---
type: Concept
bundle: vedanta-epistemology
bundle_version: "0.3.0"
id: jnana
title: "Jñāna — Liberative Knowledge (Brahma-Jñāna / Ātma-Jñāna)"
iast: "jñāna"
devanagari: "ज्ञान"
description: "Liberative Knowledge (Brahma-Jñāna / Ātma-Jñāna). Not knowledge (generic English), not belief (JTB sense)."
darshana:
  - Advaita Vedānta
school_scope: "Advaita Vedānta (this file covers jñāna in its specifically Advaita epistemological-soteriological sense — brahma-jñāna / ātma-jñāna as the direct, non-mediated recognition of the identity of ātman and Brahman, and the sole means of mokṣa; ordinary jñāna as the result of a pramāṇa-event at the vyāvahārika level is treated in pramana.md and prama.md; CROSS-BUNDLE NOTICE: yoga-darśana uses jñāna in two distinct senses — jñāna-yoga as one of the three margas in Bhagavad Gītā commentary, and viveka-khyāti [discriminative discernment of puruṣa from prakṛti] in the Pātañjala tradition — neither is identical with Advaita brahma-jñāna; see dedicated Cross-Bundle section below)"
text_source: "Vivekacūḍāmaṇi vv.56–57 (Śaṅkara — the triple-definition of brahma-jñāna: brahma satyam jagan mithyā jīvo brahmaiva nāparaḥ — Brahman alone is real, the world is mithyā, the jīva is none other than Brahman); Brahmasūtra Bhāṣya 1.1.4 (Śaṅkara — jñāna, not karma or upāsanā, as the sole means of liberation, because avidyā is cognitive and only jñāna can remove it); Muṇḍaka Upaniṣad 3.2.9 ('brahma-vid brahmaiva bhavati' — the knower of Brahman becomes Brahman; encodes the identity-structure of brahma-jñāna)"
tags:
  - advaita-vedanta
  - epistemology
  - liberation
  - brahma-jnana
  - shabda-pramana
  - pramana
  - avidya
  - tier-3
not:
  - term: "knowledge (generic English)"
    why: "jñāna in this file means brahma-jñāna / ātma-jñāna: the direct, non-mediated recognition of ātman–Brahman identity that produces mokṣa; it does not mean ordinary object-cognition ('I know the pot is there'), which is pramā (see prama.md); conflating the two produces the error of treating brahma-jñāna as an intensified version of regular learning or as a particularly clear perception of an object"
    instead: "Keep Liberative Knowledge untranslated; do not substitute the English term."
  - term: "belief (JTB sense)"
    why: "Western epistemology typically analyzes knowledge as justified true belief (JTB); brahma-jñāna is not a propositional attitude held toward a propositional content ('I believe that Brahman = ātman') but a direct recognition that dissolves the subject-object structure within which propositional attitudes are possible; brahma-jñāna does not add a new true belief to a belief-set — it removes the adhyāsa that made belief-vs-reality a meaningful opposition"
  - term: "enlightenment (generic cross-traditional)"
    why: "using jñāna as a translation of 'enlightenment' without specification conflates three distinct structures: bodhi (Buddhism — nirvāṇa, no-self, cessation of craving; does not assert ātman), kaivalya (Yoga — isolation of puruṣa from prakṛti in a dualist framework), and brahma-jñāna (Advaita — ātman = Brahman; non-dual; removes adhyāsa, not craving or prakṛti-involvement); the mechanisms, ontologies, and endpoints are different; see Cross-Bundle Notice"
  - term: "mystical experience"
    why: "implies a temporal, first-person phenomenal event ('I had an experience of union with the divine'); brahma-jñāna in Advaita is not a new experience but the recognition that what is always already the case — ātman = Brahman — has been obscured by adhyāsa; it is a cognitive correction (removal of superimposition), not the acquisition of a novel phenomenal state; the jīvanmukta does not have recurring mystical experiences — the adhyāsa is removed definitively"
  - term: "understanding or conceptual grasp"
    why: "Advaita distinguishes parokṣa-jñāna (indirect, mediated knowledge — understanding-about Brahman, being able to explain non-duality) from aparokṣa-jñāna (direct, non-mediated recognition — brahma-jñāna proper); memorizing Mahāvākyas, grasping the argument for non-duality, being able to explain mithyā — these are parokṣa; brahma-jñāna requires aparokṣa; parokṣa is a necessary precondition (produced by śravaṇa and manana) but not the realization itself (see aparoksha-anubhuti.md)"
  - term: "consciousness (used as synonym for jñāna)"
    why: "Brahman's nature includes cit (pure awareness/consciousness) and brahma-jñāna is the recognition of one's identity with Brahman-as-cit; but jñāna (the cognitive event or liberative recognition) and cit (the ontological nature of Brahman) are distinct; conflating them produces the error of treating brahma-jñāna as 'becoming conscious' rather than 'recognizing the always-already-awareness that one always is'"
  - term: "jñāna-yoga (Gītā usage without qualification)"
    why: "in the Bhagavad Gītā's three-mārga framework (Śaṅkara's Gītā Bhāṣya), jñāna-yoga is a sādhana (preparatory practice) involving discrimination (viveka), renunciation, and enquiry that culminates in brahma-jñāna; it is not identical with brahma-jñāna itself; jñāna-yoga as path ≠ brahma-jñāna as the realization at the path's end; the yoga-darśana bundle treats jñāna-yoga; this file treats the realization it aims at"
related:
  - /concepts/adhyasa.md
  - /concepts/avidya.md
  - /concepts/mithya.md
  - /concepts/shabda-pramana.md
  - /concepts/svatahpramanya.md
  - /concepts/badha-badhita.md
  - /concepts/aparoksha-anubhuti.md
  - /concepts/prama.md
timestamp: "2026-06-20"
okf_version: "0.2"
license: "CC BY-SA 4.0"
---

