viprataa (was Re: Sadhana)

[Anand Hudli]

  Ramakrishnan wrote:

>Anand Hudli wrote:
>
>>  6) It may appear that 4) contradicts 2). But this cannot be the
case.
>>    HH the Swami of Sringeri, himself a scholar in tarka-shAstra, can
>>    never contradict Shankara. So we should interpret 4) in the manner
>>   indicated by 5). That is, by studying the jnAna-yoga granthas, one
>>   may get krama mukti. In other words, the study of such works
>>   _eventually_ leads one to mokSha, not to jIvanmukti. Perhaps, by
>>   such study, one gets an excellent birth in an excellent family in
>>  the next life. Then every opportunity to study VedAnta directly
>>  will become a certainty.
>
>Not so. In fact by yoga vAshishhTha moxa _may_ be obtained right now by
>_anyone_. The prime example is vidura and dharmavyAdha who were GYAni-s
>(accepted by shrI sha.nkara). They may not have used the YV, but they
>could not have used upanishhad-s either. The so called "contradiction"
>is resolved not by assuming krama mukti. It means that they heard the
>mahAvAkya-s in some previous birth, but because their minds were not
>pure enough, produced results in the next birth only. shrI sureshvara
>has explained this in naishhkarmya siddhi II.2-5. Here he raises a
pUrva
>paxa objection giving examples where people are known to have attained
>GYAna and implies that they must have heard the mahAvAkya-s previously.
>Apparently sarvaGYAtma muni makes this very explicit and states that
>those who seem to attain moxa without mahAvAkya-s must have heard it in
>their previous life (sorry, I can't give exact references).
>
>So _anyone_ may obtain moxa here and now.
>
>Note that HH has said anyone can obtain _GYAna_ => it is _not_ krama
>mukti.
>
>Rama.
>

 I agree that there will be exceptions to the general rules. In
 fact, I stated so in my initial post.

  The reason why I feel the "contradiction" can be removed the way
 I wrote above is that I felt it is more general than saying one
 has to have had vedantic lessons in a previous life. Saying the
 latter lays down a precondition that one must have been a Brahmin
 in some previous birth and must have somehow slipped on the path of
 jnAna, even after hearing the mahAvakyas. Instead, if the gist of
 what HH of Sringeri said is to prescribe Yoga vAsiShTha and similar
 texts to anyone and everyone then the spirit of his advice is to
 give a fair chance of moxa to all, regardless of this birth _and_
 regardless of previous births.

 If this be the case, then it is logical that such study can yield
 some kind of krama mukti _in_general_, and not the jIvanmukti which
 is won by sannyasins only, who have renounced karmas in the spirit
 of the MunDaka upanishad statement, "parIxya lokAn.h karmachitAn.h
 brAhmaNo...", and who  approach a Guru well versed in the Vedas, a
 shrotriya, and who is himself situated in Brahman, ie. a jIvanmukta.

 Further, if bhakti can lead to moxa by krama mukti per MadhusUdana
 SaraswatI, what makes the BhAgavata and  similar texts on bhakti
 inferior to  texts such as the Yoga vAsiShTha, whereby one can
 get moxa in the current birth? I am not implying that such an
 inferiority (or superiority) exists, nor am I implying the
 opposite. This is something that has to be carefully considered.
 But if the Yoga vAsiShTha and similar texts are accepted as
 suitable for those who want to be able to _ultimately_ reach moxa,
 then there is no such problem.

 Also, it is accepted that only through vedantic sentences such as
 tattvamasi, does one get liberated and not by any other means.
 For example, Sureshvara writes in his sambandha vartika:

      "tvamasyaaditastasmaadaagamaadeva naanyataH "

 In any case, the matter is very complex, and I agree, very sensitive,
 so it is better to seek the opinion of the Swami's and others well
 versed in  Vedanta.

 Anand






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