...To start with, let me say to Sri Sangom Ji, that advaitha is not just a 'philosophy' as one would understand that term from the western perspective of that discipline. Unlike the western philosophies, advaitha (or for that matter other sampradhayams under Hinduism) is not just content to describe the material life, but goes beyond that and shows how 'Sat Chit Ananda' is obtained. In that sense the apriori of all Sampradhayams in Hinduism are the same - how to achieve salvation, whatever may be that salvation is as illustrated by the Vadanta and interpreted within the scope of the Sruthis.
Shri KRS,
It is necessary to keep in mind that even the ancient western philosophy had as its objectives, understanding the fundamental causes and principles of the universe; explaining it in an economical way; the epistemological problem of reconciling the diversity and change of the natural universe, with the possibility of obtaining fixed and certain knowledge about it; questions about things that cannot be perceived by the senses, such as numbers, elements, universals, and
gods.
Thus, they also perhaps started with more or less the same ideas. But it is true that the western philosophy as such has morphed very much and the question of final emancipation no longer occupies the central attention. This may be due to the spread of christianity, in which the final goal of humans is a very sharply defined set of items – heaven, hell, the purgatory, eternal damnation.
Granting that the Indian darSanas are more about salvation – which itself is an imaginary idea, incidentally, still each of the darSanas went about it in a logical way mostly by convincing the intellect, and not by edicts or decrees, coupled with punishments for any heretical opinion. It was exactly due to this need for convincing the opponents that all the Acharyas have had to write bhAshyas, which are commentaries or explanatory works.
Another important point which is of great relevance in this context is that the rigveda which is considered as the fountain head of all of our religion, scriptures, philosophies, etc., does not envisage anything which resembles the idea of “mOksha” – final emancipation, much less is there any reference to rebirth, karma, etc. In a way, if one reads rigveda without any preconceived ideas, the picture of the rigvedic people is one of cheerful people who loved life and bestowed very little attention to any next birth, had no predilection for “karma” etc. You will find their spirit echoing in the oft-heard line “Satam jeevema SaradassuveerAH”, “bhavAma SaradaSSatam, nandAma SaradaSSatam, mOdAma Saradassatam, prabravAma SaradaSSatam, ajeetAsyAma SaradSSatam” (the Sandhyavandana mantra), and prayer to live happily and in good health for hundred autumns alongwith sons and grandsons, etc. cArvAka probably echoed these rigvedic sentiments only, in his lines, “yAvajjeevEt sukham jeevEt riNam kritvA ghritam pibEt” but he denounced the sacrificial system and the priesthood which benefitted from it immensely, which caused his death and near extermination of whatever his ideas were.
Therefore, whatever Sruti pramANas are adduced in support of the different darSanas under the vEdAnta category have to be viewed keeping this background information as well.
It is mainly because people (I mainly refer to the brahmin population in general) do not have knowledge of Sanskrit, and also of our scriptures, that a stage has now come that anything and everything which someone claiming to be spiritually evolved, brahmajnAni, etc., (in most cases these greatness are bestowed on these people but otherwise not evident from their accounts) say as their spiritual advice/s is swallowed by a vast gullible public without any question and people even swear for the truth of such words, as though they have experienced it, but not many will honestly say that they have experienced it.
So, first of all, one should realize that Shankara's interpretation of Brahma Sutra using Nyaya can not be contested. It can be questioned on it's merits (as many have done, including Ramanuja and Madhvacharya), but certain fundamentals of advaitha are based on the Truth of the Sruthis. Now one need not accept the Sruthis as the Truth (as perhaps Professor Nara Ji is liable to do) and so in this case not only advaitha but other sampradhayams as well can be dismissed as fallacies.
