[Advaita-l] Saguna and Nirguna Sruti

Bhaskar YR bhaskar.yr at in.abb.com
Wed Apr 27 00:21:13 CDT 2011


praNAms
Hare Krishna

But there is one more Nyaya known as Utsarga Apavada Nyaya.  There is
a Sruti saying a Pashu can be killed for Yajna. One more Sruti saying
animals must not be killed. The second Sruti means the animals can be
killed in Yajnas like the first Sruti is saying. But other animals
must not be killed. This is coming from Mimamsa.

>  Kindly tell me what is the relevance of this nyAya with regard to the 
present context of our discussion ?? The point to be noted here is advaita 
does not side line the saguNa shruti-s and it does acknowledges the 
importance of these shruti-s in the upAsana, dhyAna, archanAdi mArga.  And 
strongly recommend it to the manda & madhyama adhikAri-s like us. 
sOpAdhika brahma & its upAsana have their own important place in advaita 
vedAnta and upAsana finds its place in jnAna kAnda of vedAnta as well 
since upAsana gives us the apEkshikAmrutattva phala which is almost near 
to jnEya brahma paramArtha jnAna.  Hence, shankara says in sUtra bhAshya : 
tatra etasmin advaitavidyAprakaraNe  'abhyudaya sAdhanAni' upasanAni 
uchyante. 


But where is Sruti saying Brahman does not have Divine Gunas like
Power and Omnisicience. Where is Nirguna Sruti denying Gunas of Saguna
Sruti?

>  nirguNa shruti does not deny the guNa-s of saguNa brahman, but it says 
para brahma is guNAteeta or guNa-dOsha vivarjita. While advocating 
absolute non-visheshaNa of nirupAdhika brahma shankara duly points out the 
sarvajnatva, sarva shaktitva of brahman as a creator, sustainer & 
destroyer while denying any other reason for this 'jagatsrushti'. 

But the divine Gunas are not limited Gunas. They are unlimited. God
has unlimited Power has unlimited Knowledge unlimited Size unlimited
Bravery.

>  yes agreed but point is we can not limit brahman's boundaries with ONLY 
'sarva kalyANa guNa sampannatva' he is Ota-prOta in each & everything..the 
word 'sarvam' in 'sarvaM khalvidam brahma' indicates his 'sarvavyApakatva' 
irrespective of guNa-dOsha..we have to say he is everything and there is 
nothing apart from him, he cannot be everything minus something :-))

One method to not put limitations on Brahman is Nirguna with no Gunas.
If there are no Gunas there cannot be limitations for them. But
another method is there. Brahman has unlimited Gunas. We cannot
imagine unlimited Gunas but God will have unlimited Gunas.  He has no
limitations.

>  again agreed..that is the reason why we say brahman is ekamevAdviteeya, 
we cannot impose any visheshaNa-s on IT, shruti also confirms this by 
saying : astUlaM, anaNu, ahrasva, adheerghaM, ashabdaM, asparshaM, arUpaM, 
avyayaM..etc.

Hari Hari Hari Bol!!!


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