All-
With reference to post # 82:
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Though the question is addressed to Sri Raju let me add the following comments/observations to add to the discussions.
It is an uncanny event that the same three references chosen by Sr Sangom are also here at this website except it offers
more details - Yes, it is seemingly a Vishnavite's view point indeed!
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RE: apaurusheya
For the benefit of readers let me reproduce the entire discussion:
Q. 1. Are the Vedas Apaureshaya? From what is presented here it
seems that the claim to non-authorship of Vedas is based on the fact that
the Vedas do not say that they are authored. All they say is that the Vedas
were taught by the Lord to Brahma at the beginning of creation. But, do
they say they were not authored? If not, what we have, at best, is unknown
authorship, not no-authorship. In this situation, since our Lord was there
without a second, and He taught the Vedas to Brahmma, it seems reasonable to
assume the Lord to be author and unreasonable to assume no-authorship.
Answer:
Yes, Vedas are apaurusheya. Consider the following two prAmANic statements,
one within the body of the Vedas and one outside it.
a. The SvestAsvatara Upanishad says:
|| yo brahmANam vidadhAti poorvam yovai vedAnsca prahiNoti tasmai ||
which roughly means: "He, who created Brahma in the past, and who
gifted him with the Vedas ..."
This clearly implies that the ParamAtma gifted to Chaturmukha Brahma
the Vedas which already existed. Hence a positive proof of the
non-authorship of the Vedas.
b. Sri Krishna says in 15.15 of the Bhagawad Geeta:
vedaisca sarvaih aham eva vedyo |
vedAntakrt vedavit eva ca aham ||
which roughly translates to:
"All the Vedas speak about me and I am the ONLY (eva) one who knows
all the Vedas." (Note: In the above statement, vedAntakrt does NOT mean
creator of vedAnta, rather it means the giver of the fruits of the Vedas
i.e. moksha. (Veda + antakrt).) In this context, not only does Krishna
quote the Veda as an independent testimony to His supremacy and glory, but
also says that He alone knows all the Vedas. It can be easily implied that
at best he could have been its author. But then again, Krishna could easily
have mentioned that he created the Vedas, since he has anyway taken the
pains to tell Arjuna (and the whole world) that he knows all of the Vedas.
So, an implied proof of the non-authorship of the Vedas.
Now, consider the ChAndogya Upanishad statement
sadeva soma idam-agra aaseet ekameva adviteeyam || ...
which confirms that only "sat" existed in the beginning, alone and
without a second. From this it might possibly be inferred that not even the
sruthis existed in the beginning. This in turn might imply sruthi's
personal origin. We should not just stop at this; rather, go the whole
nine yards and ask: What about Nitya Vibhuti (Paramapadam) and Nitya SUris?
The prefixes "Nitya" (or eternal) would have no meaning then. The same
scriptures talk about an eternal halcyon heaven, and eternal angels who
serve that Supreme. SwAmi Desikan resolves this matter by pointing out that
the "idam" (=this) refers to the prakrti and prakrti-related creation. This
is confirmed in other upanishadic passages as well. Since only prakrti is
under consideration, the Nityas, Paramapada and the Sruthis do not fall into
this realm.
In conclusion, there is proof (both internal and external) that Veda is an
independent pramANa of the Brahman, and that it is apaurusheya, and seeming
contradictions to this theory can be easily resolved. It is not that its
authorship is undeterminable, but that its authorship is non-existent.
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I am neither endorsing the above post nor opposing the ideas expressed since scriptural debates are not of interest to
me. My point is to provide the reference here which from a certain perspective answers the questions posed by Sri
Sangom.
Question raised and explanations are not satisfactory in these blogs since they seemingly arise from assumptions and
infrastructure that is already flawed IMHO. I know that is not a fair statement since one would expect a description of
what the correct infrastructure is. That is like asking someone to explain in a blog why time and space are relative and
not absolute quantity. Even an attempt at this will only open more questions.
IMHO, the questions are like someone asking for directions in chennai but using the map of timbectoo but has names of
some streets that happen to be in Chennai. The only legitimate response in my view is to go and get a right map from a
right source.
Though the blogger explains from a vaishanvite's perspective (and I am not an expert on that) I thought I will share
what I have understood thus far about the various schools of thought.
The seemingly different and often diametrically opposing differences between these schools of thought such as Dvita and
Advita arise from an incomplete knowledge in my view.
The differences being the norm the only suggestion is to learn that deep understanding of Advita concept includes Dvita
practice and deep application of Dvita practice will lead one to prepare oneself to understand Advita .
How can two ideas seemingly opposite be unified?
The above is an age old discussions and is a major topic by itself. Let me share two my thoughts for what is worth.
1. Words like Brahman - Saguna, Nirguma, Maya are not easily understood since they lie outside the means of knowledge we
are endowed with. Anyone that claims to understand do not. To paraphrase a well known verse in Kena Upansishad
"Those who feel they know Him know Him not. Those who know that anything amenable to the senses is not Brahman, they know it best." (from Wikipedia translation summary).
In other words Brahman is truly comprehended by one who knows it is incomprehensible. The one who does not is the one that says he understands it all. It is unknown to those who think they know and known to those who knows it is not known.
Without understanding the above it is not possible to have meaningul discussions and even harder in my view to talk about specific schools of thought.
2.Let me use a metaphor to explain in an area that is much more familiar to most of us as to how two seemingly opposing
views are unified. In the area physics there is Newton's laws which is enough to describe almost all mechanical action.
Newton assumed space and time are absolute quantities. Einstein developed a set of ideas that showed that all these
fundamental items are actually not absolute. To design a rocket ship to go to Mars one needs mainly Newtonian mechanics.
Trying to use Einsteins's equations will be futile effort leading to computationally complex and almost impossible
situations. This is like trying to apply Advita in everyday life of duality of experience. However for the rocket ship
to reach Mars trip calculations have to include space-time curvature and relativity concepts. The Einstein's theory
reduces to Newtonian approximation for everyday life. Without understanding Newton's laws and Galilean transfromations
it is not possible to understand Einstein's formulations. The seemingly opposing views are actually unified as order of
physical reality that we experience.
So within a given context one can gave discussions about Vaishnavite's view point to declare this as the gospel speaks
of ignorance.
With reference to post #80 by Sri Prasad - thanks for your encouragement - I will find time to do another post to share my understanding with the members.
