[Advaita-l] Re: Advaita-l Digest, Vol 2, Issue 1

[Vidyasankar Sundaresan]

>Taittareeya upanishat is saying,  parabrahma-jnAnee attains Moksha.
>Attaining Brahman is sometimes expressed as attaining the abode

But according to you, nobody ever has been, is or will be one who is 
completely "para-brahma-jnAnI" because every one is doomed to only partial 
jnAna. So attaining brahman is impossible in your argument. Right?

>any attribute of Brahman is also Brahman,  so His abode is not
>considered different from Him in shAstra.  It is only a matter of
>expression.

Sorry, no. In what "matter of expression" is one supposed to understand the 
claim that any attribute of brahman is also brahman?

>So, like Brahman  this Brahma-jnAnee also becomes Bruhanta or
>reaches his completeness which is same as attaining Brahman

Anything to reject the advaitic conclusion which logically follows, right?

>But is this completeness same as Parabrahman's compleness?
>Shrutis, sootras, and Geeta  in union say - NO.

Pray, where?

>SriKrishna has already declared what this Brahma is.
>"mama yOnir mahad brahma tasmin garbham dadAmyaham"
>So, the Brahma in this context is mahAlakshmI.

No, that is your peculiar interpretation. Nowhere in the gItA is there room 
to explain it so.

>He is ever filled with untainted bhakti (avyabhichAra bhakti) towards
>VishNu, which is Me.   He finds the root of everything that happens only in
>Me without any sort of compromise (avyabhichAra).   He is dear to Me just 
>as
>chit-prakrti (avyaya ) is dear to Me.   By his tattva-jnAna that everything
>is rooted (prathiSHTaa) in Me, even if he reaches Mahaa-lakshmII,  because
>of his knowledge that I am the doer of All (sarva-kartr, sarvOttama) in the
>end he attains only Me.  (14.26, 14.27).

All of this is based on making unwarranted assumptions. To reiterate, there 
is no reason to take mahad brahma as mahAlkashmI. Nowhere does the gItA give 
room for the statement "even if he reaches mahAlakshmI".

eko vishNur mahad bhUtaM pRthagbhUtAn anekaSaH ...

ekaH - That is the consistent meaning of all my quotes. ekas san bahudhA 
bhAti. tam ekam jnAtvA paramaM sAmyam upaiti; sAmyam upaitItyeva 
SAstrasyArthaH.

>I hope all the readers realize the importance of  shAstra samanvaya.
>If  our interpretation of Veda, Geetha and Sootras  produces knowledge
>which is inconsistent with one another or if it contradicts other pramANas
>such as pratyaksha,  then it means we have lost Veda itself, and along
>with it goes the entire prasthAna-traya.

Well, your concern is v. good, but to set the record straight, in all our 
long history, we advaita vedAtin-s have neither lost veda and/or prasthAna 
traya, nor do we subscribe to knowledge that is either inconsistent or 
contradictory. And we are in no danger of doing so any time soon ...

Regards,
Vidyasankar

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