[Advaita-l] mithyA and abhAva chatuShTaya - Vaadiraaja's Nyayaratnavali Slokas 43-46

[V Subrahmanian]

On Wed, Sep 2, 2015 at 1:24 PM, Venkatesh Murthy via Advaita-l <
advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> wrote:

> Namaste,
>
>
>
> Vaadiraaja has asked this interesting question to Advaitis. Then he is
> making allegation Advaiti behaviour is like killing his own mother.
> रजतार्थी भ्रमे जाते तदैव तदपेक्षया ।
> तत्र गत्वा बाधकं च तत्काले प्रतिपद्यते ॥
> A person desiring silver goes to find it and gets the Shell Silver
> Illusion. Examining the Shell Silver the Illusion is cancelled then
> and there itself.
> तदनर्थी भ्रमे जातेऽप्युपेक्ष्य स्वगृहं गतः ।
> बाधं च नैव जानीते को विशेषस्तयोर्वद ॥
> A person not desiring silver and seeing the Shell Silver will ignore
> it and go home. For him there is no cancellation of Shell Silver
> Illusion. Tell me what is the difference between the two?
>
> Vaadiraaja is making this example. There are two persons A and B. A is
> interested in getting silver. If he sees Shell Silver Illusion he will
> examine it and find it is not silver but Ilusion Silver only. It is
> Pratibhasika Silver. Therefore his Illusion has ended. Person B is not
> at all interested in silver even if it is lying in front of him. He
> will see the Shell Silver Illusion. But he will not even examine it
> because he is not interested. He ignores the Shell Silver and goes
> home. For him there is no Illusion cancellation.
>
> What is the difference between the two? Vaadiraaja is saying Advaiti
> will simply say there is no difference. Because Pratibhasika and
> Vyavaharika are the same for him. Person A has Vyavaharika knowledge
> it is not Silver but Shell. But Shell is also Illusion only. It is not
> Brahman. Person B has Pratibhasika knowledge of Silver. Both Shell and
> Silver are Illusions only. There is no difference between them. This
> is the Advaiti argument. If you take there are only two Sattas
> Paramarthika and Pratibhasika  this will be the result. But if you
> take three Sattas Paramarthika, Vyavaharika and Pratibhasika the
> Advaiti will say Person A has Vyavaharika knowledge and Person B has
> Pratibhasika knowledge. There is a difference between them here.
>
> अनिवर्त्य महाभ्रान्तिजनकोन्मादरोगवान् ।
> सर्वोपकारिवेदादेर्हीनादपि च हीनताम् ।
> यो ब्रूते वैदिकच्छद्मी हन्ति मातरमेव सः ।
> विश्वापकारकरणं तस्य लीलेति मे मतिः ॥
>


Actually, in Dvaita, the Only Swatantra Satyam is Brhaman (Viṣṇu) and
everything other than Brahman enjoys only paratantra satyatvam, dependent
reality.  Veda too, thus, comes under paratantra satyam.  P.S is something
that does not have a reality of its own; it is forced to 'derive' reality
from Brahman.  The only example possible for this phenomenon is the
rope-snake.  While the advaitin openly says that the Veda is only
vyavaharika satya (paratantra satya), the Dvaitin does not openly say
that.  He accepts veda as paratantra satya and insists that it is 'as real
as Brahman', an argument that no one will take.

Thus, by according a lower level of satyatvam, a second-class citizen
status, to Veda, the Dvaitin has no right to accuse the advaitin on this
count.  The   यो ब्रूते वैदिकच्छद्मी हन्ति मातरमेव सः  accusation of Sri
Vadiraja rebounds on himself. By according a non-swatantra satyam status to
Veda and swearing by the veda makes him a vaidika cchadmī even more than
the advaitin who openly admits that veda has only vyavaharika satyam.  If
he says that within paratantra satya, entities like Lakshmi, veda, vāyu
have a higher status, then the advatin also has the response: within
vyavaharika, veda, guru, upadesha, sādhana, realization, etc have a higher
status.

Thus, there is no strength in Sri Vādiraja's objection.

regards
vs



> The Advaiti is a maniac with a mental disease from the Uncancellable
> Great Illusion. He has the disguise of  having a Veda base. The Vedas
> are doing good to all but he is saying they have a very poor status.
> It is like he is killing his own mother. I feel doing harm to the
> world is his Leela.
>
> Vaadiraaja has not understood Advaita theories. In dreamless sleep
> will Vaadiraaja see his mother? No. Will he see the world objects and
> people of the world in dreamless sleep? No. Can we say he has killed
> his mother in dreamless sleep? No. Can we say he has done harm to the
> world in dreamless sleep? No. Will he hear Vedas in dreamless sleep?
> No. Then why is he blaming Advaitis of killing mother and harming the
> world? Because he has not even understood dreamless sleep. First he
> must understand dreamless sleep and then only he can understand
> Moksha. He is very far from understanding Moksha.
>
> Taking Vyavaharika Illusory objects to be real is a bigger mental
> disease than realization of the objects unreality. Those people are
> the maniacs because they search for happiness in worldly objects
> thinking they are real.
>