/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.21876926]

He was right about everything.

[Anonymous No.21876927]

>>21876926
Yes

[Anonymous No.21876935]

>>21876926
Yes

https://youtu.be/U0Zaur5DZo0

[Anonymous No.21876972]

>>21876926
Based

Swami Sarvapriyananda just recently began an ongoing series of videos on his Adhyasa bhasya

https://youtube.com/watch?v=pHFlSnvtUdk
https://youtube.com/watch?v=xcMNUjbSVWk
https://youtube.com/watch?v=svEvGbjkIjw

[Anonymous No.21876973]

Why is buddhism so popular on 4chan? Hinduism at least has a caste system. What does buddhism have?

[Anonymous No.21876983]

>>21876972
what are these lectures about anon

[Anonymous No.21877022]

What was Hinduism like before Shankara? Why did he need to clarify anything? Now could he say anything new from such an old religion? Did Buddhism force him to?

[Anonymous No.21877061]

>>21876926
"Reverence to that venerable Guru of Gurus who
removed with the collyrium-stick of his reasoning the
whole of that ignorance which is the seed of transmigration,
and who revealed to us that divine and glorious
knowledge, embedded deep in the heart of the Upanishads,
which destroys the darkness in our intellects and which is nowhere
confounded, though it bears on the realm of transcendence."
(Sureshvaracharya)

[Anonymous No.21877071]

>>21876926
Retroactively refuted.
>>21876973
It's not—any Buddhist literature thread will be infested with seething christlarpers crying about demons and also trans-hindus who read English translations of New Age French commentaries on medieval Indian commentaries on the Upanishads and think that means they are indologists.

[Anonymous No.21877098]

>>21877071
>Retroactively refuted.
wrong.

all this ''crypto-buddhist'' bullshit has been refuted in the introduction of picrel

[Anonymous No.21877097]

>>21876983
>what are these lectures about anon
It’s on the introductory preamble that Shankara wrote to his Brahma Sutra commentary

[Anonymous No.21877120]

>>21877098
>what if Buddhism but we had an atman so the other hindus didn't call us nihilists
that was also already done by Buddhists prior to Shankara, e.g. Yogacara, Tathagatagarbha

[Anonymous No.21877214]

>>21877098
https://archive.org/details/Sachidanandendra_Swamiji_-_Maandukya_Rahasya_Vivrutti/page/n13/mode/2up

[Anonymous No.21877266]

>>21876973
No real buddhist would be posting on 4cuck.

[Anonymous No.21877286]

>>21877071
Hinduist monks went into the jungle to die from diseases and savages in their cause of converting others to their religion. Meanwhile Buddha cried about the class system and attacked Hinduism in front of Brahmin priests. He was the original leftist, but was he based?

[Anonymous No.21877374]

>>21876972
I'm going through his lectures on Aparokshanubhuti. He's great.

[Anonymous No.21877803]

>>21877286
>cried about the class system and attacked Hinduism in front of Brahmin priests
Do you earn a living sacrificing animals and selling ritual services to peasants? Why are you invested in the ancient caste system as some sort of essentialist reality? The Buddha's point was that being a brahmin was neither inherently pure of blood nor virtuous. This is too obvious to require further elaboration, but you are hostile to the idea anyway. Given your reference to "leftism" you have a telegraphed agenda to project here in defense of the team you think was "right wing," whatever that means to you. Indian Buddhism was dominated by brahmin converts anyway, they were their own worst enemy in terms of attacking "Hinduism" and authored most of the polemical and scholastic works of Buddhist philosophy aimed at rival pajeets until the final days of Buddhist discourse in India.

[Anonymous No.21877933]

>>21877098
>Adhyatmaprakasha
>>21876972
>Adhyasa Bhasya
>>21877214
>Sachidanandendra_Swamiji_

I really like to see it.

[Anonymous No.21877997]

>>21877022
> What was Hinduism like before Shankara?
We only have a hazy idea because they didnt keep accurate records thats survived. All the 6 darshanas already existed as distinct schools of thought by Shankara’s times, and there were various different Vedantic teachers offering their own competing interpretation of the Upanishads and Brahma Sutras. There are a lot of names of texts and writings by specific teachers known to Indologists which dont survive, so its an error to assume that the texts which survive are exhaustive of all the philosophical views being taught and debated at the time.

>Why did he need to clarify anything?
Because he saw that there were people and groups teaching what he considered to be the wrong interpretation of Sruti, which is something he would naturally be opposed to.

>Now could he say anything new from such an old religion?
What he said wasn’t new, he is just explaining what the Upanishads teach in his view. One thing that was novel about him was that as far as we can tell nobody before Shankara wrote a comprehensive set of commentaries on the Upanishads + Brahma Sutras + Bhagavad Gita explaining how they all teach the same doctrine.

>Did Buddhism force him to?
Buddhism was just one of a dozen or so schools of thought and perspectives that he was criticizing for being wrong, Buddhists like to attribute more importance to their involvement than the evidence suggests.

[Anonymous No.21878017]

>>21877120
What you think is “Buddhistic” about Shankara is already found in the Upanishads that date from a century or two *before* Buddha

[Anonymous No.21878097]

>>21877997
Thanks

[Anonymous No.21878150]

>>21878017
It is as if the transhindu side of this debate is not only pretending to be well-versed in Hinduism, but equally ignorant of how "scriptures" are used and appropriated for legitimacy historically, irrespective of the religion in question. In Buddhism for instance, Tibetan scholastics can point to pre-Mahayana texts mentioning sunyata as evidence that the historical Buddha taught or hinted at the very post-nikaya philosophy of rangtong Madhyamaka. (They are also aware of "three turnings" of "the dharma," i.e. that there were three versions of Buddhism expounded according to the traditional acounting, and much effort is made to organize and schematize these received texts). This claim (or lie) that the ancient material corresponds to a (known) novelty can only be taken on faith by a true believer, that the author and the scholar have the same meaning, because texts don't exegete themselves, it is the interpreter who must endeavor to show his reading of it is valid based on the limited amount of citations possible. It is far more likely that Shankara was influenced by Buddhists, given his dialectic with Buddhism, than it is that his presentation of Advaita Vedanta sits above history and thought as the incorrupt transmission of "what the Upanishads mean" without any interference during the thousand year lacuna covering the rise and decline of Buddhism versus Brahminism. You are a true believer so you don't care, but I would expect more thoughtful, actual Hindus, lacking the autistic zeal of the convert, have a more historical view, perhaps similar to Tibetan self-awareness of Buddhism being an evolving system.

[Anonymous No.21878185]

>>21878150
>This claim (or lie) that the ancient material corresponds to a (known) novelty can only be taken on faith by a true believer, that the author and the scholar have the same meaning,
That’s a false claim, it doesn’t have to be taken on faith, since people can and do examine the evidence and thereby find this claim to indeed be a totally reasonable conclusion, based on the abundance of evidence, this isn’t a faith-based conclusion.

>It is far more likely that Shankara was influenced by Buddhists, given his dialectic with Buddhism, than it is that his presentation of Advaita Vedanta sits above history and thought as the incorrupt transmission of "what the Upanishads mean"
It’s really not, since he highlights the issues with and rejects just about every identifiable part of Buddhism. You seem to be under the impression that one cannot criticize something else without one’s own position being shifted in some way, which is just dumb.

[Anonymous No.21878197]

off topic, but does anyone here know anything about shaiva siddhanta?

[Anonymous No.21878202]

>>21878185
>one cannot criticize something else without one’s own position being shifted in some way
another dumb essentialist viewpoint as fitting for someone who believes his atmangelion is in primordial brahmanostasis, but in any case Shankara's position was informed by a thousand years of brahmin breaking at the hands of buddhist bulls, that's a powerful motivator and him being labeled a crypto-buddhist by his opponents is important to the mnemohistory of Buddhism within Hinduism, where it lives, rent-free, and was still generating ressentiment among brahmins when European travellers in the colonial era inquired about Buddhist ruins in India and were met with scornful explanations regarding them. The only way to appear to exorcise Buddhist influence is to pretend it never happened, but why aren't you still sacrificing animals to Indra and standing in rivers?

[Anonymous No.21878226]

>>21878202
>believes his atmangelion is in primordial brahmanostasis

>After one separates oneself i.e. 'I' or Atman from the sense objects, the qualities superimposed on Self are also negated by saying that which not being and not non-being, cannot be described by words, without beginning and end (BG 13.32) or as in Satyam Jnanam Anantam Brahman, beyond words, beyond mind and speech, etc. Here there is an attempt to negate the eariler [sic] attribute like being witness, bliss, most subtlest, etc. After this negation of false superimposition, Self Alone shines. One enters into the state of Nirvikalp Samadhi, where there is no second, no one to experience and hence this state cannot be described in words.
Stasis and Equilibrium is a superimposed quality, so there is no "Brahmanostasis" and it is not the matter of belief, and there also is no momentary consciousness perpetually renewing and rebirthing itself.
>buddhist bulls, brahmin breaking
Thats why theyre nowhere to be found in india today, or tibet?
Buddhism spread because of the Brahmins buck breaking the east asians, indian culture is to the east what jewish culture is to the west, buck-broken = victim complex
If anything Buddhism is merely an extension of Advaita vedanta, Advaita Vedanta is closer to the source which Buddhism has its origin.

[Anonymous No.21878239]

>>21878202
>buddhist bulls
You mean the ones who fled to Tibet to escape the muslimoids, while the Hindus fought?

[Anonymous No.21878255]

>>21878226
>it is not the matter of belief
Ah yes of course, Hindu theology is not a matter of belief. I will leave your thread so you can agree with your peers about who agrees the most

[Anonymous No.21878415]

>>21878226
> After this negation of false superimposition, Self Alone shines. One enters into the state of Nirvikalp Samadhi, where there is no second, no one to experience and hence this state cannot be described in words.
Presenting Nirvikalpa Samadhi as the supreme goal is common alike to modern NeoVedanta, to late medieval Vedantist writings, and also to a few of the Shankara works of spurious or questionable authenticity like Vivekachudamani, however Shankara doesn’t use the term in his authentic writings (the main bhasyas) and he doesn’t appear to endorse it as the main goal in his authentic works. The final removal of ignorance is simultaneous with the dawn of Brahmavidya, but you don’t have to suppress all of your thoughts first and enter a thoughtless state in order that ignorance be overcome.

[Anonymous No.21878447]

>>21877071
>French commentaries on medieval Indian commentaries on the Upanishads and think that means they are indologists.
Guenon.

[Anonymous No.21878490]

>>21878415
>term in his authentic writings (the main bhasyas) and he doesn’t appear to endorse it as the main goal in his authentic works. The final removal of ignorance is simultaneous with the dawn of Brahmavidya, but you don’t have to suppress all of your thoughts first and enter a thoughtless state in order that ignorance be overcome.
I actually agree with you. I found the wording of "Nirvakalp Samadhi" pretty strange aswell, also I know that it is from the Vivekachudamani, I also know that there are many texts attributed to Shankara with "spurious or questionable authority."
You are right about thought-supression, ADHYATMA YOGA – Devarao Kulkarni, goes over it. It is a a question of "effortless spontaneity," there can be no volitional suppression, or opposition to what is alone without second, that would be like murdering the body to attain liberation.
Just as the images are not apart from the mirror there is no non-self apart from the self, the apparent ignorance of Truth is itself the outcome of Reality so that there is nothing but Reality.

[Anonymous No.21878495]

>>21878490
>‘He who takes extinction to be extinction and, having taken extinction to be extinction, thinks of extinction, thinks of extinction, thinks of extinction, thinks “Mine is extinction”, and rejoices in extinction, such a person, I say, does not know extinction.’

[Anonymous No.21878512]

>>21876926
Question: are there any Advaita texts where they subject the human psyche to extremely close analysis, for example categorizing the "types" of thought, I know "remembrance" plays a big role, aswell as the specific interactions between the "I" and "Not-I," the Outisde and Inside, Aham and Idam, Shiva and Shakti, the Ego and Alter Ego, looking at the subject of Alienation, Xenophilia and Xenophobia, I understand that Avdiya is the product of the exchange of properties between the "I" and "Not-I" and it is this division and the subsequent attatchment to the Ego-Sense that pretty much Existence and Cosmology depends on,
But my question is Why does this Exchange and Superimposition even occur, what are the psychodynamics at play, I have the feeling it has something to do with Desire for the Other, but how does this Desire for the Other control us, why should the empirical Other (Not-I) have its authenticity hollowed? What if I just enjoy the taste of steak too damn much.

[Anonymous No.21878525]

umm advaitabros...

[Anonymous No.21878540]

>>21878512
>aswell as the specific interactions between the "I" and "Not-I,"
Check out the prose section of the Upadesa Sahahsri. Although it's worth reading the whole thing, Shankara elaborates at length on the relationship between the conscious (I) and non-conscious (not-I) and how they practically relate to each other phenomenologically. One of the points is that anything which is not-I does not have an intrinsic self-relationship, which means it never exists "for itself", it is merely always present "for another", or more particularly, "for the Self."
>What if I just enjoy the taste of steak too damn much.
You should know the answer to this if you're familiar with Shankara, which you seem to be somewhat. It's due to ignorance about the nature of Self. In enjoying the steak it is merely the Self enjoying itself in its own glory (maya), which is the production of ignorance about Self-nature (the production of not-Self from Self).
>but how does this Desire for the Other control us, why should the empirical Other (Not-I) have its authenticity hollowed?
Other only controls other. Your empirical ego is just another "other." All is ultimately controlled by the Self because all of these others are only "for Self." It's just a matter of dispelling ignorance to understand the interplay of all of these illusions.

[Anonymous No.21878542]

>>21876926
>Fools! Their ref l ections are not far-reaching, who expect what was not before to come to be, or that something will die out and perish utterly. For from what in no way is, it is impossible to come to be, and for what is to perish cannot be fulfilled or known, for it will always be there wherever one puts it at any time.
- Empedocles retroactively refuting Buddhist sophism, and agreeing with the Uddalaka from the Upanishads (450 bce)
Also I recommend you guys to read the chapter on Parmenides in Graham's texts of Early Greek philosophy

[Anonymous No.21878567]

>>21878542
Buddhism never asserts anything like that, though. Even in the most apophatic schools like Madhyamaka, Ch'an, Zen, the teaching is broadly that emptiness is empty of emptiness, which not only lends itself to many differing interpretations but is like an absolute affirmation via absolute negation, to use Western terminology.

[Anonymous No.21879411]

>>21877803
> Why are you invested in the ancient caste system as some sort of essentialist reality?
The caste system of India is the only reason this country exists to this day.

[Anonymous No.21879530]

>>21878525

can you read?
>>21877098
>>21877214

[Anonymous No.21879590]

>>21879530
Sachidanandendra is technically correct afaik when he says that in the works of Nagarjuna, Maitreya, Vasubandhu, Dinnaga and Dharmakirti there are no explicit references to the doctrine of the Upanishadic Atman, as distinct from the theories of the Sankhya or Vaisheshika. However, it would be incorrect to say that all Indian Mahayana writings are like this, which appears to be the impression Sachidanandendra is trying to create with that statement. There are at least two exceptions, both of them come from Buddhists who lived in between the time of Shankara and Gaudapada. The first is Bhaviveka when he mentions Vedanta in his work Madhyamakahrdaya, where he quotes from Gaudapada's Karikas. The second is Shantaraksita's Tattvasamgraha with the commentary of Kamalasila. The arguments in both of these works however essentially revolve around a confusion of Advaita with Bhedabheda, where they try to find inconsistencies in combining these two positions and then attack Vedanta on that basis even though Shankara himself did not teach that combination of views, needless to say there is no argument to be found in either work that actually challenges or presents any difficulty for Advaita.

