[Advaita-l] Scholarly Article on Why Vedas are Valid

[Raghav Kumar]

SrI Satish Arigela ji
Namaste

I have a question for you. Devata-s like gaNapati are found in Tibet,
China etc., and let us assume that they were independently arrived at/
communed with, by adherents of those respective cultures and did not
get there as a result of cultural effusion.

My question is regarding the vice versa  : what would be the attitude
of a vaidika/tantrika towards devata-s from other cultures who do not
seem to have any obvious counterpart within the Vedic scheme of
things.

For example:
http://www.ancientegypt.co.uk/gods/explore/main.html

An example: "Hapy" was a god represented as a man with a pot belly,
shown with water plants on his head; he was especially important to
the ancient Egyptians because he brought the flood every year. The
flood deposited rich silt on the banks of the Nile, allowing the
Egyptians to grow crops.

Will such a "god" be accepted as valid devata-s ? Or is he merely a
cultural artefact corresponding to the annual flooding of the nile and
such a "god" has no ontological significance ?

For the record : I am basically sympathetic to the idea of such
devata-s from other cultures. But then what would be the appropriate
position on this question for a vaidika ? For a tantrika ?

Hari Om
Raghav.



On Fri, Oct 14, 2011 at 3:15 PM, Satish Arigela <satisharigela at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>>How do we logically establish?
>>   1. There are super-sensuous entities such as the Devas
>
> Not sure about logically establishing them, but devata-s are experienced by upAsaka-s. I seriously doubt if you can logically establish them.
>
>
>>   2. Vedas are pramana for studying these super-sensuous objects
>
> veda is not the only pramANa for these(devata-s in specific). Because people from other cultures and Hindu-like religions experience some of the devata-s in similar, if not in the same manner as upAsaka-s from the Hindu world. And the best part is, the experience of the deities as also the effects of rituals involving the invocation of these deities can be repeated with same or similar results.
>
> The best example is gaNapati.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: Rajaram Venkataramani <rajaramvenk at gmail.com>
> To: A discussion group for Advaita Vedanta <advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org>
> Sent: Wednesday, October 12, 2011 9:41 PM
> Subject: Re: [Advaita-l] Scholarly Article on Why Vedas are Valid
>
> I was perhaps not clear on what I wanted. It is easy - sort of of - to
> establish pratyaksha and anumana as pramanas. Empiricism relies on
> observation of facts about the external world and logical inference. For
> objects that cannot be seen with naked senses (e.g. electrons), one can come
> up with a hypothesis which can be validated through experimentation
> (observation) and it becomes a theory. We can build on theories to come up
> with complex theories.
>
> Now, there are unseen entities (devas, isvara, results of karma, other
> worlds etc.). The existence of these and theories about them are based on
> Vedas, which have been accepted as axiomatic truths. I am less concerned
> about apaureshyatvam or anaditvam of the Vedas. I am concerned with
>
> How do we logically establish?
>
>
>    1. There are super-sensuous entities such as the Devas
>    2. Vedas are pramana for studying these super-sensuous
>  objects
>
>
> 2011/10/12 श्रीमल्ललितालालितः <lalitaalaalitah at gmail.com>
>
>> *श्रीमल्ललितालालितः <http://www.lalitaalaalitah.com>
>> lalitAlAlitaH <http://about.me/lalitaalaalitah/bio>*
>>
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Oct 12, 2011 at 21:08, Rajaram Venkataramani
>> <rajaramvenk at gmail.com>wrote:
>>
>> > This is a question for shri lalitaalaalitah. My sanskritist friend
>> skimmed
>> > through your blog and said he could not find any article that presents
>> > arguments in favour of why Vedas are valid as pramana. If you do have
>> that,
>> > can you
>  please send the specific links?
>> >
>>
>> Sorry for not being clear.
>> I've no post regarding apauruSheyatva of veda-s on my blog.
>> That's correctly pointed by your friend.
>>
>> But, I didn't ever say that I've those.
>> I said that there is a big essay (book) by swAmI hariharAnanda saraswatI jI
>> (karapAtri ji) on these subjects. It was published in two volumes, each
>> containing 700+ pages. You can see that for logic supporting
>> apauruSheyatvam
>> of veda-s and refutation of dayAnanda(Arya-samAja), max muker, etc.
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