[Advaita-l] Re: Advaita-l Digest, Vol 2, Issue 29

[Jay Nelamangala]

Dear VidyAshankar,  Namaste.

Let me first apologize for using the term "drink a cup poison"  on you.
I should have used  "third person"  in that sentence.   I hope you
understand
that I am not really challenging you to drink a cup of poison.
I wish you a happy long life, so we can keep this friendly exchange of
shAstraic discussions going.    So please do not take this personally.
To insult a knowledgeable person like you, would be a hindrance
to my own growth.      So, the "you" in all these "drinking poison" emails
does not really refer to you.   It refers to an unknown third person.
Pl. make a note of it.

>are real,  and then drink a cup of poison,  or you say this world
>and its contents are unreal and then drink the cup of poison,
>the effect of the poison is same  that the person will die.

>This is the kind of ridiculous argumentation that we advaitins are totally
>fed up with. The effect of the poison is that the body will die. The AtmA
>will not die. na hanyate hanyamAne SarIre.

Thanks for quoting, kaTopanishat ( and also found in geetha)

The poison, the cup, our drinking it and dying because of it,  is all true.
But it is only  vyAvahAric Truth.   Right ?

Guess what,  KaTopanishat does not say it is only vyAvahAric Truth
that  this body dies, not jeeva.  "na hanyatE hanyamAnE sharIrE".

Other AchAryas think that this two level truths as
vyAvahAric and pAramArthic  is like a hide and seek game
played on vEdaanta.

First sit in this vyAvahAric world and postulate  a theory that this world
and its contents are all an illusion,   when asked to drink the illusory
poison,
go to the  seeking place  in the hide-and-seek game and say,
it is  vyAvahAric truth that by drinking it,  the poison is going to take
the
jeeva out of this illusory body  in this vyAvahAric  world so won't
drink the illusory poison.   Then come to the hiding place in the game,
and declare  that the same jeeva in this body that you were
trying to protect a moment ago,   declare it  to be Brahman, and you
know it because you have already  "experienced"  that you are indeed
that  Brahman,  but as the poison cup is dangled again,   come out of
the hiding place and run to the seeking place where you can refuse to
drink it.

How long are you guys going to play this hide-and-seek game on us?

Look at Prahallada,  he drank a cup of poison that his father game him
not because the poison was illusory and had only vyavahAric truth.
He drank it because even as a child he had the full knowledge that
it was Parabrahman that made him, his father, the poison, and gave
power to the poison to kill people who drink it.
So,  the "samhAra-kartrtva" is not really poison's but it is Parabrahman's.
Because Prahallad had full knowledge of this,  and because of this
knowledge,  Parabrahman's full grace was on that little boy,
the poison could not do a thing to him.

So,  instead of throwing away our lifes  playing these hide-and-seek games
 let us become devotees like  prahallAda.