Creation theories (was Re: What is the exact meaning/significance of this?)

[S Jayanarayanan]

--- Vidyasankar <vsundaresan at HOTMAIL.COM> wrote:
> >How does the ajaatavAda  account the existence of
> pot  now and its
> >absence before or after. If it accounts as apparent
> but not real then in
>
> Well, it doesn't. "ajaatasyaiva bhaavasya
> jaatimichchhanti vaadinaH" In the
> case of a pot, the material of the pot was not
> non-existent before, and will
> not be non-existent after. The space enclosed in the
> pot remains unchanged
> throughout. What has happened is that we have given
> the name "pot" to a
> shape, that is all. And although a particular pot
> may acquire its "potness"
> at one instant of time, and lose its "potness" at
> another instant of time,
> the concept of "potness" itself has not been created
> anew nor destroyed.
>

I understand ajAti vAda slightly differently. Two
verses prior to the one you've quoted above, i.e.
Kaarikaa 4.4, says (translation by Swami
Gambhirananda):

bhUtaM na jaayate kiMchit abhUtaM na eva jaayate .
vivadantaH advayAH evaM ajaatiM khyApayanti te ..

"A thing that already exists does not pass into birth;
and a thing that does not pre-exist cannot pass into
birth. These people, while disputing thus, are really
non-dualists, and they thus reveal the absence of
birth."

My understanding after reading Shankara's commentary:

Assume Existence to be the property of an object (many
would take objection, but let it pass for now).

If something already exists, it has the property of
Existence. Hence, there is no meaning in saying "it
comes into Existence".

If something does not exist, i.e., does not have the
property of Existence, then it has the opposite
property of non-Existence. By saying "a non-existing
object comes into Existence", we're effectively
implying that the said object has taken up an
antithetical property, which makes it an entirely
different object. Therefore, an object that does not
exist cannot "come into Existence".

"Coming into Existence" is absurd. Consequently, birth
is impossible.

[..]

> Vidyasankar

-Kartik

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
The New Yahoo! Search - Faster. Easier. Bingo.
http://search.yahoo.com