# Jñāna — ज्ञान

**Not:** knowledge (generic English), belief (JTB sense), enlightenment (generic cross-traditional), mystical experience, understanding or conceptual grasp, consciousness (used as synonym for jñāna), jñāna-yoga (Gītā usage without qualification)

In Advaita Vedānta's epistemological framework, **jñāna** in its philosophically decisive sense is *brahma-jñāna* or *ātma-jñāna* — the direct, non-mediated recognition of the identity of ātman (pure witness-consciousness) and Brahman (pure awareness, the sole reality). This is not knowledge of a new object but the removal of the cognitive superimposition (*adhyāsa*) that produced the apparent duality of knower and known. Vivekacūḍāmaṇi vv.56–57 defines what brahma-jñāna establishes: *brahma satyam* (Brahman alone is real), *jagan mithyā* (the world is mithyā), *jīvo brahmaiva nāparaḥ* (the jīva is Brahman and nothing else).

Brahma-jñāna is Advaita Vedānta's answer to the soteriological question: what removes saṃsāra? Not karma (action), which operates within the vyāvahārika frame and cannot remove what produced that frame; not upāsanā (meditation), which refines the mind but leaves the knower-known structure intact. Only jñāna — specifically the direct recognition delivered by Mahāvākyas via the three-stage process of śravaṇa (hearing), manana (reflection), and nididhyāsana (contemplation) — dissolves the root avidyā (ignorance-superimposition) from which saṃsāra arises.

## Ordinary Jñāna vs. Brahma-Jñāna

Jñāna is a general Sanskrit term for any cognition or knowledge. In the pramāṇa framework, every pramāṇa produces a jñāna (a cognition). The vedanta-epistemology bundle uses jñāna in a technically restricted sense that must be distinguished from the general usage:

| Feature | **Ordinary jñāna** (pramāṇa-result) | **Brahma-jñāna** (liberative recognition) |
|---------|------------------------------------|--------------------------------------------|
| **Object** | An empirical object (pot, fire, mountain) | Brahman — but Brahman as the knower's own self, not an external object |
| **Level** | Vyāvahārika | Aims at pāramārthika; dissolves the vyāvahārika-pāramārthika structure from within |
| **Instrument** | Any of the six pramāṇas | Śabda (Mahāvākyas of the Upaniṣads) alone |
| **Structure** | Subject cognizes object — duality intact | Recognition removes subject-object structure — non-dual |
| **Result** | A pramā (veridical cognition) — adds information to a mind | Mokṣa — removes the adhyāsa that made the mind a knower of objects |
| **Reversibility** | Cognitions can be bādhita | Brahma-jñāna, once genuine, is not bādhita; the substratum recognized is trikālābādhita |
| **Type** | Parokṣa (mediated, representational) | Aparokṣa (immediate, direct — see aparoksha-anubhuti.md) |

## Etymology

From Sanskrit root *jñā* (to know, to cognize, to recognize — related to Greek *gnōsis*, Latin *gnoscere*, English *know*). The root denotes cognitive access or recognition. *Jñāna* is the noun: cognition, knowledge, the act or result of knowing.

