kaival advait is incompatible with vyasa and vedas

[dhaa 0]

www.swami-krishnananda.org/brahma/brahma_08a.html

according to the Brahma Sutra -- Jagat vyaparavarjam.....Sri Sankaracharya particularly, who comments on the Brahma Sutra elaborately, is, as I could understand, caught in the net of this kind of statement, because Acharya Sankara, whose commentary is the best, cannot agree that some limitation continues even in liberation! But he cannot say that the Sutra is wrong.

 

Sankaracharya finds himself often in a difficulty of this kind. There are some places where he is between the accepting of the Brahma-Loka Attainment as the meaning of the Sutra and the insisting on the utter absorption in Brahman as true Moksha.

 

If the Sutra is correct, the Identity doctrine of Sankara is not correct; if the Identity doctrine of Sankara is correct, the Brahma Sutra is not correct. But we must consider both as correct. We cannot reject Sankara's idea or reject the Brahma Sutra. Sankara reconciled himself to the feeling that here the Brahma Sutra is not concerned with Nirguna Brahman even when it says in the end, Anavrittih shabdat, Anavrittih shabdat (no return); and that it just means attaining the Cosmic Creator, but not the Absolute

 

A great difficulty arises here in understanding the Sutra's intention. Ramanuja and the Vaishnava Acharyas have no difficulty! They say 'Yes! It is like that only!', because you cannot become God. But Acharya Sankara cannot accommodate himself to it

 

www.swami-krishnananda.org/brahma/brahma_12.html

But Acharya Sankara is at pains to tell us that the God who is described in the Brahma Sutra is a God with many attributes, Saguna Brahman, because it is mentioned that God is He who creates, preserves, and destroys. But it does not say who God is by Himself independent of the activity of creation, preservation, destruction; The essential God is missed, but nobody can dare to say that the Brahma Sutra is not giving the correct information...

 

According to Sankara, the God described in the Brahma Sutra is the Creator God, not the Absolute, -- a position that he maintains which is opposed to every other Acharya's interpretation -- the Ramanuja, Madhva, Nimbarka, Vallabha, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, the Sakta and Saiva philosophers. All these have almost a uniform view; against all which Sankara stands

 

www.swami-krishnananda.org/brahma/brahma_13.html

The Sutra makes out that the liberated soul is free only in so far as it can enjoy the bliss of perfection equally as Brahman, but it cannot have the power of creation, preservation, destruction etc. of the universe...Here the Sutra seems to be landing itself on the qualified monism of Acharya Ramanuja, according to whom the soul is an organic part of Brahman but not identical with Brahman. If we persuade ourselves to believe that the Sutra is sympathetic with the Vaishnava theology of Ramanuja, we can easily understand why the soul in liberation cannot have the power of God Himself. Acharya Sankara here has practically nothing to tell us except to interate that if the soul is given the power of creation, etc., there would be a clash of purposes among the liberated souls. Here again arises the question: are there many liberated souls in the state of Brahman? Acharya Ramanuja would not disagree with this proposition, but Acharya Sankara would find here a hard nut to crack

 

A very pertinent issue arising in the Brahma Sutra is when it defines Anandamaya Brahman, stating that Anandamaya is Brahman...Commentators generally bypass this issue and would not like to enter into any controversy for fear of contradicting the obvious intention of the text and the reasoned conclusions spontaneously coming out of the issue. It was Acharya Sankara alone who had the courage to <font color="brown">disagree</font color> with the Sutra and declare that the Anandamaya cannot be Brahman.

 

...what doctrine is the Brahma Sutra preaching, since Ramanuja would certainly be happy to fully agree with the statement that Anandamaya is Brahman itself. Would a commentator stand against the obvious meaning of the Sutra and contradict it by insisting on a non-dualistic interpretation? </font color>

[Guest guest]

Shri Dhaa

 

 

I do not know why you have picked up, a certain portion of the article that summarizes the challenges Sankaracharya goes through in reconciling apparent contradictions in the Brahma Sutras.

 

That Sankara, could reconcile the apparent contradictions is not pointed out by you at all. Read the following 3 parts (taken from the same article) where there is no re conciliation required since Brahma Sutra is emphatic.

