[Advaita-l] Sleep and Dream of a Jivanmukta

[Ven Balakrishnan]

Sankara in Brhad and Gaudapada in Mandukyakarika equate waking and dream states, as no-different.  Brhad indicates the (absence of) experience in deep sleep is where the Absolute alone reigns.

Of course the Absolute alone IS anyway; however mistaken subject-object duality is superimposed only in the waking and dream states.

So, the question then is what the jivanmukta experiences in the waking and dream states, if s/he has "no particular consciousness”, dissolved like a salt doll in the ocean (as Brhad exclaims).

The alternatives that are contended:
Experience of the world continues, but the jivanmukta knows it is an illusion and non-separate
The jivanmukta registers no difference at all, as the ‘I’ has disappeared; so the body continues to function and respond without any volition.  Gaudapada refers to this as ’no-mind’.  Astavakra makes the analogy of a dry leaf blown in the wind.
For the jivanmukta, there is no further perception.

The latter two would seem to be consistent with Ramana Maharshi, as quoted by Lakshmana Karma in Guru Ramana Vachana Mala:
 
“The Liberated one has neither knowledge of difference, nor knowledge of non-difference.  The non-arising of knowledge of difference is referred to by the wise as ‘knowledge of non-difference’"