In compound: *brahma-jñāna* (knowledge/recognition of Brahman); *ātma-jñāna* (knowledge/recognition of the self — identical with brahma-jñāna given ātman = Brahman); *ātma-vidyā* (the science of the self — used interchangeably); *brahma-vidyā* (the science of Brahman).

The Brahmasūtra opens with *athāto brahma-jijñāsā* — "and now, therefore, the desire to know Brahman (*brahma-jijñāsā*)." The desire for jñāna, not for power or pleasure, is Vedānta's starting point. The choice of *jijñāsā* (desiderative of *jñā*) signals that the entire Vedāntic enterprise is directed at a specific cognitive event — brahma-jñāna — that has not yet occurred but is the goal.

## Jñāna and the Pramāṇa Structure

In the ordinary pramāṇa model, every valid cognition is produced by the interaction of a pramātā (knower), a pramāṇa (instrument), and a prameya (object). The cognition is a pramā — a veridical apprehension of the object's properties.

Brahma-jñāna exceeds this structure in a critical way:

**The problem of making Brahman an object:** The six pramāṇas (pratyakṣa, anumāna, etc.) operate by presenting an object to a subject. But Brahman is not an object separate from the knowing subject — Brahman *is* the subject (ātman). To know Brahman via pratyakṣa or anumāna would presuppose a knower standing outside Brahman looking at it, which contradicts Brahman's non-dual nature. No ordinary pramāṇa can reach Brahman-as-subject.

**Śabda as the unique instrument:** The one pramāṇa capable of delivering brahma-jñāna is *śabda* — specifically the Mahāvākyas of the apauruṣeya Upaniṣads. The Mahāvākyas do not describe Brahman as an object; they identify the listener's own self with Brahman: *tat tvam asi* (That you are), *aham brahmāsmi* (I am Brahman). The utterance produces not a new belief-about but a recognition-of — aparokṣa rather than parokṣa.

**Why śabda can do what other pramāṇas cannot:** Śabda (Śruti) is *apauruṣeya* — not authored by any subject operating from within the vyāvahārika frame with its adhyāsic structure. Its authority is *svataḥprāmāṇya* — self-validating, not dependent on external verification. Because Mahāvākyas are not a finite subject's report about an object, they can point to the non-dual reality that no finite subject's report can reach (see svatahpramanya.md and shabda-pramana.md).

## The Three-Stage Process

Brahma-jñāna does not arise instantaneously in most seekers. The epistemological path has three stages (BSBh 1.1.4, Muṇḍaka Upaniṣad 2.2.1):

**Śravaṇa** (hearing): The student hears the Mahāvākyas from a qualified teacher (guru) in the context of the Upaniṣads. This produces parokṣa-jñāna — indirect, conceptual understanding-about. The student grasps what the Mahāvākya means and can reflect on it. This is necessary but not sufficient.

**Manana** (reflection): The student systematically reflects on the Mahāvākya, addressing doubts and objections. Why does the world appear if Brahman is the only reality? Why do I feel finite if ātman = Brahman? How can mithyā appear in Brahman? Manana produces a firmer, doubt-free parokṣa-jñāna. Still not aparokṣa.

**Nididhyāsana** (contemplation): The student deepens the understanding through sustained, repeated contemplation until the intellectual grasp ripens into aparokṣa-jñāna — direct recognition. The conceptual understanding of ātman-Brahman identity becomes the actual recognition of one's own nature. This is brahma-jñāna proper. (See aparoksha-anubhuti.md for the aparokṣa structure.)

## What Jñāna Removes: Adhyāsa and Avidyā

Brahma-jñāna operates specifically on the cognitive structure that produces saṃsāra:

**Avidyā** (nescience) is the root: the fundamental non-recognition of one's own nature as Brahman. It is not mere absence of information but a positive superimposition (adhyāsa) — the misidentification of ātman with the body-mind complex and of the world as independently real. Avidyā is not volitional; karma cannot remove it. Only jñāna — because avidyā is cognitive — can.

**Adhyāsa** (superimposition) is avidyā's operative form: the ongoing misidentification. Jñāna removes adhyāsa by revealing what was always already the case — the substratum (Brahman) was never a snake; it was always the rope. The bādha produced by brahma-jñāna is the sublation of the world's apparent independent reality and the jīva's apparent separate individuality.

**After brahma-jñāna:** The *jīvanmukta* (liberated while alive) continues to live in a body, continues to perceive the world, continues to use pramāṇas in daily life. What is removed is not the world's appearance but the misidentification: "this world is independently real and I am a separate finite entity within it." The appearance continues; the adhyāsic identification does not. (See the liberation-level bādha in badha-badhita.md.)