 

First

 

Nobody says 'I am not'. This affirmation of 'I am' is actually the affirmation' of Brahman.

 

'Iha amutra vishaya tyaga' is necessary. ------ Unless the longings for the pleasures of this world as well as the other world are abolished and obliterated completely, one cannot become fit for the knowledge of Brahman.

 

What are the joys of this world? So many sense-enjoyments; ----- Then you are unfit for knowing Brahman, you should not even talk about that word. With these desires that are longings of the earth, touching Brahman would be like touching a dynamite.

 

------ Why not have the longing for the pleasures in heaven? ------' - this desire also should be abandoned. Because the joys of the heaven are only rarefied forms of sense pleasures, that desire also should go. The joys of this world and joys of the other world also must be rejected completely, by discriminative understanding.

 

Second:

 

The idea that the Atman is inside is also to be understood properly in its proper connotation. 'Inside' does not mean 'inside me', 'inside you', etc.; rather it is inside everything. A thing that is inside everything is everywhere. --------- who will comprehend it?

 

----- That which is everywhere includes even the person who tries to know It. So, That which is everywhere cannot be known unless the knower also becomes That. Knowing Brahman is being Brahman. Knowing Reality is being Reality. Thought and Reality coalesce and become Absolute Being. Thus, the Atman is not an 'Anu' or a little spark as sometimes people think.

 

 

Very surprisingly, this is why the Brahma Sutra should not be read by all and everyone; -- it refutes even theology like Vaishnavism, Saivism etc. You will be surprised why it refutes Vaishnavism and Savisism. Towards the end of the second chapter, the Brahma Sutra goes into detail of the impossibility of conceding validity to the Vaishnava concepts -----------.

 

Why does the Brahma Sutra go to that extent of defying the religious beliefs of people? Again, the point is that people are not fit for the knowledge of Brahman, and they should not study the Brahma Sutra in the beginning of the educational process. Prior knowledge of the logic of desires and emotions is necessary.

 

'Vyuha' means a group of divinities. These groups are called Vasudeva, Sankarshana, Pradyumna and Aniruddha. Vasudeva is Lord Krishna. Pradyumna is his son, Aniruddha his grandson and Sankarshana his brother. Vasudeva, Sankarshana, Pradyumna, Aniruddha - these are the categories of divinities, compared to God, individual, mind and ego, according to Vaishnavism.

 

The Brahma Sutra says that there cannot be categories of divinities. It is one indivisible mass, and if Vasudeva produces Sankarshana, Pradyumna, Aniruddha etc., each one will be perishable. That which produces another has an end. A cause that transforms itself into an effect has already undergone a transformation within itself and it has ceased to be a cause; the effect has destroyed the cause.

 

Brahman cannot become Vasudeva, Sankarshana, Pradyumna and Aniruddha unless it modifies itself into these gradations or objects which we are worshipping religiously. When milk transforms itself into the thing called the curd, it cannot be called milk anymore. Then when curd is seen, milk ceases to exist. If you accept this doctrine of the manifestation of vyuhas according to Vasihnava theology, then it would mean that Brahman has modified itself into these vyuhas, as milk has modified itself into curd. Then as curd has destroyed the milk completely, these vyuhas will destroy Brahman also. Therefore, this theology cannot be accepted. For analogous reasons, the Pasupata and Saiva cosmologies are set aside.

 

 

The third

 

The realisation of Brahman is itself the liberation of the soul. Here, knowing Brahman is the same as being Brahman. --------. The known itself is the knower, and the knower is the known. ----------------- appreciate that knowledge of Brahman itself is the being of Brahman, and hence knowledge is not an action. Knowledge is not 'doing' something, but 'being' something. In this context the Brahma Sutra defines Brahman as that from which proceed the creation, preservation and destruction of the universe. It is also said, towards the end of the Brahma Sutra that the knower of Brahman will not return to mortal existence. When we read the initial statement as the definition and the concluding statement as the result thereof, we can gather what the Sutra is actually intending to say. It is evident that the state of Brahman is eternal and unchanging, not involved in the space-time-cause complex. Thus, the authorship of the universe, its sustenance and destruction do not fit well with the non-spatial and eternal nature of Brahman. The promise that the knowledge of Brahman puts an end to the transmigratory nature of the soul would easily demonstrate that the soul that attains freedom in Brahman is not going to be entangled in the process of creation, preservation and destruction, etc. Moksha or liberation has necessarily to be the realisation of the ultimate Absolute which is non-relative in nature. Creation, preservation and destruction etc. are relative processes involved in space and time and hence it could not be that the soul finds its liberation in the God who creates or the Brahman that is busy in the world process.

