06-11-2005, 12:57 PM
Consider the recent post made by sunder, quoting from the Mahabharata (?). This kind of mayavadi argument is so common, that it is worth addressing separately here. Like many mayavadi arguments, <b>the objective is obfuscation</b>. Note that sunder-and-group have not at any point taken up a meaningful discussion on any particular CONCEPT (such as the Personal aspect of Absolute Truth), but they would like to jump to more esoteric <i>details</i> (âVishnuâ, âShivaâ, etc) and try to obfuscate.
To the uninformed reader, sunder's post seems to contradict other sections of Hindu shastra. By highlighting this (apparent) conradiction, sunder intends to imply: "See, now Siva is being praised. In other places Vishnu is praised. So all these are just stories. <i>This is dangerous sectarianism.</i> Better to ignore all this talk of Personality and just accept that the REAL supreme is Impersonal."
Before I directly address sunderâs latest cut-n-paste ecstacy, lets use another analogy (analogous concepts inserted in square braces []). Consider the following snippet of curious characters:
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->àÃà âºÂ·bÃÃû ã² ¨ôÃâr¦h ý>ê L Ë<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The above is taken from an MP3 music File [analogous to shastra] on my desktop. I opened the file using a Word Processor application [anlogous to my own set of dogmatic axioms], and took a random snippet from the displayed result. By examining the above contents, I now declare that the file is full of gibberish -- apparently meaningless but amusing shapes, etc, ["contradictions"], that no such thing as music exists [its an "illusion"], and that the Ultimate Reality is just 0âs and 1âs and nothing else! (This will appeal to Matrix movie-spiritualists like Pulikeshi. I apologize for hurting his feelings, which caused him to whine like a schoolgirl.)
Now any halfway intelligent person will tell me: âYou foolish rascal, if you try to interpret the MP3 file [shastra] with an application program [philosophical lens] which is based on the assumption that the incoming bitstream can only contain UNICODE characters [a limiting conditionality to begin with], then what the hell do you expect? OTOH, if the application [philosophical lens] you used to interpret the same file had the ability to recognize that the incoming bitstream included numeric sound frequencies, which are then to be parsed by a bona fide psychoacoustic model, etc, [bona fide parampara that recognizes various aspects of Noetic methodology] then the output would have been music.â
Now note that both of us are actually correct. I would have been right to say that the file is just 0âs and 1âs, but clearly I was NOT seeing the whole picture. In fact, by making premature assertions based on fundamental ignorance, I was greatly obscuring the File contents [shruti shastra], and <i>the associated MP3 technology</i> (i.e. <b>the process of realization of its mature contents</b>) [yoga]. But the intelligent person who pointed out my mistake will be able to extract the greatest treasures [transcendental rasa] from the same file.
The above is a very close analogy of the difference between the Impersonalist mayavadi and the Vaishnava commentator. The Vaishnava completely accepts that Impersonal Brahman exists (brahmeti pramatmeti bhagavan iti sabdyate), but he asks you to decide if you want to stick around at a level of realization that comprises staring at a string of 0âs and 1âs, or whether you would like to listen to some good music. (I beg your pardon if this crude example is oversimplifying things a bit).
Now to briefly address sunder and gangajalâs latest graffiti:
As I stated in my last post to <b>Ashok Kumar</b>, mayavadi commentaries not only keep introducing more and more contradictions as they try to explain away one problem with another, but the mayavadis also see "contradictions" where none exist. This is because, given the dogmatic assumptions they BEGIN with (kevala-advaita in this case), which act like a filter in reading shastra, they fail to read closely what they themselves quote. (sunder canât see the special adumbrations about Krishna even in his own post, and gangajal wets his pants when he sees a word that's not Krishna/Vishnu in an Upanishad). The result is that they themselves are frustrated with Vedic scripture, and so they end up watering-down the bona fides of various Vedic scriptures. (Of course, in this case I have no idea why sunder chose to quote the Mahabharata, which is acknowledged to be corrupted by all acharyas, but let's ignore this for the moment. There are many bona fide scriptures that have similar passages about Krishna and Lord Shiva.)
These people do not understand the ontological position of Shiva (not just the gunavatara, but of Sadashiva). This is not the place to get into the details, but here's a start: <i>Lord Siva, in association with maya, has many forms, which are generally numbered at eleven. Lord Siva is not one of the living entities (jivas); he is, more or less, Krishna Himself. The example of milk and yogurt is often given in this regard - yogurt is a transformation of milk, but still yogurt cannot be used as milk. Similarly, Lord Siva is an expansion of Krishna, but he cannot act as Krishna, nor can we derive the spiritual restoration from Lord Siva that we derive from Krishna. The essential difference is that Lord Siva has a connection with material nature, but Visnu or Lord Krsna is wholly transcendental. In Srimad-Bhagavatam (10.88.3) it is stated that Lord Siva is a combination of three kinds of transformed consciousness known as vaikarika, taijasa and tamasa.
