[Advaita-l] Defintion of anubhava

[V Subrahmanian]

I think there is enough support in the Bhashya for the equation of jnanam
and anubhava with reference to Brahman:


In the Taittiriya Bhashya, for the term 'jnanam' occurring in the mantra
'satyam jananm anantam brahma', Shankara explains jnanam as jnapti,
objectless consciousness, that is not produced and is not an action (of
knowing) either:

ज्ञानं ब्रह्मेति । ज्ञानं ज्ञप्तिः अवबोधः, - भावसाधनो ज्ञानशब्दः - न तु
ज्ञानकर्तृ, ब्रह्मविशेषणत्वात्सत्यानन्ताभ्यां सह ।

Br.up:

अयमात्मा ; कोऽसौ ? यः प्रत्यगात्मा द्रष्टा, श्रोता मन्ता बोद्धा, विज्ञाता
सर्वानुभूः — सर्वात्मना सर्वमनुभवतीति सर्वानुभूः — इत्येतदनुशासनम्
सर्ववेदान्तोपदेशः ; एष सर्ववेदान्तानामुपसंहृतोऽर्थः ; एतदमृतमभयम् ;
परिसमाप्तश्च शास्त्रार्थः ॥

And the above can be collapsed into a comment by Shankara to the Mandukya
karika 4.89:

सर्वश्चासौ ज्ञश्च सर्वज्ञः, तद्भावः सर्वज्ञता

Having said that, Praveen ji, your profile statement:

* येनेदं सर्वं विजानाति, तं केन विजानीयात्। Through what should one know
That owing to which all this is known! [Br.Up. 4.5.15] */

itself is a definition of sorts for 'anubhava'.

regards







On Wed, Jul 5, 2017 at 11:15 AM, Praveen R. Bhat via Advaita-l <
advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> wrote:

> ​Namaste Venkatraghavanji,
>
> On Tue, Jul 4, 2017 at 11:04 PM, Venkatraghavan S <agnimile at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> > yatArtha jnAna corresponds to pramANa vritti, ayatArtha jnAna to
> viparyaya
> > vritti, vikalpa is different from these two - asat vastu are the
> "objects"
> > of vikalpa vritti - which is neither correct nor incorrect knowledge.
> nidrA
> > and smriti are well known.
> >
> ​vikalpa being viruddha or viparita kalpa vRtti may be said to include
> abhAva in Vedanta, but I'm not sure if its exactly the same in Sankhya.
>
>
> > Therefore, he does not need to recognise a category of vritti like
> vikalpa
> > that refers to an asat vastu.
> >
> Thats true, but as I remember, Bhashyakara uses this and refutes
> Vainashika-paksha in Chandogya ​Upanishad (Ch. Up.) 6th chapter on the
> mantra असदेवेदम् अग्र आसीत्। Ch. Up. bhashya's way is mentioned towards the
> end of this mail.
>
> Coming to our context, one cannot have anubhava of asat vastu.
> >
> True, but this is same as saying one cannot have अपरोक्षज्ञान of
> अत्यन्तासत्/ अत्यान्ताभाव। So the connotation of the word ज्ञान vs अनुभव
> doesn't change, although I do see that you are saying that it is a ज्ञान
> which is different from ​स्मृति। However, I am afraid, this leads to a
> similar आरोप of dualists as we saw in the thread following Vadiraja's work.
>
> Because the naiyyAyika by definition says asat cannot be the object of even
> > a nAsti shabda prayoga, he can get away with defining anubhava as smriti
> > bhinnam (i.e. it is yatArtha jnAna, ayatArtha jnAna, sushupti jnAna),
> >
> ​Although we do not agree with Naiyayikas​ types of
> प्रागुत्पत्त्याद्वयभावs, we also deny that अत्यान्तासत् can cause any शाब्द
> and वाक्यबोध on its own merits. Bhashyakara says in Ch. Up. 6th chapter
> that although there is no शाब्दबोध directly in a statement dealing with
> अत्यान्तासत्/ अभाव, the way वाक्यबोध happens though is that the नञ्
> (negation) of the भाव applies not to the word but to the entire sentence.
> That is, the बोध happens first with the भाव वस्तु and the नञ् says that it
> is the अभाव of that बोध। This is an awesome way that Bhashyakara deals with
> statements such as असत्/ अभावः अस्ति or I would say even नास्ति|
>
> I think we will have to define anubhava as smriti-vikalpayorbhinnam.
> >
> So barring
> अत्यन्तासत्/
> अत्यन्ताभाव we would be agreeing with Nyaya definition.
> Fair enough
> ​, I don't see any harm, and no definite effect in what matters for
> Vedantins.​
> ​​
> Thanks for your participation.
>
> ​gurupAdukAbhyAm
> ,
> --Praveen R. Bhat
> /* येनेदं सर्वं विजानाति, तं केन विजानीयात्। Through what should one know
> That owing to which all this is known! [Br.Up. 4.5.15] */
> ​
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