 

 

I request that please read the article in totality and then ponder.

 

 

The basic clue is that Brahman is independent of the existence of our time-space world.

 

 

 

[dhaa 0]

 

That Sankara, could reconcile the apparent contradictions is not pointed out by you at all

 

 

from my previous post: "Sankara reconciled himself to the feeling that here the Brahma Sutra is not concerned with Nirguna Brahman.."

 

im my opinoin, i dont see kaival adaviat doing any real reconciliation based on vedas siddhanta, just inventing new unvedik concepts to reconcile its philosophy like 'x&y verses apply to sagun brahm' while 'p&q verses apply to nirgun brahm'. sometimes kaival advait is 'reconciling', sometimes disagrees with vedas sometimes agrees, i dont see it as a valid system

 

 

The Brahma Sutra says that there cannot be categories of divinities. It is one indivisible mass, and if Vasudeva produces Sankarshana, Pradyumna, Aniruddha etc., each one will be perishable

 

 

wherein brahma sutras says that? or is it brahma sutra accordin to kaival advait interpretation says that?

[Guest guest]

Read the full article.

[dhaa 0]

bhagavan vyas has given the meaning of all vedas in his vedanta sutra. i dont believe in the kaival advait theory that brahma sutra gives lower teachings. i personally dont believe in a system that disagrees with vyas & vedas, then 'reconciles' its unvedik philosophy by using vedas in support of its disagreement

[dhaa 0]

http://www.hinduismtoday.com/archives/1986/05/1986-05-03.shtml

 

shyamdas of the vallabh school: Shankaracharya's theory of maya is not supported in the Upanishads. It's not supported in the Brahma Sutras and it's not supported in the Vedas - as the world being false, that this world is an illusion, a dream with no substance and in some way separate from God. This is not a Vedantic thought. Even Western scholars who are impartial who have studied the Brahma Sutras and have studied the teachings of Shankara and, let's say one of the Vaishnav teachers, Ramanuja or Madhva - they would have to side with Ramanuja as being more true to the spirit of the Brahma Sutras...

 

Shankara accepted from the Vedas and the Upanishads only things that agreed with his teaching. This is Shankara's style. He has taken only those passages. And the passages which didn't agree he wouldn't comment on. He had a system, and he said "My interpretation is this, and I will only accept those Upanishads or slokas which fit into it."

 

...I think that the concept of Sanatana Dharma is so great that it allows for these things to occur...I may have said something about Shankaracharya, how I don't personally agree with his interpretation, but I respect Shankaracharya...Contradictions can exist within truth, and no one has a turnkey formula. That is one of the most important concepts of Vedantic thought, that the person who says he knows, doesn't know. And the person who says he doesn't know knows. Hinduism is perhaps the only religion in the world that has allowed an incarnation to establish a religion which is anti-Vedic in its actual teachings. What other religion would accept a teacher who taught against their own school?

[Guest guest]

You quoted only a part of the article. Why?

 

I am not interested to know what you think about Sankara and how he falsifies. Why you did it?

 

The truth is God.

[dhaa 0]

i posted it to show even 'advaitins' admit kaival advaita disagrees with vyas & brahm sutra & cant take the direct meaning of brahm sutra

[Guest guest]

So is Ramanuja's Vishitadvaita Vedanta, the interpretation that is the closest to the Vedas, Upanishads and Bhagavad Gita (the sruti's) and hence the most original form of Hinduism?

[Guest guest]

Dear Dhaa,

 

Shankara was the one who refuted the Maya philosophy of Buddhism.

 

He said to the Buddhist arguments: if there is something outside your mind that is percieved as Maya then there has to be something objective on which the perception is based.

