[Advaita-l] A matter for Adjudication

[Siva Senani Nori]

Sir

We have three sets of AchAryas here: a) SrimannArAyaNa to Sankara, b) sureSvarAchArya and other disciples and their paramparas, c) Sri SacchidAnanda Saraswati and his disciples and their parampara. All agree with and follow the first set of achAryas, at least with their own interpretation of what Sri Sankara meant. SSS and tatparamparA strongly believe that the second set of AchAryas have not properly understood what Sri Sankara said; explicitly reject the concept of mUla-avidyA (and variations of that or consequences of that) and hold anubhava to be the 'kingpin' amongst pramANas. 

Now, when somebody presents a detailed denial of what one's guru and one's paramparA hold to be correct, one option is to examine the new material with as much of an open mind as is possible, meditate upon it and using yukti arrive at what seems right to one. This is why Sankara could argue against the Sage Kapila's teaching, and this is the reason why Madhva could reject what Sankara taught, and why SSS rejected BhAmati and VivaraNa. All these men are of remarkable learning and possessed of great confidence. To reject one's paramparA requires great confidence and few possess it. My own name would be the first amongst those who don't have that confidence.

So, I am not really surprised your appeal for adjudication is rejected on technical grounds. However, if we go beyond the objections stemming from the seemnigly great sAhasam of rejecting one's paramparA's teachings, 'mass appeal' is indeed the pramANa based on which these matters get adjudicated. We know of the shaD-darSanas but only see Vedantis around. What happened to the followers of sA~Nkhya, yoga, nyAya, vaiSeshika and pUrvamImAmSA? Or, the other different 'mata's as expounded in the 20+ bhAshyams to the BrahmasUtras? 

Thus, your appeal is indeed correct even though the response to it in the short term would be negative or negligible. Why? If anybody who follow the second set of AchAryas respond, their integrity would be questioned impicitly or explicitly by those who follow the third set; knowing this fully, these would not respond. Few amongst those who follow the third set would have the confidence (I do not intend any disrespect, knowing as I do my own similar lack of confidence) to consider what you wrote with an open mind and possibly reject their paramparA. It is also possible that you got the whole thing terribly wrong, and somebody will respond with the correct interpretation of what the pUrvAchAryas said; but even that would be negative. Or such a person might deem it beneath him to repond. In all situations, the response would be negative or negligible.

The best way, then, is to put it all together as an independent unit, remove the sharp edges or any offensive material and put it on the web so that followers of the third set can consider it at their leisure impersonally and then arrive at their own conclusions over time.

I personally agree with what you say regarding avidyAleSa and thank you for your detailed, scholarly and lucid contributions on some difficult points. I particularly admire the 'prasAda guNa' in your posts.

dhanyo'smi
Senani



________________________________
From: V Subrahmanian <v.subrahmanian at gmail.com>
To: A discussion group for Advaita Vedanta <advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org>
Sent: Sun, April 11, 2010 12:23:30 PM
Subject: Re: [Advaita-l] A matter for Adjudication

Namaste Madam,

Thank you for your perspective of the discussion.  Kindly permit me to offer
my comments, in between [  ]  on what you have said.

On Sat, Apr 10, 2010 at 2:16 AM, savithri devaraj <
savithri_devaraj at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Here is one interested member's opinion -
>
> This is not a matter for adjudication - where loukika pramANa and vaidika
> pramANa have not helped, how can consensus help?
>