ADVAITA-L Digest - 15 Jun 1999 to 16 Jun 1999 (#1999-54)

[Sankar Khrish]

--- Vidyasankar Sundaresan <vsundaresan at HOTMAIL.COM> wrote:
> Gerald Penn <gpenn at SFS.NPHIL.UNI-TUEBINGEN.DE>
> wrote:
>
>
> >The distinction is quite relevant here, because it
> could be (and, I
>
> You are right. I should have said well-founded.
>
>
> suspect,
> >has been) argued that no system of knowledge can
> purport to be well-founded
> >that claims that the entire universe is mithya.  If
> one accepts that
> statement,
> >then apaurusheya serves no purpose at all.  Ideas,
> anyone?
>
> The Dvaitins have already argued this. But it
> depends on what exactly one
> means by apaurusheyatva. If one holds that brahman
> is the source of all
> there is, then brahman also becomes the source of
> scripture. However,
> scripture also serves as a pramANa to tell us about
> brahman. See Sankara's
> bhAshya on the sUtra SAstrayonitvAt. The really
> strong view of
> apaurusheyatva was held by the pUrva mImAMsakas, but
> advaita vedAnta holds a
> much modified view.
Here is something that I read in HH Sri Chandrasekarendra Sarasvathi's
discourses.  He says Sruti indeed is the breath of brahman and it
certainly makes sense.  So they should have come into being, if we can
use that word, simultaneously.  In that case both brahman and Sruti are
existing since time immemorial, or should I say they transcend time.  I
will get that portion of his discourse transliterated and post it soon.
>Sruti is indeed apaurusheya and
> is accepted as reliable.
> However, the pAramArthika viewpoint transcends even
> scripture. And the
> advaitin would argue that this is stated in the
> scripture itself, when it
> talks of parA and aparA vidyA.
>
>
> >
> >> if one does not "close" the canon somewhere,
> >
> >I suppose at this point I should be feeling guilty
> for not following the
> >recent postings to this list from the Shankara
> Gitabhashya, but I was under
> >the impression that one of the central tenets of
> Chapter 2 of the Gita is
> >to delineate qualified teachings and their
> qualified teachers.  At the same
> >time, it doesn't read, at least to me, as
> necessarily closing the "canon,"
>
> My argument essentially is that one cannot and need
> not impose the Indian
> thinking about apaurusheyatva on the scriptures of
> religions like
> Christianity and Islam. Or for that matter on the
> texts of the Buddhists and
> Jains. There is a wide range of thinking about
> scripture in the world, and
> quite a lot of it involves circular reasoning, which
> the notion of
> apaurusheyatva avoids. But we are still at a loss to
> answer a question about
> how the mecahnisms by which the Rshis "saw" the
> Veda. The simpler way out is
> to simply accept the age-old tradition of scripture,
> thereby closing it
> somewhere.
>
> Vidyasankar
>

_________________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com

>From  Sat Jul 17 11:29:46 1999
Message-Id: <SAT.17.JUL.1999.112946.0400.>
Date: Sat, 17 Jul 1999 11:29:46 -0400
Reply-To: achandra at wnmail.wndev.att.com
To: List for advaita vedanta as taught by Shri Shankara
        <ADVAITA-L at LISTS.ADVAITA-VEDANTA.ORG>
From: Ashish Chandra <achandra at WNMAIL.WNDEV.ATT.COM>
Subject: Nahhusha Episode in MBh.
In-Reply-To: <199906171453.KAA23693 at cancerous.braincells.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

Namaskaar All,

Could someone please direct me to the Nahusha episode in MBh. I might be
able to put it to some immediate good use.

Thanks
Ashish