[Anonymous No.21879599]

>>21879530
>>21879590
I mean, he does say that there are no references until "very late in the history of Buddhism", but Bhavaviveka (who references Vedanta) lived before Dharmakirti whom he namedrops

[Anonymous No.21881183]

>>21876926
Yes.

anyone interested in advaita should read this thesis

https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:dd733c9d-780f-4012-b451-ad5677f1b928

[Anonymous No.21881197]

DAMN RIGHT HE WAS

[Anonymous No.21881370]

May it not, perhaps, be misleading continually and almost exclusively to stress the emptiness of apparent objects and the illusory character of the phenomenal universe?

It is equally true to say that there is nothing BUT the phenomenal universe, and there is not any thing outside it.

The source of its appearance is not apparent for there is no “thing” to conceive its source and render it apparent. And that is because all that appears is appearance and there can be no other appearance than what appears.

“We” are looking at it, perceiving it with our five senses and conceiving it with our sixth (mind), and it is what “we” are that “we” are thus conceiving as appearance, for there is nothing else whatever at any time but what “we” are, nor anything but what “we” are that “we” could ever experience.

That also is why THERE CANNOT BE such a thing as existence since there cannot be such a thing as non-existence, and vice versa, for there is no thing to be present or absent, since what appears is an image in mind.

That, too, is why there cannot be an entity, since there cannot be a non-entity, and vice versa, so that all appearance can only be described as such-as-it-is or “Suchness” — which term also denotes its origin.

Thus every sentient being is the source of the apparent universe BY MEANS OF EXPERIENCING IT AS WHAT HE IS, for his “objectivity” is only an appearance in mind, and his “subjectivity” is the source of all experience.

For true-perceiving is absolute functioning in this-here-nowness, and the apparent universe is this; so that the fundamental nature of all phenomena is the perceiving of phenomena.

Herein positive and negative vision approach integration, and the superficially contradictory statements of the Sages find their re-solution in Whole-mind.

Note: This should explain the famous three degrees of understanding, a rational elucidation of which is not vouchsafed: (1) mountains and rivers are perceived as such, (2) mountains and rivers are no longer perceived as such, (3) mountains and rivers are once more perceived as mountains and rivers — which is as sages perceive them.

tl;dr the apparent distinction between phenomenon and noumenon collapses when you realize they are interdependent concepts and void in themselves without having the other of the pair to contrast them with; by wiping out both (seeing their mutual interdependence and hence intrinsic emptiness as concepts), you are left in a state which could either be characterized positively as the Absolute (Brahman) or negatively (the apophatic way, the via negativa) as voidness (sunyata).

tl;drttl;dr (“too long; didn’t read the tl;dr”): Am-This-Here-Now

[Anonymous No.21881419]

If the Rishis were non dualists why did Shankara have to come in 900 AD to explain this?

[Anonymous No.21881568]

>>21876926 Was? He is right about everything.

https://youtu.be/qXbqp9fqozU

[Anonymous No.21881595]

>>21876926
This is the best thread in this board right now by the way.

[Anonymous No.21881599]

>>21881419
> If the Rishis were non dualists why did Shankara have to come in 900 AD to explain this?
Because enough time had elapsed that a variety of competing interpretations of the Sruti had sprung up, from atheistic Samkhya to multiple varieties of dualistic and non-dual/monist Vedanta, to the ritualist Mimamsa who thought that the Sruti just enjoin action but without imparting any metaphysical knowledge.

[Anonymous No.21881640]

>>21876972
this is better

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMddRSWoHnQY9kX3hpmMgw2WZg0b0fJ82

[Anonymous No.21881747]

>>21881640
> this is better
I’m not so sure about that, his English is a lot more accented than Swami Sarvapriyananda, and he appears to be a follower of Satchidanandendra Saraswati, who advocates a reading of Advaita that is contentious (I would personally go farther and call it highly dubious) and which only arose in the 20th century. Swami Sarvapriyananda when he is giving talks on Vedanta generally just bases his talks on Shankara’s works without following some specific later commentator’s take or Ramakrishna’s or Vivekananda’s take on it unless it’s a talk specifically about those figures.

[Anonymous No.21881789]

>>21878017
The core religion of the Vedas is closer to Buddhism than Hinduism.

[Anonymous No.21881797]

>>21881789
Lol. Nope.

[Anonymous No.21881826]

>>21881797
In what was is it not?

[Anonymous No.21881828]

>>21881826
in what way*

[Anonymous No.21881829]

You will never be an Indian.

[Anonymous No.21881830]

>>21881747
>his English is a lot more accented
i don't really see this as a problem, and i'm not even a native english speaker
>and he appears to be a follower of Satchidanandendra Saraswati,
you're right
>who advocates a reading of Advaita that is contentious (I would personally go farther and call it highly dubious) and which only arose in the 20th century.

i suggest you read this paper:
https://pt.scribd.com/document/123400230/Avidya-Adhyasa-Objection

> just bases his talks on Shankara’s works
this is exactly what Satchidanandendra proposed, to study Shankara directly instead of relying on an ocean of subcommentaries that actually departed from the teachings of the Acharya

[Anonymous No.21881834]

>>21881826
Buddhism says that all you need to do do achieve the Nirvana is to abstain from sin and be a virtuos person. That has nothing to do with the core religion of the Vedas.

[Anonymous No.21881856]

>>21881834
This is literally like saying Islam is less like Judaism than Christianity because it promises 40 virgins in the afterlife,

[Anonymous No.21881871]

>>21881856
The Vedians believed that the sky was reserved to those who died in battle. The primitive brahmin did not go any less by this philosophy and would willingly let himself killed by a savage in the middle of the jungle without giving a sound, without moving a finger, he dies, gloriously. How is this anyhow related to buddhism? They put next to no burden on the individual. You can have been anything in your past life, virtue up a little bit, die from old age and go to nirvana. Kek, the Vedians would have laughed at such a pity.

[Anonymous No.21881874]

Are all of you white people ITT or just indians talking amongst yourselves?

[Anonymous No.21881896]

>>21881834
This is such a reductionist and simplified summary of the Buddha’s teachings, that it’s practically reduced to being a lie. The belief of painful and suffering transmigration until one reaches a state of liberation or enlightenment (moksha and various other names in Hinduism, nirvana in Buddhism), of the world as somehow illusory, void, or a misleading temptation and to be transcended through a certain type of insight inspired by or closely related to a certain form of yogic (variously meditative, or intellectual) practice … all make the Buddha’s teachings rather similar to the broad generalization/category “Hinduism”. At least as similar as its in some crucial ways dissimilar or rebelling against it.

Anyway, any (fundamentally malicious) attempt at stirring up silly hatred and besides-the-point argumentation, to make some big cosmic binary or dichotomy, to think it’s a “BIG WIN for one’s side” that “Shankara borrowed from Buddhism” or “Buddhism is just knock-off Hinduism” shows a fundamental metaphysical error, an inability to think clearly, as well a dissolutely petty and malevolent emotional state. And this is because it shows one is more caught up in some culturally-conditioned religious forms or “wanting to show which side is true” than one is in pure metaphysical truth itself, apart from all merely social and cultural considerations, apart from stick up for and preach for some — in the cosmic scheme of things — simply local cult, whether you’re arguing “for Vedanta” or “for Buddhism.”

The Truth, the Self, is neither strictly Indian nor Aryan, an African or a Chinaman, black or white, Hindu or Buddhist. Although I do not at all support faux-benevolent, enforced globalist leftism and the multiculturalism cult of the modern West, this has to be said for the sake of ultimate philosophical and spiritual truth.

[Anonymous No.21881902]

>>21881896
Buddhists put the state of enlightenment as the final goal, the top of the temple so to speak, the ideal of it wich must be achieved in itself ideally.

Nothing is further from reality. Enlightenment is something to be reached quickly and prosperously and earlily: it is merely the first step of the aescalon.

Because what follows from enlightenment indeed is the dark truth that heaven is only reserved to those who died in battle, speaking, in a fight against something, and loosing to it, but the gain is in the fact that you have actually detected something that is to be fought against for and that you gave everything for it.

Everyone else is condemned to perpetual suffering in the cycle of life.

[Anonymous No.21881935]

>>21881830
> this is exactly what Satchidanandendra proposed, to study Shankara directly instead of relying on an ocean of subcommentaries that actually departed from the teachings of the Acharya
In the Advaita tradition both in the Mathas and in the Ramakrishna and Chinmaya orders etc they all study closely Shankara’s works as well, the idea that, as a rule, Shankara’s works are neglected and that people in the tradition abandoned them to study later works is a self-serving and partisan talking point that Satchidanandendra Saraswati’s fans push without ever really substantiating it, as is the claim that they all depart from Shankara in a way that he doesn’t. Moreover in the various sub-commentaries and others works by these medieval Advaitins they make numerous citations from all over Shankara’s writings to support their exegesis, just like Satchidanandendra Saraswati does, it’s not as though he somehow paid more attention to Shankara’s works than they did, some of them wrote much more extensive commentaries on Shankara’s works than he did.

> i suggest you read this paper:
>https://pt.scribd.com/document/123400230/Avidya-Adhyasa-Objection
I have never read Martha Doherty’s paper on this subject, my opinion about Satchidanandendra Saraswati was not informed by or based on her paper, but since you brought it up I will try to read the original paper and the response you linked this weekend. My objections to his take on Advaita was based on my experience reading through some of his works and finding that he often makes sweeping and inaccurate generalizations about different views on Advaita, he sets up false dichotomies and uses spurious reasoning when trying to refute opposing views, and he also makes blatantly false statements like saying “Shankara never says this” when you can actually find half a dozen or more passages of Shankara explicitly saying the opposite. He also tries to claim Suresvara held the same views as him even though Suresvara explicitly contradicts him and argues against what he says about sleep.

[Anonymous No.21883082]

Trika Shaivism is more right

[Anonymous No.21883137]

>>21881902
>it is merely the first step of the aescalon.
if it's the first steo then is not enlightenment, enlightenment is freedom from the constructs of hierachy and compartmentalization, if there'es still "things" beyond enlightenment, then you're not there yet

[thefuckingcrowguy No.21883142]

>>21883137
wrong.

midwit take from a midwit era.
how about not living 1600 years behind

[Anonymous No.21883164]

>>21883082
>Trika Shaivism
retroactively refuted by Chandradhar Sharma

[Anonymous No.21883505]

>>21881183
>https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:dd733c9d-780f-4012-b451-ad5677f1b928
The author of that paper follows the strategy of a certain someone in omitting any examination and discussion of the passages in Shankara's bhashyas where he explicitly identifies maya and avidya with each other and also refers to maya as a power of the supreme Brahman, because those passages are problematic for the kind of interpretation they are arguing for, so they would rather just ignore those passages totally instead of engaging with them, I find this slightly dishonest. Like when he writes on page 157 "maya is always described as caused by
ignorance" that's factually incorrect since in various passages Shankara identifies them with each other without any mention of one causing the other; this is reconcilable with the few passages that mention avidya causing maya precisely because they are two aspects of one and the same power or principle. I agree with the author and Paul Hacker though that Shankara often uses both 'Isvara' and 'Paramisvara' in reference to the Supreme Brahman and not exclusively to Saguna Brahman.

[Anonymous No.21883553]

>>21881829
but I am

[Anonymous No.21883728]

>>21881370
>It is equally true to say that there is nothing BUT the phenomenal universe, and there is not any thing outside it.
The phenomenal universe is but an appearance in/of the limitless all-pervading ocean of spontaneously-present, unconditioned, self-luminous partless awareness that is both more subtle than and infinitely greater than all phenomena.

>“We” are looking at it, perceiving it with our five senses and conceiving it with our sixth (mind), and it is what “we” are that “we” are thus conceiving as appearance, for there is nothing else whatever at any time but what “we” are, nor anything but what “we” are that “we” could ever experience.
All the senses as well as the mind are part of the display that manifest in undifferentiated numinous awareness like reflections appearing in water, this awareness in which they appear is utterly unlike all this phenomena and itself is fearless, uncaring, desireless, beyond conceptual elaboration, beyond acceptance and rejection and is beyond all change including decay and death, it is self-established in eternal freedom forever. It is because of misunderstanding that the mind, which is an object of awareness, falsely appropriates the sentience of the numinous light that illuminates it from within and thinks "I (the mind) am aware and the self". This mind and its impressions, appropriations and actions are themselves just part of the display within eternally free pristine awareness and they don't actually affect it, there are no "awareness that are liberated" and "awareness still within samsara", what appears to the ignorant as otherwise is just the one infinite non-dual Self in association with the appearances of various mind's that each falsely appropriate the same non-dual Self's awareness to themselves. It doesn't actually ultimately matter what happens to any of these minds since they are all unconscious appearances and the same awareness that they wrongly appropriate and attribute to themselves and falsely imagine to be bound is unaffected by any of this, any sort of importance or moral implication, as well as 'bondage' and 'release' is just one part of the display producing another within one eternally free undifferentiated self-luminous awareness that is unaffected by and indifferent to the display. When the mind stops this error it's just another shift in the display and the infinite, partless, ever-free, radiant and immaculate awareness remains the same as it always has. If you know you know.

[Anonymous No.21883740]

[Anonymous No.21883783]

>>21883740
>no actual parallels being drawn between nagarjuna and shankara's beliefs
besides, don't advaitins believe in self unlike buddhists?

[Anonymous No.21884028]

>>21883728
Divinity-as-Transcendental-Awareness (noumenal and symbolically masculine) is conceptualized as Paramashiva in Tantric traditions like Kashmir Shaivism. Divinity-as-Immanence is conceptualized as Paramashakti (manifesting as all phenomena and symbolically feminine) in this same tradition and in similar traditions. Your analysis talks about the Transcendental-Consciousness aspect of Divinity, corresponding to Paramashiva (itself a beautiful and interesting coincidence, as Shankara is regarded by some Hindus as an incarnation of Shiva, and Shankara himself made odes to and identified himself/the Self/the-Transcendental-Consciousness as Shiva).

The conception of Paramashiva corresponds more closely (but not exactly) to a classical monotheism, with a transcendental Lordly Being (Ishwara, Personal Lord) beyond all, and the conception of Paramashakti corresponds more closely to pantheism (Divinity as spread throughout and manifesting in all of nature and all beings, on the gross, subtle, and causal levels).

>The phenomenal universe is but an appearance in/of the limitless all-pervading ocean of spontaneously-present, unconditioned, self-luminous partless awareness that is both more subtle than and infinitely greater than all phenomena.

The other part of the whole (the yin to the yang) is that as Paramashakti, Brahman is also absolutely immanent in all phenomena, from the gross to the subtle, and in fact also being grosser than the gross, being the Presence behind the manifestation of even the most minuscule atom. Even the single atom is not apart from the Self, all is only and nothing else but the Self. Shiva needs Shakti and Shakti needs Shiva. They play and sport with each other. The symbolic reading, is that a transcendental awareness must needs phenomena (a phenomenal reality, whether gross, subtle, causal) to experience for it to even be properly “aware”, and phenomenal reality (from the gross or the subtle) needs a noumenal transcendental observer of it to even be regarded as existing in the first place (the philosophical tautology, that we cannot know what anything could be like if there were no one to experience it, corresponding to the philosopher Thomas Nagel’s thought-experiment of “the view from nowhere”).

Shiva is “Consciousness” and Shakti is “Power.” Reaching a transcendental state of awareness can be done by symbolic and/or literal devotion to either, but would be by slightly different means, and ideally both means would be fused and balance each other, working with and supporting the other. If you work on your consciousness, this can raise your innate power (kundalini shakti), and if you work from the opposite angle of raising your innate power (kundalini shakti) with practices like kundalini yoga or meditation on a mantra, this can also raise your consciousness. They are interdependent and as if self-feeding, like the famous ancient image of the snake feeding on its own tail.

