A god of clay

Swami Tadatmananda, a Western supporter of Advaita Vedanta (who looks like an adorable autistic baby) tries to explain Shankara´s "non-dual" position on Brahman and the unreal world. And perhaps make it sound more rational? If so, he doesn´t succeed very well. Instead, the viewer (me) is left wondering what on earth is the difference between this and materialism? Isn´t this really a kind of spiritual materialism? But sure, I suppose you could say that spiritual materialism is "rational", somehow. 

In this scenario, Brahman is the subtle substance everything is made of: humans, stars, dreams, even Ishvara (the personal creator-god). Everything that exists is just a "form" or "name" of Brahman. The swami at one point calls it "a concept" (which is absurd). He constantly compares Brahman to the clay in a clay pot. The pot has no "independent existence" and is really "just clay" (again, absurd notions). At another point, he compares Brahman to atoms and quarks - if science had been able to discover what quarks are made of, they would have discovered Brahman. 

Tadatmananda is smart enough not to say that the world is a literal "illusion". It is "real" in some sense, but it´s a dependent reality. Ultimately, only Brahman is real (just as ultimately only the clay is real in the analogy of the clay pots). But if I understand this man´s teachings correctly, he says that Brahman is inert and passive. It´s just a substance. The phenomenal world is created by Ishvara. While Ishvara is also a manifestation of Brahman (and hence not "ultimately real"), it seems to be this personal creator-god which molds the Brahmanic clay into the "names" and "forms" surrounding us (including ourselves). But if so, Ishvara is really Brahman´s shakti, the active energy that *actually* does something, the Demiurge that takes the clay and applies (its own?) "concepts" onto the clay, creating the entire world. *But that logically means that we should worship Ishvara alone, and not bother with Brahman*. 

Yet, the group this teacher belongs to, Arsha Bodha Center, wants to reach Brahman through meditation practice. They want to return to the clay, merge with it, even. According to another clip, the goal of non-dual meditation is similar to a permanent dreamless sleep. Indeed, Tadatmananda says in yet another clip that Advaita Vedanta (or his favored version thereof) is very similar to orthodox Buddhism. This seems to be correct: nirvana is also a permanent dreamless sleep of sorts (or is often interpreted that way). Presumably, this is the only way to escape suffering in this system. Note, however, that this makes the divine imperfect, since the suffering can only be caused by an imperfection in the clay. Everytime the clay is molded into name and form, suffering (I presume) is the result. 

However, since humans can pray to Ishvara, there seems to be another way out of our predicament. Why can´t Ishvara create a number of heaven worlds for his creatures? Indeed, this is what he or she has done according to Hindu mythology. While these heavens will be destroyed after one mahakalpa, that is a very long time. Sure sounds more fun cavorting with the gopis in Vrindavan (the transcendental version) than becoming dreamless clay!

I happen to agree (I think) with the idea that there must be one metaphysical substance underlying everything that exists (or at the very least everything we can concieve or percieve as existing). Even "good" and "evil", or "God" and the "world", must in *some* sense consist of the same substance, otherwise they would never be able to interact with one another. To take just one example, the Christian Devil is a fallen angel, and hence presumably made of the same substance as the good angels. (While creatio ex nihilo for the same reason seems wrong, emanationism being the correct take.) However, I want to believe that this substance isn´t "the ultimate reality", it´s just part of "God´s energy body" or whatever exotic term we want to use. If you enter it in a meditative state, you are (in one sense) "one with God", but in another and more important sense, you have simply touched his vast energy (let´s call it clay-energy), while other and more interesting possibilities remain untapped...