If one accepts the premise of the validity of Sruthis, then one can look at the seeming contradictions contained within advaitha and question them
This is somewhat confusing to my limited intelligence. First you say that Sankara’s interpretation of brahma sutra cannot be
contested; it is not clear whether it is a condition you are putting to others who may be posting in this thread, or whether it is just your opinion about the brahmasutra bhashya of Sankara. If it is the former, I would request you affix your seal of moderator so we will abide by it; if it is the latter, while you are free to have this view, Ramanuja, Madhva,
Bhaskara, Yadavaprakasa, Kesava, Nilakaņţha,
Vallabha, Vijnanabhikshu, Nimbarka, Baladeva Vidyabhushana, (the last one is the only non-brahmin to write a bhashya) did contest the bhashya of Sankara and questioned his very interpretation of brahmasutras in the advaitic mode. That itself shows that the brahmasutras, being too cryptic, could have different interpretations. Moreover the authorship of brahma sutras itself is a contested topic.
Whether one accepts Sruti pramANas or not,
will not, in my opinion, come into the consideration of the main question which is, “which of these sampradAyas or darSanas is more logical and convincing to the intellect, since, as already stated, the commentaries of the Acharyas was an unmistakable sign that they wanted to “convince” by means of arguments and, since the people of those times were particular about a philosophy being in tune with – and not transgressing, the Srutis, they cited those Sruti statements for ready appreciation by the opponents. The darsanas are not mere interpretations of Sruti. They are separate ‘philosophies’ if we may use that term for the sake of convenience. Hence the argument contained in the last two sentences in the quote, is not relevant at all, according to me.
As a simple person with a simple mind, to me there were two main arguments about advaitha - one about the much maligned 'Maya' concept and the other perhaps not limited only to advaitha - the Karma theory, discussed in this thread. Let us examine these two concepts.
1. 'Maya': To explain this concept one has to agree that there is no explanation as to WHY the material universe is created - the best any religion or science offers in this realm so far is that 'it is just so'. On this topic what Hinduism offers is as good - it is God's Leela. So if one accepts this conditional knowledge then there is no schism in Shankara's postulation of Maya. Maya is not 'illusion' as what people usually think of an illusion. It is as real as a snake as perceived by a witness who mistakes it for a rope. As much as the witness would behave seeing the 'snake', so would a person living in the material world would behave thinking that the world is 'real'. But since the reality is the rope, that is the underlying jeevatma, this concept comes in. Why is this maya then? We have to attribute it to His Leela, as the 'illusion' of identifying the ephemeral to the constant is the condition of the mind. Advaitha does not negate the material world, as folks who do not understand this idea commonly believe. It is stated mainly to 'discriminate' between what is real versus unreal (as the sadhana of jnana yoga prescribes and a form of it is what Ramana Maharishi taught as to ask 'Who am I?') to facilitate one to reach Nirvana. I am sure both of my erudite friends here have read Shankara's Tattva Bodha to understand this argument better.
(I had commenced writing an answer to Shri Mohan’s post but could not complete it due to my poor typing ability. I copy & paste the same and request Shri Mohan to consider this as my observations in reply to his posts.)
It is possible under the influence of maya, the individual souls have forgotten theiridentity. Having fogotten ones true idendity, the individual souls identify themselves with the body and with that theindividual souls carryout actions as I have done this and that which has developed attachments. When one identify oneselfwith the body, all actions bound create karma effect. Base root of all souls may be one and the same, but when one start idendifying oneself with the body, it becomes individuals who is doing the karmas. It is said the evolution of the individualsouls are a long and ardous process extending into cycles after cycles, from various yonis and to human bodies. In this longprocess one gathers karmas according to ones actions. When the understanding comes that the body is merely an instrumentwhich undergoes the experiences, but the soul is merely the witness, at that stage the attachment may not arise.
Rgds,
Mohan
Shri Mohan,
To my limited understanding ability, except that the aspect, "It is possible under the influence of maya, the individual souls have forgotten their identity." there seem to be nothing new in what you have stated above and all are covered by the bulleted items given by Shri Nara in his post #96.
