[Advaita-l] Advaita-l Digest, Vol 50, Issue 26

[Dilip Dhopavkar]

Namaste to all.

This is my first participatory act in the group discussion. I am astonished
to  see the high quality  of discussions . I was quite charmed by the
wonderful explanation  of Grace by Sri Prem and Sri Sadananda.As Sri Prem
has indicated , the Mumukshatwa is the link between the phenomenon and the
noumenon. The  impulse to be free is from the land of noumenon , manifesting
in the domain of phenomenality. The  explanation , the form ,  is later
given by the mind.

In the dream , if you see the dream of waking state  itself, it is obvious
that the origin is  not earthly , it is the divine itself. The dream  of
waking state itself , although coloured by the phenomenolity , is no less
important , just because it is coloured.It is the divine  calling you
towards him. In the Gita, the Lord  says, -------    Dadami Buddiyogam tam ,
yen mam upayanti te.

Here Buddhi given by the Lord  itself is the Grace of the Lord.

Sri Sadananda's  expression is  great  in terms of  today's language.I fully
agree with him.

Looking forward to   more scintillating  discussions.

Dilip Dhopavkar


On 6/27/07, advaita-l-request at lists.advaita-vedanta.org <
advaita-l-request at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> wrote:
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> Today's Topics:
>
>   1. Re: anubhavAN^gaatvena (Ramakrishnan Balasubramanian)
>   2. Grace of God (Siva Senani Nori)
>   3. meaning (michael reidy)
>   4. Re: Grace of God (kuntimaddi sadananda)
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Tue, 26 Jun 2007 17:22:11 -0700
> From: "Ramakrishnan Balasubramanian" <rama.balasubramanian at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Advaita-l] anubhavAN^gaatvena
> To: "A discussion group for Advaita Vedanta"
>        <advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org>
> Message-ID:
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>
> Here is some more food for thought on what forms a justification.
>
> As I mentioned before, anumaana is based purely on data from
> pratyakSha. But anumaana reveals something other than what pratyakSha
> does. The role of pratakSha is only immediate apprehension by the
> senses. anumAna is based on pratyakSha, but reveals something which
> cannot be grasped immediately by the senses. So they are independent
> means of knowing with regard to the *results they produce*. Both
> reveal the true nature of some object under consideration.
>
> Even shruti, notwithstanding its eternality, is dependent on the
> senses of the person hearing it. However, the knowledge it conveys is
> of something which cannot be grasped by the senses, or inferred by
> anumaana. Just because we depend on the senses to hear shruti does not
> mean it is subsidiary to pratyakSha Thus, it is an independent means
> of knowing.
>
> Similarly anubhava is something direct. But the minute we start
> reasoning based on it, namely  the dream state and waking state
> contradict each other, etc., we are going beyond anubhava itself,
> since we are using a reasoning process. Just because the advaitic
> reasoning process seems so natural and familiar to us, it does not
> mean there is no justification required for it. As pointed out by
> Sankara, we can use only shruti-anugR^ihiita-tarka. It's not
> anubhava-anugR^ihiita-tarka, or anubhava-anusaarita-tarka.
>
> Also, this tarka only serves to reinforce what is already revealed by
> shruti, for the people who cannot grasp the truth by shravaNa alone.
> This is made clear by Sankara in 1.1.2.
>
> Rama
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 2
> Date: Tue, 26 Jun 2007 22:30:43 -0700 (PDT)
> From: Siva Senani Nori <sivasenani at yahoo.com>
> Subject: [Advaita-l] Grace of God
> To: A discussion group for Advaita Vedanta
>        <advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org>
> Message-ID: <30393.24284.qm at web54207.mail.re2.yahoo.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ascii
>
> sarvebhyo namaH
>
> In the course of a private exchange, Sri Prem had brought up the issue of
> "grace of God" and has made some observations and posed some questions,
> which I thought can be much better answered by some members of the list.
> With the hope that both Sri Prem's observations and the ensuing discussion
> would be of general list, I am posting Sri Prem's message to the list.
