matarisvan

 

You seem to be right somewhere, but some of your beliefs such as " Parashurama, Rama and Krishna were born on this planet lived here and died here," clarifies your immaturity in the field of sprituality.. against to your claim here is a verse from yamakabharthja written by Sripada Madhwa

 

 

 

<CENTER>

reme gopIshhvarihA sa manmathAkrAntasundarIpIshhvarihA |

pUrNA.anandaikatanuH sa vishvarukpAvano.ayapyanandaikatanuH || 22||</CENTER>Lord Krishna is of fully blissful body.He incarnates in several forms only to give pleasure to others.He is the remover of all diseases.And He is the Destroyer of Sankhacudasura.Still He enjoyed without any attachment,the company of lovely cowherdesses who had been affected by passion and in whom Goddess Lakshmi was residing.

 

 

 

All of Lord's incranations are same and equal in thier potencies,, one should not degrade one incarnation against the other.. This was said by Sripada Madhwa...

 

Hari bol

 

Who is degrading avatars? Read my posts once more.

 

The people here have no idea what an avatar means. I was illustrating the meaning of an avatar by explaining the concept of Vishnu in Vaikunta coming down to earth for a finite period of time as Rama or Krishna. Seeing the responses I doubt these people are capable of understanding anything.

 

Instead of acknowledging the simple truth of the avatar list found commonly everywhere people are avouding the issue and posting stupid responses. Someone came up with an avatar list which has some Baladeva in place of Krishna. If you have a counter argument for the standard avatar list then post a proper response with justification. If you do not have anything meaningful why are you wasting your time on this thread?

 

According to Jayadeva Goswami's Dasavatara Stotra the 10 avatars are the following:

 

Matsya

Kurma

Varaha

Narasimha

Vamana

Parashurama

Rama

Baladeva

Buddha

Kalki

 

Your list is wrong!

 

I do not know who Jayadeva is. I do not know who Baladeva is. But the name does not appear in the list of avatars in the Mahabharata or any of the Puranas. The eight avatar is Krishna.

 

It appears you have been misguided very badly by some unethical people. For your own good read authentic texts which have not been mistranslated. You will find out for yourself that Krishna is the eight avatar of Vishnu.

 

Parashurama, Rama and Krishna were born on this planet lived here and died here. Shriman Narayana or Vishnu was never born and never lived on this planet. His abode is Vaikunta and when he came to the earth he came as one of the avatars.

 

Amazing!!!

 

Of course, being a fan of Shakespeare, who often took liberties with his mother tongue (inventing words and using words in novel ways), I wouldn't care one bit if Srila Prabhupada used meanings not found in *any* dictionary. He was being guided by the Lord from within.

 

Wrong example. Shakespeare was not translating someone else's work. If he was translating he had no liberty to invent new meanings to misread the original.

 

Your defense is comical. Your are saying the Lord used a word incorrectly when he wrote the Bhagavatam. Now he appeared in Prabhupada's heart and revealed this incorrect usage which was reported by Prabhupada in his translation.

 

Either the Lord was incorrect or Prabhupada was incorrect. Pick one.

 

The translation is incorrect, alright. But then, this is not uncommon in Hare Krishna literature. There are instances where they tried to interpret certain Upanishads completely out of context to mean predictions of avatarhood of Chaitanya, etc. If you use the search feature, you may find connected topics. However, right or wrong, the fact that this literature is certified by Prabhupada is good enough for them as most of them are westerners lacking sanskrit knowledge and more importantly they lack knowledge of Hinduism to be aware of mainstream beliefs. They mostly come from Christian backgrounds and are more interested in aligning their Hare krishna beliefs with the bible than with established streams of Vaishnavism.

 

I will not waste my time trying to correct them. If they are interested, they can find someone who knows sanskrit and find out for themselves.

 

I cannot accept a false translation just because it was written by my Guru.

 

Srimad-Bhagavatam 11.6.16:

tvattaH pumAn samadhigamya yayAsya vIryaM

dhatte mahAntam iva garbham amogha-vIryaH

so 'yaM tayAnugata Atmana ANDa-kozaM

haimaM sasarja bahir AvaraNair upetam

 

tvattaH--from You; pumAn--the puruSa-avatAra, MahA-ViSNu; samadhigamya--obtaining; yayA--along with which (material nature); asya--of this creation; vIryam--the potential seed; dhatte--He impregnates; mahAntam--the mahat-tattva, the raw amalgamation of matter; iva garbham--like an ordinary fetus; amogha-vIryaH--He whose semen is never wasted; saH ayam--that same (mahat-tattva); tayA--with the material nature; anugataH--joined; AtmanaH--from itself; ANDa-kozam--the primeval egg of the universe; haimam--golden; sasarja--produced; bahiH--on its outside; AvaraNaiH--with several coverings; upetam--endowed.