As regards the concept of "mAyA" it is one of the or perhaps the, most challenged aspect of advaita. Sankara introduced the concept of "adhyAsa" in his famous "adhyAsa bhAshya" which is an introduction to his brahmasUtra bhAshya. He also used the words “adhyArOpa” , “avidyA”, “mAyA”, etc., to refer to a phenomenon in which the ‘jeevAtma’ (or, individual soul) loses the knowledge that it is but the parabrahman, or the only reality without a second (this is exactly what the word ‘advaitam’ means) and starts thinking that this world is real.
This concept of the One reality which is devoid of any ‘guNa’ or characteristic whatsoever, is the corner stone of advaita. Hence it becomes necessary to explain first of all, as to how this seeming universe of myriad objects, shapes, characteristics, etc., came into existence. mAyA is postulated as the reason for this. But so far no one has been able to prove the statement contained in you post, viz.,
"It is possible under the influence of maya, the individual souls have forgotten their identity." It is to be inferred or just believed without questioning by those who are real advaitins.
rAmAnuja, the propounder of viSishTAdvaita was not satisfied with the advaita theory. He had nAthamuni and his grandson yAmunAcArya, who was rAmAnuja’s preceptor, before him who also criticised the advaita as “mAyA vAda”. rAmAnuja wrote his ‘saptavidha anupapatti’ or seven-fold untenabilities, on advaita. vEdAnta dESika of the 14th century compiled one hundred objections to advaita and that work was known as “Sata dUshaNi”. Shri Nara has already referred to this.
As per Sankara's original adhyAsa bhAshya, the individual Atmans (jivatma, in future) arise out of the parabrahman (brahman, which is the only reality in the entire existence) but right from the start these jivatams are enclosed in a cover of ignorance. Sankara indicated this phenomenon as adhyAsa or adhyArOpa, something which is like a cover or something which exists over the surface.
[FONT="]Granting this for arguments' sake, the critics of advaita starting from nAtHamuni onwards have questioned the origin and locus (location – where is this mAyA located) of mAyA. The rebuttals of the initial criticism took a long time to come, (in fact 20th. century) from the advaitin’s side. In the meantime, the advaita school itself had undergone divisions based on abstruse interpretational details of its various postulates, known as the bhAmati and the vivaraNa schools. Ordinary people have no interest in these matters and that suited the advaitins well, since the inadequacies were known only to the learned circles.[/FONT]
I quote from a web-page of advaita-vedanta.org (
The Advaita Vedânta Home Page - Bhamati and Vivarana Schools):
“In his works, SankarAcArya takes a direct approach to the problem of human liberation, and declares that moksha consists in realizing the identity of Atman with the One brahman. This brahman is in fact, all that really IS, and there is no change or multiplicity in It. As for the question, how does the perception of multiplicity arise in the first place, Sankara points to avidyA and mAyA. He does not attempt to explicate avidyA too much, and tells the student not to worry about the logical status of this avidyA, except to recognize that it is responsible for desires (kAma) and action (karma) which lead to bondage (bandha). Therefore, getting rid of the avidyA leads to moksha, which is really not different from the brahman itself.
After his time, avidyA and mAyA became a tough problem for his followers. Sankara described avidyA as anAdi - beginningless. His approach was informed by the well considered notion that searching for the roots of avidyA was itself a manifestation of the very avidyA one was seeking to remove. However, in order to work out the logical implications of various advaitic doctrines, his followers had to pay greater attention to this issue. In course of time, two sub-schools, known as the bhAmatI and the vivaraNa schools emerged within advaita vedAnta. The bhAmatI school takes its name after vAcaspati miSra's commentary on Sankara's brahmasUtra-bhAshya, while the vivaraNa school takes its name after prakASAtman's commentary on padmapAda's pancapAdikA, which is itself a commentary on Sankara's brahmasUtra-bhashya.”