[Anonymous No.21884057]

>>21884028
The Taoists have a similar conception that you can work on greater awareness of Essential Nature (working on the consciousness aspect), or work on the cultivation of Eternal Life (the energy aspect, as in Taoist immortality yoga and their visualization and breathing practices), or, even better, on both, with both supporting the other. The Tibetan Kargyudpa sect also has a similar dichotomy set up as the Path of Means (deliberately using yogic or meditative practices, sitting practice, mantras, deity yoga of visualization and identification of oneself with that same deity, and the like) and the Path of Liberation (which is direct, immediate, and symbolically pathless glimpsing of the truth, and transcendence of reliance on any means, time-bound process, struggle, or imagination that one is “building up” to something, as in Mahamudra meditation), and, of course, ideally that one should do both as they both support each other.

>>21883783
You won’t hear this from everyone, but I think transcendental cosmic reality doesn’t give a hoot about conforming strictly to any culture-bound ideology or means, whether nominally Buddhist or Hindu. One of the three “dirts” or malas obscuring the divine consciousness, after all, according to Kashmir Shaivism and similar Shaivist or Tantric teachings, is mayiyamala, the dirt of dualistic limited identification (“I am this, you are that, I am an Indian, you are from Japan, I am a Tantrika, you are a Zen Buddhist.”) This is in fact itself a self-limiting error, despite how much subtler it appears, on a similar scale as any other cruder form of nationalism, militaristic identification of oneself with some chosen group or military. It is the building up of a glorious historical and cultural self-identity in the faculty of the ahamkara (“I-maker,” “ego-maker”) in the causal body. E.g. a Jesuit of the 16th-century builds up a strong self-image in the ahamkara as intimately bound up with being a Jesuit and to the Roman Catholic Church, a Lebanese Shia Muslim of the 20th-century to being a Lebanese Shia Muslim, both are probably unaware of the Self beyond the gross, subtle, and causal bodies to more-or-less the same degrees.

Go study some Zen koans and think about it. Give up the limited self-identification with being a “Traditionalist” or “anti-Traditionalist”! They’re all just more words and more useless faces which get clogged up in your head as a sort of confused congestion.

>>21881874
I am a disabled transgender Eskimo.

[Anonymous No.21884470]

>>21877266
Yeah because they post on reddit instead

[Anonymous No.21885461]

where do i get started with advaita?

[Anonymous No.21885516]

>>21885461
https://estudantedavedanta.net/uploads/1/0/9/5/109527077/god_realization_through_reason_swami_iswarananda.pdf

[Anonymous No.21885532]

>>21885461
>where do i get started with advaita?
The 'Ashtavakra Gita' is considered a great Advaita classic that it's fine to read before more in-depth stuff

https://realization.org/p/ashtavakra-gita/richards.ashtavakra-gita/richards.ashtavakra-gita.html

Pic related is the chart for reading the works of the main Advaita metaphysician, Adi Shankara, the chart has some intro books you can use to prepare yourself to understand Shankara's works, another way to do so is to read the chapters on Advaita in one or both of the two Encyclopedias of Indian Philosophy, there is one by Karl Potter and one by Dasgupta that have decent sections on Advaita, you can find things to quibble with in most books and textbooks on Advaita but as long as they prepare you to understand all the terminology Shankara uses then it's fine to read first as an intro, which is necessary unless you are Indian and absorbed most of the terminology already via cultural osmosis

[Anonymous No.21887128]

>>21884028
>>21884057
>>21883728
>>21881370
the only way to resolve such matters is through an examination of the three states (waking,dream,sleep), that is, through an examination of our total experience; that was the secret of the rishis, compared to this, other methods are no more than mere speculation.
the mind can work only in a 'horizontal' or analytical way, you can't expect much from her, you can't 'escape' from samsara 'through' samsara, as Guénon put it: 'The Indefinite is Analytically Inexhaustible'

the only way out is through a 'vertical' or synthetic operation that has its source 'outside/beyond' samsara; this has nothing to do with 'mysticism' or any 'superior state', but its just to look at things from the metaphysical standpoint, what advaitins call the standpoint of the Witness/Sakshin and that is the goal of the avasthatraya

From this 'standpoint' you'll see that this whole samsara (as Sureshvara put it: 'from the Creator (BrahmA) to a clump of grass') is nothing but a dream, an illusion.

[Anonymous No.21888295]

bump

[Anonymous No.21888511]

>>21887128
> the only way to resolve such matters is through an examination of the three states (waking,dream,sleep), that is, through an examination of our total experience; that was the secret of the rishis
False, this is a repackaged K.A. Krishnaswamy talking point repeated by Swami Satchitdanadendra (the latter got most of his ideas about Advaita from the former) but it’s totally absent from Shankara’s works.

Krishnaswamy’s and Satchitdanadendra’s works and their presentation of Advaita are influenced by western thought, above all they show a concern to demonstrate that Vedanta is ‘scientific’, ‘rational’ and can be confirmed through empirical examination (meanwhile, Shankara lists faith as an essential prerequisite for the aspirant seeking liberation). This is reflected in the choice of title for Krishnaswamy’s book ‘Vedanta: or the Science of Reality’, their teaching is basically a special form of Neo-Vedanta.

It’s incorrect to say that “the only way to resolve such matters is through an examination of the three states”, this is not what the Upanishads and Advaita teach, instead the Upanishads teach that liberation is reached through the Upanishads imparting knowledge of the Self via the removal of ignorance. Shankara almost never talks about the three states, if it was truly that important, or if it was the ‘central method’ or ‘only way’ then Shankara would explicitly mention it in every work and commentary, which he doesn’t do (far from it). You don’t have to examine the three states in order for the Upanishads to induce knowledge of the Self via eliminating ignorance. In Shankara’s view, someone with a already pure mind can be liberated (ie their mind no longer being fooled by ignorance) just by hearing one or two of the Upanishads which dont talk about sleep or the three states at all.

Krishnaswamy and Satchitdanadendra are essentially calling for a rational, discursive contemplation of the three states, which is then supposed to lead to direct experience of pure consciousness via ending superimposition. You are contradicting yourself by saying that liberation cannot be escaped by the mind working in a ‘horizontal’ or analytical way, while at the same time claiming that liberation happens via a rational analysis of the three states, its just absurd, especially given these two ideologues endless defense of this process as rooted in rational analysis and empirical experience.

Please read Coman’s book “The Method of Early Vedanta” before continuing to spam Krishnaswamy talking points and pretending they are Shankara’s position. He details why Krishnaswamy’s (and his follower Satchitdanadendra’s) claims are untenable.

Knowledge of the Self is not reached via rational analysis OR via superimposition and removal (the latter is at best an ancillary and optional method), it’s already known right now which is why only the ignorance obscuring it has to be removed and that’s it.

[Anonymous No.21888594]

>>21888511
His wording may have been off in claiming that you have to particularly “examine” such three states, but isn’t the four-levels a common teaching technique/idea of the Vedas, Upanishads, Vedanta and Hindu yoga in general? Viz. there are the three major states human being go through of waking life, dreaming, and deep sleep (on the physical, subtle, and causal levels), and turiya being the “fourth state” (on the level of the Atman) which is simultaneously beyond and subtler than any of these states, while also intimately present in them? Hence reaching the Self, the Atman, is through realization of that state where you are beyond being awake, dreaming, or in deep sleep (the seeming experience of voidness/unconsciousness which we can’t remember well)? Or in terms of the three bodies (sarira traya), the Atman is not your physical body, not your subtle body, nor your causal body, but the Presence behind them which animates them and allows you to mistakenly identify yourself with these vehicles?

[Anonymous No.21888603]

>>21888511
One of the great ironies of the controversy around Krishnaswamy and Satchitdanadendra is that their position on avidya and sleep was evidently inspired by when they approached one Advaita pontiff or senior monk and asked him about what happens post-liberation and how there is still knowledge of the world. The monk, like the Advaita traditon and Shankara, said that the prarabha-karma continues and accounts for the jiva mukti still having knowledge of the people and objects around him. Krishnaswamy and Satchitdanadendra apparently considered this unacceptable because it would involve ignorance remaining in some way (if the mind isn’t being fooled by it anymore this is a moot point), they came up with their alternative response that all experience of the world basically ends and the jivanmukti enters an indescribable state.

Why is this a great irony? Because Shankara explicitly repudiates this latter position and Shankara himself endorses the prarabha-karma theory. Satchitdanadendra harps on and on about post-Shankara advaitins supposedly deviating from Shankara, only to completely toss out Shankara’s explicitly stated position when he disagrees with it, talk about being a hypocrite.

[Anonymous No.21888606]

>>21888603
>Shankara on Prarabdha Karma

>For Shankara, the matter, as already discussed in his quotes I have mentioned in the earlier part of this article, after Self Realization, the body/mind/intellect of a Jnani continues to function till the Prarabdha Karma gets exhausted, after which they drop and one gets final liberation. I am quoting all the relevant passages from Shankara here:

>But (of his) former works only those which have not begun to yield results (are destroyed by Knowledge); (for) death is the limit (set by the scriptures for Liberation to take place).

>Shankara’s Commentary: In the last two topics it has been said that all the past works of a knower of Brahman are destroyed. Now past works are of two kinds: Sanchita (accumulated) i.e. those which have not yet begun to bear fruit, and Prarabdha (commenced) i.e. those which have begun to yield results, and have produced the body through which a person has attained Knowledge. The opponent holds that both these are destroyed, because the Mundaka text cited says that all his works are destroyed. Moreover, the idea of nonagency of the knower is the same with respect to Sanchita or Prarabdha work; therefore it is reasonable that both are destroyed when Knowledge dawns.

>The Sutra refutes this view and says that only the Sanchita works are destroyed by Knowledge, but not the Prarabdha, which are destroyed only by being worked out. So long as the momentum of these works lasts, the knower of Brahman has to be in the body. When they are exhausted, the body falls off, and he attains perfection. His Knowledge cannot check these works, even as an archer has no control over the arrows already discharged, which come to rest only when their momentum is exhausted. The Sruti declares this in texts like, “And for him the delay is only so long as he is not liberated (from this body); and then he is one (with Brahman)” (Chh. 6. 14. 2). If it were not so, then there would be no teachers of Knowledge. Therefore the Prarabdha works are not destroyed by Knowledge.

https://neevselfinquiry.in/2020/09/24/prarabdha-karma-after-self-realization-its-philosophy-part-1-3/

[Anonymous No.21888710]

>>21888594
> His wording may have been off in claiming that you have to particularly “examine” such three states, but isn’t the four-levels a common teaching technique/idea of the Vedas, Upanishads, Vedanta and Hindu yoga in general? Viz. there are the three major states human being go through of waking life, dreaming, and deep sleep (on the physical, subtle, and causal levels), and turiya being the “fourth state” (on the level of the Atman) which is simultaneously beyond and subtler than any of these states, while also intimately present in them?
Krishnaswamy and Satchitdanadendra are explicitly talking about a rational, discursive analysis of the three states, done obviously by someone who is awake, which is supposed to then end superimposition and thereby give rise to pure consciousness. This is not what the Upanishads and Shankara are talking about, liberation isn’t reached via analysis for Shankara. Perhaps even worse, Krishnaswamy and Satchitdanadendra depart from the teaching and muddy the waters by claiming that Prajna (deep sleep) is actually the Paramatman, despite Gaudapada and Shankara explicitly identifying the Paramatman to be the fourth, Turiya, which is different from Prajna, which is beyond all the states and also present in each one.

[Anonymous No.21889094]

>>21888511
>>21888594
>>21888603
>>21888606
>>21888710
Replying to these posts would be just a waste of time anyway, but I'll just highlight some points that are misunderstood (at least I hope so, because some of them really look like just intellectual dishonesty)

1. There's a difference between a teaching resting on anubhava (translated sometimes as 'experience', which is the only way possible for metaphysical enquiry according to Shankara) and a teaching 'confirmed through empirical examination'. Actually, empty speculation is rejected by Shankara and Satchidanandendra.

2. The analysis of the three states is found in the oldest upanishads (chandogya, brihadaranyaka) where interestingly they affirm outrightly that in deep sleep there's no Avidya. Regarding the 'necessity' of the method, if the pupil hears the mahavakya and understands immediately, great; but if he doesn't get it, he needs manana and nididhyasana, in which a variety of methods are employed and the avasthatraya vicara is exalted because culminates inevitably in the intuition of the Absolute as Saksin.

3. I did not say that liberation 'happens via rational analysis'. Again, the method culminates in the intuition of the Saksi and this is NOT a mental operation. Again, you don't know the difference between a pure metaphysical method of enquiry and mere speculation. Obviously, the method starts from an ignorant (the waker) point of view (like all vedantic teaching), but 'ends' in the Absolute.

4.
>they came up with their alternative response that all experience of the world basically ends and the jivanmukti enters an indescribable state.
I simply cannot reply to this, because it's completely made up. It's a point that is outrightly rejected by Shankara and Satchidanandendra.

5. Turiya is not a 'state'.
‘That designated as prAjna, (when it is viewed as the cause of the phenomenal world) will be described as TurIya separately when it is not viewed as the cause and when it is free from all phenomenal relationship such as that of the body etc. in its absolute real aspect.’

6. Another point regarding the avasthatraya vicara, is that its purpose is not to affirm that the Self goes through any of those 'states', but that those states are completely ILLUSORY. The avasthas are clearly an adhyaropa, used only for the purpose of teaching.

7. You clearly have no knowledge of neither the general methodology propounded in the Bhashyas (adhyaropapavada), nor the application of this methodology through particular methods; so you think that this is an analytical knowledge like science or philosophy, when in reality the opposite is happening. If I'd show you how a mahavakya has to be understood (according to Shankara and Sureshvara) you'd say that it's a 'rational analysis' too.


Seriously, ALL those ''objections'' have been refuted in the Mulavidya-nirasah, just get the book and read it (it doesn't seem you have).
I have read Comans, Deutsch, Guénon, etc.

[Anonymous No.21889569]

>>21889094
>>21889094
>There's a difference between a teaching resting on anubhava (translated sometimes as 'experience', which is the only way possible for metaphysical enquiry according to Shankara)
Shankara doesn’t posit any subsequent anubhava being necessary after the removal of ignorance since that removal is simultaneous with and basically equal to the dawning of Brahmavidya, thinking a subsequent experience is necessary is Mandara Misra’s views and not Shankara’s.
>Actually, empty speculation is rejected by Shankara
I never said otherwise

>The analysis of the three states is found in the oldest upanishads (chandogya, brihadaranyaka) where interestingly they affirm outrightly that in deep sleep there's no Avidya.
As far as I recall that’s false, they just mention an absence of observable duality, but they don’t specifically say that all avidya is gone. Shankara himself in multiple places mentions avidya being present in dreamless sleep and even talks in the Sariraka-Bhashya about avidya being the reason that the sleeper returns to the waking state (exactly what Satchidanadendra argues against), when I get home later I can post the exact quotes. Because Satchitdanadendra is dishonest he omits any discussion of these passages and just cherry picks one type of passage to support his contrived narrative. Suresvara explicitly refutes Satchitdanadendra on the topic of sleep in Naiskarmya-siddhi; and his disciple Sarvajnatman actually succeeds in reconciling Shankara’s different statements on sleep which Satchitdanadendra doesn’t even attempt, preferring instead to mislead through cherry picking.

> I did not say that liberation 'happens via rational analysis'.
You didnt, but in effect thats what Krishnaswamy and Satchit are claiming when they say rational discursive analysis of the 3 states produces the intuition of saksi
>Again, the method culminates in the intuition of the Saksi and this is NOT a mental operation.
The rational analysis is one
>Again, you don't know the difference between a pure metaphysical method of enquiry and mere speculation.
empty rhetoric

[Anonymous No.21889573]

>>21889094
>simply cannot reply to this, because it's completely made up. It's a point that is outrightly rejected by Shankara and Satchidanandendra.
No it’s not, I have seen the passages where Satchidanandendra disagrees with the prarabdha-karma doctrine that Shankara endorses, later when I have time I will try to find proof and post it. It’s telling that you didnt even acknowledge the Shankara quotes I provided where he endorses prarabhda-karma.