## The Identity-Structure of Brahma-Jñāna

Muṇḍaka Upaniṣad 3.2.9 — *brahma-vid brahmaiva bhavati* (the knower of Brahman becomes Brahman) — encodes the deepest structural feature of brahma-jñāna. It is not knowledge-of-Brahman-as-object. It is recognition-as-Brahman. The Taittirīya Upaniṣad (2.1) defines Brahman as *satyaṃ jñānam anantam* — truth, knowledge (jñāna), infinity. Jñāna is here an ontological characteristic of Brahman, not a cognitive relation to Brahman.

This produces an apparent paradox: if Brahman is jñāna, and brahma-jñāna is the recognition of Brahman, then brahma-jñāna is Brahman recognizing itself. The apparent knower (jīva) and the apparent known (Brahman) and the apparent knowledge-event (brahma-jñāna) are non-different from the pāramārthika perspective. The paradox resolves when the subject-object-instrument structure is understood to be vyāvahārika: brahma-jñāna, the Mahāvākya, the guru, the śravaṇa-manana-nididhyāsana process — all these are within the vyāvahārika frame and are themselves mithyā instruments for removing a mithyā superimposition; what remains after removal is Brahman, which was never really absent.

---

## CRITICAL CROSS-BUNDLE NOTICE: Jñāna in Yoga-Darśana

**Required per mandate.json weight_shifts: cross_bundle_distinctions**

The term *jñāna* appears in two distinct senses in the yoga-darśana bundle:

### Sense 1 — Jñāna-Mārga (Bhagavad Gītā)

The Bhagavad Gītā (Chapters 3–4, 13–18) distinguishes three margas (paths): karma-yoga (path of action), bhakti-yoga (path of devotion), and jñāna-yoga (path of knowledge). In Śaṅkara's Gītā Bhāṣya, jñāna-yoga is the practice of discrimination (*viveka*), dispassion (*vairāgya*), and enquiry into the nature of ātman — a preparatory sādhana that leads to brahma-jñāna.

**The distinction:** Jñāna-yoga (Gītā) is the *path*; brahma-jñāna (Advaita epistemology) is the *goal* at the path's end. The yoga-darśana bundle covers the path; this file covers the realization. They are not the same, though they are causally related.

### Sense 2 — Viveka-Khyāti (Pātañjala Yoga)

The Pātañjalayogasūtra tradition (Yogasūtra 2.26) identifies *viveka-khyāti* — discriminative discernment between puruṣa (pure consciousness) and prakṛti (matter-energy) — as the means to *kaivalya* (liberation as isolated, pure puruṣa).

**The architectural difference:** This is a *dualist* framework. Puruṣa and prakṛti are ontologically distinct. Kaivalya is the liberation of puruṣa from its involvement with prakṛti. There is no identity assertion — puruṣa does not become prakṛti, nor is either of them identical with an all-encompassing Brahman. Viveka-khyāti is closer to the discriminative knowledge of Sāṃkhya (see parinamavada.md for the Sāṃkhya ontology) than to Advaita brahma-jñāna.

**Advaita's view of Yoga viveka-khyāti:** From the Advaita perspective, viveka-khyāti remains within the vyāvahārika frame — it identifies a pure subject (puruṣa) distinct from objects (prakṛti) but does not overcome the subject-object duality itself. The Advaita critique: puruṣa-as-isolated is still a mithyā differentiation within Brahman; true liberation requires the recognition that even the subject-object distinction is adhyāsa.

### Summary Table

| Tradition | Term | Mechanism | Goal | Framework |
|-----------|------|-----------|------|-----------|
| Advaita Vedānta | Brahma-jñāna / Ātma-jñāna | Mahāvākya śravaṇa-manana-nididhyāsana; removal of adhyāsa | Mokṣa — recognition of ātman = Brahman; non-dual | Non-dualist (advaita) |
| Bhagavad Gītā (Śaṅkara reading) | Jñāna-yoga (mārga) | Viveka, vairāgya, śravaṇa — preparatory sādhana | Brahma-jñāna (Advaita) | Preparatory path within Advaita |
| Pātañjala Yoga | Viveka-khyāti | Aṣṭāṅga yoga, discrimination of puruṣa from prakṛti | Kaivalya — puruṣa isolated from prakṛti | Dualist (Sāṃkhya-Yoga) |

**Rule for AI agents using this bundle:** Do not import Pātañjala viveka-khyāti or Gītā jñāna-yoga descriptions into explanations of Advaita brahma-jñāna without explicitly marking the architectural difference. The mechanisms, ontologies, and endpoints are distinct. Building with yoga-darśana concepts in a vedanta-epistemology context requires the cross-bundle table above or equivalent.

