What is Maya?

Sri Siddharameshwar Maharaj 

What is the meaning in all of this, after all? It means that "all of this" is false. Maya wears the bangles of determination, and doubt. The ego, the jiva, is dancing to the tune of the jingling of the bangles. The son-in-law is given the mind as a dowry. She has expanded solely on the base of the three qualities (Gunas). This false Maya's nature is such that she affects the ignorant. How can we say that she is actually existing? With the "inner-vision" of Knowledge, she is not there at all. How can we say that she is? We cannot say that she is. In order to go beyond this Maya, many have let their hair grow, and undergone many austerities. They know the Panchakshari Mantra which shows that Maya is such that we should not ask any question about her. She is indescribable. We should not use words to describe her, as she is not even fit for that. She was not there in the past, nor will she be there afterwards. To think that this world is real, is Maya.

The Vedas were asked what is Maya? They remained silent. What can we tell about the beginning of the river in the mirage? Its beginning is in the Ignorance of the fools and her end is in Knowledge. She appears because we conceive of something. We hear our own footsteps, and look to see who is following us. Whatever a man thinks and imagines, is what is true for him. He is confused and he is afraid there. All of this is the play of the imagination. The original imagination is called the "Primal Illusion," or Moola-Maya. When man forgot Reality, the concept of Maya arose. Then man thought it to be true. Maya means "me." The wrong concept about ourselves here is the great error, nothing else. When a little piece of cotton is placed under a lens, and the sun's rays pass through the lens, the cotton burns. In "Pure Brahman," the "me" is not. In the chains of ego, the worldly life starts. This "me" is something of the neuter gender. The concept creates a ghost out of nothing and by concept only it disappears. We construct by our imagination, try to digest it, and when we cannot do so, we are afraid. There is no worldly life in the body, nor is it in the Self. Desire and body identification create the feeling that the world exists.