In short, Siva is the umbilical link between the material and spiritual.</i> Therefore, one will see Vedic literature divided into 3 parts based on subject matter (e.g. stuff dealing with hiranyagarbha, kundalini, etc will be under Lord Shiva) and guna (different grades of religion for different qualities of people). Of course, there's much more to it. The conceptual <b>pancha-tattva </b>of Chaitanya Vaishnavism, with its deep meanings is something I myself am not familiar enough with.
As for the eulogies Krishna Himself speaks to Lord Shiva in various scriptures â <b>including the main Vaishnava scriptures</b> â it is not possible for an Impersonalist to appreciate their significance. The problem is that, by distracting the curious and decent beginner with apparent contradictions, <b>and by erecting the strawman of sectarianism</b>, the mayavadi steals away that basic interest/respect, and kills it. <b>Mayavada cannot exist without slicing, distorting, and selectively deprecating large parts of Hindu scripture.</b> The confused mayavadi has no clue how to put all the pieces of the puzzle together. But Vaishnavism (and I refer to Chaitanya Vaishnavism in particular) supports and elegantly assembles everything together. The difference is the differing set of axioms (see analogy above). The mayavadi starts out with Impersonalist axioms, and then uses circular arguments, but only ties himself in knots.
<b>That there is plenty of petty, ignorant, castebound sectarianism in certain parts of India doesn't help. It is only a handle for the mayavadi to persuade the proud-but-confused Hindu to just accept Imersonalism as the be-all and end-all. It sweeps a lot of ugliness under the carpet, shuts out a lot of the noise. But it also obscures the transcendental music that is truly the greatest treasure of the Vedas.</b> Places like Tamil Nadu are a mental hospital comparable to pre-Islamic Arabia, complete with sectarian gods, concocted "puranas", and a high rate of female infanticide. Bengal is another place where great philosophies have been abused by deviant sects.
Shastra, when read with the wrong lens, only partially reveals itself in distorted ways. In fact, this is one of the ingenious aspects of Vedic shastra. Take one well-known example â Bhagavad Gita, chapter 7 verse 24. Such a crucial verse has been deliberately worded in ambiguous Sanskrit, so that it can be translated in exactly opposite ways! The difference is that, translated one way, it ties together all of the Gita, and translated another way (Impersonalist), it flies in the face of large sections of the Gita, including the very next verse. This is the difference. It is an entertaining exercise now, to flip through the <i>contortionist commentaries </i>that mayavadis have to write.
To the uninformed reader, sunder's post seems to contradict other sections of Hindu shastra. By highlighting this (apparent) conradiction, sunder intends to imply: "See, now Siva is being praised. In other places Vishnu is praised. So all these are just stories. <i>This is dangerous sectarianism.</i> Better to ignore all this talk of Personality and just accept that the REAL supreme is Impersonal."
Before I directly address sunderâs latest cut-n-paste ecstacy, lets use another analogy (analogous concepts inserted in square braces []). Consider the following snippet of curious characters:
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->àÃà âºÂ·bÃÃû ã² ¨ôÃâr¦h ý>ê L Ë<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The above is taken from an MP3 music File [analogous to shastra] on my desktop. I opened the file using a Word Processor application [anlogous to my own set of dogmatic axioms], and took a random snippet from the displayed result. By examining the above contents, I now declare that the file is full of gibberish -- apparently meaningless but amusing shapes, etc, ["contradictions"], that no such thing as music exists [its an "illusion"], and that the Ultimate Reality is just 0âs and 1âs and nothing else! (This will appeal to Matrix movie-spiritualists like Pulikeshi. I apologize for hurting his feelings, which caused him to whine like a schoolgirl.)
Now any halfway intelligent person will tell me: âYou foolish rascal, if you try to interpret the MP3 file [shastra] with an application program [philosophical lens] which is based on the assumption that the incoming bitstream can only contain UNICODE characters [a limiting conditionality to begin with], then what the hell do you expect? OTOH, if the application [philosophical lens] you used to interpret the same file had the ability to recognize that the incoming bitstream included numeric sound frequencies, which are then to be parsed by a bona fide psychoacoustic model, etc, [bona fide parampara that recognizes various aspects of Noetic methodology] then the output would have been music.â
Now note that both of us are actually correct. I would have been right to say that the file is just 0âs and 1âs, but clearly I was NOT seeing the whole picture. In fact, by making premature assertions based on fundamental ignorance, I was greatly obscuring the File contents [shruti shastra], and <i>the associated MP3 technology</i> (i.e. <b>the process of realization of its mature contents</b>) [yoga]. But the intelligent person who pointed out my mistake will be able to extract the greatest treasures [transcendental rasa] from the same file.
