Sage Sankara pokes fun at ascetics and points out that all their austerities do not cause desires to go.+

Sage Sankara, is one of the greatest geniuses of all time. This world owes him a deep debt of gratitude. He not only consolidated the classical values of life but also spiritual wisdom. 

Sage Sankara is the only Sage who has final authority on the Advaitic truth. The Advaitic truth is rational truth and scientific truth without dogmas.

Unfortunately, few philosophers in the world are as misunderstood and misinterpreted as Sage  Sankara. Ironically, most of the harm came from his admirers and followers of Advaitic orthodoxy because they propagated rituals as a means to attain lower knowledge which is meant for those who believed in the physical existence (universe or waking) as a reality.

The Advaitic orthodoxy is dualistic and it is not the means to acquire Self-knowledge or Brahma Gnana or Atma Gnana. Advaitic orthodoxy is meant for the ignorant mass that is unfit to grasp the highest truth. 

Thus, the Advaitic orthodoxy is nothing to do with the ultimate truth or Brahman. Those who have chosen the Atmic path have to discard orthodoxy in order to get the pure essence of Advaita.

Advaitic orthodoxy blocks the realization of ultimate truth or Brahman or God in truth.

Thus, if one wants Advaitic truth or wisdom he has to drop the path of Advaitic orthodoxy, which is meant for the traditionalists who take the practical life within the practical world as reality.

Advaitic Orthodoxy is not the means to acquire Self-Knowledge or Brahma Gnana or Atma Gnana, because the Advaitic orthodoxy is based on the experience of the birth, life, death, and the world, whereas the Soul, the Self is birthless, deathless, and the world less because it is ever nondual.

When Sage Sankara declares the world is an illusion, then it is erroneous to hold the experience of birth., life, and death, which takes place in the unreal world as real.

When Sage Sankara says, the world is an illusion, then why do you hold the experience of birth, life, and death, which takes place in the unreal world as real?

The Advaitic orthodoxy is meant for the ignorant populace, which believes the world as real.

The path of wisdom is meant for the class, not for the mass. 

According to Advaita Vedanta, the Veda addresses itself to two kinds of audiences - the ordinary ones who desire the transitory heaven and other pleasures obtained as a result of ritual sacrifices, and more advanced seeker who seeks to know Brahman. Thus, the Purva mimam. sa, with its emphasis on the karma kanda of the Vedas, is meant for the first audience, to help lead its followers along the way. However, the Vedanta, with its emphasis on the Gnana kanda, is meant for those who wish to go beyond such transient pleasures.

First Mundaka - Chapter 2 (8) - Fools, dwelling in darkness, but wise in their own conceit and puffed up with vain scholarship, wander about, being afflicted by many ills, like blind men led by the blind.

First Mundaka - Chapter 2 (9) - Children, immersed in ignorance in various ways, flatter themselves, saying: We have accomplished life's purpose. Because these performers of karma do not know the Truth owing to their attachment, they fall from heaven, misery-stricken, when the fruit of their work is exhausted.

First Mundaka - Chapter 2 (10) - Ignorant fools, regarding sacrifices and humanitarian works as the highest, do not know any higher good. Having enjoyed their reward on the heights of heaven, gained by good works, they enter again this world or a lower one.

All the orthodox ideas were rejected by Sage Sankara. There is no need to indulge in rituals, in order to realize the ultimate truth or Brahman. There is no need to study philosophy, in order to realize the ultimate truth or Brahman then why indulge in studying philosophy?

Sage Sankara pokes fun at ascetics and points out that all their austerities do not cause desires to go. (Altar Flowers" Page 205, v.2 P.207 v.4)

Sage Sankara pointed out that those rituals could in no way bring about wisdom, much less moksha.

Sage Sankara says the rewards of the rituals were not a matter of direct realization. The Advaitic wisdom is based on personal realization.

The orthodox Advaitin believes that rituals alone would lead one to higher levels of attainment. Further, the deities would reward only those entitled to perform the rituals alone. The entitlement involved caste, creed, and other parameters.

The scriptural authority and value of rituals are part of the Advaitic orthodoxy, which is meant for ignorant people.

The Advaitic wisdom of Sage Sankara is nothing to do with religion, caste, rituals, worships, yoga, and other practices. Therefore, an obvious disparity between Sage Sankara‘s path of Gnana and the path of Karma. The path of Gnana is meant for the advanced seeker of truth and the path of Karma is meant for the ignorant populace. 

Advaitic Orthodoxy is meant for the ignorant and ordinary ones who desire the transitory heaven and other pleasures obtained as a result of ritual sacrifices. :

Advaitic orthodoxy is meant for the ignorant mass that is unfit to grasp the highest truth. Thus, the Advaitic orthodoxy is nothing to do with the ultimate truth or Brahman or God in truth. Those who have chosen the Atmic path have to discard orthodoxy in order to get the pure essence of Advaita.

Sage Sankara disagrees with Buddhists who say, there is nothing - a nonentity. Sage  Sankara believes there is some reality, even though things are not what they appear to be. If one knows the truth, he will know what to do to find inspiration for action. The seeker of truth‘s subject is to know what is it that is Real.

Buddhism says ~ “All things are illusory and nothing exists. However, Sage Sankara avers that it is not so. It says that the universe, of course,  is illusory, but there is Brahman (consciousness), that exists forming the very substratum of all things (illusion or universe)”.

In the context of Advaita Vedanta: ~ Jagat (the world) is not different from Brahman; however, Brahman is different from Jagat

It has not been possible to preach Advaitic Truth entirely free from the settings of dualistic weakness it has not been more operative and useful to mankind at large because only a few will be able to grasp and realize it.

To realize the Advaitic Truth in a freer and fuller scope the seeker has to realize that form, time and space are one in essence. And that essence is consciousness. And the Soul, the innermost Self is present in the form of consciousness.

To realize the Advaitic truth the seeker has to be free from all superstitions and orthodox contaminations. The seeker  dedicated himself  to acquiring Self-knowledge or Brahma Gnana or Atma Gnana alone: ~Santthosh Kumaar