Sonic Yogi

Good point, but that still doesn't change the fact that Mahaprabhu put all emphasis on Srimad Bhagavatam. Whenever someone came to see Mahaprabhu for guidance, Svarupa Damodar would tell them all to study the Bhagavatam under the guidance of a person Bhagavat. Baladeva took up that task as an effort to support the authenticity of the Gaudiya sampradaya, yet that still did not make Vedanta-sutra the recommended reading for students of Gaudiya Vaishnavism. It was for the Vedantists, for their benefit. It was not for the devotees. The Vaishnavas already had the commentary and explanation of Vedanta-sutra by Vyasadeva in the form of Srimad Bhagavatam. Baladeva Vidyabusana commented on Vedanta-sutra but that still is not near as important for devotees as Srimad Bhagavatam.

It has to do with the fact that you must have a guru in disciplic succession to explain what Vyasadeva wrote. You can't just barge willy nilly into the Vedanta-sutras without a guru and claim to know what Vyasadeva meant in the Vedanta-sutras. You need an acharya to explain them to you. Who is your guru in succession from Vyasadeva that has explained the Vedanta-sutra to you? Do you think that knowing Sanskrit alone is qualification for knowing the meaning of Vedanta-sutras?

The flaw in the first post of this topic presumes that there is no past or future in the spiritual world but that there is a "present" time. If people would just read the books of Srila Prabhupada they would also find that Srila Prabhupada says there is no past, PRESENT or future in the spiritual world. So, the answer of Hari Sauri is flawed in that he is working off the premise that there is only "PRESENT" time in the spiritual world when in fact there is not PRESENT time in the absolute because time has no effect in the spiritual world. The spiritual world is divided by the different lilas of the Lord, not by time. So, there is no past lila, present lila or future lila because all the lilas are going on eternally. So, obviously, Hari Sauri is also confused as he operates on the notion that there is a "PRESENT" time in the spiritual world when in fact there is NOT. There is no material time there. There is no PRESENT time either. Put that in your pipe and smoke it. There is no past lila, present lila or future lila in the spiritual world. They all exist simultaneously eternally. That is why the conception of time does not exist in the spiritual world.

So, there is no guru between you and Vyasadeva that has explained to you the meaning of the Sutras? Did Mahaprabhu and his chief disciples teach everyone to study Vedanta-sutra?

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Jim Croce - Time in a Bottle.....

I am going to ignore what you say it says because I don't blindly accept as absolute truth things that anonymous people on forums are posting. You could be chewing on a sausage and washing it down with whiskey as far as I know. Why should I accept your claim to know the meaning of Brahma-sutra? Do you always expect people on forums to blindly accept everything you post anonymously in an arrogant attitude? As I said before, if the jiva didn't falldown to the material world from the brahmajyoti he certainly fell down once he got here, so either way, the jiva fell down. Consciousness was pure in the beginning. I already quoted that evidence from the Bhagavat. When the jiva came into prakriti he was originally pure and then he fell into the karmic cycle upon entering the material energy.

I was a "fallvadi" for several years. I of course was an ISKCON devotee for several years and partook of the myth. My thinking underwent some changes as I studied more and also got some association with devotees outside ISKCON. I am far from a finished professor. I try to keep learning and growing. I know the myth is an old ISKCON myth. But, I don't believe it anymore.

Srila Prabhupada never authorized the gathering together of all his personal letters to disciples into a central depository to be used as a resource for establishing the Gaudiya siddhanta. Letters were many times fashioned according to the level of the disciple. The letters should never have been gathered together into a book and distributed to the whole movement like shastra. I don't think Srila Prabhupada would have approved of doing that. Anytime we find a contradiction between the letters and the books, I think it would be only right to give preference to the books. I stopped reading the letters years ago. I don't even bother to read any of them anymore. I think it can lead to some misunderstanding as we see evident with these internet discussions of siddhanta.

I read the books a lot and I find that both angles are presented in different places. There is something for both parties in the books. Either party can find some support for their theory. I think Srila Prabhupada wanted something for all classes of men in the books. He attempted to nurture both classes of believer. That confuses some readers. Some readers just see it all as a lot of crazy contradiction and they go elsewhere for siddhanta. I just see it as Srila Prabhupada trying to foster the faith in everyone no matter which way of thinking they intuitively think about the issues. It can be a little exasperating, but we have to try and see the good will behind everything Srila Prabhupada taught.

