Maya & Matrix

Source: http://matrixessays.blogspot.ae/2003_06_01_matrixessays_archive.
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Saturday, June 28, 2003
posted by Tom Good at 12:40 PM (permalink)
The Matrix and Maya

[Reader Harneet Bhatia submitted this essay by Amit Whig of Delhi, India.
Amit just completed his bachelor's degree in Architecture from the School of
Planning and Architecture, Delhi. I added the links in this essay. -- Tom]
The computers in The Matrix create a cyber world, which is just an illusion
and does not actually exist. Man is a slave of the computer. The enslaved
man is made to sleep (almost dead) . . . only his neuro-system is allowed to
be active but under the control of the Matrix. The energy generated (tiny
electrical impulses) by the neuro-systems of the body-dead-mind-alive
humans is accumulated and used to run the Matrix.
Now these humans (captives of the computer or cyberspace) experience
themselves to be alive in a normal day-to-day world, but in reality they are
body-dead and stacked at some place by the Matrix. The humans feel so
contented by their existence in the Matrix, which in fact is an illusion only,
that they never get to know the reality. These humans stay alive in a nonreal cyber world only as electro-magnetic impulses (or waves) with no real
existence as such. They are prisoners of the Matrix yet they never know of
it. What the (captive) humans experience as the reality is actually not there
and hence all false. The "real truth" is never known to them.
Now there is a parallel concept in Eastern thought. In India we talk
about maya. Maya, if I try to explain it in English, shall mean a network of
illusions. It is somewhat like the Matrix. The only difference being that while
talking ofmaya, one does not talk of guns or bombs or cell-phones or ultrafuturistic things, as shown in the movie Matrix.
The concept of maya is like this. We in India believe that this Whole universe
is a manifestation of God. Since everything is nothing but a manifestation
of God, actually and essentially there is no difference between 2 or more
things, because all are God, whether it is a stone, a metal, a building, or a
book, a human, an animal, a fish, etc. I am God and you are God, they all
are God ... we all are nothing but manifestations of God. This has been said
to be real truth, which we normally don't perceive. This is what the Saints
and icons of Eastern thoughts (be it Krishna, or Buddha or Guru Nanak,
etc.) have always tried to preach, using different means and ways.
Now the question arises that since all is manifestation of God and hence
there is essentially no difference between two or more things or entities
then why do we perceive two or more things as different (shape/ size / make
/ etc.)when actually they are the same? Now here comes what we
call maya.
It is said that maya engulfs this whole wide universe. You are always
within maya and part of maya yet you never know of it, just like humans
never know that they are part of the Matrix (as electromagnetic impulses)
sensing everything to be real, but being far away from the ultimate truth.
The world of maya (or Matrix) is so self-contained that we never suspect of
it to be anything unreal.
The concept of maya says that God is everywhere around you, in living and
non-living entities, in phenomena, in all perceptions, in senses, etc. But you
never see God because maya engulfs the space (mental space) between you
and God. Maya makes you perceive this universe and its entities, and not
God that manifests them. Maya causes corporeality of things. A mountain
looks like a mountain because Maya (just like the Matrix) makes us perceive
it like that only. Actually there is no mountain there but God and only God.
Similarly when you see a tree , it is actually God looking at you and you
never know.
Maya is a world of senses and perceptions, and no sense or perception is
perfect, hence no sense or perception is perfectly true. Attributes assigned
to senses or perceptions (like good, bad, ugly, excellent, marvelous,
fabulous, worse, best, etc.) all arise out of comparative situations (or out of
comparison) and actually don't belong to any of the sense or perceptions.
Hence all sense or perceptions are very balanced in themselves; only
comparison between various perceptions makes us say something good or
bad about a thing or phenomena. Hence nothing is good or bad in itself.
These attributes are peripheral. What we perceive as good is the same as
what we perceive as bad. So, actually all are same, no difference.
Another way of explaining this: look out of the window and concentrate on 2
persons. Lets say one is white and the other is black. See a little more
closely and biologically. They both are composed of almost identical
molecules of carbo-hydrates. Once you look at them as a biologist, the black
and white color difference will vanish. These attributes are peripheral. Now,
look more carefully, as a physicist. You see all those carbo-hydrate
molecules are actually composed of Atoms, which in turn are nothing but a
special composition of electrons + neutrons + protons. So, the whole body
of the white guy is nothing but a bee-hive of electrons + neutrons +
protons, and similarly that of the black guy. No difference. Look at more
things around you (as physicists), and you will see all things are nothing but
a beehive of electrons + neutrons + protons. See the difference between all
entities has vanished. They all end up to be same. (I am not very good in
Physics but I have tried to explain things).
In the same way, applying a different perspective we can come to the
conclusion that actually all things are nothing but manifestation of God. No
difference. Thus explained.
It is only maya that doesn't allow us see deeper. We get too contented with
peripheral attributes. Racism in this whole world was a result of this
peripheral vision of things. As man has become more intelligent, racism has
gradually vanished. One day man will also erase the boundaries created in
the name of religion, country, ethnicity, and so on.
Where does maya reside? Maya is in each place and in every manifestation
where our thought takes us with our shallow peripheral perceptions and
senses. The moment we apply deeper understanding, maya starts fading out
and things show their true colour. Maya, one may say, is in the mentalspace and fills it thoroughly.
But why do people in India worship maya as a goddess? Well, this is again
long to explain, but I will try to give a brief explanation. It is all about
personal way of viewing things. If I am walking on a certain path, and doing
"effort" to reach a certain (lets say theological) destination or goal, then my
effort is making me experience things, good or bad (peripheral attributes),
during my journey. Now if an obstacle comes in my way and I frown upon it,
it shows that I am not liking my journey. But another person may smile at
this obstacle and praise it for a new experience during the journey that this
obstacle will give, thus raising his experience to new heights.
Sakyamuni Gautama Siddhartha Buddha also began by first experiencing
death, age, youth etc. of other people. We (may I say, rightly or wrongly)
worship the maya or revere the maya in the same way. To break free of the
cage of maya, one has to first accept the cage around himself.
There is another reason for worshipping maya as Goddess, but that will
indulge in core Hinduism, not subject to the present discussion. (hint
: maya is good because it allows us to enjoy life as it is by causing sense
perceptions to work).
In the last part of the movie The Matrix, Keanu Reeves (playing the main
character), is able to see through the hollowness of the cyberworld and
perceives the Matrix. Similarly, Buddha also perceived the hollowness of this
world (in which we live and which is nothing but maya) and he saw the nonduality of everything. Nothing remained different from Buddha himself. Thus
he gave the Homily of AN-ATMAN (the self having no real identity and being
same with the supreme and hence with every other Self). Krishna also
made Arjuna perceive Krishna himself in all opponents of Arjuna in the
battlefield of Kurukshetra. Hence no difference.
So, we see the similarity between maya (a theological concept) and The
Matrix (a Hollywood movie).
***
[Harneet also points out that this article from the Times of India makes a
similar comparison. -- Tom]
posted by Tom Good at 12:40 PM (permalink)
amitwhig@yahoo.ie

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The Matrix and Maya

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