Doubts

[Sankaran Panchapagesan]

Hi.

        Regarding Yaska's views on the devas being different
manifestations of the same Atman, I read it in the book "The Hindu Gita"
by Arvind Sharma (page 247).

He in turn quotes from "Revelation and Reason in Advaita Vedanta" by
K.Satchidananda Murty.

 '(Yaska) mentions several kinds of interpreters (of the Veda):
etymologists, ritualists, polytheists, atmavadins (those who sought
spiritual truths), and lastly those who said that the Veda is nonsense
useful in magic (the school of Kautsa). Yaska himself admits that there
are all kinds of "mantra-seeings" in the Veda, some expressing "high"
ideas and some "low", and he thus implies that different interpreters may
take anyone of these ideas as the engrossing theme of the Veda, and then
interpret the whole Veda in that light. He, for instance, mentions various
views regarding the Vedic gods - whether there are many or one, whether
they have any shape or not - and states his own view that they are all
aspects or manifestations of the one Atman".


Also, in the Aditya-hRdayam hymn in the Ramayanam (the knowledge and
recital of which was supposed to have been vital to Rama's defeat of
Ravana), Surya is hailed as the Supreme Reality, and the various gods are
said to be his different manifestations, I read.


Regards,
Ganesh.