[Advaita-l] Manu smriti

[Viswanathan]

Pranams to all sajjans

This is my first mail to this group....
my humble view is not to bother about all these shastras and swamiji...I
stared  feeling that all these things are for mundane living and nothing
more...
I strongly beleive in  sayings of Astavakra in Astavakra Geetha...
as it is you are pure , you are blissful nd you are that....
Just drop everything that you have acquired in the name of religion/culture
and heritage etc...just drop them and start looking deep into you...
recall what shankara says in 'Bhaja Govindam"....

this is what an advaithin need to do ...nothing more and nothing less

with humble pranams again

Viswanath
----- Original Message -----
From: "sthanunathan Ramakrishnan" <r_sthanu at yahoo.com>
To: <advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org>
Sent: Monday, February 13, 2006 9:56 AM
Subject: [Advaita-l] Manu smriti


Dear Shri Ram Garib,

   Once I asked Swami Paramaananda Bharathi (in
Bangalore) about this, after one of his lectures,
where he said that the Shastras are the source of good
for all living beings, not just human beings alone.

   His answer was that some of the "violent"
statements in Manu smriti seemed to be interpolations,
because he had seen an 1860 (or so) publication of the
Manu Smriti (or Shankara's commentary on it, I forget
which), in which such verses were absent.

   That such violent punishments were never meted out
(atleast as far was we know) seems to suggest the
latter day origin of such verses.

   The lack of community pride, pride in the religion
and role models is indeed a very serious issue and
must be dealt with.

  Also as Advaitins, our dependence on Shastras and
its validity is high indeed. We need to be convinced
that the Shastras are intrinsically good before we can
continue along the prescribed path. And surely such
statements are an obstacle to that belief.


regards
Sthanu

> >Take for example rules of manu. No self-respecting
> non-dvija can ever
> relate to those >rules. I understand that no one
> today is insisting
> for imposition of those rules, but the >sanction of
> them by a
> religious scripture attacks at the very core of ones
> value as a >human
> being. As a non-dvija, it makes you feel worthless
> as a human being.
>


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