The Nullity of Nescience: G. R. Malkani’s Contemporary Formulation of Advaita

Abstract

Abstract This article is a conceptual exploration of a central argument developed by Ghanshamdas Rattanmal Malkani (1892–1977) to indicate that ignorance (ajñāna) does not have any nature and it should not be invested with any measure or degree of substantiality. In his writings in English, we find a contemporary way of working through some of the key problems that appear on premodern Advaita exegetical landscapes. One aspect of the distinctiveness of Malkani’s hermeneutic style is that, generally speaking, he does not directly engage with, or even name, commentators from these premodern traditions. In the first three sections of this article, we will outline some conceptual problems that different exegetes—from Sureśvara (c. 800) to Prakāśānanda (c. 1600)—grapple with, and this discussion will lead us, in subsequent sections, to an exploration of Malkani’s articulation of the non-duality between the one and the many. Malkani’s view that non-duality has to be presented in terms of the utter absence of all traces of duality—material as well as notional—is resonant with similar claims in Prakāśānanda and his own contemporary Svāmī Satchidānandendra Sarasvatī (1880–1975).