>5. Turiya is not a 'state'.
Obviously, I never said it was
>Another point regarding the avasthatraya vicara, is that its purpose is not to affirm that the Self goes through any of those 'states', but that those states are completely ILLUSORY.
Again, this is basic elementary Advaita and I never said otherwise

>You clearly have no knowledge of neither the general methodology propounded in the Bhashyas (adhyaropapavada)
This is a fake bullshit talking-point that K.A. Krishnaswamy made-up wholecloth; nowhere in his Bhashyas does Shankara state that this is the general methodology of his bhashyas that everything else is subordinated to. By appealing to that claim without actually demonstrating how and why its the general method according to Shankara you are just engaging in circular cult-logic; it is basically Neo-Vedanta presuppositionalism.

>Seriously, ALL those ''objections'' have been refuted in the Mulavidya-nirasah
Wrong, Satchidanadendra just ignores the countless passages that contradict his claims and when he puts forward positive arguments they are typically sophistic. Because I have actually read the Bhashyas I was immediately able to tell he was bullshitting and being incredibly dishonest.

[Anonymous No.21889909]

>>21889569
>>21889573

1. I did not say that there was any 'experience' necessary after liberation. But that the true metaphysical enquiry rests on anubhava, that is, our immediate self-awareness. And you're right, removal of ignorance and dawn of knowledge are one and the same thing, not two.

2. The ignorance that is talked about as being present in deep sleep is not metaphysical ignorance, but it's just the absence of a second thing, as in sleep there's only the Self, pure unity.

'It is verily pure unity which is the reason why there is no vision of distinctions in dreamless sleep" (B.B.V 4.3.1310)
So it's not avidya, but absense of empirical knowledge.

3. To speak 'sleeper returns to the walking state' is avidya-kalpita. The waker is confined to the waking state, he doesn't 'go' anywhere. So this is just looking at things from a wrong standpoint.

4. Paragraphs 163 and 164 of Mulavidya-nirasah deals with the Naishkarmya siddhi, you could check it out.

I just want to post these two excerpts from Sureshvara's Varttikas which contradicts any Avidya in deep sleep:
"That Self which is free from all differentiation and whose nature transcends verbal communication is attained by us in dreamless sleep. This statement is not wrong, as it has behind it the weight of the authority of the Veda' (T. B. V. 2.664)
"It is the true form of the Self that is here being taught. It is that which is severed from Ignorance, desire and action and is found in dreamless sleep" (B. B. V. 4.3.1205)

5. Regarding the so called prarabdha-karma, this is a later (vyakhyanakara) advaita doctrine.
It's well known that for Shankara ignorance and knowledge cannot coexist in the same place as they're oposites like light and darkness, so there cannot be any type of 'remaining ignorance' in the jnani.

Well said by Sureshvara:
"Only a fool would claim that Ignorance and knowledge could inhere in the same seat (the same individual consciousness), and that ignorance of a thing could remain on, uncancelled, after the thing had been right known" (B.B.V 2.4.204)

6. The method of vedanta has been expressed by Shankara in the gita bhashya 13.13:
"Similarly there is the saying of the sampradaya-vid – The one devoid-of-prapancha (Brahman) is explained through Adhyaropa-Apavada."

And you don't need to do much research to see that everything in the bhashyas revolves around this methodology: doctrines regarding creation, maintenance and dissolution, the avasthas, koshas, pramanas, vidya, avidya, even the Veda itself!. They're all adhyaropas. It's so obvious.

"And in putting an end to this condition, the final means of knowledge ceases any longer to be a means of knowledge, just as the means of knowledge present in a dream cease to be such on waking" (Bh.G.Bh. 2.69)

7. All of this is found in the Mulavidya Nirasah, and if it's not enough you can check out the Vedanta Prakriya Pratyabhijna.
Satchidanandendra doesn't 'cherrypick' anything.

[Anonymous No.21890037]

>>21889909
>it is explicitly stated in gita bhasya 13:13
>hmmm
>Even though the form created by upadhi (-bheda) is mithya, still, in order to explain the existence (of jneya), the same form is imagined as the dharma of jneya and (then the jneya) is stated as having hands and feet everywhere.

>Similarly there is the saying of the sampradaya-vid – The one devoid-of-prapancha (Brahman) is explained through Adhyaropa-Apavada.

>Everywhere the hands, feet, etc., which are perceived as parts of all bodies, carry out their activities because of the existence of the shakti of the jneya.

>Thus, the grounds of inference (namely the upadhis of karanas) for existence of jneya are stated to belong to jneya by upachara. At other places also, it should be explained in this fashion.

>That jneya has hands and feet everywhere. That has eyes, heads and faces everywhere. That has indriya for hearing i.e. ears everywhere. That situates pervading entire host of creatures in loka.

>In order to pre-empt the apprehension that the upadhis of indriyas such as hands, feet etc, which are adhyaropita (in jneya to expound Its existence), actually belong to jneya,
>>21889569
Uh You have some explaining to do guénonfag

[Anonymous No.21890195]

>>21890037
>Uh You have some explaining to do guénonfag
Just you wait, I'm typing up a response at this very moment to BTFO dishonest Neo-Vedantist pseud Satchidanadendra and his pitiable hylic fanboys.

[Anonymous No.21890354]

>>21889909
>But that the true metaphysical enquiry rests on anubhava, that is, our immediate self-awareness.
This immediate self-awareness is invariably present always and already known according to Advaita and there is not even any possibility of samsaric experience being possible without it so when you say "metaphysical enquiry requires anubhava" it's basically a tautology that's not stating any new information whatsoever since enquiry like all mental acts and modes requires the presence of immediate self-awareness as per Advaita 101

>2. The ignorance that is talked about as being present in deep sleep is not metaphysical ignorance, but it's just the absence of a second th-ACK!
"And it was pointed out (by the Pūrvapakṣa) that if all distinctions are obliterated during resorption (Pralaya) there will be no reasonable ground regulating the re-emergence of creation with the usual differences. That too is untenable for the very reason that there is a supporting illustration. As in natural slumber and samādhi, although there is a natural eradication of differences, still owing to the persistence of the unreal nescience, differences occur over again when one wakes up, similarly so it can happen here."
- Shankara, Brahma-Sutra Bhasya 2-1-9

Shankara refutes the underlying bedrock of K.A. Krishnaswamy's and Satchidanadendra's whole system right there in that one passage. Their entire system depends on metaphysical ignorance being absent in dreamless sleep and in the above verse Shankara explicitly disagrees and says the presence of metaphysical ignorance (unreal nescience) in slumber is involved in differentiation being established again after it's made unmanifest in dreamless sleep (since there is differences in dreams, by 'natural slumber' he obviously means Prajna). Then, he cites this fact as a supporting illustration for defending the thesis that Pralaya periodically takes place (at a conditional level and not as an absolutely real change). When Satchidanadendra bases his whole system on avidya being absent in dreamless sleep and then just ignores this passage (as far as I have seen after looking a long time) from Shankara that unequivocally disagrees it makes literally everything else he says suspect, and this is only one of the many gargantuan elephants present in the room of his writings. And you were calling me the one who was intellectually dishonest, kek. I don't make retarded omissions like that about anything. And there is no way to somehow square or Shankara disagreeing with Satchidanadendra on sleep but otherwise disagreeing with him since the point about sleep is what Satchidanadendra's whole system of interpretation rests upon.

[Anonymous No.21890358]

>>21889909

Suresvara says the same thing that Shankara, his teacher, says in the above passage:

"For in sleep there is present that very ignorance of the Self which is the seed of all evil. And if this ignorance were not present in dreamless sleep, then it would be a fact that all living creatures would realize the complete destruction of transmigratory life (ṣamsāra) merely by falling asleep"
- Suresvara, Naiskarmya-Siddhi 3:58

>So it's not avidya, but absense of empirical knowledge.
There is both avidya in dreamless sleep, as Shankara and Suresvara both explicitly state in the two passages cited above, and also an absence of empirical knowledge at the same time.

>To speak 'sleeper returns to the walking state' is avidya-kalpita. The waker is confined to the waking state, he doesn't 'go' anywhere. So this is just looking at things from a wrong standpoint.
As Comans observes, Shankara's arguments that mention memory in connection with sleep and dream only make sense in the assumption that the waking jiva is the same jiva who entered a state of sleep/dream and then exited it, otherwise you would be talking about one entity being irrationally imbued with the memories of another separate entity.

>4. Paragraphs 163 and 164 of Mulavidya-nirasah deals with the Naishkarmya siddhi, you could check it out.
I looked at it and he fails to sufficiently explain away Suresvara's explicit statement, in fact one of the pieces of evidence that he cites actually further undermines his own position, when he cites in 163 Suresvara's statement "Since every object is unknown before the first idea of it arises in our minds, and since (even as unknown) it exists by the power of the one reality (sat), it is that reality which is (ultimately) the thing that is unknown', then Satchidanadendra writes "If Sri Suresvara has accepted 'positive ignorance', he would not have agreed that ignorance was absence of knowledge, and would have simply affirmed that the doubt was groundless, since Ignorance was a positive entity. He would not have said that the cause (of the objects of the world) was reality qua unknown.

This is laughable and it undermines Satchidanadenra's claims since ignorance BEING A POWER of the 'one reality' (Brahman) is EXACTLY WHAT Satchidanadendra calls the 'causal ignorance' and mulavidya. Suresvara is explicitly saying "the objection is invalid because just as with this example it can manifest by the power of the one reality Brahman (regardless of how one defines ignorance)" and then Satchidanadendra tries to flip this statement on its head and imply that Suresvara is denying exactly what he is actually affirming

[Anonymous No.21890361]

>>21889909

Equally laughable is when Satchidanadenra in 164 describes a way to interpret Suresvara as accepting avidya in dreamless sleep and then calls this incorrect, but he omits the fact that this is THE POSITION OF SURESVARA'S OWN STUDENT SARVAJNATMAN MUNI!!!! whom I think we can probably all agree was more likely to understand his own teacher better than a 20th century NeoVedantist

>I just want to post these two excerpts from Sureshvara's Varttikas which contradicts any Avidya in deep sleep:
>"That Self which is free from all differentiation and whose nature transcends verbal communication is attained by us in dreamless sleep. This statement is not wrong, as it has behind it the weight of the authority of the Veda' (T. B. V. 2.664)
to say that the Self is attained in dreamless sleep is not denying that avidya is still present as a power of the Self/Brahman

>"It is the true form of the Self that is here being taught. It is that which is severed from Ignorance, desire and action and is found in dreamless sleep" (B. B. V. 4.3.1205)
1) The Self is equally severed from ignorance in all states, to say otherwise betrays a lack of understanding of Shankara's position, thus when Suresvara is saying in the first part of the sentence "severed from ignorance, desire and action", he isn't saying anything that's somehow more true in dreamless sleep vs waking (to say otherwise is confusing the buddhi and its vritti's with Atman), thus the sentence doesn't constitute a statement of avidya being totally absent in dreamless sleep, here he seems to be saying this true nature of the Self is especially obvious or evident when we think about dreamless sleep (since avidya etc isn't presenting itself in the form of an object) but neither he nor Shankara admits that the Self is really 'non-severed' to ignorance during the waking state, you or Satchidanadenra citing that verse in that manner is implying that the Self is really attached to ignorance during waking and that a change happens to it in sleep.
2) Also, since this quote can be understood in the manner of Suresvara's own student Sarvajnatman to refer to Ignorance not being known in a definite or objective way as per the waking state despite being present it makes more sense logically to read it in this way since he supplements the claim of avidya being present in NS 3:58 with various additional arguments that it would be totally illogical to make if he didn't actually mean that metaphysical avidya is present in prajna.

[Anonymous No.21890366]

>>21889909
>5. Regarding the so called prarabdha-karma, this is a later (vyakhyanakara) advaita doctrine.
Are you serious dude? What is wrong with you? I just cited a verse of Shankara explicitly affirming the prarbdha-karma doctrine and even calling it by that name! Did you miss that or have some cognitive dissonance that made you decide to ignore it altogether? I will now cite some of the various verse where Shankara explicitly teaches prabadha-karma, Satchidanandenda doesn't have any good way to explain away these explicit statements:

"In the last two topics it has been said that all the past works of a knower of Brahman are destroyed. Now past works are of two kinds: Sanchita (accumulated) i.e. those which have not yet begun to bear fruit, and PRARABDHA (commenced) i.e. those which have begun to yield results, and have produced the body through which a person has attained Knowledge. The opponent holds that both these are destroyed, because the Mundaka text cited says that all his works are destroyed. Moreover, the idea of nonagency of the knower is the same with respect to Sanchita or PRARABDHA work (karma); therefore it is reasonable that both are destroyed when Knowledge dawns.

The Sutra refutes this view and says that only the Sanchita works are destroyed by Knowledge, but not the PRARABDHA, which are destroyed only by being worked out. So long as the momentum of these works lasts, the knower of Brahman has to be in the body. When they are exhausted, the body falls off, and he attains perfection. His Knowledge cannot check these works, even as an archer has no control over the arrows already discharged, which come to rest only when their momentum is exhausted. The Sruti declares this in texts like, “And for him the delay is only so long as he is not liberated (from this body); and then he is one (with Brahman)” (Chh. 6. 14. 2). If it were not so, then there would be no teachers of Knowledge. Therefore the PRARABDHA works are not destroyed by Knowledge."
-Shankara, Brahmasutra Bhashya IV.i.15

"The opponent argues that even as a knower of Brahman sees diversity while living, so also even after death he will continue to see diversity; in other words, he denies that the knower of Brahman attains oneness with Brahman at death. This Sutra refutes it and says that the PRARABDHA KARMA are destroyed through fruition, and though till then the knower of Brahman has to be in the relative world as a Jivan-mukta, yet when these are exhausted by being worked out, he attains oneness with Brahman at death. He no longer sees any diversity, owing to the absence of any cause like the PRARABDHA, and since all works including the PRARABDHA are destroyed at death, he attains oneness with Brahman.
-Shankara, Brahmasutra Bhashya IV.i.19

[Anonymous No.21890375]

>>21889909

"Objection: How is that meditation already known as a possible alternative, since, as you said, on the principle of the residuum the train of remembrance of the knowledge of the Self is an inevitable fact?
Reply: It is true, but nevertheless, since the resultant of past actions that led to the formation of the present body must produce definite results, speech, mind and the body are bound to work even after the highest realisation, for actions that have begun to bear fruit are stronger than knowledge; as for instance an arrow that has been let fly continues its course for some time. Hence the operation of knowledge, being weaker than they, (is liable to be interrupted by them and) becomes only a possible alternative. Therefore there is need to regulate the train- of remembrance of the knowledge of the Self by having recourse to means such as renunciation and dispassion; but it is not something that is to be originally enjoined, being, as we said, already known as a possible alternative. Hence we conclude that passages such as, ‘(The aspirant after Brahman) knowing about this alone, should attain intuitive knowledge,’ are only meant to lay down the rule that the train of remembrance— already known (as a possible alternative)—of the knowledge of the Self must be kept up, for they can have no other import."
-Shankara, Brhadaranyaka Upanishad Bhashya 1.4.7

>Well said by Sureshvara:
>"Only a fool would claim that Ignorance and knowledge could inhere in the same seat (the same individual consciousness), and that ignorance of a thing could remain on, uncancelled, after the thing had been right known" (B.B.V 2.4.204)
1) that one sentence doesn't negate that 3 obvious mentions of prarbdha-karma in the above passages by Shankara
2) when he is talking about 'ignorance of a thing' he means the false understanding about the Self that is one of the requirments/factors in further transmigration he is not talking aboutthe mind's perception of name and form, ending ignorance about the Self involves the sublation of non-Self, but sublated name and form means no longer regarding them as real or as having any being apart from Brahman, it doesn't mean that the mind stops perceiving them. To cite this passage as Suresvara denouncing prarbdha-karma appears to be based on the mistake of confusing the sublating of name and form with the mind ceasing to perceive name and form (even as sublated) in ordinary empirical experience (Shankara denounces the latter as making the transmission of the Vedantic teaching impossible in BSSB 4-1-15 that I have already quoted)

[Anonymous No.21890378]

>>21889909
>6. The method of vedanta has been expressed by Shankara in the gita bhashya 13.13:
>"Similarly there is the saying of the sampradaya-vid – The one devoid-of-prapancha (Brahman) is explained through Adhyaropa-Apavada."
Again, this is not saying that Adhraropa-Apavada is the central method or the main method of 1) the Upanishads 2) the Advaita teaching tradition or 3) Shankara's Bhasyhas, he is only saying in passing here in this passage that it's one way to contribute to teaching someone about Brahman and this is a part of the tradition. It's simple logic that saying X is explained through Y doesn't rule out saying that saying Z helps explain X in another context unless you have the explicit mention of other methods as being invalid. However, Shankara doesn't say that and he actually mentions other methods as well and he never says any of them are the main method or central, so it's unwarranted and indefensible to assume that Shankara is saying that Adhyaropa-Apavada is the end-all-be-all solely because he mentions this in connection with 'Tradition' or 'Knowers of Tradition', he talks about Tradition in a bunch of other contexts as well and speaks of various obscure pre-Gaudapada with their various quotes as knowing the tradition as well, so it's arbitrary and wrong to select one of these as the metric to guide all the others.