As far as the "fall theory" advocated by Srila Prabhupada, I have learned not to take everything he says as literal fact because in fact I think such theories are metaphorical fables fabricated for the consumption of the passengers on board Kali yuga Airlines. In the books of Srila Prabhupada "anadi" always means "beginningless" when it refers to the Lord, but it always means "since time immemorial" when it refers to the conditioned living entities. Prabhupada apparentely felt he needed to slightly modify the siddhanta and soften some of the rhetoric of the Vedic shastra. So, I don't take everything Prabhupada said literally. There is evidence that he in fact used metaphor, fables and tales in his preaching to us lowly western people. That's fine, but I think in time that approach has become somewhat of a burden on ISKCON as other Gaudiya sects come out and challenge some of the ISKCON myths.

Like I said in my last post. I don't believe living entities fall into the material world. They are impregnated into prakriti by a power beyond them. They fall down after they get here. They don't fall down to get here. Otherwise, as has been established there would be no meaning to the Vedic concept of karma being "anadi".

The shastra says quite definitively that the living entities are impregnated into prakriti. To me that does not convey any concept of any being falling down but of living beings being conceived as are the words of Srila Prabhupada "living entities are conceived" by Lord Siva in the womb of Durga. I don't consider that living entities fall down to the material energy, but they fall down after they get here.

A Vedabase search produces these as the only occasions where "tatastha" appears in the books of Srila Prabhupada.

Lord Siva impregnates Durga with us the little jivas. We don't fall here. We are impregnated into matter by Lord Siva. Siva is our daddy. CC Madhya 20.273 purport:

In fact, the Gaudiya texts do say that the living entity has been involved in this karma in terms of "anadi". In places regarding anadi referring to the Supreme Lord, it always means "beginningless" as in absolute beginningless. When anadi is used in terms of the living entity being involved in material existence Srila Prabhupada translates it as "since time immemorial". So, is this a case of Srila Prabhupada trying soften the siddhanta for better ease of reception by his western audience, or does "anadi" not always mean absolute beginningless? Here again, we might have some evidence that Srila Prabhupada indeed softened the tone of the shastric conclusions to make things more understandable for the audience that he was trying to reach. But, then again, if he did not foresee that future teachers might come along and say that "anadi" always means absolute beginningless, he was setting his books and ISKCON up for criticism and the situation of being dated and outdated. Does anadi always mean absolute beginningless? If so, did Srila Prabhupada modify the siddhanta thinking that western people should hear a softened version of the truth as given in the Vedic texts? I am certainly open to that possibility and see evidence in how ISKCON has failed so many followers of Srila Prabhupada and come to be a splinter in the side of the Gaudiya culture.

Here are all the references to "anadi" that can be found in the Bhagavad-gita, Srimad Bhagavatam and Sri Caitanya Caritamrita. So , the readers can study them for themselves and make their own conclusion.

Well, Vyasadeva gave Srimad Bhagavatam as the commentary on Vedanta Sutra because the codes of the sutras are easily speculated upon and misconstrued. So, I am not concerned really with the Brahma-sutra. I take my spiritual understanding from Srimad Bhagavatam as it has been rendered into my language by the guru that I have accepted. In that Srimad Bhagavatam I am not finding the conclusion that karma is beginningless but is so old and predates the universe that it cannot be traced to a specific date and is therefore called beginningless because it predates even the universe. But, as far as absolute beginningless is concerned I am not finding it in the Bhagavatam as explained by my guru and therefore am not going to accept it just because of some unsubstantiated claims you are making on the forum. You have really failed to prove your claims. You just make assertions and expect everyone to just accept your anonymous conclusions blindly. In fact, here is how we are taught by our guru, despite what you might claim about anything in the Brahma-sutra So, we are taught that karma exists since "time immemorial". That is not exactly the same as "beginningless" as far as I am concerned. im⋅me⋅mo⋅ri⋅al    /ˌɪməˈmɔriəl, -ˈmoʊr-/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [im-uh-mawr-ee-uhl, -mohr-] –adjective extending back beyond memory, record, or knowledge: from time immemorial.

Liberation includes merging into the brahmajyoti. So, to say nitya-siddha does not necessarily imply anything more than impersonal liberation into brahman. Nitya-siddha does not strictly means one of the higher active devotional rasa with Krishna. CC Adi 3.18 Sayujya mukti is in fact the "nitya-siddha" platform from where jivas come down into maya.

I thought the argument was that God is not partial because everyone starts off with no karma? Who is saying that God is unfair because everybody starts off with different karma? God is fair because everyone starts material existence with NO karma and free will to pursue their own karma according to their desire. If everybody starts off with karma, as you say karma has no beginning, then that itself is not fair because the jiva doesn't get a fair chance but has to exist in beginningless karma. If karma is beginningless, then God is very cruel because he didn't give the jiva a fair chance to accept devotional service before he had to accept karma. So, the beginningless karma theory means that God is cruel and not willing to give the jivas a chance before they are dispatched to Maya.