[Advaita-l] Re: Pa~nchapAdikAchArya

[bhaskar.yr at in.abb.com]

praNAms Sri Ramesh Krishnamurthy prabhuji
Hare Krishna

RK prabhuji:

Like yourself, I am eagerly awaiting Sri Ramakrishnan's critique of
the writings of SSS. While I am no expert on SSS, the impression that
I get from some of his *followers* is that they dont respect the
concept of sampradaya.

bhaskar :

how did you jump to this conclusion??  where SSS followers give you an
impression that they dont respect saMpradAya?? Infact, SSS followers are
more concerned about saMpradAya avanati...

RK prabhuji:

One of the consequences of not going by the sampradaya is an excessive
focus on trying to identify Sankara's "genuine" works, and then
speculating about where this or that acharya differs from Sankara.

bhaskar :

Without reading a single work of Sri SSS, how can you claim it is only
speculation??  prabhuji, dont you think your allegation here is baseless??

RK prabhuji:

While such an exercise has its academic merits and no sampradayavit
would ignore it, it does not help us in understanding the teaching the
way it has been passed down by the sampradaya.

bhaskar :

what do you mean by saMpradAya here??  saMpradAya is not like parrot like
repetition of what has been said earlier...that is what is concluded here
in this list sometime back when issues of Sri MadhusUdana saraswati,
bhAmati & vivaraNa schools came for discussion...So, under these
circumstances, Sri SSS refuted certain points of later vyAkhyAnakAra-s
since he has the good reason for that based on shankara mUla bhAshya..only
coz. of this you cannot treat him as a stranger to shankara saMpradAya.

RK prabhuji:

For example, the Vivekachudamani is undoubtedly a sterling work of the
Advaita parampara. In fact, it is probably the most widely known and
widely read text in Advaita-Vedanta.

bhaskar :

who said it is not??

RK prabhuji:

And yet one finds some SSS followers dismissing it because they think it
may not have been written by Sankara, or that it differs in some aspects
from what they think is Sankara's "true teaching".

bhaskar :

My dear prabhuji please note, it is not only SSS & followers of SSS
claiming this, some neutral readers with an analytical perspective have
concluded *some content* & emphasization of VC is not in line with
shankara's prasthAna trayi bhAshya...Questioning the authorship does not
mean negation of the text itself...VC as an advaita prakaraNa graNtha is a
must read for all advaita sAdhak-s...

RK prabhuji:

Advaita-Vedanta is not "Shankaraism".

bhaskar :

but you cannot leave aside shankara & study advaita...can you prabhuji??

RK prabhuji:

Advaita Vedanta does not derive its greatness from Sankara. It is Sankara
who derives his greatness from Advaita Vedanta.

bhaskar :

To realize this greatness of advaita we, sAdhak-s in jnAna mArga, need the
light of AchAryOpadEsha..that AchArya is none other than shankara bhagavad
pUjya pAda....

Ramesh

Hari Hari Hari Bol!!!
bhaskar