[Advaita-l] The nature of spiritual realisation

[S Jayanarayanan]

Combining responses to Raghavendra Kalyan and Vaidya Sundaram:

--- Raghavendra N Kalyan <kalyan7429 at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
> >Before I type Shankara's commentary, any ideas as to how the
> >opponent's theory can be refuted?
> 
>  
> For a moment, let it be accepted that consciousness is an attribute
> of the body. 
>  
> Is consciousness an essential attribute or an accidental attribute of
> the body? If it is essential, then even a dead body (with all organs
> preserved)must be conscious. If it is accidental, then there is no
> reason why bodies alone must be conscious.
>  

Quite correct, this is a large portion of Shankara's argument. For if
consciousness were an essential attribute, the body should always be
conscious. But that would include dead bodies, which is absurd. If
consciousness were an accidental attribute, the attribute is not
strictly always associated with the body and so can be found
independent of the body also. 

There is yet another reason which I will explain when I type out the
entire argument. 

--- "Sundaram, Vaidya (MED)" <Vaidya.Sundaram at med.ge.com> wrote:
> Namaskaram.
>  
> > For a moment, let it be accepted that consciousness is an attribute
> of
> the body. 
> 
> Your assumption is not accepted. Your problem starts with this wrong
> assumption that consciousness is an attribute of the body. 

There is a method of proof known as "Reductio ad Absurdum" according to
which one makes an assumption and proves that it leads to a
contradiction, thereby implying that the assumption is false.

-Kartik

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