The Many Faces of The One

"Ekam Sat Vipraa Bahudaa Vadanti"

(Truth is One; Sages Call it by Many Names)

-- Rigveda

Imagine a prism held up to the light. The pure, white beam passes through, and on the other side, a spectrum of colors bursts forth—each one distinct, yet each a part of the same light. The colors didn’t come from nowhere; they were always contained within that one beam, waiting to be seen. Likewise, the prism doesn’t create the diversity, it simply reveals what was already there, hidden in plain sight. This is the dance of the “one” and the “many,” an interplay that spans across philosophies, faiths, and worldviews.

We often spend our lives focused on just one color, convinced it holds the entire truth. The devout believer may see only a bright red—passionate, singular, and absolute—claiming the truth of one God. The seeker of wisdom might contemplate the many hues in deep blue, each color a different path towards understanding, like the gods of polytheism. The mystic, bathed in indigo, claims there is no separation at all, that it’s all just different shades of the same thing: the oneness of Advaita. Then there’s the skeptic, whose lens shows no light or color, but perhaps a transparency, an openness to question if the colors were ever there to begin with.

But all these perspectives are still part of that same light. They are refracted truths.

The colors, in all their variety, don’t betray the oneness of the light; they are its expressions. The red is not more “right” than the blue, nor is the green closer to the truth than the yellow. Each one allows us to glimpse a different side of what it means to exist and search for meaning. The prism didn’t break the light; it showed us just how expansive that light is. The seeming conflict between dualism and non-dualism, between monotheism and polytheism, even between belief and skepticism, becomes a question of where we choose to look, not whether the light itself is real.

Yet, there’s a curious paradox here: To say “all is one” is not to flatten out the diversity into a bland sameness. Instead, it’s to recognize that the colors are not separate from the light but are one with it. They are inseparable expressions of the same source. Even the skeptic, who sees no light, may inadvertently reveal another dimension of the prism’s magic—one where the “nothingness” becomes an unspoken color of its own, an empty space that somehow gives shape to the others.

In Dvaita, the world appears as dual: the divine and the individual seem separate. It’s like seeing the prism from one angle where red and blue appear as distinct beams. But as we shift our perspective towards Advaita, we realize that these colors were never truly separate; they were all part of the light from the beginning, just different expressions emerging from how the prism bends and refracts the beam. The many can be seen as paths, not as ends. They guide us back to the singular light that’s always there—often unnoticed in its simplicity.

Even when it comes to monotheism, the idea of a singular deity, it’s not that far removed from recognizing the oneness beyond form. The idea of “one God” can be seen as the pure white light itself, while the many deities of polytheism are the spectrum that unfolds when that light passes through the prism. The divine expresses itself in countless ways, but the origin remains singular and unified. Thus, to speak of the "one" or the "many" is just to change the angle at which we look at the same light source.

And what of atheism, you might ask? Isn’t atheism a rejection of this entire picture, denying the light’s very existence? Not necessarily. If anything, atheism can be viewed as the act of dismantling the prism, stripping away the filters that make the colors appear at all. The irony is, in doing so, it may end up revealing the same pure, formless light—without the distraction of colors, without the need for any distinctions. The search for truth, even in atheism, might lead to that same realization: that there’s something fundamentally unbroken about the universe. The colors were interpretations, perceptions, but not illusions; they were the prism’s offering, not an indication that the light was ever divided.

So, what does all this mean for us as we try to live meaningful lives, amidst differing beliefs and worldviews? It means that to appreciate the whole light, we don’t need to deny any color. We can explore the red and the blue, engage with the deep greens, question the transparency, and accept that each viewpoint, while partial, belongs to a greater whole. The point isn’t to choose between Dvaita and Advaita, monotheism or atheism, but to recognize that they’re all different paths around the same mountain, different angles through which we experience the fullness of being.

By embracing the dance between “one” and “many,” we begin to see that our paths needn’t be limited by dogma or rigid thought. Instead, they can be expressions of the freedom that comes from recognizing that the entire spectrum belongs to us, not just one shade. We don’t need to strip away the colors to see the light, nor do we need to ignore the light to appreciate the depth of each color. We can hold the paradox, walk the contradictions, and understand that life, in all its varied hues, is pointing us back to the same truth: that all is one, and yet, within that oneness, there is space for endless diversity.

The prism has always been there. The light has always been there. And as long as we live in this world of forms and perceptions, the colors will be there too. We can look at them with a fresh gaze, not as opposing truths, but as complementary expressions of the same light that illuminates us all.

-- Pradeep K (Prady)