CORE PHILOSOPHY

Christopher Isherwood was a novelist and initiate of the Vedanta Society of Southern California, headed by Swami Prabhavananda.  In his introduction to the collection of essays Vedanta for Modern Man, Isherwood points out that Vedanta is a nondualistic philosophy that teaches that Brahman (the Ultimate Reality behind the phenomenal universe) is “one without a second.”
 
Brahman, he says, is beyond attributes.  Brahman is not conscious; Brahman is consciousness.  Brahman does not exist; Brahman is existence.  Brahman is the Atman (the Eternal Nature) of every human being, creature and object.
 
Vedanta teaches that Life has no other purpose than the following:  that we shall learn to know ourselves for what we really are, that we shall reject the superficial ego-personality that claims that “I am Mr. Smith; I am other than Mr. Brown,” and know, instead, that “I am the Atman; Mr. Brown is the Atman; the Atman is Brahman; there is nothing anywhere but Brahman; all else is appearance, transience, and unreality.”