If advaita stands, all other systems(including dvaita) fall

[Jaldhar H. Vyas]

On Tue, 7 Jan 1997, M Suresh wrote:

>
>   Somehow I have always found the criticism of dvaitins that advaita is
>  identical
>   with buddhism to be very valid.
>

They aren't paying either Advaita or Buddhism much of a compliment when
they say that.

>   Buddhists say that the reality behind everything is emptiness and advaitins
>  say
>   that the reality behind everything is non-dual brahman. Both are two
 different
>   words to denote something which is beyond all dualities and can be treated
 as
>   equivalents.
>

No. Buddhists say there _isn't_ a reality behind everything.  Vedantins
say there is.  You cannot treat these two as equivalents.  They are in
fact polar opposites.

>   Of course in buddhism it is negation and in advaita it is affirmation, but
>  both
>   are concepts which point to the same eternal non-dual state beyond all
>  concepts.
>

A salient feature of Buddhist thought is the doctrine of momentariness.
Nothing is eternal.  Buddhists therefore refer to realization as Nirvana or
'existance' wherease Vedantins refer to it as Moksha or 'release'.

Buddhists believe atma = ahamkara and is unreal.  Vedantins believe the
atma is real.  (The different schools disagree on whether this atma is
identical to Brahman)

Finally, Buddhists reject the validity of the Vedas and ancillary shastras
as a valid means of knowledge whereas _all_ Vedantins (not just Dvaitins
as you erroneously stated in your previous post) believe Shruti, Smrti,
and Shistachara are the _only_ valid means to knowledge of Brahman.

>   Therefore IMO the core of both buddhism and advaita teachings are the same
>  though
>   they differ in details and practice.
>

That's like saying humans and fish are the same though they differ in arms
and legs.

>   This is the reason why many advaitins are somewhat familiar with buddhist
>   philosophy.
>

Advaitins are familiar with Buddhist philosophy because the great Acharyas
of our parampara have vehemently criticized it.  It is obvious from
Shankaracharyas writings that he regards Buddhism as the worst kind of
heresy and nothing to do with Vedanta.

--
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