Any all-important metric would have to be mentioned at the start of every work of Shankara, according to Mimamsa hermeneutical principles followed by Shankara which states that the statement or idea at the beginning of a work has to always be in agreement with its overall teaching. Shankara follows these principles and they are critical for his project, he cites them to back up his own case as if to say "Jaimini's exegetics taken to its full conclusion actually leads to Advaita". At the beginning of all his major Upanishad commentaries he only talks about the purposes of the Upanishads being to overcome ignorance and he doesn't talk about Adhyaropa-Apavada in the beginning of his Upanishad bhashyas. The one exception was the Aitareya Upanishad which was thought by scholars to be incomplete and soon enough a much longer Aitareya-Bhasya by Shankara was found that DOES make the same point about overcoming ignorance at the beginning and which is currently being edited and slowly translated but not yet published. Thus, the central point he emphasizes is overcoming ignorance through knowledge and not Adhyaropa-Apavada, all his methods thereby are subordinated to the former and not the latter.

[Anonymous No.21890380]

>>21889909

What are some of the various methods that Shankara uses? As Shankara's Stanford philosophy article observes "These methods include continuity and discontinuity (anvaya and vyatireka), secondary indication (lakṣaṇā), and negative language (neti neti). Śaṅkara does not clearly codify these separately, but it may be most accurate to describe his primary method as continuity and discontinuity (see, e.g., GKBh 13.13). Post-Śaṅkara Advaitins often discuss his method as lakṣaṇā instead; however, Śaṅkara appears to view all three as varying iterations of a single method.

Why does his Stanford article say "Shankara appears to view all three as varying iterations of a single method?" Because he doesn't explicitly say anywhere which is his main method, not in the sentence you quote nor anywhere else. Applying the Mimamsa hermeneutical principles to Shankara's works that he himself follows DOES NOT support Adhyaropa-Apavada being the main point of his bhashyas. Mimamsa hermeneutical principles completely disagree with and are designed to safeguard against retards taking single sentences like that out of context as has been done.

>"And in putting an end to this condition, the final means of knowledge ceases any longer to be a means of knowledge, just as the means of knowledge present in a dream cease to be such on waking" (Bh.G.Bh. 2.69)
Here he is basically saying that the Vedas cease to be the means to knowledge of Brahman once you have overcome the ignorance obscuring it and are established in it, you don't need them to access Brahmavidya anymore unlike the unenlighted man, this isn't an endorsement of Adhyaropa-Apavada being his main method, it's just another sentence taken out of context

>Satchidanandendra doesn't 'cherrypick' anything.
Demonstrably untrue
1) as far as I've seen he doesn't address Shankara's explicit statement of avidya in deep sleep in Brahma-Sutra Bhasya 2-1-9
2) He lies and says Shankara doesn't equate maya and avidya when there are actually at least 5 or 6 (possibly more) explicit and unequivocal identifications of them in Shankara's Bhashyas, from what I've seen Satchidanandendra omits and runs away from any reference to these and tries to argue he doesn't equate them by cherrypicking 1 verse from the Adhyasa-Bhasya where they are mentioned as performing different functions (which itself doesn't mean that they aren't two aspects of the same thing).
3) Satchidanandendra lies and says Shankara doesn't teach that maya and samsara in general is a power of the Brahman when there are actually more than a dozen verses when Shankara explicitly and unequivocally does say exactly this, again from what I've seen he omits any reference to these verses

[Anonymous No.21890390]

it's amazing how people in the middle could babble about something they completely made up like Brahman.

[Anonymous No.21890405]

>>21889909
Here is one of Satchidanandendra's characteristically dishonest statements, presented as a refutation of maya being a power of Brahman:

"All misconceptions about Shankara's Vedanta which impute to Brahman a power called Maya in virtue of which It manifests Itself as the universe, are therefore to be accounted for as being due to confounding of the two significations of "Shakti" and mistaking the Shakti or 'potential aspect of the universe of names and forms, for the power of Isvara'. It is this potency of names and forms that has been declared by Sankara to be a figment of avidya in the quotation cited above."
- Satchidanandendra, "Misconconceptions about Shankara", page 25

What does Satchidanandendra duplicitously omit any reference to here when trying to refute maya being Brahman's power?

All of the following:

Now with a view to begin the subject chiefly dealing with the refutation of the opponent's doctrines, the Acharya proposes to conclude the chief subject of the establishment of his own (Vedanta) doctrine, in as much as, when once this Brahman is accepted as the cause of this world, all qualities attributable to the cause, become reasonably sustainable in the manner indicated, viz—that Brahman is omniscient, omnipotent and possesses the great power of Maya, and that therefore one should not doubt the Upanishad doctrine over much.
- Shankara, Brahma Sutra Bhashya 2.1.37

Hence He is the supreme Self. He Himself is being specially described: who, by dint of His own active power inhering in the energy that is Maya; permeating; the three worlds-called Bhuh (Earth), Bhuvah, (Intermediate Space) and Svah (Heaven); upholds (them) by merely being present in His own nature.
- Shankara Gita Bhashya 15.17

>the other person is the aksarah, immutable, opposite of the former, the power of god called maya, which is the seed of the origin of the person called the mutable.
- Shankara, Gita Bhashya 15.16

[Anonymous No.21890408]

>>21889909
he also omits mentioning these:

Though I am birthless; and undecaying by nature, though I am naturally possessed of an undiminishing power of Knowledge; and so also, though the Lord, natural Ruler of beings, from Brahma to a clump of grass; (still), by subjugating; My own Prakrti, the Maya of Visnu consisting of the three gunas, under whose; spell the whole world exists, and deluded by which one does not know one's own Self, Vasudeva; -by subjugating that Prakrti of Mine, I take birth, appear to become embodied, as though born; by means of My own Maya; but not in reality like an ordinary man.
- Shankara, Gita Bhashya 4.6

In answer to the objection that the reference in the Upanisad to such forms as the possession of golden beard etc. does not befit God, we say: Even for God there may be forms created at His will out of Maya for the sake of favouring the aspirants, as is declared in the Smrti, "0 Narada, it is a Maya, created by Me, that you see Me in this form possessed of all the substances and qualities. You must not understand Me thus".
- Shankara, Brahma Sutra Bhashya 1.1.20

That God who is the Self; yah, who, because of His inscrutable power (ie maya); karoti, makes- by His mere existence; (His) ekam rupam, one form - His own Self that is homogeneous and consists of unalloyed consciousness; bahudha, diverse-through the differences in the impure conditions of name and form
- Shankara, Katha Bhashya 2-2-12

I bow down to that Brahman which, though birthless, appears to be born through Its inscrutable power (of Maya);
- Shankara, - part of salutory invocation at the very end of Gaudapada-Karika-Bhashya

[Anonymous No.21890448]

>>21889909

Here is another outrageous lie by Satchidanandendra that will immediately stick out to anyone who has actually read Shankara:

"Avidya and Maya are not synonymous terms in Shankara-Vedanta. It is some post-Shankara Vedantins who have treated Avidya and Maya to be identical."
- Satchidanandendra, "Misconceptions about Shankara" page 9

What does Satchidanandendra duplicitously omit any reference to here?

All of these statements of Shankara identifying Maya and Avidya:

"This one—this Purusha; in all creatures—from Brahmā to a clump of grass; is hidden;— though He has such activities as hearing, seeing, etc., yet he is covered by Maya i.e. Avidya"
-Shankara, Katha Upanshad Bhashya 1.3.12

"The aggregates, of bodies etc., that are analogous to the jars etc., are like the bodies etc. seen in a dream and like those conjured up by a magician; and are produced, conjured up, by the Maya, ignorance (avidya), of the Self; the idea is that they do not exist in reality"
-Shankara, Gaudapada-Karika Bhashya verse 3.10

The Supreme Lord is but one—unchanging, eternal, absolute Consciousness; but like a magician He appears diversely through Maya, otherwise known as Avidya (ignorance). Apart from this there is no other consciousness as such.
- Shankara, Brahma Sutra Bhashya 1.3.19.

This potential power of the seed is of the nature of Nescience (i.e. ignorance), and it is indicated by the word 'undeveloped' (Avyakta), and has the Highest Lord as its basis, and is of the nature of an illusion (Māyā), and is the great sleep in which the transmigratory Jiva-Selfs unaware of their own true nature (Rūpa) continue to slumber on. This same 'undeveloped' (Avyakta) is occasionally indicated by the word Ākāśa, as in the Scriptural passage—"Verily, Oh Gārgi, in this, the imperishable one, is the Ākāśa woven weft-and-warp-wise" (Brih. 3.8.11). Occasionally it is expressed by the word 'Akshara' as in the Scriptural passage "Higher than the high Imperishable" (Muṇḍ 2.1.2.), and occasionally it is suggested to be the illusory power (Māyā) thus—"You should know the Prakriti (the cause) to be but the illusory power—Māyā, and the Highest Lord as the master-illusionist" (Shvet. 4.10). It is this Māyā that is this 'undeveloped' (Avyakta)....
- Shankara, Brahma Sutra Bhashya 1-4-3

[Anonymous No.21890460]

uh oh Satchidanandendrasisters.... I don't feel so good

[Anonymous No.21890464]

>>21876926
I liked Shankara but Nagarjuna converted me to Buddhism and now I’m an atheist again.

[Anonymous No.21890560]

I ignore texts written by sannyasins because I'm not an ascetic, simple as. Nothing that is written there will serve a purpose to me.

[Anonymous No.21890565]

Also you can't expect objectivity on this topic, because pajeets are motivated by PRIDE to defend Vedanta.

[Anonymous No.21890690]

>>21890560
Yeah, Shankara is for those who have already renounced son, wealth, worlds, for those outside of the four stages of life, and for those who have no desires like woman, or desires for the results of avidya (karma), the objects of meditation on the gods, relative immortality, or the results of the performance of rites, and duties etc. Really he is writing for the true class of sages of supreme purity, who are occupy the highestmost rung of the intellectual nature.

[Anonymous No.21890763]

>>21876926
MOGGED

[Anonymous No.21890770]

>>21890690
I'm intellectually curious, so I have to make real effort to restrain myself not to waste time reading literature for ascetics.

[Anonymous No.21890891]

>>21878540
>Other
>Not-I
>Desire for/of the Other

This smells a lot like Lacan to me. Does any anon know if there's literature on Lacanianism+Buddhism (I suppose)? Or something along those lines?

[Anonymous No.21890924]

Never seen any strong refutation of the claim that Shankara is just plagiarized Buddhism. It always devolves into "actually we define things differently" as if that matters at all.

[Anonymous No.21891020]

>>21890354
>>21890358
>>21890361
>>21890366
>>21890375
>>21890378
>>21890380
>>21890405
>>21890408
>>21890448

Just throwing a bunch of excerpts doesn't help that much, as I could just do the same to support my position (as I did, quoting from Sureshvara's vartikas where he explicitly denies avidya in sushupti, but you just used that to support your own Mulavidyavada position).

Regarding Adhyaropa-apavada, I didn't say that it was the only method, but that it is the modus operandi ('general methodology') of not only the Bhashyas, but of the whole Upanishadic literature. And all other 'methods' are just 'particular applications': https://www.advaita-vedanta.in/adhyaropa-apavada
1. The fact that most Upanishads start with a description of karma-khanda (rituals, etc) and later on they deny all that, to start the jnana-khanda, this is Adhyaropa-apavada.
2. The description of many theories of creation, causality, etc, that are later on all denied. .
3. The appeal to many means of knowledge, that are all denied. etc,etc.
4. Brahman provided with many attributes such as being a knower, an agent, having a 'power'.

All those (deliberately)false attributions are all (ultimately)denied by the Upanishads, the Karikas of Gaudapada, Bhashyas of Shankara and the Varttikas of Sureshwara.
It's so obvious that Shankara didn't have the need to express it very often.

"There is no manifestation neither dissolution nor limitation;
there is no one who strives or aspires to obtain Liberation;
and there is not even any freed. This is the supreme truth. (MU II.32)

But why make all those descriptions if they're all illusory? Well.. "there is a saying of the people versed in the tradition: 'The Absolute is described with the help of superimposition and its refutation'."


But anyways, we're not gonna reach any agreement because we're not speaking on the same grounds.

What's the common ground for metaphysical enquiry that should be referenced? Let the Commentator speak:
"In the case of enquiry into the Vedic ritual, the Vedic and other traditional texts alone are the criterion. But this is not so in the case of enquiry into the Absolute. Here it is the same texts that are the authority, but with immediate experience added in the case of the purely metaphysical texts. For knowledge of the Absolute requires to culminate in immediate experience (anubhava), and (unlike the part of the Veda dealing with commands and prohibitions) has an already existing reality for its object" (B.S.Bh. 1.1.2)

so 'nothing based on the mere authority of words can be accepted in the course of such reflection if it contradicts immediate experience'.
And that's exactly where we're differ.
Before quoting anything, follow Shankara's instructions and look at your own anubhava, and you'll see for example that there isn't any trace of avidya or any shakti in deep sleep.
but please, don't confuse anubhava with any 'particular experience', or 'empirical knowledge'.

[Anonymous No.21891124]

>>21890560
What should someone of a more kshatriya disposition read then? Just be content with the Gita?

[Anonymous No.21891518]

>>21891124
In my post I didn't mean that I don't read ascetic works because I identify myself with a different caste, it's solely because there are sadhanas more fit for householders and laymen and that Shankara's method is fruitless for those who don't accept to leave society. But I will answer your question either way because I have controversial insights on this, the development of warrior culture was after human societies became agricultural, in order to protect borders. If we believe Hesiod's doctrine of the four eras, then it corresponds with the Bronze Age, when men started fighting between themselves. However this is also an esoteric doctrine, Hyperborea, when humans were immortals, existed in the Golden Age and every spirituality is a return to this Golden Age, in which there was no cultural differentiation. Most universalist ideologies also have in mind a Golden Age that existed, like Rousseau's gentil sauvage. So to answer your question, there simply isn't an esoteric spirituality for the kshatriya, the kshatriya honors his family and does libations for the dead, protects the land of his ancestors, that's it. The Bhagavad Gita is a sin against the kshatriya: the betrayal of the family in the name of an universal dharma. Yet I do sadhanas because I know it's comfy and my mind is too sick to go on like this.