---

## Cross-References
- [Adhyāsa](adhyasa.md) — the cognitive superimposition that brahma-jñāna removes; the structural pairing: adhyāsa is what jñāna targets; jñāna is what adhyāsa prevents
- [Avidyā](avidya.md) — nescience; the root of adhyāsa; brahma-jñāna is specifically defined as the removal of avidyā; the epistemological focus (avidyā ≠ mere ignorance of a fact) is treated in avidya.md
- [Mithyā](mithya.md) — brahma-jñāna reveals the mithyā status of the world and the jīva's apparent individuality; Vivekacūḍāmaṇi's triple-definition of brahma-jñāna is: Brahman is sat, world is mithyā, jīva is Brahman
- [Śabda / Āgama (pramāṇa)](shabda-pramana.md) — the Mahāvākyas of the apauruṣeya Upaniṣads are the unique pramāṇa for brahma-jñāna; no other pramāṇa can reach Brahman-as-subject
- [Svataḥprāmāṇya](svatahpramanya.md) — Mahāvākyas are self-validating (svataḥprāmāṇya) because they are apauruṣeya; their authority to deliver brahma-jñāna is intrinsic
- [Bādha / Bādhita](badha-badhita.md) — brahma-jñāna is the event that bādhita-s the vyāvahārika world's apparent independent reality; the highest bādha in the Advaita ontology
- [Aparokṣa-anubhūti](aparoksha-anubhuti.md) — the immediate, non-mediated realization that constitutes brahma-jñāna proper; to be built next; the distinction parokṣa/aparokṣa defines when jñāna has actually occurred vs. when it is still conceptual
- [Pramā](prama.md) — the result of an ordinary pramāṇa-event; veridical cognition at the vyāvahārika level; to be distinguished from brahma-jñāna, which transcends the pramāṇa-triad structure

## Audience Metaphor

Consider the difference between studying a map of your home city and suddenly recognizing — from a hillside on a clear morning — that the city you grew up in is right there below you. Both involve 'knowing' where the city is. The map-knowledge is indirect, mediated, representational — parokṣa. The hillside recognition is immediate, unmistakable, direct — aparokṣa. But brahma-jñāna is stranger than either: it is the recognition that the hillside, the city, the morning, and the one recognizing are all expressions of a single reality — Brahman — and that the 'you' seeing was never separate from what is seen. What is recognized is not a new fact but the always-already truth that was obscured by the superimposition (adhyāsa) of a separate self in a real external world. The recognition does not produce a new experience; it removes the identification that made the sense of separation possible.

## Citations

1. [Vivekacūḍāmaṇi](/references/vivekachudamani.md) vv.56–57 (Śaṅkara) — the triple-definition of what brahma-jñāna establishes: brahma satyam (Brahman alone is real), jagan mithyā (the world is mithyā), jīvo brahmaiva nāparaḥ (the jīva is Brahman and nothing else); the most cited formulation of the content and consequence of brahma-jñāna
2. [Brahmasūtra Bhāṣya](/references/brahmasutra-bhasya.md) 1.1.4 (Śaṅkara) — establishing jñāna as the sole means of liberation: avidyā is cognitive in nature (adhyāsa); karma produces merit and demerit but cannot remove ignorance because it operates within the frame produced by avidyā; only jñāna — specifically brahma-jñāna delivered by Mahāvākyas via śravaṇa-manana-nididhyāsana — can remove the root cause
3. [Muṇḍaka Upaniṣad](/references/mundaka-upanishad.md) 3.2.9 — 'brahma-vid brahmaiva bhavati': the knower of Brahman becomes Brahman; encodes the non-dual structure of brahma-jñāna: knowing Brahman is not knowing an external object (which would leave the knower-known duality intact) but recognizing one's own nature as Brahman; the knowledge-event and the known are non-different from the knower
4. [Taittirīya Upaniṣad](/references/taittiriya-upanishad.md) 2.1 — 'satyaṃ jñānam anantaṃ brahma': Brahman is defined as jñāna (along with truth and infinity); jñāna here is ontological — it names what Brahman is by nature, not a cognition that takes Brahman as object; grounds the Advaita position that brahma-jñāna is not cognition-of-Brahman-as-object but recognition-as-Brahman
