[Advaita-l] Re The stance of the upadeshasaahasrii on Ignorance, Deep Sleep

[Bhaskar YR]

praNAms Sri Karthik prabhuji
Hare Krishna

If Deep Sleep were really the paramArtha state, would Sankara ask
us to reject it or remain in it?

>  I must reiterate ( as I did n'no. of times in this list itself) that 
those who say in sushupti jeeva would become 'ekeebhuta' and experiences 
the 'athighni' type of Ananada do not anyway declaring : 'go to sushupti 
get mukti'.  Having said this it is a matter of fact that in prasthAna 
traya bhAshya of shankara, 'sushupti' has been viewed from various stand 
points and one of those stand point will be saying that 'sushupti' is the 
state where jeeva merges in brahman. When this state is viewed from 
pAramArthika siddhAnta drushti ( that is without superimposing the avidyA 
(jnAnAbhAva rUpa) to the jeeva in sushupti) some amazing and unbelievable 
declarations come from both shruti and shankara.  ONe of the foremost 
example for this is where shankara says ajnAna hetu in sushupti is 
'ekatva' not mUlAvidyA nor agrahaNAtmaka avidyA.  tatra ajnAna hetuM 
ekatvameva tadajnAnahetuH !!??  If the sushupti is really full of avidyA, 
why shankara says here ajnAna hetu is ekatva??  Hence, there is various 
view points through which we have to approach sushupti to understand its 
importance in entirety. 

What you call mukti is available as a sleeping pill in your local 
pharmacy!

>  IMHO, we cannot not push aside this state as mere tamO pradhAna when 
this state is dealt in great detail in bhAshya-s from various angles. 
Ofcourse, sushupti is not the mukti avastha per se, but shankara says 
'sushupti viveka' is enough to know  the would be state of muktAvastha. 
saMprasAda sthAnaM mOksha drushtAnta bhUtaM, clearly says shankara in 
bruhadAraNyaka. He continues here : sarvAtmanO hi brahmaNO drushtAntatvena 
pradarshitaM etad rUpaM ' tadvA asya etat AptakAmaM AtmakAmaM akAmaM etat 
rUpaM iti, tasya hi dArshtrAntikabhUtO ayamartha upasaMhreeyate atha 
akAmayamAna ityAdinaa...For explaining the sarvAtmakatva of jeeva shankara 
takes here sushupti as drushtAnta.  And as we all know, to state the 
paramArtha state, we often take the example of atra veda aveda bhavanti. 
deva adeva bhavati etc. from bruhadAraNyaka which is said while explaining 
the sushupti avasthA in shruti!!  So, IMO, sushupti has its own importance 
in siddhAnta nirNaya and it cannot be a negligible state. 

>  Anyway, this is my opinion, you can correct me if I said anything wrong 
here.

Hari Hari Hari Bol!!!
bhaskar