Exegesis of mahAvAkya-s - III

[Ramakrishnan Balasubramanian]

miinaaxii tanaya <miinalochanii at YAHOO.COM> wrote:


> In this regard, please refer to
>
> http://www.escribe.com/religion/advaita/m4520.html
>
> Which came up in the context of the trishatii naama laxaNaagamyaa
and

>From the above link:

<<<Jeeva's perspective they provide a working definition to separate
Brahman
from the jagat that is changing but they are not absolute definitions
since
in the absolute Brahman is Brahman (infiniteness).  As Ravi pointed
out
there is elaborate discussion in vedanta on the jahad, ajahad and
jahadajahat lakshaNa where lakshaNa-s are further differentiated.  Tat
twam
asi comes under the last variety and Swami Sadananda (not me!) has>>>>

laxaNa is, as I mentioned, indirect indication or implication. You can
see Monier Williams page 892, col 1 for various references.
"definition" is not as good a translation as "indirect indication".
When we say "the iron burns" we are indirectly indicating fire by the
word iron. This is laxaNa. There is nothing imprecise about iron or
fire, that's not the point of laxaNa. That brahman is beyond words is
not to be confused with what laxaNa means.

The jahad, ajahat and jahadajahat varieties mentioned above are called
laxaNA-s, with respect to vR^itti or usage of words in sentences.
laxaNa is quite different from laxaNA, although there seems to be some
overlap in meanings.  As a matter of fact, I was planning to point
this fact out (common mistake in many publications) in my next post.

Rama

--
bhava shankara deshikame sharaNam

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