The jiva in itself as limited by its avidya is often spoken of as paramarthika (real), when manifested through the sense and the ego in the waking states as vyavaharika (phenomenal), and when in the dream states as dream-self, pratibha@sika (illusory).

Prakas’atma and his followers think that since ajnana is one there cannot be two separate reflections such as jiva and Is’vara; but it is better to admit that jiva is the image of Is’vara in the ajnana.  The totality of Brahma-cit in association with maya is Is’vara, and this when again reflected through the ajnana gives us the jiva.  The manifestation of the jiva is in the anta@hkara@na as states of knowledge.  The jiva thus in reality is Is’vara and apart from jiva and Is’vara there is no other separate existence of

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Brahma-caitanya.  Jiva being the image of Is’vara is thus dependent on him, but when the limitations of jiva are removed by right knowledge, the jiva is the same Brahman it always was.

Those who prefer to conceive the relation as being of the avaccheda type hold that reflection (pratibimba) is only possible of things which have colour, and therefore jiva is cit limited (avacchinna) by the anta@hkara@na (mind).  Is’vara is that which is beyond it; the diversity of anta@hkara@nas accounts for the diversity of the jivas.  It is easy however to see that these discussions are not of much fruit from the point of view of philosophy in determining or comprehending the relation of Is’vara and jiva.  In the Vedanta system Is’vara has but little importance, for he is but a phenomenal being; he may be better, purer, and much more powerful than we, but yet he is as much phenomenal as any of us.  The highest truth is the self, the reality, the Brahman, and both jiva and Is’vara are but illusory impositions on it.  Some Vedantists hold that there is but one jiva and one body, and that all the world as well as all the jivas in it are merely his imaginings.  These dream jivas and the dream world will continue so long as that super-jiva continues to undergo his experiences; the world-appearance and all of us imaginary individuals, run our course and salvation is as much imaginary salvation as our world-experience is an imaginary experience of the imaginary jivas.  The cosmic jiva is alone the awakened jiva and all the rest are but his imaginings.  This is known as the doctrine of ekajiva (one-soul).

The opposite of this doctrine is the theory held by some Vedantists that there are many individuals and the world-appearance has no permanent illusion for all people, but each person creates for himself his own illusion, and there is no objective datum which forms the common ground for the illusory perception of all people; just as when ten persons see in the darkness a rope and having the illusion of a snake there, run away, and agree in their individual perceptions that they have all seen the same snake, though each really had his own illusion and there was no snake at all.  According to this view the illusory perception of each happens for him subjectively and has no corresponding objective phenomena as its ground.  This must be distinguished from the normal Vedanta view which holds that objectively phenomena are also happening, but that these