[Advaita-l] Animals can get Jnana?

[V Subrahmanian]

On Fri, Apr 18, 2014 at 8:37 PM, Venkatesh Murthy <vmurthy36 at gmail.com>wrote:

> Namaste
> On Fri, Apr 18, 2014 at 12:51 PM, V Subrahmanian
> <v.subrahmanian at gmail.com>wrote:
>
> > On Fri, Apr 18, 2014 at 12:22 PM, Parthiban K.K. <parthiban.kk at gmail.com
> > >wrote:
> >
> >
> > According to the Vedic dharma, an animal life is the result of a jiva's
> > past adherence to niShiddha karma.  The animal/plant life is for bhoga,
> > experiencing the past karma phala only.  No new karma is accumulated  in
> > these lives.  At the end of this animal life, the jiva might return to
> > human or take any other form as per its accumulated karma.  From a human
> > life too one  could go up to attain super-human lives and after that from
> > there one could straight land in human or even lower lives.  The
> > Mundaka/kaTha upanishads have the appropriate mantras for this.
> >
>
> If animal life is for Karma Phala Bhoga only why Viveka Chudamani Sloka 2
> is saying Jantunaam Narajanma Durlabham? If it is Durlabha we have to make
> a great effort to get it. For Nara Janma who is making the effort? The
> animal or some other person like Sudra and Stree to get born as male
> Brahmin?
>

It is that humans alone who have worked for getting further human janma-s
in order to continue their sAdhana and culminate it in self-realization.
 Since we have admitted anAdi sRShTi, there is no room for the question
about which being did sAdhana for getting human birth.  Since it is very
easy for humans to follow the niShiddha karma-s only the shAstra warns that
human janma is very difficult to get and that one aught to make the best
use of it.

>
>  I agree generally animals cannot get Jnana. Viveka Chudamani has said for
> Jnana that person must be a Brahmin male knowing Vedas and Vedanta and
> other qualifications like Sadhana Catushtaya. Sudras and Strees are ruled
> out. This is a general rule. But there can be exceptions in the three
> categories of Sudras, Strees, and Pashus.
>

In my first response itself I have covered the case of pashu-s by saying
that a spiritual sAdhana commenced in a human body can continue and
culminate in a pashu body.  For continuation of sAdhana we have the case of
jaDabharata's previous life as a deer where he continued to be exceedingly
careful not to end up getting another animal life.  But for the culmination
of sAdhana in a pashu body, I have no prAmANic example.  The cases of
Gajendra etc. are not the Advaitic Kaivalya but the other forms of mokSha
like sArUpya.

regards
vs

>
>
> >
> > regards
> > vs
> >
> > >
> > >
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> --
> Regards
>
> -Venkatesh
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