Multiplicity of individuals is a moot point with most persons :

A jiva is only the light reflected on the ego. The person identifies himself with the ego and argues that there must be more like him. He is not easily convinced of the absurdity of his position. Does a man who sees many individuals in his dream persist in believing them to be real and enquire after them when he wakes up?


This argument does not convince the disputant.


Again, there is the moon. Let anyone look at her from any place at any time; she is the same moon. Everyone knows it. Now suppose that there are several receptacles of water reflecting the moon. The images are all different from one another and from the moon herself. If one of the receptacles falls to pieces, that reflection disappears. Its disappearance does not affect the real moon or the other reflections. It is similar with an individual attaining Liberation. He alone is liberated.


The sectarian of multiplicity makes this his argument against non-duality. "If the Self is single, if one man is liberated, that means that all souls are liberated. In practice it is not so. Therefore Advaita is not correct." The weakness in the argument is that the reflected light of the Self is mistaken for the original Light of the Self. The ego, the world and the individuals are all due to the person's vasanas. When they perish, that person's hallucinations disappear, that is to say one pitcher is broken and the relative reflection is at an end.


The fact is that the Self is never bound. There can therefore be no Release for It. All the troubles are for the ego only.


A question was asked why it was wrong to say that there is a multiplicity of jivas. Jivas are certainly many. For a jiva [?] is only the ego and forms the reflected light of the Self. Multiplicity of selves may be wrong but not of jivas.


M.: Jiva is called so because he sees the world. A dreamer sees many jivas in a dream but all of them are not real. The dreamer alone exists and he sees all. So it is with the individual and the world. There is the creed of only one Self which is also called the creed of only one jiva. It says that the jiva is only one who sees the whole world and the jivas therein.


D.: Then jiva means the Self here.

M.: So it is. But the Self is not a seer. But here he is said to see the world. So he is differentiated as the Jiva.

(Talk 571 (7th Nov., 1938) of 'Talks with Sri Ramana Maharishi'.)