 

My dear Lord, the original puruSa-avatAra, MahA-ViSNu, acquires His creative potency from You. Thus with infallible energy He impregnates material nature, producing the mahat-tattva. Then the mahat-tattva, the amalgamated material energy, endowed with the potency of the Lord, produces from itself the primeval golden egg of the universe, which is covered by various layers of material elements.

 

 

What a funny and incorrect translation! Did you write this yourself or did you copy it from someone?

 

This verse is praising Vishnu as the supreme source of power where puman means Purusha or the male aspect of creation. You are translating puman to 'the original puruSa-avatAra, MahA-ViSNu'and completely twisting the verse to mean something else.

 

Why dont you learn sanskrit and come back in a year or two?

Go to a Vaishnava forum like dvaita or ramanuja and ask them if you do not believe me. Many people there know sanskrit and will point out the same error in your translation. The Bhagavatam never says Krishna is the source of Vishnu. Only an unknown book like Brahma Samhita will make such a false statement.

 

No that is not correct. The three Vishnu's that the mahat-tattva of Maha-vishnu - Karanodakasiayi-vishnu, Garbodakasayi-vishnu and Ksirodakasiayi-vishnu (Paramatma), all are expansions of Many Hindu's believe Krishna is the seventh incarnation of Vishnu, that is nonsense and incorrect as the Brahma Samhita tells us

When Krishna comes to the material world for sport to kill demons, he manifests as His Vishnu form with the bodily appearance of Krishna (there is no difference) while the original Krishna remains in Goloka Vrndavan and never leaves His pastimes.

 

 

You are the one who is posting nonsense. Who has heard of the Brahma Samhita? You are quoting some unknown source to reject the widely accepted version of Vishnu and his avatars.

 

Maybe you are not from India and do not know these things. You can read the Mahabharata, Vishnu Purana and the Bhagavatam to learn more about Vishnu's avatars.

 

Hare Krsna!

 

I heard in this forum that all incarnation of God comes from Paramatma, what does it really mean?

 

According to Vaishnava traditions Vishnu descends from his abode Vaikunta several times in different forms to protect the righteous. Ten avatars of Vishnu are specially noted and classified. They are

 

Matysa (fish)

Varaha (boar)

Kurma (tortoise)

Narasimha (half human, half lion)

Vamana (Brahmin dwarf and first human form)

Parashurama (Brahmin warrior)

Rama

Krishna

Buddha

Kalki (yet to arrive)

 

Agreed. It is a term so laden with a confusing mish mash of beliefs and traditions as to be meaningless.

 

Agreed...if you will in turn agree to the follwing.

 

Vaishnava - It is a term so laden with a confusing mish mash of beliefs and traditions as to be meaningless. (Sri, Shuddha, Gaudiya, ..............no one agrees with the other)

 

Christian - It is a term so laden with a confusing mish mash of beliefs and traditions as to be meaningless (Catholic, protestant, Jehovah, .....countless)

 

Muslim - It is a term so laden with a confusing mish mash of beliefs and traditions as to be meaningless (Shiya, Sunni....they kill each other)

 

Hare Krishna - It is a term so laden with a confusing mish mash of beliefs and traditions as to be meaningless (iskcon camp, babaji camp, ....everyone disgarees with everyone else)

 

If we can accept all of the above, then in the same spirit we can also accept Hindu is an inadequate term. If not, then Hindu is perfectly valid... no matter what some idiots from India may have blabbered about it in America and allowed this nonsense to propogate among some dense westerners.

 

I really do not like that word Hinduism. Devotees of Krishna are NOT 'Hindu'

 

Historically the word Hindu comes from the invaders who invaded India, most recently the Muslims in the 7th Century. They could not pronounce the word Indus, referring to the river and it eventually became Hindus the Hindu. This word is not found in Sanskrit.

 

The religious name for the followers of Krishna consciousness is Sanatan Dharm “Sanatan” means original, universal, eternal and is used as “Sanatan Dharm”, the ancient name for those who follow the eternal Vedas and worship Krishna and Vishnu

 

Liking and disliking words is entirely personal.

 

The problem however is "Sanatana Dharma" is not found in sanskrit either. Ironically this allegedly ancient name is not even a couple of hundred years old. Many prefer to use Hindu which is much older than Sanatana Dharma.

