Cosmism in Advaita Vedānta
Journal of Indian Knowledge Systems June 22, 2026 Mehak Kulchander
Advaita Vedānta is often seen as world-negating, but this paper argues it actually presents a cosmist, world-affirming vision. The world is neither denied nor absolutized but affirmed as contingently real and ethically significant. Using Jean-Paul Sartre's non-egological account of consciousness, the paper shows how the ego is displaced from the interior of experience and situated within the world. It traces doctrines of māyā and adhyāsa from Śaṅkara through post-Śaṅkara Advaita, explaining egohood as metaphysical misidentification rather than ontological falsity, preserving the empirical world as the locus of experience and action. Jīvanmukti is interpreted as embodied freedom within the world, not withdrawal.