[Anonymous No.21891766]

>>21891124
Vajrayana, you have sutras designed for warriors, with deities, rituals, and metaphysical systems

[Anonymous No.21891799]

>>21891020
>Just throwing a bunch of excerpts doesn't help that much, as I could just do the same to support my position (as I did, quoting from Sureshvara's vartikas where he explicitly denies avidya in sushupti, but you just used that to support your own Mulavidyavada position).
That's just coping, those excerpts included Shankara's refutation of avidya being absent in prajna in BSSB 2-1-9, which you didn't even acknowledge in your post, every time you are face with explicit evidence of Satchidanandra being wrong you fail to directly address it and come up with some coping excuse based on circular thinking instead. Believing Satchidanadenra's position requires one to have to come up with an endless amount of copes to explain away hundreds of statements by Shankara.

You also claimed that "Satchidanandendra doesn't omit anything" which I refuted and demonstrated was false with excerpts by showing how in one book when he makes arguments he omits any reference to critical passages about maya being identical with avidya and viz. maya being a power of Brahman. He is a liar, plain and simple. He cannot be trusted as he has demonstrated his own dishonesty.

You also made the retarded claim that prarbdha-karma was not taught by Shankara but was invented by later Advaitas, the 3 excerpts I provided from Shankara incontrovertibly refuted your claim and showed the opposite to be true.

>as I did, quoting from Sureshvara's vartikas where he explicitly denies avidya in sushupti, but you just used that to support your own Mulavidyavada position).
Neither of those statements were explicitly saying as much as I already pointed out but you have to infer them to be doing so, but this inference is made untenable by the abundance of other evidence that is opposed to it.

[Anonymous No.21891804]

>>21891020
>Regarding Adhyaropa-apavada, I didn't say that it was the only method, but that it is the modus operandi ('general methodology') of not only the Bhashyas, but of the whole Upanishadic literature. >And all other 'methods' are just 'particular applications': https://www.advaita-vedanta.in/adhyaropa-apavada
That's wrong, this is another bullshit K.A. Krishnaswamy/Satchi talking point, Shankara does not say this anywhere, linking that website is not a sufficient authority or basis to demonstrate this claim. Shankara does not say that adhyaropa-apavada is the modus operandi of the Upanishadic literature anywhere in his works so it's unacceptable for one to try to foster that view on him. He also doesn't say anywhere that other methods are just applications of adhyaropa-apavada. It's because you are trapped up in circular cult thinking that you are forced to rely on citing random websites instead of being able to substantiate your claim with a direct quote from Shankara.

>1. The fact that most Upanishads start with a description of karma-khanda (rituals, etc) and later on they deny all that, to start the jnana-khanda, this is Adhyaropa-apavada.
False, they don't deny karma-khanda but the Upanishads consider karma-khanda and jnana-khanda to each be valid in the sphere to which they refer and this is also the approach Shankara makes to them. It doesn't even mean anything to say that the Upanishads "deny" them (wtf), do they deny that karma-khanda produce sons, heaven, etc? No, they don't. Emphasizing that only jnana-karma leads to moksha does not constitute a "denial" of karma-khanda, that's a retarded thing to say and it's certainly not an example of adhyaropa-apavada.

>2. The description of many theories of creation, causality, etc, that are later on all denied. .
Only a real creation is denied, the Upanishads and Shankara both never deny that maya is a power of Brahman, it's an outright lie to say that the Upanishads or Shankara deny that Brahman projects maya as the "master illusionist". We have direct proof of Satchidanadenra's interpretation of this being totally wrong in Shankara's Bhashya on Mandukya-Karika 3.25 when Shankara writes that the negation of creation only means the denial of the reality of Hiranyagarbha, he doesn't say anything about maya being denied as not Brahmans illusory projection

[Anonymous No.21891809]

>>21891020
>3. The appeal to many means of knowledge, that are all denied. etc,etc.
False, empirical means are not denied as being valid in the empirical sphere and neither are the Vedas denied as being a valid means to knowledge of Brahman
>4. Brahman provided with many attributes such as being a knower, an agent, having a 'power'.
All negation only removes the perception/belief of the reality of differences created by limiting adjuncts (upadhis), but Brahman having maya as his power is not something caused by upadhis. Negation leaves the uncompounded Brahman shining in his own nature free of upadhis, this is why Shankara talks about Brahman as being free of relative attributes and phenomenal attributes and he never says that Brahman lacks all attributes to the point of not even having any impartite and uncompounded nature of its own

>All those (deliberately)false attributions are all (ultimately)denied by the Upanishads, the Karikas of Gaudapada, Bhashyas of Shankara and the Varttikas of Sureshwara.
False, as I have said before, neither the Upanishads nor Gaudapada nor Shankara nor Suresvara deny anywhere that maya is a power of Brahman, without this element Advaita doesn't even make sense.

>"There is no manifestation neither dissolution nor limitation; there is no one who strives or aspires to obtain Liberation; and there is not even any freed. This is the supreme truth. (MU II.32)
This is obviously a denial of the manifested universe being real and not a denial of an illusory manifestation being Brahman's power, the illusory manifestation being Brahman's power is what allows it to appear as illusion in the first place despite lacking reality. In his Bhashya on this verse Shankara says the actual word used is not "manifestation" but "origination" (you probably reposted a misleading Satchidanadenra translation), maya is not "originated" but is a beginningless contingent illusion projected by Brahman, Shankara and Gaudapada are merely saying that Brahman's power maya (which constitutes samsara) never originates in time or space etc because these frames of references are themselves product of maya

>It's so obvious that Shankara didn't have the need to express it very often.
This is cope, Shankara never endorses that theory anywhere and it's too big of a leap to infer it without his explicit statement of it being justified

[Anonymous No.21891814]

>>21891020

>But why make all those descriptions if they're all illusory? Well.. "there is a saying of the people versed in the tradition: 'The Absolute is described with the help of superimposition and its refutation'.
Again, it's totally baseless to assert that this one sentence is claiming that adhyaropa-apavada is the modus operandi of the Upanishads or Advaita solely because "it helps describe the absolute". Shankara also talks about analogies or laksana being used to explain Brahman many times and he never places or elevates adhyaropa-apavada over analogies or vice-versa.

>But anyways, we're not gonna reach any agreement because we're not speaking on the same grounds.
You are so committed to your position that you refuse to even acknowledge when I provide sourced quotes from Shankara that directly refute your claim, it's dishonest of you to not even engage with or acknowledge them (eg. Shankara saying avidya is present in dreamless sleep in BSSB 2-1-9, the quotes about Prarbdha-Karma, about maya and avidya being identical etc) but then still reply with half-hearted cope attempts at saving face. I have given up hope that you are honest or that you will acknowledge the glaring failures and contradictions in your own position and I am just posting this so other people are also not mislead into your NeoVedanta cult and its circular thinking.

>And that's exactly where we're differ.
I'm saying anything should be accepted if it contradicts immediate experience, avidya being present in a non-objective manner in dreamless sleep is not contradicted by any experience. According to your dumb NeoVedanta theories the waker is different from the dreamer so it literally makes no sense for you to even be talking about your experience of sushupti in the first place!!! Comans also correctly notes this blatant contradiction in Krishnaswamy's/Satchitdanadendra's theories

[Anonymous No.21891832]

>>21891814
*I'm NOT saying anything should be accepted if it contradicts immediate experience,

[Anonymous No.21891912]

>>21890924
>Never seen any strong refutation of the claim that Shankara is just plagiarized Buddhism
That claim is only ever asserted on incredibly weak grounds in the first place, in order to refute it all you have to do is show how these grounds are fallacious or involve outright misinformation, which has already been done various times, by C. Sharma, by Swami Nikhilananda, even by the dishonest shithead Satchidanadendra (broken clock is right twice a day)

[Anonymous No.21891980]

>>21891124
https://www.lionsroar.com/conquering-fear/
Start from here and google any associated person, keywords and practices

[Anonymous No.21892083]

>>21891518
>The Bhagavad Gita is a sin against the kshatriya: the betrayal of the family in the name of an universal dharma.
The duty of the kshatriya is to be a soldier, being fickle and suddenly switching sides in a war (betraying your sovereign and your oath/agreement to serve them as a solider) because a number of relatives join the other side seems to me like placing egoistic concerns above one's duty as a solider.

>>21891124
At least within the Hindu context, there is a lot of Shaivist and Shaktist literature that aims to make a kind of monist/non-dual spirituality practicable and relevant for householders, Ramanuja does this to a certain extent too. I personally think that non-monks can still benefit and be spiritually enriched by studying Advaita (either by itself or in addition to other stuff) and it's sort of implied by Shankara that doing so can create a karmic tendency that makes one be born into a sannyasin-eligible status in a future life or to otherwise attain Brahmaloka or a future priviledged birth that can help one get moksha. Since he follows the example set by the Brahma-Sutras and Dharmasastras he says that it's proper only for twice-born peoples (the upper 3 castes) to study the Vedas, but he says there is nothing wrong with shudras etc studying the various Smriti literature and by extension this would naturally apply to yogic texts, sankhya, tantra etc; his writings still have the clear implication though that someone studying Advaita without the proper caste context can still generate this karmic seed that fruitions in a positive way in the future. Francis X. Clooney has a chapter on the possibility of accidental (non-proper) disclosure of the teaching and the related enlightenment in his book "Theology after Vedanta".

[Anonymous No.21892091]

>>21891124
>>21892083
A list of translated Shaivist literature includes:

Shiva Sutras
Shiva Samhita
Matrikabheda Tantra
Spandakarikas
Paratrisikavivirana
Isvara-Gita
Shiva Purana
Vijnana Bhairava Tantra
Paramārthasāra - Abhhinavagupta (trika)
Tantraloka/Tantrasara - ibid (trika)
Paramarthasara - ibid (trika)
Bhagavad-Gita commentary - ibid (trika)
Īśvarapratyabhijñā-vimarśini - ibid (trika)
Pratyabhijnahrdayam - Ksmeraja (trika)
Siddha Siddhanta Paddhati (Natha)
Kaulajnananirnaya (Natha)
Amritanubhava - Jnanadeva (Natha)
Bhavartha Deepika - Jnanadeva (Natha)
Siva Jnana Bodham with Nigamajnanadesika's commentary (Shaiva Siddhanta)
Shunya Sampasade (Veerashaiva)
Siddhanta Shikhamani (Veerashaiva)

translated Shaktist literature includes:
Kularnava Tantra
Devi Mahatmya
Markandeya Purana (includes the Devi Mahatmya)
Srimad Devi Bhagavata Purana
Devi Upanishad
Kalika Purana
Tripura Rahasya
Soundarya Lahari - Adi Shankara
Sri Lalita Trisati Bhasya - Adi Shankara
Manthanabhairavatantram, Kumarikakhandah, The Section Concerning the Virgin Goddess of the Tantra of the Churning Bhairava
Lalitasahasranama with Bhāskararāya's commentary (Sri Vidya)
Varivasyā-Rahasya and its atuocommentary Prakāśa by Bhāskararāya (Sri Vidya)

In some Shaktism schools like Sri Vidya they include Adi Shankara in their guru lineage and read some of his (possibly inauthentic) works about Shaktism in addition to their own Shakti literature but they still are oriented towards householders regardless. Also, sometimes Shaktism and Shaivism are hard to separate from one another.

[Anonymous No.21892152]

>>21891799
>>21891804
>>21891809
>>21891814
What's the use of knowledge in face of brahman's so powerful Shakti and prarabdha-karma then?
Knowledge can only remove false knowledge, not some eternal entity, substance or power. (and that is what's implied in your position, you can't deny that, only if you're dishonest)

This is not vedanta. This is not only against the Sruti, but against reason and experience/anubhava (not that you care, because you ignored the most important part of the last post, with the excerpt of Shankara regarding the necessity and priority of looking into your own anubhava)
This is what Ramanuja thought was Shankara's vedanta, that's why he got pissed off by it, because it really doesn't make any sense.

And it's worse, now you're saying that rituals, means of knowledge and atributes are real (yeah, they're real in their own sphere, but this sphere is demonstrated as unreal by the dawn of metaphysical knowledge, paramartha; like everything seem on a dream ceases to be valid on waking). Don't you understand the meaning of 'denying', 'negation', 'sublation' in metaphysics?

The ultimate negation of creation, causality, pramanas, avasthas, etc means that they are all asat, brhanti, mithya, unreal. That's it. If you think otherwise it's nothing more than manasarga, your own imagination.

You simply cannot understand this, because you're a proponent of mulavidya, so with that comes the whole package of misunderstandings: remaining karma, maya-avidya, relative 'reality' (if you cannot fathom how retard this expression sounds, I can't do nothing for you).
All of that because you ignore your own experience and prefers to follow mental constructions of a so-called waker.

Also, you have literally no idea how the avasthatraya vichara works. I don't even know why I'm mentioning it.

>>21891832
>*I'm NOT saying anything should be accepted if it contradicts immediate experience,
Everything that you advocate contradicts immediate experience. But you have no idea what I (or Shankara, Sureshavara or Satchidanadendra) mean by immediate experience and doesn't seem to wanna know it, because it contradicts all the pseudo-vedanta that you built in your head.

[Anonymous No.21892397]

>>21892152

>What's the use of knowledge in face of brahman's so powerful Shakti and prarabdha-karma then?
As Shankara states "Because the potential power of the seed (to sprout up into a new life) is destroyed by the true knowledge - BSSB 1-4-3. Indeed, this answer is elementary and obvious—The use of Upanishadic knowledge is that it eliminates the specific delusions of the one particular jiva or intellect (buddhi) that is currently bound, which eliminates the cause of that particular one buddhi's further transmigration/bondage, despite maya-avidya persisting for other buddhis who are still deluded and transmigrating. This is why complaining about maya-avidya remaining as Brahman's power even after enlightenment is effectively an irrelevant non-issue and it also betrays Shankara's stated position.

The intellect is comprised of tanmatras (subtle elements) which are themselves a part of maya, and the vrittis (the most subtle and innermost type of mental modifications including all insight/realization) just happen when the translucent tanmatras receive and are lit up by the light of the Atman. The delusions inhering in someone's intellect and the ending of these are just a corresponding shift in tanmatras, it's all just a shift in the maya-avidya sakti of Brahman when the sublation of non-Self occurs, Brahmavidya is NOT a mysterious realization that is neither in the buddhi's tanmatras and nor in the Atman, it's just the Buddhi's tanmatra's shifting or unwinding in such way such that they don't have any more delusions (a unique type of configuration) anymore about the Atman's light that pervades it, this forever removes the impetus for further transmigration.

The Upanishads that impart this knowledge, the intellect that grasps it, the thoughts and vrittis that correspond to wrong beliefs and the subsequent mental actions involved in their correction, this all equally just phenomena made of the gunas (which are maya), it's only on the assumption that this process is crafted as an artful illusion by Brahman (on whom all of samsara depends) that gnosis can be conceived of as possibly leading out of samsara, because that gnosis is imbued into their minds by the same source as samsara instead of coming from a source that they schizophrenically imagine up out of ignorance but which coincidentally happens to be correct (lmao). The higher CANNOT come from the lower.

