/lit/ - Literature

Currently having to confront all of my pre existing beliefs. I have had a series of spiritual experiences with psychedlics and meditation that have led me to believe in the perennial philosophy. And I realized that hinduism is the closest of traditions to metaphysical reality. I can see that chastity and vegetarianism are not only morally superior but also conducive to well being. I'm on the edge of the leap of faith, becoming chaste and vegetarian, giving up the decadence of my body... and I'm very scared. I can hardly stand the decadence of Western society, and I can't believe how lost so much of humanity has been for so long. Considering moving to India and emulating based Shankara if I can. Any advice appreciated

Okay, Schopenhauer-worshiping cucks. If consciousness isn't all there is, then where did it come from?

Does Advaita Vedanta have a Western equivalent?

>>11384416
>The Vedas, the Upanishads, & the Gita. Seek no further till you have gotten through with this.

This, but with Shankara's commentaries

>Expect not to find any truths in the works of non-Indians.

This is wrong though, the same truths are sometimes found expressed more or less clearly, more or less cryptically in various thinkers, i.e Daoism, Plotinus, Eckhart, Spinoza, and so on.

>>11274712

Start with Guenon's Introduction to the Study of the Hindu Doctrines, you can find it online for free. This will acquaint you with the background knowledge and context to accurately understand the texts. After that I would recommend the Bhagavad-Gita because it's a synthesis of a bunch of Hindu teachings and is sort of a TLDR of Hinduism. Easwaran's translation is good for newcomers to Hindu texts and explains a lot of terms (you won't get the deeper ideas involved through his translation but you can come back and read a more thorough one later after you are familiar with Hindu texts.) One can read the Ramayana and the Mahabharata at any stage in studying Hinduism.

If you really want to deeply understand Hindu thought I'd recommend studying Vedanta, in particular Advaita Vedanta, which one would study through the Prasthanatrayi (Upanishads, Brahma Sutras, Bhagavad-Gita) commentaries that Adi Shankara wrote.The reason is that in his commentaries he mostly established the mainstream orthodox understanding of Hindu doctrine. Vedanta is the peak of Hindu 'philosophy' or 'metaphysics'. Most classical and post-classical Hindu texts show significant Vedantic influence. If you don't want to read his commentaries Radhakrishnan has a good translation of the Upanishads. The Brahma Sutras are mostly useless though if you are not reading the Vedanta commentaries because you won't get most of it. Adi Shankara also wrote a number of good non-commentary texts.

In addition to the previously mentioned texts you have a large body of other Hindu texts, which can be separated into those that are specifically Vedanta texts or those which are just general texts (almost all of the later invariably influenced by Vedanta). The first category includes the Ashtavakra, Avadhuta and Ribhu Gitas, The Yoga Vasistha, Tripura Rahasya, Advaita Bodha Deepika etc. The later category includes the many dozens of Puranas and Agamas. There is also the school of Kashmir Shaivism which has many interesting Tantric-influenced texts.