>
> Senani
>
> ----- Forwarded Message ----
> From: prem d p <prem_d_p at yahoo.co.in>
> To: Siva Senani Nori <sivasenani at yahoo.com>
> Sent: Sunday, June 24, 2007 11:19:44 PM
> Subject: Re: sruti
>
>
> namaste...
>
> dear sri sivasenani,
>
> thank you for your response. on the subject of 'grace of God' i think
> there is lot
> more to discuss and it might turn out to be crucial for our understanding
> of
> moksha itself.
>
> as you have pointed out the subject is intimately related to the problem
> of free
> will. freedom and will themselves are deep topics. i see that you
> personally
> take the position that focus on self-will is sufficient and a
> pre-occupation with
> 'grace of God' is not then so important.
>
> i was first led into a lot of confusion by the analogy of dream and
> phenomenal world and the apparent lack of any nexus between it and brahman.
> i was
> puzzled by the paradox of 'purposelessness' and the existence of
> 'urge for jnana' or 'moksha'. mumukshutva was like a link existing between
> the
> dream state and the waking state, a link which was apparent to the
> dreamer.
> what compounded the problem was the fact that the subject in the dream is
> obviously not the same as the subject of the waking state though the
> individual
> enlivens both.
>
> then it dawned on me that perhaps 'puposelessness' and 'mumukshutva' are
> opposing currents/directions within maya and directionality was the
> essential
> nature of prakriti or maya.
>
> i have reconciled all of the above by trying to reflect on the meaning of
> the
> words 'freedom' and 'will'. it occurs to me that in duality 'freedom' has
> to be
> spoken of always in relation to 'will'. and the will of the jada may be
> considerd
> as the familiar natural law.
>
> we know that in the phenomenal world there is no perfect free will
> possible for
> the limited entity, as its perceptions and will is moulded by the
> phenomenality
> around it. it thinks and wills in terms of the percepts & concepts. but
> being
> beset by limitations in the exercize of will, the limited entity embarks
> on the
> quest for that perfect freedom. this quest is the direction of
> mumukshutva.
> 'grace of God' is often spoken of as that turn of events culminating in
> this right
> direction. ie. an apparent impossibility of free will turning miraculously
> yet
> inexorably towards freedom.
>
> what do you think?
>
> pranam.
>
> ...prem
>
>
> Siva Senani Nori <sivasenani at yahoo.com> wrote:
> ----- Original Message ----
> From: prem d p <prem_d_p at yahoo.co.in>
> To: sivasenani at yahoo.com
> Sent: Sunday, June 17, 2007 10:24:46 PM
> Subject: sruti
>
>
> btw a related question........what is 'grace of God'?
>
> Dear Sri Prem
>
> praNAm.
>
> My first instinct was to reply that there is nothing called daivam
> (related to God, and pretty much meaning bhagavatkripA, grace of God), only
> paurusham (related to purusha) is, as is said in the yogavAsishTham. At
> least in practice, I do not depend on BhagavtkripA, and try to work at
> getting the desired result.
>
> The correct view, I think, is that bhagavatkripA is indeed what it is
> normally understood to be, resulting in such things as rains, good luck etc.
> Only it is as ephemeral as the rest of the world, and hence not worthy as a
> final goal. After all, we have Sankaracharya himself praying "mama dehi
> karAvalambam" - or asking for the grace of God.
>
> Regards
> Senani
>
>
>
>
>
>
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> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 3
> Date: Wed, 27 Jun 2007 14:48:03 +0100
> From: michael reidy <michael_reidy at eircom.net>
> Subject: [Advaita-l] meaning
> To: advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org
> Message-ID: <46826A93.3050206 at eircom.net>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
>
> Reasoning can be justified by experience as in the case of induction.
> Which comes first, the establishment of a general principle through the
> experience of many instances or the principle that one is capable of
> doing this? Do they not both emerge together?
>
> Sri Rama wrote:
>
> The phrase "based on" in phrases such as "based on tarka" or "based on
> > anubhava" is extremely misleading. This is another place where the
> > English cannot directly substitute for the Sanskrit. In some sense,
> > the tarka is based on anubhava, because it uses anubhava. But the