[Anonymous No.21892403]

>>21892152

This is in fact the ONLY way that the Vedas can provide liberating knowledge, since if they are totally delusive products of Avidya (Satchidanadenra's position) instead of being ultimately sourced from Brahman then they cannot be a reliable means for the being to be liberated to any sense or fashion, it would be like asking a schizophrenic person to trust his own delusions to be his own psychologist. Shankara makes this point himself in the Brahma Sutra Bhasya when he says that only in the event of maya/bondage/samsara being a contingent power of Brahman that Brahman projects/controls and also grants freedom from at the same time (via the Vedas) is the premise of endless liberation reasonably sustainable:

"(in response to Samkhya purvapaksin) As regards this (argument), we reply—If we were to understand any absolutely independent antecedent condition as such to be the cause of this transitory world, then perhaps it would mean, that the doctrine of the Pradhāna being the cause (of the transitory world) is thus arrived at (by us). But we understand this antecedent condition of the transitory world to be dependent on the Highest Lord and not independent in any way. It must necessarily be so understood, because it is only in this way that it can have any meaning, as without such supposition, the creative activity of the Highest Lord is not established. And in the absence of any such power inherent in the Highest Lord, neither his proceeding to create, nor the non-liability of those who have already attained Final Release to be born again, would be reasonably sustainable. How so? Because the potential power of the seed (to sprout up into a new life) is destroyed by the true knowledge."
-Sariraka-Bhasya (BSSB) 1-4-3

In that one passage, Shankara completely refutes and overturns Krishnaswamy's and Satchitdanadendra's entire sophistic project

[Anonymous No.21892407]

>>21892152

>Knowledge can only remove false knowledge, not some eternal entity, substance or power. (and that is what's implied in your position, you can't deny that, only if you're dishonest)
I'm not saying that knowledge removes a beginningless power, but rather as Shankara himself explicitly states in BSSB 1-4-3, "the potential power of the seed (to sprout up into a new life) is destroyed by the true knowledge". And as Shankara himself explicitly states in BSSB 4-1-15, BSSB 4-1-19 and in BUB 1-4-7, knowledge does not eliminate the prarabdha-karma brought about by past works, which is only destroyed when the body dies, Shankara states clearly in those passages that the author of the Brahma Sutras refutes the contention that knowledge erases the prarbdha-karma. Since the delusions (made up of tanmatras in the buddhi) are just one part of maya unfolding from one configuration into another, you are essentially just arbitrarily claiming that Brahman can't make his power of maya do something or behave/function in a certain way, whereas the Upanishads and Shankara make no such restriction.

>this is not vedanta.
I just proved why it is the teaching of Vedanta using Shankara's own words from the BSSB, now watch you cope in response and not even directly engage with said passages in your post replying to this
>This is what Ramanuja thought was Shankara's vedanta, that's why he got pissed off by it, because it really doesn't make any sense.
Incorrect (another fake NeoVedanta talking point), much of what Ramamuja says had to do with the point that ignorance in our common experience doesn't have the ability to summon up consistent and vast worlds of experience and that it's thus irrational to think of avidya (ignorance) as being responsible for the world; this is an argument from experience that would apply to Satchitdanadendra's quasi-solipsim, but it's a not relevant or valid argument if you understand that avidya is just maya and that avidya-maya is proceeding 'from above' ie from Brahman, then Ramanuja's objections lose their relevance especially since as a theist he has no reason to place constraints on the power of the Supreme Lord.

[Anonymous No.21892412]

>>21892152

>And it's worse, now you're saying that rituals, means of knowledge and atributes are real
No I didn't, saying they are valid in their own sphere isn't saying that they are real like Brahman, that's a pathetic strawman, even after being sublated empirical means of knowledge still function as a part of prarabha-karma, as Shankara explicitly says in the quotes I already cited for you (you keep ignoring this because of your cognitive dissonance). "since the resultant of past actions that led to the formation of the present body must produce definite results, speech, mind and the body are bound to work even after the highest realisation, for actions that have begun to bear fruit are stronger than knowledge; as for instance an arrow that has been let fly continues its course for some time." - Shankara, Brhadaranyaka Upanishad Bhashya 1.4.7
>(yeah, they're real in their own sphere, but this sphere is demonstrated as unreal by the dawn of metaphysical knowledge, paramartha; like everything seem on a dream ceases to be valid on waking). Don't you understand the meaning of 'denying', 'negation', 'sublation' in metaphysics?
As I pointed out earlier, you are making the mistake of thinking that sublating phenomena as unreal means that the mind no longer perceives them at the empirical level, but Shankara explicitly refutes this contention in quotes which I have now cited several times
>The ultimate negation of creation, causality, pramanas, avasthas, etc means that they are all asat, brhanti, mithya, unreal. That's it. I
Brahman being the master-illusionist is not negated by anything anywhere that Shankara or Gaudapada or the Upanishads ever say, as I pointed out Shankara says this is the only view that makes permanent liberation reasonably sustainable in BSSB 1-4-3

>You simply cannot understand this, because you're a proponent of mulavidya
Mula-avidya is a contrived generalization that doesn't reflect the diversity of metaphysical viewpoints in post-Shankara Advaita
>I don't even know why I'm mentioning it.
Because I'm BTFOing everything you are saying but you feel the need to come back with half-hearted copes to save face because you struggle to let go of this viewpoint that you have been so convinced by
>>21891832
>*I'm NOT saying anything should be accepted if it contradicts immediate experience,
>Everything that you advocate contradicts immediate experience.
nothing I've said has

[Anonymous No.21892615]

>>21876926
>Refuted by Abhinavagupta

[Anonymous No.21892640]

>>21892615
>Abhinavagupta
Retroactively refuted by Chandradhar Sharmar (pbuh)

Kashmira Shaivism is right in saying that the ultimate reality is the Supreme Self, the transcendental Subject, which is pure consciousness, immediate and indeterminate awareness, self-shining eternal light (prakasha). But it is wrong in believing that this pure consciousness is, at the same rime, self-consciousness (vimarsha). Prakasha or pure consciousness and vimarsha or self-consciousness or will cannot be identified. Self-consciousness involves subject-object duality and objectivity cannot belong to the Self. It need not be argued that in self-consciousness the self itself is both the subject and the object, for the pure Self can never be an object, not even for itself. Again, to say that the object here is pure and that it is not explicitly enjoyed, but implicitly contained in the subject will not save the situation, for no object can be pure and even if it is implicit the reference to it is necessarily there. Objectivity can be traced only to transcendental Illusion.

Pure consciousness, due to avidya, appears as self-consciousness or will. It is not the real nature or power of the Self. This system is confusing between the empirical self and the transcendental Self. In the case of the empirical self pure consciousness remains as its transcendental background and self-consciousness appears as its essence; here the subject and the object are synthesized and every empirical experience, cognitive, emotive, or conative, is based on this synthesis and necessarily refers to an object. This system wrongly imagines that what is true in the case of the empirical self should also be true in the case of the transcendental Self.

Hence the supposition that if the pure Self is not united with the object, it would not be even conscious of its consciousness, would not be able to enjoy its bliss and freedom and would not be able to create anything by the force of its will. So this system treats objectivity as the inherent power of the pure Self and binds the subject eternally to the object. It puts Shiva in eternal embrace of Shakti; without his Shakti or matra (measure) ‘Shiva* would remain a mere ‘Shava' (corpse). This may be true of God and His divine Consort, but not of the Absolute. This is an illegitimate imposition of the empirical nature generated by avidya on the transcendental Self. Pure consciousness is self-shining and self-proved; it needs no other consciousness for its awareness, as this would lead to infinite regress. Pure consciousness is at once pure being and pure bliss. Its unity, its being and its bliss are transcendental and beyond duality. This unity is beyond the categories of unity and difference; this being is beyond the concepts of being and non-being; this bliss is beyond empirical pleasure and pain.

[Anonymous No.21892701]

>>21892397
>>21892403
>>21892407
>>21892412

You still haven't grasped my position. And then you're attributing upon me doctrines that I don't advocate.

First of all, Ignorance is only superimposition and its not real.
There's no bondage or any liberation. It's indeed all Maya, imagination.
To think: "Oh, this Brahman through his Shakti conjures up all this multiplicity", this is avidya-kalpita, manasarga, your imagination. It could have some pedagogical use but it's later on denied to reveal the true nature of reality.

It's you who came up with the whole avidya-maya-shakti-prarabha-karma paraphernalia.
Shankara never even got into this debate of locus-effect-cause-nature of avidya because he knew that it was something irrelevant.
"If you now ask: 'To whom, then, does this absense of enlightenment pertain?' We reply that it pertains to you who are asking the question" (BSBh 4.1.3)

Also, only Brahman is real. There's no talk of something not being 'as real as' Brahman, it APPEARS but it's not real, just like everything seen on a dream appears to be real but it's later sublated by waking.
'Practical experience', 'if I continue to see something or not', 'functioning'. These are not something of metaphysical concern. What matters is to determine if it's real or not.
What's the criterion of reality? According to Shankara, real is that which can't be sublated. And only the Absolute fulfills this requirement.
Again, to be sublated doesn't have anything to do with 'seeing anything' or not, it appears but it's not Real.

And you keep ignoring the need of looking at your own anubhava. Without anubhava all this talk is no different than mere speculation.


"Cause, effect, part, whole, universal, particular, substance, attribute, having or not having action -- all these conditions are falsely imagined in pure Consciousness" (U.S)

This is the final truth.

[Anonymous No.21892745]

>avidya

[Anonymous No.21892839]

>>21892745
>avidya2

[Anonymous No.21892908]

>avidya3
>We therefore conclude that for Shankara, avidya and maya are one and the same thing, coinciding with namarupa, ONLY when they are explicitly referred to as the prime matter of the universe.
>When they stand alone they have their specific function, and in none of the many passages which we have considered in preceding sections are they interchangeable

[Anonymous No.21893125]

>>21892701
>First of all, Ignorance is only superimposition and its not real.
I never said Ignorance is real, nothing I am saying had involved that claim. For Shankara, avidya and maya both belong to the category of falsity (mithya) which is neither Brahman (absolute existence) nor complete nothingness/void, most traditional Advaitins defend this triparatite division, from Shankara's direct disciples to the great logicians like Madhusudana Saraswati.
>There's no bondage or any liberation. It's indeed all Maya, imagination.
Manifestation is not synonymous with existence for Shankara, Shankara agrees that illusory manifestation (including illusory bondage and liberation) is taking place qua manifestation but he disagrees with the claim that it exists (which for Shankara entails absolute existence). To say manifestation take places is admitting that it's appearing. If you say "it's not manifesting" that's incorrect and it's controverted by the very act of you engaging in speech and posting on 4chan, like the man who denies the tongue that he speaks with
>To think: "Oh, this Brahman through his Shakti conjures up all this multiplicity", this is avidya-kalpita, manasarga, your imagination.
False, it's what the Upanishads directly state and Shankara says it himself in like a dozen passages some of which I already quoted for you earlier in >>21890405 & >>21890408, it's you and Satchidanadendra who have to come up with coping nonsense answers as to why these statements should not be taken seriously and directly
>It could have some pedagogical use but it's later on denied to reveal the true nature of reality.
False, maya being Brahman's power is never denied anywhere by Shankara and you have failed to provide a single source for this BS claim. Shankara specifies in Mandukya-Karika Bhashya that he interprets Gaudapada's phrase in 3:25 about the "negation of creation" to ONLY be talking about Hiranyagarbha being illusory, he doesn't say that it means Brahman actually doesn't have maya as his power, but this is the lie that Satchidanadendra tries to foster onto Shankara. "Negation of creation" doesn't do anything to negate Brahman's power of maya for Shankara, this is a made-up NeoVedanta concept that Shankara never once endorses.

[Anonymous No.21893130]

>>21892701
>Shankara never even got into this debate of locus-effect-cause-nature of avidya because he knew that it was something irrelevant.
>"If you now ask: 'To whom, then, does this absense of enlightenment pertain?' We reply that it pertains to you who are asking the question" (BSBh 4.1.3)
That statement doesn't do anything to negate Shankara's statements that maya/samsara in general is contingent on and projected by Brahman, Satchidanadendra misquotes it out of context. In the actual BSSB, that sentence occurs when the question is raised in response to Shankara talking about how the Vedas are sublated and then the person asks "if all this is sublated then who has the wrong understanding?", this has to deal with the topic of sublation which Shankara elsewhere (including in the same work) assigns to prarabdha-karma, but he is not even going that far in that context because he is effectively dismissing it as a pseudoproblem in that passage, however we know from his statements elsewhere n the BSSB that the jivas (who are unenlightened) are considered an image of Brahman and that the manifestation of jivas including after final realization is due to prarabdha-karma.
>Also, only Brahman is real. There's no talk of something not being 'as real as' Brahman
I have never once said that anything else like a 2nd thing is as real as Brahman
>'Practical experience', 'if I continue to see something or not', 'functioning'. These are not something of metaphysical concern. What matters is to determine if it's real or not.
Shankara himself explicitly states that they continue due to prarabdha-karma even after being sublated as an unreal illusion, it's a part of his metaphysics, you can accept this or cope about it but there is no 3rd option
>Again, to be sublated doesn't have anything to do with 'seeing anything' or not, it appears but it's not Real.
I didnt say it did, sublation for Shankara is the ending of the false belief in the reality of multiplicity, the mind perceiving physical objects etc continues both before and after sublation occurs as Shankara emphatically states since belief in their reality is something different from merely sensing them
>And you keep ignoring the need of looking at your own anubhava. Without anubhava all this talk is no different than mere speculation.
Shankara just says the Upanishads remove ignorance and that's it, he doesn't say you need to "look at your own anubhava" for realization and overcoming of ignorance, that's NeoVedanta. Anything that's not the direct removal of ignorance by the Upanishadic knowledge is only ancillary

[Anonymous No.21893179]

>>21893130
>Shankara just says the Upanishads remove ignorance and that's it, he doesn't say you need to "look at your own anubhava" for realization and overcoming of ignorance, that's NeoVedanta. Anything that's not the direct removal of ignorance by the Upanishadic knowledge is only ancillary
"In the case of enquiry into the Vedic ritual, the Vedic and other traditional texts alone are the criterion. But this is not so in the case of enquiry into the Absolute. Here it is the same texts that are the authority, but with immediate experience added in the case of the purely metaphysical texts. For knowledge of the Absolute requires to culminate in immediate experience (anubhava), and (unlike the part of the Veda dealing with commands and prohibitions) has an already existing reality for its object" (B.S.Bh. 1.1.2)
>>21893125
there's a difference between appearance and manifestation.
a snake appears on a rope, but there's no manifestation of any kind, as the snake is purely illusory
"One merely imagines silver, and the mother-of-pearl is not really silver" (BSBh 4.1.5)

[Anonymous No.21893236]

>>21892745
>Shankara does not raise avidya to an eternal metaphysical entity. Correspondingly, he does not use anadi (beginningless), constantly used by other authors to characterize avidya, in connection with this word
Wrong, Satchidanadendra is blatantly lying here, because he is dishonest. In contrast to his Satchidanadendra's lies that ensnare feeble and uninformed minds, Shankara DOES call ignorance beginningless in multiple texts like:

"From this it follows that like the idea of the rope removing the ideas of snake etc. the acceptance of the unity of the (individual) Self with Brahman, as declared in the scripture, results in the removal of the idea of an individual soul bound up with the body, that is a creation of BEGINNINGLESS IGNORNACE."
- Shankara, Brahma Sutra Bhashya II-1-14

Vedantin : We say, no, since whatsoever is brought about by an adjunct is not the essential characteristic of a thing, since the adjuncts themselves are conjured up by ignorance. And we said in the respective contexts that all social and Vedic behaviours crop up only when the BEGINNINGLESS NESCIENCE (ignorance) is taken for granted.
- Shankara, Brahma Sutra Bhashya III-2-16

"As It (Brahman) is birthless, so It is sleepless. Sleep (in this Upanishad verse) is the BEGINNINGLESS MAYA CHARACTERIZED BY IGNORANCE."
- Shankara, Gaudapada-Karika-Bhashya III-36

He also describes the transmigratory state and the related universe that proceeds from ignorance as beginningless multiple times as well, Satchidanadendra has to lie about Shankara not saying ignorance is beginningless because Satchidanadendra claims this would make avidya a real entity, but Shankara disagrees and calls ignorance beginningless while also saying that since it can be sublated it's a non-starter to assert that it's real (regardless if it's a beginningless illusion).

