Jivatman and Paramatman — Individual and Universal Self
The apparent distinction between Jivatman (individual self) and Paramatman (universal Self) is the fundamental structure of Advaita's teaching — and their recognition as identical is liberation.
Advaita Vedanta describes the apparent situation as follows: Paramatman (the universal Self/Brahman) appears as Jivatman (the individual self) through the limiting adjunct (upadhi) of the individual body-mind. The Jivatman believes itself to be separate, finite, and bound — this belief is Avidya (ignorance). In reality, Jivatman and Paramatman are identical — the same consciousness appearing as individual through the lens of the body-mind. The teaching of the Upanishads and Shankara's commentaries is directed at this recognition: 'You are not the Jivatman that you appear to be; you are the Paramatman that you actually are.' The apparent distance between individual and universal is created by Avidya and dissolved by Jnana (direct knowledge). The analogies used: the pot-space (a pot seems to contain a separate piece of sky, but the pot-space and the cosmic space are the same space); the river and the ocean (a wave seems separate from the ocean, but is the ocean in the form of a wave).
The individual self (Jivatman) and the universal Self (Paramatman) are one — their apparent difference is caused by ignorance.
Physicist Carlo Rovelli's relational quantum mechanics — which holds that quantum states are not absolute but relative to observers, so that the apparent separateness of things is a function of relationships rather than intrinsic properties — provides a modern physics parallel to the Advaita teaching that individual separateness is a functional appearance rather than an ultimate fact.
Vivekachudamani
Written about in
- What Advaita Vedanta says about the self
The individual self and the universal Self are held to be one, with the apparent difference caused by ignorance. This is the structure every Advaita argument is trying to collapse.
- What Advaita Vedanta says about loneliness
The separateness you feel is produced by an upadhi, a limiting adjunct — the body-mind acting as a lens. Shankara's image is the pot: it appears to hold its own private piece of sky, and the clay wall is the only thing making that appear true.