[Advaita-l] How can one claim to know Brahman?

[Jaldhar H. Vyas]

On Fri, 18 Mar 2005, Mahesh Ursekar wrote:

> The only reason for my last remark is that the lives and teachings of
> Masters teach one more about Brahman than the theory of philosophers.
> It is easy to sit in a comfortable study reading about loftly thoughts
> and flights of genius but how these ideas can be bought into our lives
> can only be learnt at the feet of the Masters

But you quote Ramakrishna and Vivekananda and you haven't learnt at their
feet.  You have only sat in a comfortable study and read about them.
Just like a philosopher.

>and by reading about
> their lives.

And another thing, how do you know books about the master lives are
accurate?  There was a notorious case a couple of years back of some
person who wrote a book about Ramakrishna which alleged some pretty
heinous things.  People lie.  How will you know the difference?

 And for that very reason Sri Sankaracharya is not the
> best example. A genius no doubt but only his ideas are well
> established. His biography, other than a few facts, is shrouded in
> mystery. Which is probably apt since the whole purpose of his life was
> to settle the storm of confusion that prevailed in India in those
> times by stellar debate and argumentation. The danger in that is that
> if one takes to the study his works, one could become a proverbial
> pundita but be nowhere closer to the real knowledge of Brahman!
>

Would you recommend to an MBA student that instead of reading accounting
textbooks he study the lives of great accountants lest he doesn't get
close to the real knowledge of accounting?

-- 
Jaldhar H. Vyas <jaldhar at braincells.com>