JIVA-MAN

[Ms. Aikya Param]

----------
From:  Jaldhar H. Vyas[SMTP:jaldhar at BRAINCELLS.COM]
Sent:  Friday, November 15, 1996 8:34 AM
To:  Multiple recipients of list ADVAITA-L
Subject:  Re: JIVA-MAN

> From: Ms. Aikya Param <aikya at IX.NETCOM.COM>
> To: Multiple recipients of list ADVAITA-L <ADVAITA-L at TAMU.EDU>
> Subject: Re: JIVA-MAN
> Date: Thursday, November 14, 1996 2:09 PM
>
> So what are the swamis doing?  They are official renunciates. If they
> are eating and travelling and teaching and accepting donations and build-
> ing ashrams and publishing books, is this some new class of karma that
> doesn't happen in the world but on some other plane of existence but we
> see it, hear it and get annoyed with it if they are also having romantic
trysts
> with the ladies?
>

Instad of speculating as to what is karma and what isn't, why don't you
take a look at the dharmashastras.  What a sannyasi can and cannot do is
clearly delimited therein.

There was not speculation.  Refer to Bhagavad Giitaa, 3:4

##na hi kashchit.h kshanamapi jaatu tishhTatyakarmakR^it.h |
kaaryate havashaH kaarma sarvaH prakR^itijairguNaiH || 4 ||##

Everyone is always engaged in doing karma even if it is just
the actions which maintain life like eating, drinking, etc..

> If one cannot attain brahmaGYaanam.h and continue one's worldly life,
then
> what are we saying about Lord Krishna and Lord Rama?  Were they both
> ignorant?  Pardon me but they were both very involved in their worldly
> roles as soldier/king (Krishna) and Heir Apparent and then King (Raama).
>

An avatar is an amsha of Bhagavan so their situation is hardly the same as
a normal human being.

You have a very good point.  Then please can you explain away Janaka?
There have been householder Gyaanis even in this century.  Perhaps another
list member would know specific examples.  I heard about someone in
Bombay who the students of my guru visited sometimes.

> In the west we don't have a sannyaas option the way there is in India.
It's
> not quite the same thing to join the ranks of the homeless as it is to
join the
> ranks of the sadhus in India.  Sanyaas is a lifestyle option within a
social
> system which also supports those who choose it.  It has clear legal and
> religious definitions.
>

Of course we have a sannyasa option in the west.  It may take more effort
and you may not have the willpower to pursue it but that's  your problem
not the Wests.

It is interesting that you think you know or comment on another's will
power, especially someone who is unknown to you and whose life struggles
and triumphs you do not know.  .

I am not especially troubled by the cultural situation I described.
It is only a cultural difference.  It cannot change who you/I really are/am as
Paramaatma so how could it be a problem?

> This knowledge has gone beyond those India.  It's important to look
> at what is the intention, the idea behind these social forms referred to
> in these texts..
>
Our Dharma is refered to as Sanatan or eternal.  It is completely valid in
any place and any time.

You write "our dharma" and then the rest.  Is there not a contradiction?

It is a beautiful things that Indian culture is a spiritual culture, or has been
 for
many thousands of years and so many valuable things have been preserved.


> Also, it may help if people remember that Shankara was writing for a
bunch
> of swamis often so he could make his comments in support of the lifesyle
> they all had adopted.  He was perfectly clear that karma, including
lifestyle,
> doesn't produce the paramaatma in a person.
>

True, just being a sannyasi doesn't guarantee Moksha but not being a
Sannyasi guarantees you won't acheive Moksha.

So I have to bring up the Janaka question again.

If all this world  is illusory, what is the necessity to flee or withdraw
from it?  Don't you want to see the illusory nature while at the same
time knowing the truth about the self? Then you can be right in the
thick of it but not entranced.

> To be a normal. well balanced successful person anywhere doing anything
> requires renunciation.  That is my observation after  thirty months
> intensive study with Swami Dayananda at Sandeepany West in Piercy, CA
> and now fourteen years "in the world".  It seemed to me that our ashram
at
> Piercy CA, funded by the hard earned money of Chinmaya Mission
> members was very much in the world as well.  We bought vegetables, did
the
> cooking, maintained the cars the grounds and the buildings, get along
with
> each other or didn't get along with each other.  Seemed just like "the
world" to
>  me.

Sounds like the world to me too.  Doesn't sound like Vedanta though.

Our classes covered "Vedanta" very well.
--
Jaldhar H. Vyas [jaldhar at braincells.com]  I will choose.-_|\ free will
Consolidated Braincells Inc.                          /     \
http://www.braincells.com/jaldhar/   -)==Perth=Amboy=>*.--._/  o-
"Witty quote" - Dead Guy                                   v      McQ!

To be a normal. well balanced successful person anywhere doing anything
requires renunciation.

Aikya