digvijaya

[Vidyasankar Sundaresan]

>Canto 16
>Verses 93-99
>Page 193
>
>"At Badari, he spent some days, teaching his Advaita commentary
>on the sutras to some followers of Patanjali school ..."
>
>Of course sa.mskR^ita.m text will probably reveal if svAmi
>tapasyAnanda has translated the verse incorrectly or not.
>
>In any case, Ashish, there is an ambiguity in "suutra-s" itself.
>He could have told them, guys don't waste your time on
>yoga-suutra-s it will take you nowhere, I will teach my
>commentary on brahma suutra-s. Or He could have taught them his
>commentary on yoga-suutra-s. To me latter seems likely.

It would seem so, but if one reads the brahmasUtra-bhAshya carefully,
it will be obvious that Sankaracharya is rather more "partial" to Yoga
than to other schools of thought. The primary principle is this -

"Sruty-anusAra-ananusAra-vishaya-vivecanena ca san-mArge prajnA
saMgrahaNIyA" - One should accept things (or reject them), according
as they are in accordance (or otherwise) with Sruti.

Under the brahmasUtra which reads "etena yogaH praty uktaH", he
comments, "yena tv aMSena na virudhyete tena ishTam eva sAMkhya-yoga-
smRtyos sAvakASarvam" - in that aspect which does not stand in
opposition (to Sruti), that aspect is perfectly acceptable.

He even quotes yogasUtra 1. 6, under the discussion of the prANas.

The comments against Yoga are all based on the argument against the
prakRti vs. purusha dualism of sAMkhya. Except for that, Yoga is
easily accepted. Going back to the thread titled "liberation and
citta-vRtti- nirodha", one can see how he acknowledges that the
constant remembrance of Self-knowledge leads to citta-vRtti-nirodha.
And if one reads gItA bhAshya closely, again there are remarkable
affinities to yogasUtras and its bhAshya. In other words, the subject
of Yoga is handled quite comprehensively in the major bhAshyas on the
prasthAna trayI themselves. However, it is not as if the yogasUtras
are to be rejected. They are subsumed and reinterpreted within this
set of works itself.

sureSvarAcArya also explicitly recommends yogAbhyAsa after the total
renunciation of all karma - the references are there in the thread on
citta-vRtti-nirodha and earlier in one of Rama's posts.

It is against this background that the yogasUtrabhAshyavivaraNa stands
out, as it has been conspicuously unknown within the Advaita tradition.
As far as I can see in the mAdhavIya, wherever just the word bhAshya
is mentioned, the default reference is to the brahmasUtrabhAshya. In
an earlier chapter, the various texts composed by Sankara are mentioned,
but this vivaraNa is not listed there. So the reference in the later
chapter cannot be to a commentary on the yogasUtras.

Vidyasankar

--
bhava shankara deshikame sharaNam

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