Antiquity of Advaita Vedanta

[nanda chandran]

>To answer this we must necessarily
>go back in time as far as we can to his day. It is as simple as
>that! If it means that we will find this from Hinayana, that is
>fine.

For this you must have a time machine to go right to the time when the
Buddha lived! The current PAli canon preserved in Lanka was itself only
written about 600 years after the death of the Buddha.

And I suppose with your two week acquaintance with Buddhism, you can
understand what it took a milleneum for Bauddha philosophers to comprehend.

And I suppose your sudden affinity with the HinayAna is due to the fact that
it supports your theories. Anyway my argument doesn't concern HinayAna. My
argument only involves Advaita's relation with the MahAyAna schools of
Buddhism - the MAdhyamaka and the VijnAnavAda (I hope atleast now that
you're aware that there's something called the HinayAna and the MahAyAna). I
suppose I can overlook your misunderstanding given your incredibly limited
exposure to Bauddha philosophy.

>That is patently wrong. Buddha NEVER answers the question of whether
>the self exists or not. He considered it avyakrta, undescribable.

>Pray, tell us sir where he said this.

>Your remark reminds me of a saying which goes: After listening to the
>Ramayana all night, a person asked "what is the relationship between
>Rama and Sita?" Read the few messages in this thread since Saturday.

This is just absolutely amazing. With just a couple of weeks of browsing
books about Buddhism, your confidence about what the Buddha or NAgArjuna
taught or didn't, is just incredible!

There's not a single place in any of the nikAyas, where the Buddha directly
says there's no self. He'll alway say that the body is not the self, the
mind is not the self, the skandhas are not the self etc. But nowhere will he
directly say that there's, "no self".

Even in the famous chapter in Samyutta NikAya where he teaches anatta, he
doesn't directly say that there's no self. He individually takes each of the
skandhas and says that this is not the self.

Ofcourse the HinayAna philosophers generally take this as total negation of
the self e.g, Buddhaghosa's Visuddhimagga. But this is not what the MahAyAna
follows.

On the contrary there're numerous places where he teaches the existence of
the self. For e.g., in the DhammapAda itself he says, "the Self is the lord
of the self", "Use the self as your lamp, as your guide, ...", "Abide in
your self", etc.

There's no point in this argument. You can argue with somebody who atleast
has done his homework. But how can you argue with ignorance which blatantly
parades as knowledge?

You cannot learn Bauddha philosophy in two weeks. It takes years of deep and
hard study. What you're questioning in my posts with your assorted quotes
from "authoritative authors", is years of earnest and devoted learning.
Please don't make learning and knowledge cheap, just because you've to prove
a point.

Go on, now abuse me.

Bitter personal criticism, blatant denials, fantastic theories and out of
context quotes from "authoritative authors" are your style, aren't they?
________________________________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com

--
bhava shankara deshikame sharaNam

Archives : http://lists.advaita-vedanta.org/archives/advaita-l.html
Help     : Email to listmaster at lists.advaita-vedanta.org
Options  : To leave the list send a mail to
           listserv at lists.advaita-vedanta.org with
           SIGNOFF ADVAITA-L in the body.