Tat tvam asi?

[nanda chandran]

>Note this is also an a priori statement! :-)

Trust you to point this out :-)

>A Vedantin includes Shruti alongside experience and reason as bases >for
>philosophy.

Note that Shankara himself says that even a thousand shrutis cannot make a
fire cold and that reason has to be given preference over revelation because
it is nearer our experience. That's the reason I said that analyze your
expereinces by themselves and when you reach a stage where you cannot go
further, from then on use the shruti. Note that this doesn't mean that you
have to use reason blindly. Be guided by the shruti. All that it teaches
about phenomenal life - like the three states of experience - take such
categories and evaluate them independently with reason. Then try to
reconcile your understanding with the shruti. That way your understanding
will be more accurate. That's the reason the adorable Gauda says that only
that which is taught by the shruti and proved by reason is the truth and
nothing else.

If you take the shruti's revelations first then you'll have a conception of
the Atman or Brahman which anyway has no real basis as you've never
experienced it in itself as it is supersensible. Then armed with the
conception of something which cannot be conceptualized you'll waste your
life away trying to reconcile it with reason. I've seen quite a few people
who've done this - after years of studying advaita, the Atman is still only
an idea for them - not something that is to be lived as an integral
experience.

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