Antiquity of Advaita Vedanta (was Re: An Open Letter to All)

[Sankaran Kartik Jayanarayanan]

nanda chandran <vpcnk at HOTMAIL.COM> wrote:

> >But if you read the descriptions that Nanda is posting, they are rejecting
> >the the idea of experience as a pramana entirely.
>
> ShUnya is the invalidity of *all* pramAnas in the ultimate sense. But
> Jaladhar, this is not the view of the Bauddhas alone. Even in Advaita the
> pramAnas are ultimately invalid for Brahman is beyond the senses, mind and
> intellect. That's why you have a phenomenal truth - samvritti satya and an
> absolute truth - paramArtha satya. The pramAnas are only valid in samvritti,
> but Brahman - paramArtha - cannot be grasped by them.
>

You've missed the point by Jaldhar: does the Buddhist claim that there
exists a paramArtha satya that cannot be grasped by sense-experience or
the intellect but by the Self alone?

I had quoted from Cheng's book "Empty Logic" before on this list, and it
will do much good if you read what he has to say when he compares
mAdhyamika with advaita:

"But perhaps Nagarjuna's negation is quite different from Upanishadic
negation. The latter assumes the existence of an inexpressible essential
substratum, and the main aim is to describe, by negation, an absolute
which cannot be expressed. The Madhyamika negations do not assume an
inexpressible essential substratum, nor is their purpose to describe, by
negation, this reality, rather to deny that there can be such a reality."
                        ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

-Kartik

--
bhava shankara deshikame sharaNam

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