[FONT="]Vachaspati Misra (900–980 CE), just less than 200 years after Sankara. Vachaspati Misra is said to have written a commentary named
tattva samIkshA to Mandana Misra’s
brahmasiddhi, which is now unfortunately lost to us. Hence we may presume that this was perhaps the view of Mandana Misra, one of the direct disciples of Sankara. The Vivarana school arose from Prakasatman’s commentary by that name, to Padmapada’s Panchapadika; Padmapada, again, is a direct disciple of Sankara himself. Thus, Sankara’s immediate disciples themselves did not know cleary what Sankara was propounding!![/FONT]
To summarise the position regarding mAyA, advaitha accepts that mAyA has a beginning, but it does not come out of something else. advaithins quote upanishads to show that, “mAyAcha avidyAcha svayamEva bhavathi” – maya and avidya arise themselves, without a source or cause; they come out of themselves, its beginning is due to itself- This is rather mysterious. This is inconceivable and critics emphasize the inconceivability, while pro-adviata people say that it is the “glory” of mAyA because mAyA cannot be thought of. Strictly speaking, it has a beginning but its beginning is not due to any other factor and that is the reason why it is called as beginningless. It has a beginning but it does not have another factor for its beginning. That is why it is as if it is called as beginningless.
Whichever position one takes, it is difficult to satisfactorily counter the criticism that
if brahman is the only Reality, how come maya or avidya are also like brahman, beginningless, causeless and sourceless?
More difficult is the question about where this maya is located. The bhAmati school says that Avidya has jiva as locus and the conditioned Brahman as content while the vivaraNa school holds that Avidya has the pure (unconditioned) Brahman as locus and content
. The problems created by these conflicting and untenable statements are one the major causes for scholarly criticisms on advaita as an untenable darSana.
"God", "Leela" etc., are terms which do not fit in with advaita. advaita holds that this seeming universe is "mithyA" or unreal; as an unreality, perhaps advaita allows it but it negates definitely the reality of it.
2. Karma theory is a central tenet of Hinduism, without which none of the Sampradhayams would exist. There are two points to remember here. 1) Karma is not attached to the Jeevatma - it is rather attached to the 'mind proclivities' of that athma (the ’enveloped’ jeevathma is still in the maya state). Once that envelope is gone through true knowledge, all karma is gone. Otherwise as the jeevathma's mind evolves over several births, eventually all karma is washed away and nirvana is obtained. This is done because over several births, the person learns to be detached from his/her righteous action and then no karma is generated. 2) Hinduism has the concept of evolution to a human being by the evolving consciousness, unlike the abrahamic religions. Only when an entity is self concious, free will is obtained and karma starts to accumulate to the 'mind'. So, how it starts in the first place is an irrelevant question that does not comprehend it's origins.
One more thing. The reason many folks embraced Visishtadwaitham as well as Dwaitham, is not because of any ‘deficiencies’ of preceding sambradhayam in concept, but because, Bhakthi replaced the strict Jnana marga as the latter requires an evolved mind to understand – to wit, the Paramahamsa allowed only one of his desciples to learn advaitha, viz. Swami Vivekananda.
As I said above, the Karma concept is alien to Rigveda. Probably it is the Gita, which is part of Mahabharata a much later entrant into hindu religious lore, which emphasises this. There is, therefore, reasonable grounds to suppose that the doctrine of karma is a borrowal from Buddha’s “kamma”, actions done intentionally and their results, according to Buddhism. Puranas nurture the karma theory extensively and that is how it has found its way into the discussion on advaita also. If the “prasthAnatraya” did not include Gita, perhaps Karma would not have found a place in any of these vedanta darsanas.
But it is difficult to state how karma starts, given the different opinions among the various advaitic schools. Since mAya is situated in the brahman itself according to the Vivarana School, and it is this mAyA which causes the jiva to perform karma, how is it that brahman alone is exempt from it, unless there is some modification either in the jiva or in the brahman, other than the pure reality (brahman) and mAya?
If we take the bhamati school, it is not clear as to how, when and from where, the jiva gets mAyA.
There are several other points which go towards criticism of advaita. The webpage referred to in my initial post may not be scholastic, but IMO, it does list many such points.
I am glad that Shri KRS has stated that bhakti does not have a place in the advaita system.
