than space. So, no body can bind it. There is no way the body can imprison Atma. But the mind, which is there, creates a condition as if the atma is imprisoned in the body. That is why people say ‘Atma is in me’ as if the body is me and Atma is inside me. In reality, the body is in Atma. Nothing can limit or bind Atma.
So, from Atma’s point of view, having a body or not having a body, doesn’t make a difference with reference to its bondage. But, of course, for the mind, it makes a difference. So, atma, changes one body to another, the ignorance doesn’t go, so even after death, the ignorance doesn’t go. Do not confuse death with liberation. People think that after death somebody gets liberated, which is not true. The liberation has to happen, by removal of ignorance, when you are alive. Not after death.
Pranams.