Guru-disciple-enlightenment topic

[Ramakrishnan Balasubramanian]

Vidyasankar wrote:

>>         Bhagavan replied "Everything is predetermined. So long as the concept
>> of      individuality exists, the concept of free will exists also. In truth
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>> the ego         has no free will because there is no ego."
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

>I was mystified earlier on, when you said there is no such thing as free
>will, and I was waiting for a further elaboration of the topic. Here it
>comes.
>
>Maharishi is quite clear that the concept of free will exists so long as
>there is an individuality, and not otherwise. Herein lies the catch. The
>problem with using this as a pedagogic tool is that if one says this to
>someone who is not even prepared to let go of the notion of individuality,
>the effect is one of blind fatalism. Such a person only carries back the
>message that "everything is predetermined", and does not pay attention to
>the rest of the statement, because he does not understand it.

Quite correct. Maharishi never denied there is nothing as free will in the
vyvahaarikaa sense. His point always was that since the reality of action
itself is denied, something like free-will is also denied. Two other related
points may make this clear.

1. When someone asked whether shraaddhas would help the fore-fathers, his reply
was "definitely". So Maharshi never denied the efficacy of karma from the
vyavahaarikaa sense. He similarly held that homams etc could bring about the
desired effects.
2. When people asked if there was really something called kailasa he used to
reply that it's all in the mind. But once someone questioned him specifically
whether Kailasa had an independent existence in the vyavahaaraa sense, i.e.,
America exists if one sees it or not, so does Kailasa exist that way?
Maharishi said that it _has_ an independent existence in a similar sense.

The moral of the story is that Maharishi rarely went into the vyavahaaraa
details unless specifically questioned. He always answered from the "point of
view" of ultimate reality. This has been mis-interpreted by many to mean that
there is no free-will in the vyavahaaraa sense also. Another source of
confusion is that the maharishi sometimes gave different answers to people of
different calibre.

Such mis-interpretations are also denied for eg. in the Yoga VasishhTha and the
Mahaabhaaratam for eg. Vyasa infact says that things are attained by effort
alone and the person who says he cannot attain something due to fate does so
only out of laziness, in the YV.

Similarly Maharishi denied rebirth also. But he has also said that if this
birth is real then there will be rebirths!

>I haven't read much of Maharishi's teachings, but there are other revered
>teachers in the advaita tradition who touch upon the concept of free will
>also. The traditional way of the guru has been to gauge the level of the
>student and teach him according to his capability to understand. And here,
>many gurus tell their students that there can be no karma or rebirth
>without the notion of free will, and that by the fruitful exercise of the
>same free will, they can find a way out of the cycle of karma. It would be
>helpful to the list-members if you could also quote what Maharishi said
>about karma, because the concept of free will is intimately tied to the
>questions of karma, and the notion of human agency (kartr.tvam).

I hope I have provided some information and not added to the confusion :-).

Ramakrishnan.
--
Utinam logica falsa tuam philosophiam totam suffodiant (May faulty logic
undermine your entire philosophy)           -- strong Vulcan curse
                  http://yake.ecn.purdue.edu/~rbalasub/

>From  Fri Nov  1 02:33:55 1996
Message-Id: <FRI.1.NOV.1996.023355.GMT.>
Date: Fri, 1 Nov 1996 02:33:55 GMT
Reply-To: kstuart at mail.telis.org
To: "Advaita (non-duality) with reverence" <ADVAITA-L at TAMU.EDU>
From: Ken Stuart <kstuart at MAIL.TELIS.ORG>
Subject: Re: truce required
Comments: To: "Advaita (non-duality) with reverence" <ADVAITA-L at TAMU.EDU>
Comments: cc: rbalasub at ECN.PURDUE.EDU
In-Reply-To: <199610312213.RAA17476 at radian.ecn.purdue.edu>
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Hello,

I'm sorry Ramakrishnan, you still have got the attributions VERY
WRONG!

On Thu, 31 Oct 1996 17:13:42 -0500, Ramakrishnan Balasubramanian
<rbalasub at ECN.PURDUE.EDU> wrote:

>I know I had said I wouldn't answer this thread anymore. But, I did point out
>my mistake in attributions. Actually my arguments with Ken did not result from
>the mistaken attribution. When it was claimed that Ganapati Muni et al were
>crooks, Ken did quote that and said "I agree dead gurus can't kick butt".

NO, NO, NO !!

You're not reading the messages and you're not reading the
corrections, either!

The message that I wrote "I agree" did NOT have the names of those 4
in it, not in my portion and not in the portion I quoted either.

Please go back to the digests, so that I do not have to fill up the
mailing list's bandwidth by reposting the exact messages.

> So I
>(rightly, I think) thought that Ken agreed with the statement that all those
>personalities were crooks. Upon which I pointed out the chronological
>inconsistencies in that slander. Now that Ken has said he does not know
>anything about these people the matter is resolved.

Which is why I did NOT say anything about them !

>> the request by Sri Giri to stop slandering people without any evidence
>> is not getting much attention either.

I agree ! Stop slandering me without any evidence !  :-)  :-)

>I hope the wrong attributions are no more in place.

Don't hope - read the digests.

> The content of my mail was not significantly changed by that in any case.

That you still think is the problem.


Namaskar,

Ken

kstuart at mail.telis.org