> > justification for using it comes from shruti only. We can't experience
> > any tarka, so anubhava cannot justify any tarka. The situation is
> > similar to the pratyakSha and anumAna. anumAna is completely "based
> > on" pratyakSha, because you can't infer without observations. But it's
> > validity is not obtained *from* pratyakSha, it is indeed a
> > self-established means of knowing.
> >
> > Rama
>
>
>
>
> |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
>
> Namaste Sri Rama,
>
> Reasoning can be justified by experience as in the case of induction.
> Which comes first, the establishment of a general principle through the
> experience of many instances or the principle that one is capable of
> doing this? Do they not both emerge together?
>
> The view that Sanskrit can isolate a nuance unavailable to English or
> Greek or Latin or Swahili is a questionable one. Meaning is short for
> speaker's meaning as the very same word eg. Reason, experience,
> anubhava, tarka can take on different shades of meaning depending on the
> speaker even if that is his native language. After all there are 6 major
> orthodox darshanas who use the same language Sanskrit. As the scholar
> reads in them he will be 'translating' the same word into different
> implications. Is 'memory' a pramana? Yes, no, maybe; whatever the view
> is then we will allow that shading to influence the meaning we give to
> the word 'memory'.
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 4
> Date: Wed, 27 Jun 2007 09:02:29 -0700 (PDT)
> From: kuntimaddi sadananda <kuntimaddisada at yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: [Advaita-l] Grace of God
> To: A discussion group for Advaita Vedanta
>        <advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org>
> Message-ID: <933655.78790.qm at web56001.mail.re3.yahoo.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
>
> PraNAms
>
> God's grace is graceful way of saying about the
> response of the total system for the local
> purturbation.  In framing the result of any action -
> action is perturbation at localized state - the global
> response is also involved in defining the future sate.
> That is the daivam's contribution in framing the
> result of the action.
>
> Another way of looking at it is - the result of all my
> previous actions up to the current point constitute -
> prarabda (in a general sense) and purushaartha is the
> current input where there is choice in action by jiiva
> - the future state is result of all that past that is
> involved modified by the present action - What I have
> is prarabda and what I do with what I have is
> purushaartha or free-will - and future prarabda is
> nothing but past prarabda modified by the present
> action.  But how the results are formulated depends on
> the laws of action - results are essentially a
> response of the global system in response to the
> perturbation at local system.  Since global system is
> nothing but an integrated algebraic sum of all the
> effects of all local systems put together, it is
> nothing but daivam in a loose sense of the term.
> Actually the consciousness identified with the global
> system is daivam.
>
> About free will - I have free will until I am free
> from will - that is I am free from the notion of doer
> ship. Then the local perturbations as well as the
> global responses all happening naturally - by prakRiti
>
> ' prakRityeva ca karmaani kriya maanaani sarvasaH'
>
> and who ever sees or understands this correctly alone
> understand that 'I am neither doer nor enjoyer' - free
> from any doing - free from 'will to do' too. That is
> of course is liberation.
>
>
> Hari Om!
> Sadananda
>
>
>
>
>
> --- Siva Senani Nori <sivasenani at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > sarvebhyo namaH
> >
> > In the course of a private exchange, Sri Prem had
> > brought up the issue of "grace of God" and has made
> > some observations and posed some questions, which I
> > thought can be much better answered by some members
> > of the list. With the hope that both Sri Prem's
> > observations and the ensuing discussion would be of
> > general list, I am posting Sri Prem's message to the
> > list.
> >
> > Senani
>
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
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> End of Advaita-l Digest, Vol 50, Issue 26
> *****************************************
>