 

Maya cannot be of something that simply does not exist outside of one's mind. He questions in the beginning itself that how the perception of outside can arise?

 

Shankara restored Sanatana dharma in India when Jaina and Buddhism had taken roots.

 

Even if I do not agree to Ramanuja and Madhavacharya, I cannot be disrespectful of them. All of them had been outstanding people of God.

 

 

Atanu

 

 

[Guest guest]

The influence of Advaita Vedanta preached by Sri Shankaracharya has pervaded the whole of world. It was this message of Vedanta that Swami Vivekananda, the messenger of Sri Ramakrishna, the harmonizer of all religions, propagated in the east and the West.

The realization of Advaita is the final stage of religious experience. But Shankara never disdained the steps that have to be traversed to attain this stage. It is for this reason that Shankara appears to us an enthusiastic organizer of worship, devotion and rites. He was not merely a monist traversing the path of knowledge. A rare and supreme devotion tempers his entire life and all his writings. The whole of Hinduism is brilliantly and uniquely reflected in the ideals of his life. The effulgent form that he gave to the Sanatana Vedic Dharma may have been dimmed by the passage of time, but it has not been obliterated. The Hindus owe an eternal debt to this teacher whose life span extended over only thirty-two years. He opened up a new and radiant horizon for the spiritual life of India and brought about a revolutionary transformation in her social life.

To call Srimadacharya a mere monist would be to denigrate his personality and his impact. His life in fact appears to be a meeting ground of Advaita, Dvaita and he has gone beyond all these stages to stand effulgent in the radiant light of the self. Rarely among the great does one encounter such harmonization.

Swami Vivekananda has said: " The modern civilized world marvels at the writings of this sixteen year old boy." The modern civilized world is a world of science and reason. Shankara was able to establish the religion of the Vedanta on the firm foundation of science and reason.

http://harsha16.topcities.com

[Guest guest]

Acharya Shankara is one of those god-men who have appeared in the world in historical times in order to establish religion firmly. Shankara's advent took place at a very critical period in the national and in the religious life of India. At that time the Buddhist faith in the Indian sub-continent has passed through many stages of rise and fall for over a thousand years. It had sunk to a condition in which it was not only of absolutely no use for Indian religion and culture, but was positively ruinous. Subjected to the influence of degenerate Buddhism, the eternal Hindu faith had become enfeebled, devastated and disintegrated.

Within two centuries of Acharya's lifetime, India had to encounter the powerful incursion of the Islamic faith. Degenerate Buddhism would not have possessed the vigor to resist the onrush. It was only the immense strength of the Vedic faith, which is eternal and man- made, and is the repository of universal truth, that could stand and did effectively resist the inroad of Islam. The advent, the career, the life work and the teaching of Acharya endowed the Hindu faith with the energy needed for the task ahead of self-defense and survival and ensured the everlasting stability of the Vedic religion by firmly establishing it on very sure foundations. Such a claim for Shankara is amply supported by historical evidence. Has Shankara not come on the scene, it would have been quite within the bounds of possibility that Hinduism got transformed into a veritable Islamistan.

If the Hindus of today can legitimately be proud of their great Vedic religion, it is in no small measure due to the services of this thirty-two year old monk. This needs to be adequately realized by all especially those belonging to man-made cults and sects who dismiss Acharya as a Mayavadi. It is unfortunate that some people indeed have succumbed to falsehood despite of Acharya's efforts. Shankara strengthened the foundations of the eternal Vedic faith to such an extent that the vigor imparted by him was an unfailing support in later years to the work and mission of people like Madhwa, Ramanuja, Nimbaraka etc. this is an undeniable historical fact. In Shankara's life and teaching and propagation lies embedded the immense vitality, which is responsible for the safe preservation and sure sustenance of the eternal Vedic faith.

