Caitanya's arguments against mayavada

[Guest guest]

Caitanya mahaprabhu is said to have defeated the mayavadis. I would like some one knowledgeable here to present his exact arguments against Sankara's philosophy based on available evidence that it is indeed his argument.

[ethos 0]

I can't do it without looking it up. But then that would be cheating.

[raga 0]

Little effort is taken in the Caitanya Caritamrita to exhaustively present the dialogue between Caitanya and the Mayavadins, as it is mainly a hagiographical account. I would suggest you study the later half of Jiva's Tattva Sandarbha and Baladeva's Govinda Bhasya on Vedanta. I do not know of any good electric edition of GB, TS is available from www.granthamandira.org under Darsana > Gaudiya > Sat Sandarbha.

[Guest guest]

So, there is no transcription of mahaprabhu's conversations itself to prove that he was against advaita. Our conception that mahaprabhu was preaching against the Sankara school comes from the works of gosvamis, krishnadas kaviraj and later day gaudiya saints.

 

As far as I know, the gosvamis were contemporaries of mahaprabhu. In the works of gosvamis, which ones deal directly with the advaita conception ? Is there any contemporary work which shows that mahaprabhu approved what gosvamis wrote about Sankara ?

[ethos 0]

I'm trying to do searches on my Vedabase, but I come up with Advaita Prabhu, part of the Pancha-tattva. "Advaita conception" brings up those words in same paragraph, but not as a phrase.

 

If you care to provide me with specific keywords to try, maybe I can find it that way.

[raga 0]

 

So, there is no transcription of mahaprabhu's conversations itself to prove that he was against advaita. Our conception that mahaprabhu was preaching against the Sankara school comes from the works of gosvamis, krishnadas kaviraj and later day gaudiya saints.

 

As far as I know, the gosvamis were contemporaries of mahaprabhu. In the works of gosvamis, which ones deal directly with the advaita conception ? Is there any contemporary work which shows that mahaprabhu approved what gosvamis wrote about Sankara ?

 

 

Mahaprabhu didn't write an autobiography. Whatever you have comes from various biographies compiled by his followers, both contemporary and later. The Gosvamis' works are accepted by the entire Gaudiya Vaishnava Samaja as the authoritative delineation of Sri Caitanya's theology.

 

It is not that Mahaprabhu was preaching against anyone. Some sects inside the Gaudiya tradition have adopted this aggressive attitude of attacking, smashing, crashing, cutting and destroying of others. You will hardly find it among the mainstream Gaudiyas.

 

[Now I can already hear somebody coming in and trying to prove from their writings that Sri Caitanya, Krishnadas Kaviraja and the rest were also bigoted fanatics who had nothing better to do than to cast critique upon others not inside their school. Spare me please! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif ]

[Guest guest]

ethos, you could try mayavada but it tends to retrun hundreds of posts by Srila Prabhupada because comments about mayavada is present throughout his commentary. Perhaps you should look for advaita+caitanya or mayavada+caitanya

[theist 1]

..perhaps the talks between Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu and Sarvabhauma Bhattacrya and those with Prakasananda Sarasvati in th CC.

[ethos 0]

I came across several verses around Adi-lila 7.120.

 

Hey, what about that Bhattacaraya (was that his name?) who was the leading proponent at the time whom Lord Caitanya defeated. Isn't there dialog there?

 

I'll run your suggestions.

[raga 0]

 

perhaps the talks between Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu and Sarvabhauma Bhattacrya and those with Prakasananda Sarasvati in th CC.

 

 

Neither of the two get into the details of analyzing Advaita Vedanta. Aside this, Caitanya Caritamrita is a biography written by Krishnadas Kaviraj, and I am uncertain whether Ram takes anything on his authority.

[karthik_v 0]

I would think that it is unlikely that Caitanya Mahaprabhu or any other Gaudiya acarya [i am not restricting Caitanya Mahaprabhu to GV alone though] ever defeated Advaita philosophy. As Shvu once said, debates can be possible only between 2 opposing teams that use the same set of scriptures as their yardstick. They may accept those scriptures or reject them as authority.

