[Advaita-l] apaurusheyatva of veda-s

[Raghav Kumar]

om sri shyam ji
let me relate an interesting experience i had...in course of a discussion
with a very learned swamiji in sastra -

he said that "if anyone sincerely believes something to be true about the
next birth etc., with strong resolve and conviction, he will actually attain
or get that very state or janma which is as per his belief as per whatever
scripture he regards as having the status of a pramANa"

i asked "if a terrorist believes he will get paradise by killing "hindus and
jews" with intense faith in the prophet and the quran, will he get that
paradise as per his faith and belief or will get some hellish tiryak-yoni in
accordance with the law of karma, which i presume applies to all human
beings"

he asked "since he does not have faith in the law of karma or veda pramANa,
our notions of pApa-puNya and karma-phala do not apply to him. he will get a
birth in keeping with his belief in his qurAn-pramANa not as per our veda
pramANa (with smritis) which is the pramANa for the karma-siddhAnta"
frankly, i was shocked by the above idea and am unable to accept it. don't
you think there is a problem in certain types of faith and belief which
makes it not fit to be referred to as "shraddhA".

coming to what i said,

i did not say that the Veda pramANa needs verification by logic. Rather, we
have to find out ways to show the fallaciousness in anyone claiming any
given book or text as a pramANa as far as they are concerned like the salafi
and wahabi interpretations of the quran or the fundamentalist versions of
the bible etc.  We should do it in such a way that the arguments used to
show the fallaciousness of a fundamentalist belief system do not apply to
the Veda itself.

The teachings and conduct of the gentler sufis like Jalaluddin Rumi and
Shams-Tabriz is of course beyond reproach.

Part of the solution lies in the word shraddhA. It is not just "faith" or
"belief" as understood in the Abrahamic religions. It is something more akin
to 'being receptive', 'perseverance' or even "faith pending
understanding" etc, i think all this is already known to most people.

regards
raghav




On Sat, Aug 20, 2011 at 5:34 PM, Shyam <shyam_md at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Pranams Raghavji and others.
>
>
> > From: Raghav Kumar <raghavkumar00 at gmail.com>
> > Subject: Re: [Advaita-l] apaurusheyatva of veda-s
>
> "if a fundamentalist muslim or christian were to claim similar infallible
> apaurusheya status for their respective scriptures, we should be able to
> logically show a fallacy in such claims without invoking the need for
> "faith" and "belief"
>
> My question is "why?"
> Is logic both sufficient or necessary to legitamize shraddhA, when the
> latter relates to a realm that is beyond the range of ordinary human
> experience and investigation??
>
> Is there something inherently incorrect or incongruent, about the shraddhA
> itself of a devout Sufi's "Islamic" Shraddha" - that we need to
> differentiate "Vedic" ShraddhA from?
>
> Hari OM
> Shyam
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