 

And what about those who worship Shiva, Ganesha, Durga and the countless Gods in India? These people far outnumber Vaishnavas. What name do you want to give them?

There is no evidence for Krishna either.

 

You say proof is secondary to teaching...but what is the value of the teaching if the source is spurious?

Mithra the powerful Sun God worshipped in that region before Christianity was born to a virgin and his birthday was celebrated on December 25th. Sounds familiar?

 

There is no independent evidence for Jesus outside the Bible. In Paul's letters he never mentions Jesus as someone who lived on earth and died recently. His Jesus is a spiritual figure with whom he communicates at a spiritual level. Fast forward a little bit and what have we? Suddenly a Jesus is created who lived as a human and was killed by Romans.

 

The authors of the new testament took Paul's spiritual Jesus and modeled a human out of existing stories such as Mithra and other unknown prophets of that time.

 

And what evidence do you have that early Christians were any different? History says Christianity has been a violent religion putting down opponents by any means necessary to acquire and maintain total domination. If Christians were always narrow and parochial, where is your logic in trying to defend the bible?

 

The roots of this violent outlook are in the Bible - preaching narrow exclusive status to Christians and condemning non-Christians aka idolators. This intolerant approach moulded the minds of Christians - then and now - to render them incapable of accepting the possible validity of any religion other than their own. Hardly makes sense to separate the bible from its followers and condemn only the followers. I do not have to quote those verses as everyone knows them and they are unequivocal as can be - much as you would like to pretend they do not exist.

 

Christians and Muslims - who together form the majority of the world's population do not consider anyone outside their own fold as theists. For instance, it does not matter if the Hare Krishna gave up everything to live a religious life centered around Krishna worship. In the eyes of the two dominant religions, the Hare Krishna is worshipping a false God and is hell bound. In their eyes the Hare Krishna is an atheist. There is nothing in the bible to challenge this position.

 

Of course, we live in a global world today and confrontation is not like what it was a few centuries ago. Today though a lily white conservative may not like to eat at a restaurant which serves other races, there is not much he or she can do about it. It is a "smile and look happy" thing. Similar facades are necessary for religion too. So if the Christian does not condemn a Hindu for idolatary and worshipping false Gods, it does not mean those thoughts are not running in his or her mind.

 

In short, as far as a Christian or a Muslim is concerned, you are an atheist. This is not something he or she makes up, it comes straight from the Bible, much as you dislike to hear that. Your attempts to reinterpret other religions to suit your Hare Krishna beliefs are of no value to anyone but to yourself. The link between the two exist only in your mind and exists only because you want it to exist.

 

Cheers

 

Modern Christians are better than Christians of the past. A Hindu worshipping images and singing bhajans in a Christian country would have been stoned to death.

you are talking about the numbers. there are more islam & christians while comparing to hindus. Taking globally only in india hinduism are followed whereas most of the worldly population following islam & christainity. Just becuase of huge mass follwers, we cannot declare hinduism is false & islam/christanity are truth.

I agree with you. You will also agree similarly that because you are a vaishnava you cannot declare vaishnavism is true and everything else is false.

similarly, just becuase vaishnavam has small number of followers while compated to advaithins or shaivam, it is wrong to tell vaishnavam is false or advaitha/shaivam is truth.

Currently you are the one making such statements in support of vaishnavism.

But still no shaiva or advaithin acharya cannot able to defeat even a single vaishnava acharya.

Only because you are ignorant of life outside your vaishnava circle. advaitins will run circles around vaishnava logic any day of the week. As someone already pointed out, vaishnava schools have been existing for 100s of years and they have not scratched the surface of advaita. the proof is in the pudding...if advaita was logically fallible it would have disappeared just like buddhism and purva mimamsa. But vaishnavism miserably failed to break Advaita. They make up stories of how their logic is superior , but keep silent on why they failed to rise above Advaita with their superior logic. Just a bunch of losers who are not willing to accept their place in the world. The dvaita web site refutes your statement of four authorized vaishnava sampradayas. only iskcon makes this claim. The quotes they provide to support their claim are bogus quotes which means you have been a victim of false propoganda.

 

It is the evolution of the soul we see in the fossil record - the soul passing through 8,400,000 species of life.

 

The scientist will tell you that religion has no place in science. But please will they finally accept that science has no place in religion.

 

Sir,

 

What kind of argument is that? Which scientist claimed science has a place in religion to begin with? It is people of religion who try to introudce religion into scence. Scientists are only interested in pointing out faulty logic used by religious people to distort science.

 

 

Science cannot answer the question 'why' - that is religion. When they start speculating about about why evolution happens they are no longer scientists. They become cranks.