 

Advaitins accept only shruti as their authority. Shrutis have little place in the scope of GV teachings, which rely only on smritis. Even the only commentary on Vedanta sutra was written long after the philosophy itself had been codified [perhaps to ward off the derisive contempt of the Advaitins and others who refused to debate with them as equals].

 

We can note that even Srila Prabhupad never debated, leave alone defeating them, any mainstream Advaitin, even though the likes of Sri Chandrasekharendra Saraswati of Kanchi mutt, Swami Chinmayananda and Ramana Maharishi were all his contemporaries. His debates with "Advaitins" were restricted only to those immigrant part time "Advaitins", who had landed in the USA on R1 visa and who lived in New York or Boston [thanks to the courtesy extended by a few idiotic rich]. That cannot, by any stretch of imagination, be construed as a serious debate with an Advaitin.

 

Most devotees of ISKCON, form their conceptions of Advaita....oooops, Mayavada /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif .......on the basis of these obsessive attacks found in the writings of Srila Prabhupada. If I were to learn about Advaita, the writings of SP would hardly be the accurate source for the same. I would rather read the bhasyas written by Sankara himself. Or the commentaries and translations there of.

 

Was there ever an instance when SP [or any GV acarya for that reason] ever analysed any of the bhasyas of Sankara and proved it to be wrong by reverting back to the shruti? Never. All they did was to define Advaita....oooops, Mayavada /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif ....... whichever way the like and then launch an ad hominem attack.

 

Another reason that Sri Caitanya might have never even attacked Advaita is because, he himself could have been an Advaitin, having been intiated by an Advaita acarya and having accepted an Advaitin's commentary on SB as the only bona fide one.

 

I would like to be corrected if I am wrong.

[Guest guest]

as raga pointed out there is no detail except i think a mention about atma rama having different meanings

 

so who were instrumental in building this religion around caitanya ? gosvamis or even later ?

[ethos 0]

I keep coming up with hits on personalities with the above search criterion or commentary from Prabhupada's purports, but little on direct verses.

 

How about Theist's idea?

 

I'll provide input later if I come across something.

[raga 0]

 

Was there ever an instance when SP [or any GV acarya for that reason] ever analysed any of the bhasyas of Sankara and proved it to be wrong by reverting back to the shruti? Never. All they did was to define Advaita....oooops, Mayavada ....... whichever way the like and then launch an ad hominem attack.

 

 

Aside Bhaktivedanta, please refer me to any other GV acarya who has offered unjust critique of Advaita in your view. If you don't know of any, then kindly keep your critique focused to where it belongs. Thanks.

[raga 0]

 

as raga pointed out there is no detail except i think a mention about atma rama having different meanings

 

so who were instrumental in building this religion around caitanya ? gosvamis or even later ?

 

 

The Gosvamis systematized and presented the theology of Sri Caitanya. Rupa contributed the theology of bhakti-rasa, Gopala Bhatta wrote on rituals, Jiva on siddhanta. Their works are foundational. Aside this, the religion assumed more of its current shape in the famous festival of Kheturi overseen by Jahnava Mata where followers of Caitanya from different locations gathered. This gave a form to most of the mainstream lineages of Sri Caitanya's religion. Narottama, Srinivasa and Syamananda, all students of Jiva, further contributed in propagating the teachings of the Gosvamis around Bengal and Orissa.

[Guest guest]

Srila Bhakti Raksak Sridhara Maharaj in his time was requested by his godbrother Yagjavar Maharaj to help him debate against the renowned head of a shakta pandit society or (adwaitin- mayavad whatever one may label those following the impersonal conception), in the highest cultural district of West Bengal of that time.

They were renowned scholars not only in their own sampradayas but also academicly thruout India.

To cut a long story short they debated for seven days against 200 of them the pro's and cons of all sriptural conclusions. And ultimately culminated in these pandits conceding defeat to Srila Sridhara Maharaj. After he affectionately and satisfactorily answered a massive barage of hundreds of the deepest philosophical points one could only imagine. A hundred questions at a time were asked witout an intervening break to which SSM gave a hundred answers for hours at a time.

