Vishnu and Shiva

[Rolando Santos]

Namaste,

1) Much of your argument hinges upon the statement
that praising other gods as supreme is really praising
the Narayana within those other gods. I am curious --
where did this come from?

3) Nirguna Brahman/turiya is completely untouched,
therefore calling it Narayana cannot be correct. Even
calling it "Brahman" or "atman" falls short. May be it
would be more correct to call Narayana and Rudra as
Saguna Brahman? Since they have qualities and are
within the realm of creation, then my previous
argument holds: that Vishnu's function of
sustaining/pervading depends upon a creation from
Brahma and Rudra's function of destruction depends
upon Vishnu's sustaining that creation, and again back
to Brahma after destruction. Hence they are all
inter-dependent and more importantly, the three gods
are really just states of the ONE being -- which IMO,
is what the contradictions in the Vedas hint at. The
contradictions make you contemplate "how can this be
the greatest and that be the greatest at the same
time?" Hopefully out of the contemplation arises the
realization: "A Ha! This IS That!"...which is sort of
a different version of Tat Tvam Asi, but is meant in
the same spirit.

The ONENESS beyond the three is turiya/Nirguna
Brahman. Therefore it isn't possible to equate
Narayana/Vishnu, who is one of the three, as the same.

AUM
Rolando

--- kalyan chakravarthy <kalyan_kc at HOTMAIL.COM> wrote:
> Namaskaar,
>
> In future I may or may not have time to write so
> many replies. So I am doing
> it right now.
>
>
> >May that Divine Physician, ***First among gods,***
> Either Brahman can be treated as a God or not. If
> the former, then saying
> that Rudra has derived his power from Vishnu is a
> contradiction. If the
> latter, then Brahman is That which is not understood
> even by the Gods.
>
> >Prostration be to Thee, O Lord, ***Ruler of the
> >universe,***
>
> Either the Narayana within Him is being praised. Or,
> Shiva is identified
> with the Praajna quarter of the Mandukya Upanishad.
> In either case, there is
> Narayana or Turiya  which is nirguNa Brahman which
> is called as the Atman
> and thus refers to Narayana.
>
> >mortality, ***Overlord over everyone,*** Bestower
> of
> >Blessedness, Ever-Auspicious,
>
> 1.Turiya being auspicious does not eliminate other
> things from being
> auspicious. Thus rudra can also be auspicious.
> 2.The over lordship can be interpreted as Praajna of
> the Mandukya Upanishad
> and not Turiya.
> 3. Again talks of blessedness can be interpreted as
> praajna which is called
> as anandamaya and not Turiya.
>
> All this is necessary, otherwise, Rudra cannot
> derive His power from Vishnu
> which means there is a contradiction with the Rig
> Veda.
>
> >Prostration to the Primeval One and the ***Chief of
> >beings;***
>
> Again Praajna and not Turiya.
>
> >***and
> >is more auspicious than anything else.***
>
> Which in itself shows an indication of duality and
> Turiya can be safely
> eliminated.
>
> At this point I foresee an objection.
>
> Objection-There are many places where Narayana is
> called as Lord etc. Why
> not interpret that as Praajna and not Turiya?
>
> Reply-You can interpret that as Praajna. But also
> note that Narayana is
> called as the Self, which is meaningless if Narayana
> cannot be said to be
> Turiya.
>
> Objection - Why not say Rudra as Turiya?
>
> Reply - Then saying that Rudra derives his power
> from Vishnu is meaningless.
>
> Best Regards
> Kalyan



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