[Advaita-l] On avidyA being anirvachanIya etc

[kuntimaddi sadananda]

Rameshji - PraNams
 
Excellent post - I was hoping you would address the issues raised. Thanks again.
 
If I remember correctly abhaava is nitya vastu as per navya nyaaya, and existence of an object O at a place A and time t is defined as praak abhaava patiyoginii - its existence at A is counter to its non-existence that pervades everywhere. It can only counter its non-existence only at A and time t where I am perceiving it right now. Once I have the knowledge of the object O, the anupalabdi can operate to know its absence later at place A or anywhere else. Knowledge of its existence at A is complete only when its existence is as though transformed into the existence of a corresponding vRitti in the mind and that existence unites with the consciousness of the subject to fulfill the perceptually condition stated in Vedanta ParibhAsha. Hence visheSha jnaanam involving particulars of a specific object involves negation of its abhaava by a pramANa. 
 
avidya is defined as praak abhaava apratiyoginii - non-negation of abhaava that is present everywhere. Essentially it is beginningless. No pramaaNa is required to establish its existence. PramAna is required only to reveal an object that counters this abhaava at specific place and time – desha kaala vastu paricchinnam. From that point avidya is not counter to the previous presence of knowledge. An appropriate pramANa is required for each specific object of knowledge to counter this all pervading abhaava. This applies to Self –knowledge which requires an appropriate pramANa, Vedanta, for its revelation. The knowledge of all pervading self can only eliminate the all pervading presence of abhaava since the self is not desha-kaala-vastu paricchinnam. 
 
Since all these are operating within vyavahaara, it is also mithyaa i.e sat asat vilakshNam as per advaita since Brahma alone is satyam where there is no-ignorance also.  
 
Hari Om!
Sadananda 




--- On Sat, 11/5/11, Ramesh Krishnamurthy <rkmurthy at gmail.com> wrote:


The tradition consistently maintains that avidyA is sat-asat-vilakShaNa,
anirvachanIya, etc. The term "bhAvarUpa" is only used to emphasize that
aj~nAna/avidyA is not the same as j~nAna-abhAva. aj~nAna is certainly
j~nAna-virodha as it is destroyed when j~nAna arises, and in that sense
aj~nAna is "correlated" to j~nAna-abhAva. However, it must still be
distinguished from pure j~nAna abhAva or absence of knowledge. There of
course various reasons why the tradition says so. This post only focuses on
one of them.