[Advaita-l] Who is Ishwara? He is NARAYANA only. Beautiful and soothing Narayana Bhajan

Srinath Vedagarbha svedagarbha at gmail.com
Wed May 24 14:19:35 EDT 2017


Namaste,

On Wed, May 24, 2017 at 11:13 AM, Praveen R. Bhat <bhatpraveen at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Namaste Srinathji,
>
> On Wed, May 24, 2017 at 8:14 PM, Srinath Vedagarbha <svedagarbha at gmail.com
> > wrote:
>
>>
>> May be I can help put a clarity on Sri.Kalyan's question.
>>
> I think Kalyanji's question was clear enough, there was no clarity sought.
>
>
>> On Sun, May 21, 2017 at 10:58 AM, Kalyan via Advaita-l <
>>> advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> wrote:
>>>
>>> ​If the Atman is nirguNa nirvishesha, how can he have the attribute of
>>> ignorance?​
>>
>>
>> That exactly is the question of Sri.Kalyan to AV.
>>
> ​No it is not.​
>
> ​His statement was "Isn't the nirguNa nirvishesha Atman itself the biggest
> and only ignoramus in advaita". Will he or you be satisfied with no as an
> answer? You will quote that but it is, since there is nothing other than
> Atman, to which I will say yes too. Ergo, my follow on question of mithyA.
>

Whatever your answer on mithyA, it does not take away the position that at
least as long mithya is said to be there (i.e during vyavahArika avastha),
only nirguNa brahman is said to be under the spell of that avidya. That is
the distinction.




>
>
>> If nirguNa-nirviShESha brahman is always is, how could AV brings
>> mAya/avidya to explain this dvandva prapancha?
>>
> Rather, that is why AV brings in the same. If you went to sleep alone, how
> are you dreaming ​the entire dvandva prapancha in svapnAvasthA? What does
> it rest on? Did you divide and become many? Did you undergo change? The
> dreamer is ignorant about being the waker along with the waking world.
> Therefore, he takes the dreamer along with the dream world as real. Ditto.
>
>
>> Since ignorance cannot float freely without any aShraya, and given that
>> only NB is only the tatva according to AV, then his question is how NB
>> possibly could have ignorance?
>>
> NB is the Ashraya, which is unopposed to knowledge and ignorance alike,
> just as the desert land is the Ashraya for mirage-water without being
> affected.
>

That is not the problem in the case of desert because it allows us to posit
the guNa (of being Ashraya or Ashrayattva). No one claims desert is
nirguNa. This cannot be said so in the case of Brahman, for by definition
it is nirguNa, including Ashraya for anything.




>
> If it cannot then why invoke ignorance argument to explain away duality?
>>
> I didn't say that ​ignorance is ​a guNa of NB; why ignorance, sat, chit
> and Ananda are also not guNas of NB.
>


Isn't it your question to Sri.Kalyan -- "​If the Atman is nirguNa
nirvishesha, how can he have the attribute of ignorance?" . Because you use
the hEtu (of Atman being nirguNa) in questioning sAdya of Atman having
attribute of ignorance, I am justified in translating attribute = guNa. If
you now disagree, then you have flaw in your duShaNAnumAna tarka in the
first place.




>
>
> Ignoring all those technical definitions aside, let me say -- mithya is
>> not at all an  ontological category such as sat & asat, but rather an
>> epistemological error confusing one for the other.
>>
> ​I don't know this definition as being an AV definition at all, viz. sat
> being confused as [atyanta] asat and vice-versa! Please elaborate as to
> where this definition is seen in AV.
>
>
>
Isn't it entire adhyAsa-bhAShya is all about this confusion?


/sv


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