The above is a very close analogy of the difference between the Impersonalist mayavadi and the Vaishnava commentator. The Vaishnava completely accepts that Impersonal Brahman exists (brahmeti pramatmeti bhagavan iti sabdyate), but he asks you to decide if you want to stick around at a level of realization that comprises staring at a string of 0âs and 1âs, or whether you would like to listen to some good music. (I beg your pardon if this crude example is oversimplifying things a bit).
Now to briefly address sunder and gangajalâs latest graffiti:
As I stated in my last post to <b>Ashok Kumar</b>, mayavadi commentaries not only keep introducing more and more contradictions as they try to explain away one problem with another, but the mayavadis also see "contradictions" where none exist. This is because, given the dogmatic assumptions they BEGIN with (kevala-advaita in this case), which act like a filter in reading shastra, they fail to read closely what they themselves quote. (sunder canât see the special adumbrations about Krishna even in his own post, and gangajal wets his pants when he sees a word that's not Krishna/Vishnu in an Upanishad). The result is that they themselves are frustrated with Vedic scripture, and so they end up watering-down the bona fides of various Vedic scriptures. (Of course, in this case I have no idea why sunder chose to quote the Mahabharata, which is acknowledged to be corrupted by all acharyas, but let's ignore this for the moment. There are many bona fide scriptures that have similar passages about Krishna and Lord Shiva.)
These people do not understand the ontological position of Shiva (not just the gunavatara, but of Sadashiva). This is not the place to get into the details, but here's a start: <i>Lord Siva, in association with maya, has many forms, which are generally numbered at eleven. Lord Siva is not one of the living entities (jivas); he is, more or less, Krishna Himself. The example of milk and yogurt is often given in this regard - yogurt is a transformation of milk, but still yogurt cannot be used as milk. Similarly, Lord Siva is an expansion of Krishna, but he cannot act as Krishna, nor can we derive the spiritual restoration from Lord Siva that we derive from Krishna. The essential difference is that Lord Siva has a connection with material nature, but Visnu or Lord Krsna is wholly transcendental. In Srimad-Bhagavatam (10.88.3) it is stated that Lord Siva is a combination of three kinds of transformed consciousness known as vaikarika, taijasa and tamasa.
In short, Siva is the umbilical link between the material and spiritual.</i> Therefore, one will see Vedic literature divided into 3 parts based on subject matter (e.g. stuff dealing with hiranyagarbha, kundalini, etc will be under Lord Shiva) and guna (different grades of religion for different qualities of people). Of course, there's much more to it. The conceptual <b>pancha-tattva </b>of Chaitanya Vaishnavism, with its deep meanings is something I myself am not familiar enough with.
As for the eulogies Krishna Himself speaks to Lord Shiva in various scriptures â <b>including the main Vaishnava scriptures</b> â it is not possible for an Impersonalist to appreciate their significance. The problem is that, by distracting the curious and decent beginner with apparent contradictions, <b>and by erecting the strawman of sectarianism</b>, the mayavadi steals away that basic interest/respect, and kills it. <b>Mayavada cannot exist without slicing, distorting, and selectively deprecating large parts of Hindu scripture.</b> The confused mayavadi has no clue how to put all the pieces of the puzzle together. But Vaishnavism (and I refer to Chaitanya Vaishnavism in particular) supports and elegantly assembles everything together. The difference is the differing set of axioms (see analogy above). The mayavadi starts out with Impersonalist axioms, and then uses circular arguments, but only ties himself in knots.
<b>That there is plenty of petty, ignorant, castebound sectarianism in certain parts of India doesn't help. It is only a handle for the mayavadi to persuade the proud-but-confused Hindu to just accept Imersonalism as the be-all and end-all. It sweeps a lot of ugliness under the carpet, shuts out a lot of the noise. But it also obscures the transcendental music that is truly the greatest treasure of the Vedas.</b> Places like Tamil Nadu are a mental hospital comparable to pre-Islamic Arabia, complete with sectarian gods, concocted "puranas", and a high rate of female infanticide. Bengal is another place where great philosophies have been abused by deviant sects.
Shastra, when read with the wrong lens, only partially reveals itself in distorted ways. In fact, this is one of the ingenious aspects of Vedic shastra. Take one well-known example â Bhagavad Gita, chapter 7 verse 24. Such a crucial verse has been deliberately worded in ambiguous Sanskrit, so that it can be translated in exactly opposite ways! The difference is that, translated one way, it ties together all of the Gita, and translated another way (Impersonalist), it flies in the face of large sections of the Gita, including the very next verse. This is the difference. It is an entertaining exercise now, to flip through the <i>contortionist commentaries </i>that mayavadis have to write.