 

Religion answers the question of 'why', a question not answered by science? What is the answer? I know 2 answers

 

1. Krishna wanted to play games

2. The Hebrew God got bored and wanted company

 

You are accusing science of not coming up with such naive answers? Well...alright. Your reasoning may make perfect sense in your own world but it makes no sense to me at all.

 

Hello Everybody,

 

I need your valuable veiws in understanding a strange predicament I am facing. Recently I bought a 4 armed Nataraj statue- made of bronze. I wanted to worship the shiva image as its Shravan month. Shiva is my ishta deva and I chant the rudram and offer my humble prayers to him. Since this idol has been installed on my pedestal- I have had strange incedences in my personal life. There was a turmoil in my mind..a strange restlessness.. this affected my communication and personal skills. I had verbal altercations with my closest friends for some inane reasons ..and then i had misunderstandings happening in my work place...my solutions were interpreted incorrectly and people thought that i wasnt keen in working on the project and in due time I was laid off from the project.

 

My parents in india consulted an astrologer who said that its because of the idol - these problems started occuring and suggested that i no longer worship or do any sort of puja to the idol.

 

could anyone of you bhakta's solve or help me understand this situation?

 

Should I chant the rudram at all ? if yes..then please tell me the correct way so that i chant without offending the lord.

 

or should I just give up all my chantings and japa of gayatri?

 

Please advise. I humbly beseech you to advice me...any words any suggestions/ critiques comments are welcome..I am at my wits end and shocked as to why such a thing would happen

 

As Ever in service

Zeph

 

Dear Zeph,

 

For proper effect, mantras should not be chanted without initation. Were you properly initiated into the Rudram? If you have not received formal initiation into the Gayathri and the Rudram my advise is to discontinue chanting until you are properly initiated.

 

You can continue to worship Rudra and pray to him.

I am a background lurker and generally appreciate your logic, but I see some problems with this one.

 

 

A common excuse people come up with, when they cannot answer the question. In the Gita Krishna says he follows Dharma because what a great man does, others follow. He has to set an example by being the example. If an avatar has to have any meaning, his actions should be easily understood by the common public. Else, why bother with the concept? He can just wave his wand from above and fix everything he would have fixed as an avatar.

This line of thinking does not seem to apply to the below case...

 

Rama killed Vali from hiding simply because he had not the ability to face Vali in <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" /><st1:City w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Battle</st1:place></st1:City> (no one did). As Vali is dying, he criticizes Rama for his shameful behavior. Rama skirts the topic and instead digresses. Anyway, in his next avatar as <st1:place w:st="on">Krishna</st1:place>, he is killed by a hunter in a similar fasion to atone for that deviation from proper conduct.

By your logic, the avatar failed to adhere to his principles. He says (as <st1:place w:st="on">Krishna</st1:place>) he follows Dharma because people will copy his actions, but as Rama he deviates from the path by killing Vali from hiding.

 

The conclusion? His act of killing Vali from hiding was not Dharma and was incorrect. It is not an example for other to follow suit.

Does not add up to your previous logic. You are now saying an avatar does not always follow Dharma which contradicts the Gita statement of an avatar always following Dharma.

However, you are correct that the dying Vali criticizes Rama for impropriety and Rama provides a long justification on why Vali deserved to be killed, he fails to justify his act of killing Vali from hiding instead of direct combat. Rama even tells Vali he is incapable of comprehending Dharma as he is only a monkey! We are not monkeys and it is clear to us that Rama made a mistake and Vali's criticism was justified.

Your position falters because you see Rama as an avatar and thereby you establish a link with <st1:place w:st="on">Krishna</st1:place> the avatar. Factually, the Ramayana does not see Rama as an avatar except in the first and last books. In the intermediate, Rama is a normal human like anyone else. Critics say when the Vaishnavas took over the Ramayana, they could not tamper with existing material as the Ramayana was already popular and was widespread. They made Rama an avatar by adding extra books to the Ramayana.

If Rama is seen as a human, then many things from the Ramayana fall into place. When he sends Sugriva to engage Vali in combat, he fails to kill Vali the first day of the combat. He then tells Sugriva, he could not do it because both monkeys looked alike and he had no way of knowing which of them to kill. The next day, Sugriva wears an identifier to solve the problem of identification. The other common criticism about this section is in some cases the Vanaras are shown as highly evolved creatures living in palaces and nothing less than humans. Some other times, they are just monkeys living in the forest. When Vali talks to Rama, he describes himself as a monkey living and wandering in forests.