Various vAda-s in advaita (was Re: A few questions)

[Sankar Jayanarayanan]

Ramakrishnan Balasubramanian <rbalasub at ECN.PURDUE.EDU> wrote:

> The vAda-s given by gauDapAda are nothing other than dR^ishTi-sR^ishTi vAda.

I beg to differ. GauDapaada also employs ajaativaada (doctrine of no birth,
or the doctrine denying creation) in some instances. (Perhaps you know this,
but your using the words "nothing other than" seems to imply that GauDapaada
did not employ ajaativaada.)

eg. in the Agama prakarana (3rd chapter), 25th verse, where he says that the
worship of HiraNyagarbha (Brahmaa) is refuted because of the absence of birth.
That is why Hindus (broadly speaking, of course) do not worship Brahmaa, the
creator, since there is no creation.

Again, in the fifth verse of the 4th chapter, he says,"We approve of the
birthlessness taught by them," which is obviously an ajaativaadic stance.

In fact, ajaativaada is more in line with "pure" advaita, according to which
there is nothing but Brahman, and therefore, nothing ever "comes into being."

-Kartik