[Advaita-l] Logical Basis of Apaureshyatva

[Vidyasankar Sundaresan]

> >
> But if we want to learn Mimamsa why should we go to a Christian
> Priest? Better to learn from a Brahmin. The Christian Priest cannot
> be trusted because he has secret agendas. He is not living like a
> Vaidika practicing Vedic religion. He may be eating beef drinking
> wine and writing. He will give bookish answers and wrong answers.
> If you want to study Chemistry you can go to a college to learn from
> Professors practicing in labs. If you want to study law you have to
> learn from law college professors practicing law. You must not learn
> from books by non practicing person.
> 
> 

1. I suggested reading the English language works of Francis Clooney. I
did not suggest to go to him as a student to learn Mimamsa. 
 
2. The reason is that, like it or not, the vast majority of us are much more
conversant with English than Sanskrit. The subtleties and technicalities of
a complex system like Purva Mimamsa will not be appreciated unless the
original language is well understood, at a very high level. As such, English
articles and books serve as a portal for many of us to relearn our own.
The only other English sources I could have recommended would have
been those of Prof. Ganganath Jha, but I would imagine that any serious
student of Mimamsa today would not need to be told of Prof. Jha's name.
 
3. Young Hindus should liberate themselves from a knee-jerk xenophobia.
Please remember that it would be equally easy for people in the West to
ask the same questions about us, which they don't. E.g. "Why is a Brahmin
boy from India interested in learning medicine or engineering from our
universities?" If this were to become the dominant mode of thinking, the
vast majority of us would be at a great disadvantage. Even worse, scholars
of Indian origin like Parameshwara Aithal would not have been able to work
at Heidelberg university, or A K Ramanujan at Chicago or Ashok Aklujkar at
Vancouver. Sadly, India has had no place to honor and nurture scholars 
like these for about a century now. 

4. I am fully aware that there are possible political implications of every move
made by every human being on this planet. With every person, however, I
would like young thinking Hindus to make judgements on a case-by-case
basis, rather than tar someone because of their name and religion.
 
I could say a lot more, but let me stop here.
 
Vidyasankar