advaitam and Kashmir shaivam

[Gregory Goode]

At 12:07 PM 7/31/97 -0500, Ramakrishnan Balasubramanian wrote:
>Gregory Goode wrote:
>
>>A: You are not instructed to shut your eyes to the world.  You
>>are only to 'see yourself first and then see the whole world as
>>the Self'.  If you consider yourself as the body the world
>>appears to be external.  If you are the Self the world appears
>                          ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>>as Brahman.
>^^^^^^^^^^^
>
>If the world is seen as brahman it is quite obvious that there is
>non-existence of name and form, because brahman is beyond name and form.
>This is from the highest stand point namely sarvaM khalvidaM brahma.

Just had another thought.  Doesn't sarvaM khalvidaM brahma translate
as something like "all this is Brahman"?  If so, then isn't the "this"
supposed to be some kind of name and form?  Without any name or form,
then there would be nirguna Brahman and no appearance or name or form
at all.  And neither sarvaM khalvidaM brahma nor anything else would
be uttered or thought or represented in any way.  And if "all this"
means "all this name and form," then the sarvaM khalvidaM brahma is
identifying name and form with Brahman, which is what Ramana is stressing.

But if sarvaM khalvidaM brahma translates as anything else, my apologies....

--Greg
>From ADVAITA-L at TAMU.EDU Thu Jul 31 22:13:01 1997
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Date: Thu, 31 Jul 1997 22:13:01 -0700
Reply-To: "Advaita (non-duality) with reverence" <ADVAITA-L at TAMU.EDU>
To: "Advaita (non-duality) with reverence" <ADVAITA-L at TAMU.EDU>
From: Vidyasankar Sundaresan <vidya at CCO.CALTECH.EDU>
Subject: Re: advaitam and Kashmir shaivam
Comments: To: "Advaita (non-duality) with reverence" <ADVAITA-L at tamu.edu>
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The recent discussion about brahman and the world seems to be going at
complete cross-purposes.

What does it mean to see the physical world as brahman? Clearly, only one
who has known brahman, and therefore sees the world as brahman, can tell
us that. Till then, all we have is just disputation about whether the
physical world appears or does not appear. But the least we can say is
that the physical world is not seen as the physical world was seen in the
state of ignorance. Most statements made about this are epistemological in
nature. Do not attach too much ontological importance to them.

Vidyasankar