To designate Shankaracharya as just an upholder of Monism, just like any other sectist Acharya's is a tone down to his gigantic personality and to dilute his contribution. Not in any of his writings does any evidence exist of one-sided outlook, the narrow vision, the vigorlessness, and the incompleteness, which are the characteristics of most of the later preachers and teachers. Indeed Shankara was the greatest, the noblest and the most luminous representative of expansive, universal and all embracing Sanatana Vedic Dharma. All that is sublime, strengthening, glorious in the Vedanta faith as it obtains today is the handiwork of this distinguished monk, and this is true not only in respect of the philosophical aspect of that faith, but also in respect of its practical side. The resplendent story of Sri Acharya's life is a veritable lighthouse illumining the path of the universal Vedic faith.

 

http://harsha16.topcities.com

[Guest guest]

By entrusting the heavy responsibility of the maintenance and propagation of Dharma on an all-renouncing order of monks, freed from worldly responsibilities, the Acharya has put the Sanatana Hindu dharma on a firm foundation. Those who are burdened with worldly responsibilities may find it practice, preservation and propagation of Dharma. The foreseeing sage had accordingly brought his disciples together and setting up Maths or monasteries in different parts of India, gave a concrete shape to this programme. This farsightedness of the Acharya astonishes us. The deep thought that the Acharya gave to the problem of maintaining intact, the beneficent character of Hinduism in accordance with Varnashrama and suited to the requirements of different times and places and the different aptitudes of its adherents, keeping the great far-reaching Vaidika dharma free from all turbidity and rescuing its ideologically ramified structure from erroneous conclusions, giving greater luster to the glory of his life. By rectifying wrong notions and semi-Vedic conclusions of the theories with the exponents of which he came into contact in the course of his triumphal tour all over India, he gave a Vedic character to all doctrines. He also took steps to preserve the distinct character of these doctrines. This reveals strikingly the generous nature of the Acharya.

The Acharya revealed his identity at the special request of King Sudhanva in the following words :

" In the Satya Yuga Brahma was the teacher of the world. in the Treta Yuga, it was Vashista. In Dwapara, Vedavyasa was the great teacher. For Kaliyuga, I am the world's teacher".

The advent and departure of Srimadacharya are both events of past. But his life and message are not set down in the pages of history alone, they have directed the course of Sanatana Dharma and have shed a soft radiance on the inner significance of Vedic Dharma. This becomes clear in the solemn lilting verse with which the Acharya concludes his masterpiece Vivekachudamani.

` Just as a traveler who has lost his way in the desert goes about in futile search of water and getting no trace of it, sinks further into misery, so in this world, man, deluded by illusions and errors, finds no end to his troubles. His whole being seems to be obscured in the blazing sun of worldly preoccupations. Where is the shade? Where is the water that can bring solace? The shade is but truth of Self, the ever-pure, ever-wise and ever-serene. For the person parched by the heat of worldly affairs, the supreme knowledge of the identity between the Brahman and Atman is the cool water'. Glory to this message of the Acharya that shows this eternal majesty of man in his spiritual crisis down the ages.

Even after long centuries, today the mission of Shankara-Bharati is not over. Acharya has not become out of date. Despite the myriad forms of wealth and accomplishments of man today, there is no end to his sorrow and suffering, for his good sense and wisdom are being clouded over with newer forms of error and delusion. Man is being tortured by lust, avarice, conceit and hatred in their various aspects, what is the way out? This way lies solely in man's realization of his own self as being non-different from the universal self. When everything is the self, who remains separate from the self to be hated or envied? Within all men burns brightly the light of an indivisible essential consciousness. Every human being represents the greatest truth of Brahman in the world in the acceptance, realization and propagation of this undeniable truth. The extraordinary life of thirty-two years of Srimadacharya is a living expression of this tremendous reality.

We have to remember the Acharya's life anew today. From his life- message, we have to find the means and inspiration of resolving the many conflicts of life in the knowledge of the self. Salutations to the incarnation of Sri Dakshinamurthy, the greatest teacher of the universe, salutations to Sri Krishna, the Jagadguru, salutations to Sri Vedavyasa, the teacher of the humanity, and salutations to Sri Adi Shankaracharya, the embodiment of all the three great teachers.

 

http://harsha16.topcities.com

[Guest guest]

The fact will always remain, kaival advaita disagrees with vyas & brahm sutra & cant take the direct meaning of brahm sutra. Even 'advaitins' admit this.