Advaita holds that liberation is not achieved but recognized: you are already Brahman and have never been anything else, so no action can produce what already is. Only knowledge (jnana) removes the ignorance. This has an awkward implication the tradition faces directly — if karma cannot liberate, what is ritual for? — and Shankara's answer, that ritual purifies the mind toward the point where the teaching can land, has never fully satisfied his critics.