[Anonymous No.21893377]

>>21893179
>"In the case of enquiry into the Vedic ritual, the Vedic and other traditional texts alone are the criterion. But this is not so in the case of enquiry into the Absolute. Here it is the same texts that are the authority, but with immediate experience added in the case of the purely metaphysical texts. For knowledge of the Absolute requires to culminate in immediate experience (anubhava), and (unlike the part of the Veda dealing with commands and prohibitions) has an already existing reality for its object" (B.S.Bh. 1.1.2)
That's a butchered and twisted quote, what Shankara actually says in BSSB 1-1-2 is this:

So far as the deliberation on Brahman is concerned, the direct texts, indicatory marks, etc. are not the sole means of the valid knowledge of Brahman, as they are when religious duties (eg mandatory rituals) are deliberated on. But in the former case, the Vedic texts, personal experience, etc. are the valid means as far as possible; for the knowledge of Brahman culminates in experience, and it relates to an existing entity. Since in the case of rites etc. that have to be undertaken, there is no dependence on direct experience, the direct texts etc. alone are authoritative here.
- Shankara, BSSB 1-1-2 (- Gambhirananda's translation, which is practically the academic standard)

What is he saying here? He is saying that with rites we are just supposed to trust the scriptural statements in the karma-khanda that the rites will produce results in post-death state, then he is also making the point that the jnana-khanda is different from this because both the scriptural statement and the direct spiritual realization they generate are the means of knowledge since one induces the other via removing ignorance, unlike rites where just the scriptural statement is the means of knowledge (at least in this life). Shankara is not agreeing with Satchidanadendra's NeoVedantic ideas about anubhava here, he is just pointing out how the scriptural knowledge culminates in a personal realization in this very life, which isn't inconsistent with anything I am saying.

[Anonymous No.21893380]

>>21893179
>there's a difference between appearance and manifestation.
False, there is not a single quote of Shankara to support this, he uses them interchangeably like in Brihadaranyaka Bhashya 1-1-1 where he says

The MANIFESTED result of all action is nothing but the relative universe. It is these three which were in an undifferentiated state (in pralaya) before manifestation. That again is manifested owing to the resultant of the actions of all beings, as a tree comes out of the seed. This differentiated and undifferentiated universe, consisting of the gross and subtle worlds and their essence, falls within the category of ignorance, and has been superimposed by it on the Self as action, its factors and its results as if they were His own form. Although the Self is different from them, has nothing to do with name, form and action, is one without a second and is eternal, pure, enlightened and free by nature, yet It APPEARS as just the reverse of this, as consisting of differences of action, its factors and its results, and so on.
- Shankara, Brihadaranyaka Bhashya -1-1-1

He talks about the universe both appearing and manifesting here in a way that doesn't distinguish them whatsoever

[Anonymous No.21893439]

>>21893236
this wasn't written by Satchidanandendra, it's Paul Hacker

[Anonymous No.21893466]

>>21892908
>>We therefore conclude that for Shankara, avidya and maya are one and the same thing, coinciding with namarupa, ONLY when they are explicitly referred to as the prime matter of the universe.
Satchidanadenra once again blatantly tries to gaslight his reader by omitting reference to where Shankara identifies maya and aviyda in cases OTHER THAN the context of referring to it as the prime matter of the universe, this is another one of his easily disprovable claims.

"This one—this Purusha; in all creatures—from Brahmā to a clump of grass; is hidden;— though He has such activities as hearing, seeing, etc., yet he is covered by Maya i.e. Avidya"
-Shankara, Katha Upanshad Bhashya 1.3.12
Nothing about Shankara's explicit identification of maya and aviyda has anything to do with the prime matter of the universe in this above quote, here Shankara is just talking maya-avidya performing a veiling function by making Brahman not clearly known despite It allowing hearing and seeing etc via Its presence as awareness.

"The aggregates, of bodies etc., that are analogous to the jars etc., are like the bodies etc. seen in a dream and like those conjured up by a magician; and are produced, conjured up, by the Maya, ignorance (avidya), of the Self; the idea is that they do not exist in reality"
-Shankara, Gaudapada-Karika Bhashya verse 3.10
Nothing about this identification of maya and aviyda has to do with the prime matter of the universe either, here is only identifying them in the context of them conjuring up delusions, which is a function that Satchidanadendra assigns ONLY to avidya, whereas Shanakra (following Gaudapada's example) talks about both maya and avidya both doing this interchangeably since they are the same power

The Supreme Lord is but one—unchanging, eternal, absolute Consciousness; but like a magician He appears diversely through Maya, otherwise known as Avidya (ignorance). Apart from this there is no other consciousness as such.
- Shankara, Brahma Sutra Bhashya 1.3.19.
The same point about the above quote is also true here and it also refutes Satchidanandendra's claim, like the others

[Anonymous No.21893488]

>>21893439
>it's Paul Hacker
Well, in that case I disagree with him on that point too. I assumed it was Satchidanandendra's writing because I have repeatedly found myself reading statements and claims from Satchidanandendra which are demonstrably untrue or highly misleading and I thought you were the Satchidanandendra-poster who was posting more of his stuff.

[Anonymous No.21893530]

>141 posts and Satchidanandendrafag STILL hasn't addressed Shankara explicitly stating that 'unreal nescience' (avidya) is present in dreamless sleep in Brahma-Sutra Bhasya 2-1-9 even though this completely blows apart all of Satchidanandendra's claims

[Anonymous No.21893624]

>>21893530
>Brahma-Sutra Bhasya 2-1-9
mulavidya-nirasah, para(158)
enjoy

[Anonymous No.21893703]

>>21893624
Satchidanandendra fails to explain away Shankara's statement in BSSB 2-1-9, he says that Shankara isn't talking about avidya being present in dreamless sleep but only once the person wakes up again, however we know that this is incorrect because in the context of defending the thesis of Pralaya, Shankara is talking about what is the "GROUND REGULATING THE RE-EMERGENCE of creation with its usual differences (Shankara's words)", he specifically means what governs the re-emergence from a state of being not-emerged, this can only be something present during the state of non-emergence because it's logically impossible that something can govern it's own emergence from non-emergence when it itself is still itself totally absent (in sushupti according to Satchi), a totally absent non-existent entity cannot govern itself or its emergence.

In fact, this is one of the exact criticisms that Shankara makes against the Buddhist doctrine of momentariness in the BSSB, that the momentary objects cannot govern their own re-mergence from dissolution so that trees are replaced each moment by trees instead of by tigers or rocks because they can't govern this process to be orderly while being dissolved every moment and if something lasts long enough to govern the process then momentariness is contradicted. The same logic extended in a consistent way here makes Satchidanandendra's interpretation of Shankara's statements totally implausible, and also illogical from Shankara's perspective.

[Anonymous No.21893758]

>>21893439
>>21893488
On a side note, setting Hacker aside, this is not the first time that I've encountered basic errors like that in reading Indology material, even among fairly mainstream respected scholars, Radhakrishnan for example writes in one of his books that there is no mention of maya in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, but this is not true since we have Brihadaranyaka 2.5.1 which says it's only because of maya that the Lord appears as a manifold. Hajime Nakamura in his 'History of early Vedanta' series doubts that Shankara wrote the Mandukya-Karika Bhashya and he says that there is no mention of the Mandukya-Karika's of Gaudapada in Shankara's Brahma Sutra Bhashya but this is contradicted by Shankara explicitly citing Mandukya Karika 1-16 in his bhashya on Brahma-Sutra 2-1-10. I'm not sure what to attribute errors like these to other than perhaps lapses in memory or a lack of searchable electronic pdfs of Shankara's writings at the time.

[Anonymous No.21893782]

>>21893758
>Brihadaranyaka 2.5.1
Do you mean tamas or asat? The maya in gamaya is just the imperative inflection of gam गम्

[Anonymous No.21893833]

>>21893782
>Do you mean tamas or asat? The maya in gamaya is just the imperative inflection of gam गम्
I'm sorry, I actually misquoted the verse and got the number wrong, I meant to refer to verse 2.5.19 where 'māyābhiḥ' is used, I don't understand why Radhakrishnan just ignores this when making his claim about maya in the early Upanishads.


इदं वै तन्मधु दध्यङ्ङाथर्वनोऽश्विभ्यामुवाच । तदेतदृषिः पश्यन्नवोचत् ।
रूपं रूपं प्रतिरूपो बभूव, तदस्य रूपं प्रतिचक्षणाय ।
इन्द्रो मायाभिः पुरुरूप ईयते, युक्ता ह्यस्य हरयः शता दश ॥ इति ।
अयं वै हरयः, अयं वै दश च सहस्राणि, बहूनि चानन्तानि च; तदेतद्ब्रह्मापूर्वमनपरमनन्तरमबाह्यम्, अयमात्मा ब्रह्म सर्वानुभूः, इत्यनुशासनम् ॥ १६ ॥
इति पञ्चमं ब्राह्मणम् ॥

idaṃ vai tanmadhu dadhyaṅṅātharvano'śvibhyāmuvāca | tadetadṛṣiḥ paśyannavocat |
rūpaṃ rūpaṃ pratirūpo babhūva, tadasya rūpaṃ praticakṣaṇāya |
indro māyābhiḥ pururūpa īyate, yuktā hyasya harayaḥ śatā daśa || iti |
ayaṃ vai harayaḥ, ayaṃ vai daśa ca sahasrāṇi, bahūni cānantāni ca; tadetadbrahmāpūrvamanaparamanantaramabāhyam, ayamātmā brahma sarvānubhūḥ, ityanuśāsanam || 16 ||
iti pañcamaṃ brāhmaṇam ||

19. This is that meditation on things mutually helpful which Dadhyac, versed in the Atharva-Veda, taught the Aśvins. Perceiving this the Rṣi said, ‘(He) transformed Himself in accordance with each form; that form of His was for the sake of making Him known. The Lord on account of Māyā is perceived as manifold, for to Him are yoked ten organs, nay hundreds of them. He is the organs; He is ten, and thousands— many, and infinite. That Brahman is without prior or posterior, without interior or exterior. This self, the perceiver of everything, is Brahman. This is the teaching.

https://www.wisdomlib.org/hinduism/book/the-brihadaranyaka-upanishad/d/doc117952.html

[Anonymous No.21893893]

>>21893833
OH, I see what you mean now. I thought you meant the general concept of maya. The actual word maya goes back to the Rigveda too, it just means tricks, illusions, guile, or when in association with gods or magical beings, magic power. Here especially it's Indra's magic power, a typical usage (a god's magic). Olivelle translates it as "wizardry," and doesn't annotate it in his otherwise hardcore annotations so I imagine he saw nothing special about it. The later philosophical concept maya is derived from it. I think maya is even cognate with our magus and magic, which enter into Greek from Persian sources as early as the 5th century (magoi)? This is a hymn attributed to a rishi so this is probably as old as the Rigveda and is an original Indo-Aryan use of maya as magic.

[Anonymous No.21894294]

>>21876973
>Why is buddhism so popular on 4chan? Hinduism at least has a caste system. What does buddhism have?
That is not your business.

[Anonymous No.21894316]

>>21876973
>why is thing deeply connected to Japanese culture popular on a site created as a safe haven for SA Japanophiles
really nigga

[Anonymous No.21894833]

For those interested in the relationship of avidya and maya

Paul Hacker and Mayeda Sengaku did a philological survey of terms used by Sankara in Brahma Sutras and Upadesha Sahasri respectively.
They confirmed Satchidanandendra's discovery that avidya is the cause of Maya rather than simply equal terms.

You can read the introductory section of Mayeda's translation of the Upadesha sahasri and Hacker's essay on "Philology and confrontation"

***as I said, the texts used for research were the Brahma sutra bhashya and the Upadesha Sahasri (two works that were without any doubts written by Shankara) , not the upanishadic or gita bhashyas

[Anonymous No.21894848]

Retard here.
So how does Brahman enter samsara/appear to become individual people through the illusion of maya/whatever you call it?
And why does that happen, if Brahman is absolutely self-satisfied, beyond bliss, totally empty and without desire, and so on?

[Anonymous No.21894858]

>>21881829
Thank goodness

[Anonymous No.21894909]

>>21894848
Advaita Vedanta does not have a satisfying answer to this question.

[Anonymous No.21894921]

>>21894848
You're confusing things, see:

The quintessence of śrī saṅkara's siddhānta is:

Brahman which is advitīya - (non-dual) and is of the very essence of satyam (reality), jñānam (Consciousness), ānandam (Bliss) is alone the paramārtha (Absolute Reality); apart from It neither the jīvas (souls) nor the jaḍaprapañca (gross world of duality) exists whatsoever. Even so, this jīvatva (soulhood) and jaḍatva (grossness) are adhyasta (super-imposed) upon It; to wit, the common people believe that they are jīvas of the essential nature of kartṛs (agents of action), bhoktṛs (enjoyers); that they have a relationship with śarīra (body), indriya (senses), prāṇa (vital force), manas (mind), buddhi (intellect) and ahaṅkāra (ego or 'I' notion) and that since they are experiencing the external objects like śadba (sound), sparṣa (touch) etc. they are getting sukha (happiness) and duḥkha (unhappiness, grief). It is not possible to say exactly as to when and from what cause this belief was gained or created in Man. However, this exists in everyone invariably in his state of non-discrimination; by virtue of this alone the empirical dealings of the type of – ‘I’ and ‘mine’ – have ensued; this wrong or false knowledge which has existed from time immemorial – the Vedantins call ‘adhyāsa’as also ‘avidyā’. If we deliberate upon the Reality as It is in an incisive manner, the Intuitive Knowledge of the type – 'advitīya (non-dual) Brahman alone which is not kartṛ or bhoktṛ is myself – accrues. That correct, Intuitive Knowledge is called ‘vidyā’.

(1)

[Anonymous No.21894923]

>>21894921

Since all empirical transactions are carried out invariably being well within the reign and realm of avidyā, the queries like – “To whom is avidyā? About which subject-matter or topic? What is its effect? How does it disappear or become extinct?” - etc. too are to be made within the realm of avidyā alone. If we observe properly (Intuitively), either the avidyā that is engendered in jīvās or it getting destroyed by anything else – both these phenomena are not to be found at all; when we assume and say that it (i.e. avidyā) exists, the bandha (bondage) that is caused due to it to the Self of everyone of us or when we say it is gone, the mokṣa (liberation) that accrues – neither of them exists whatsoever. Without cognizing the siddhānta that – ‘Thus due to avidyā alone all empirical transactions are being carried out’– in the present times some people have raised the question – ‘From which cause is this avidyā born or has arisen?’ - and have imagined and inferred a root cause for that avidyā also; they have called this root cause ‘mūlāvidyā’. This blunder is committed by them because they have verily forgotten the essential nature of avidyā. For, since all vyavahāra has ensued due to avidyā alone, the fact that even the vidyā-avidyā vyavahāra has been caused due to avidyā only need not be analysed or explained once again. For the concept of cause, the concept of time is invariably needed; for, that entity or substance which invariably precedes the effect of action in time is itself called 'kāraṇa' (cause). But when time itself is the offspring of avidyā, how at all is it possible for the phenomenon of cause, which is itself the offspring of time, to exist before or prior to avidyā - ?To affirm in the manner – “Preceding, or prior to, avidyā too there can be a cause” – is akin to the humorous saying – ‘The grandson served ghee during the luncheon held to celebrate the christening ceremony of his grandfather’ – is it not? This point the mūlāvidyāvādins (proponents of mūlāvidyā theory) should think over in a quiet manner.

(2)

[Anonymous No.21894935]

>>21894848
I second this question, even if individuality is an illusion and really there is no such thing, why was there a deviation to put us into this state of individual ignorance. Why must a person be ignorant and then realized, and if brahman is all there is, how and why does ignorance even arise in the first place? Who or what is in control of individuals being born, and if an individual can be born from brahman, whats to say when he attains brahman he does not get born from that brahman again?

[Anonymous No.21894941]

>>21894921
> It is not possible to say exactly as to when and from what cause this belief was gained or created in Man.
Why isnt it possible?

[Anonymous No.21894952]

>>21894935
>>21894941

All empirical examination is avidya alone, there's only time and causality because of avidya, so how can you ask "what's the cause? from where it came?"
Those are invalid/non-sense questions.

"To affirm in the manner – “Preceding, or prior to, avidyā too there can be a cause” – is akin to the humorous saying – ‘The grandson served ghee during the luncheon held to celebrate the christening ceremony of his grandfather’ – is it not? "

read >>21894923
and if you don't understand read it again