[Advaita-l] Pramanas - Sruti vs. Anubhava

[Ramakrishnan Balasubramanian]

Needless to say, the stuff below is recognized by every vedantin after
shankara. And this is also a big "criticism" of the advaita by other
schools, that the veda is ultimately unreal in the advaita school. So,
this is really something everyone, not just advaitins, know already,
and hence not addressed in the paper. I presume the extract below has
nothing to do with my paper. If it does, please let me know if
anything in the paper conradicts this.

Rama

On 5/1/07, Annapureddy Siddhartha Reddy <annapureddy at gmail.com> wrote:
> namaskAramu Siva Senani gAru and others (discussing this topic),
>          I just wanted to summarize the views of SSS regarding the
> pramANatva of shruti. The reference is the Method of Vedanta
> (translated by A.J.Alston) ch.3, sec. 28, pg. 60. In this section, SSS
> discusses how the vEda is the final means to attain (nirguNa) brahma.
>
> Per SSS:
> nirguNa brahma is not a pramEya as it is beyond jagat (and the term
> pramEya makes sense only in jagat, where there is a pramAtR^i to start
> with). Thus, vEda cannot be called the pramANa for nirguNa brahma.
> vEda is pramANa in the sense that it removes avidyA (which itself
> belongs to jagat). When this avidyA is removed, nirguNa brahma shines
> by Itself. (In other words, all the pramANas, namely pratyakSha,
> anumAna, and shruti have validity only in jagat, and can operate only
> on entities in jagat, and not on nirguNa brahma. vEda, in particular,
> operates on the entity called avidyA, and has the effect of removing
> it. )
>