The only account of this meeting is living in the memory of Srila B.S.Govinda Maharaj who himself was amazed at such brilliance. But he would be more than happy to elaborate on the meeting if anyone were to enquire from him.

 

[Guest guest]

I might add Like Mahaprabhus' purports into the Atmaram verse, Srila Sridhara Maharaj was famous for giving multi-faceted realizations of a single point or question based on an inconceivably vast databank of transcendental and scriptural knowledge. The other point I missed is SSMs' victory was actually what he himself called one of love not knowledge. As all of those present in the assembly were happily convinced of the personal conceptions of the Rupanuga line of understanding divinity, and the head of that society immediately offered his son for initiation to Srila Sridhara Maharaj.

[karthik_v 0]

Dear Raga Prabhuji,

 

 

Aside Bhaktivedanta, please refer me to any other GV acarya who has offered unjust critique of Advaita in your view. If you don't know of any, then kindly keep your critique focused to where it belongs. Thanks.

 

 

No, I am not aware of any GV acarya who critqued Advaita unjustly. Nor did I say so. All I stated was that no GV acarya, to the best of my knowledge, has proven Advaita to be wrong by reverting to shrutis. Yes, my second part in that para was a generalization, which I am sorry to have made. I should have directed it only to those who use that term.

 

Nevertheless, I have come across atleast one GV guru [rather a break away, I should say], who denounced Sankara and also repeatedly called his philosophy Mayavada, which it is not.

 

Dear Guest,

 

 

The only account of this meeting is living in the memory of Srila B.S.Govinda Maharaj who himself was amazed at such brilliance. But he would be more than happy to elaborate on the meeting if anyone were to enquire from him.

 

 

If an assembly went on for 7 days, in the cultural capital of Bengal and if virtually every scholar participated in it, then I would expect a narrative of the same in epigraphs and manuscripts of the different mutts. Sure, each mutt may portray the entire episode to suggest that their school prevailed over the rest, but it is unlikely that everyone would ignore it and it would be consigned to the memory of just one person.

 

Anyway, Shaktas are not Advaitins.

[Guest guest]

no one knows what caitanya spoke about advaitam. can some quote what jiva gosvami defeated in advaita ?

 

by the way, some one has mistaken advaita to be the same as impersonalism. that is not true.

[Guest guest]

I would like to point out that the great service of vaishnava school is stressing personalism. It is true that some so called advaitins degenerate in to impersonalists just as some vaishnavas degenerate in to sense gratifiers. but advaita as taught by sankara is not impersonal and it is about deovtion.

[theist 1]

ram,Sankara taught devotion?What?Or do you mean "devotion" as a means to mukti at which time the so-called devotion is discardable.I don't understand what you mean.

[raga 0]

 

It is true that some so called advaitins degenerate in to impersonalists just as some vaishnavas degenerate in to sense gratifiers. but advaita as taught by sankara is not impersonal and it is about deovtion

 

 

I believe the term "impersonalism" is a word often used for the doctrine of the ultimate non-personality of both the individual and the Supreme, ie. at the state of perfection no difference will exist between the two in any regard. In other words, "It is all one". Of course oneness in itself is indisputable (particularly as specified oneness), but ultimate oneness without personal expression is "impersonalism". Is it not?

 

Can you concicely present the perfection as presented by Sankara?

[raga 0]

 

no one knows what caitanya spoke about advaitam. can some quote what jiva gosvami defeated in advaita ?

 

 

I believe I already referred you to his Tattva Sandarbha. Did you look it up?

 

http://www.granthamandira.org/ggm/ggm.php?action=category&id=28

[Guest guest]

Dear Raga, Oneness does not mean impersonalism. Even though individuals exist eternally as Rama, Krishna, Siva etc., along with their devotees - the self is the same. Obviously, the presence of sadguna brahman means there is relation. But the "individuals" in the sadguna brahman are situated in the knowledge that the self is one. Thus they love each other as one loves oneself.

 

Thanks for you reference to jIva gosvami's works. I will look it up.

[theist 1]

Did Sankara teach this eternal differentiation in oneness ram?