According to Osho, yes—Shankara is compelled to compromise: by insisting on the absolute and denying the relative, he must still concede maya some status (indescribable, conventional, renunciatory) because it undeniably appears. Speaking of it grants it reality. Krishna, by affirming both absolute and relative together, avoids compromise; integral acceptance dissolves the paradox from the start.
If you deny part of reality, you end up sneaking it back in with clever labels; accepting both the spiritual and the worldly from the start needs no tricks.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, by calling maya “indescribable” (anirvachaniya), isn’t Shankara making a compromise?
Shankara will have to compromise. Whoever insists on a partial truth will have to compromise at some level. Because the other cannot be denied—it is. One has to accept it in some form—call it maya, call it the truth of renunciation (nivritti), call it conventional truth (vyavahar)—give it some name, but somewhere you will have to grant it recognition, because it is. Even Shankara cannot say, “We won’t talk about maya,” because why talk at all about something that does not exist? Yet he has to speak of it. So Shankara has to compromise! Only a man like Krishna is non-compromising. He has no need to compromise, because he accepts both together. He says: both are. Whoever denies one will, at some deeper level, have to make a compromise with the other, the very one he has denied. The one who accepts both has no reason left to compromise; there…
Questioner: is it a kind of compromise on the part of shankara when he says that maya is inexpressible?
Shankara has no choice but to compromise. Whoever insists on an incomplete truth meets with this fate; he has to compromise at one level or another. The other side of reality which he goes on denying will assert itself, because it is very much there. He will have to accept it in one form or another. He will call it maya that is indescribable, he will call it utilitarian truth or the truth that is transient. It does not matter what he calls it, he will have to accept it because it is there. Shankara cannot say that he will not speak about maya. Why should he speak about a thing that does not exist? But he speaks. And then he has to compromise in one way or another. Only a man like Krishna can be uncompromising, he need not compromise. He is uncompromising because he accepts both sides of…
Hence the insistence on dissolving the ego. If I disappear, my shadow disappears. And when I vanish, my shadow vanishes, I merge with Brahman. Not as an “I,” but as a zero I fall into Brahman. What happens to my avidya? When I vanish and merge with Brahman, my avidya merges with maya. I am lost in Brahman; avidya is lost in maya. Whenever I am created again, I emerge out of Brahman; avidya emerges out of maya. Avidya—each of us has received a small allotment of maya. Maya gives sorrow; avidya gives pain—so we want release. Does maya not pain Brahman? Does Brahman not wish to be free? By Brahman I do not mean a person; I mean the vast Existence. Does It not feel pain? Would It not wish to be free? We feel pain, we want release—would Brahman not want release?
Shandilya says: all these statements are right, and yet none is right. His statement is very unique. He says: all that has been said—I–Thou; Thou; I; neither I nor Thou—is right in one sense, from one standpoint; but from only one standpoint. From the rest, it is wrong. Even to say “neither I nor Thou” is not entirely true. If neither remains, why seek such a state at all? If both remain, the world remains—the quarrel of I–Thou persists in subtle form. If one remains, half the truth appears; if the other, still half. These are one-sided views—ways of speaking. They reveal the compulsion to speak, but they do not proclaim the fullness of truth. Shandilya says: ubhayapara—both, and beyond. It is this and that; it is both. There is a saying “neti-neti”; Shandilya says “iti-iti”—this too, that too. All these statements hold some truth.
Shandilya speaks more practically, more logically, plainly, factually: this entire expanse is the expansion of the Divine energy. Maya is his shadow. Understand it this way: maya and Brahman are a pair. That is why devotees made the pair of Radha and Krishna, the pair of Sita and Ram. These pairs are symbols. To devotees, Mahavira standing alone seems incomplete—something is missing. Brahman, yes, but where is maya? Where is the energy? Shiva there—but where is Shakti? It is no accident that devotees have worshiped God in pairs. The pair is a symbol—male and female; Brahman and maya. Is Sita false? As true as Ram is, so true is Sita. To proclaim this with emphasis, see what devotees did: they placed Sita first—Sita-Ram. Radha first—Radha-Krishna. To declare with intensity that maya is not only true, but even prior to Brahman.