From Shankara’s commentary on Gaudapada’s Karika (from Sw Nikhilananda’s translation):
II.32: “Though Atman is by nature pure and non-dual, yet It is not aware of Its true nature on account of such obstacles as the notions [Venkat: thoughts?] of happiness, unhappiness, corporeality, etc superimposed by ignorance. The purpose of scripture is to remove these illusory notions; thus it serves a negative purpose. This is accomplished when scriptures describe Atman as neti, neti. Thus dissociating from Atman such adjectives as happy or unhappy, which would make It an object, scripture indirectly helps to establish It as the eternal subject. The negation of attributes reveals the real nature of Atman”
II.36: “As non-duality, on account of its being the negation of all evils, is bliss and fearlessness, therefore knowing it to be such, direct your mind to the realisation of the on-dual Atman”
Note here that Gaudapa and Shankara, both differentiate between knowledge of what Atman is (which has been defined as negation of all notions, rather than any positive knowledge) and its realisation.
Then there is Shankara’s commentary on Brhadaranyaka Upanishad II.iv.12 (from Sw Madhavananda’s translation):
“That separate existence of yours, which has sprung up from the delusion engendered by contact with the limiting adjuncts of the body and organs, enters its cause, the great Reality, the Supreme Self, which stands for the ocean . . . When that separate existence has entered and merged in its cause, in other words, when the differences created by ignorance are gone, the universe becomes one without a second.”
“These elements, transformed into the body, organs and sense-objects, from which the self comes out as an individual . . . are merged like rivers in the ocean, by the realisation of Brahman through the instruction of the scriptures and the teacher, and are destroyed. And when they are destroyed like the foams and bubbles of water, this individualised existence too is destroyed with them . . . After attaining (this oneness) the self, freed from the body and organs, has no more particular consciousness . . . How can the knower of Brahman, who is established in his nature as Pure Intelligence, possibly have any such particular consciousness? Even when a man is in the body, particular consciousness is sometimes impossible (e.g. as in deep sleep); so how can it ever exist in a man who has been absolutely freed from the body and organs? So said Yajnavalkya – propounded this philosophy of the highest truth to his wife, Maitreyi”
Note in the latter part of this quote the absence of ‘particular consciousness” being described in similar terms to the absence of objects/perceptions/thoughts in deep sleep.
Would welcome thoughts from traditional vedantins on your interpretation of this vis a vis the previous discussion on jnana being simply knowledge that is gained by a mind, rather than dissolution of all knowledge.