Contradiction in Ramana Maharshi?

[Giri]

On Mon, 21 Apr 1997, Cameron Reilly wrote:

> It is important to understand that the jeeva is illusory.

        Since Jivo Brahmaiva Na Parah, maybe we can call Brahman illusory
also.
>From vidya at cco.caltech.edu Mon Apr 21 10:16:57 1997
Message-Id: <MON.21.APR.1997.101657.0700.VIDYA at CCO.CALTECH.EDU>
Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 10:16:57 -0700
Reply-To: Vidyasankar Sundaresan <vidya at cco.caltech.edu>
To: "Advaita (non-duality) with reverence" <ADVAITA-L at TAMU.EDU>
From: Vidyasankar Sundaresan <vidya at CCO.CALTECH.EDU>
Subject: Re: Journey of Soul
Comments: To: "Advaita (non-duality) with reverence" <ADVAITA-L at tamu.edu>
In-Reply-To: <199704170640.OAA22972 at aba.nsrc.nus.sg>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII

On Thu, 17 Apr 1997, Srinivas Prasad wrote:

>   Dear friends ,
>
>  1.  What happens to the soul when one leaves the material Body (Death).

Read brhadAraNyaka and chAndogya upanishads. Traditional Hindu belief
draws equivalences between the human microcosm and the universe. The
various sense faculties are said to go back to their universal sources.
The soul is also described as traveling either the path of the fathers
(pitr-yAna) or the path of the gods (deva-yAna), depending upon
circumstances.

Among the better translations of the upanishads, that should be easily
obtainable in the US are those by S. Radhakrishnan, Patrick Olivelle, and
Swami Prabhavananda.

>
>  2. Assuming that he/she is going to come back again to this living
>     planet, how long it takes in Years to be back in action?????.
>

Nobody knows, but there is no reason to believe that there is some fixed
no. of years. The time period between death and rebirth is not essentially
of any great concern to the texts.

S. Vidyasankar