[Advaita-l] Alaya vijnana and Adwaita.

[Sunil Bhattacharjya]

Namaste,

The simplest definition of  Shunyata as given in the Diamond sutta and the Hrdaya sutta is the state reached when the aspirant loses the five skandhas (koshas). That is the same as saying that the aspirnat became videhamukta.

To my knowledge etymologically both the Sanskrit words "Shunya" and "Brahman" means the expanded state. One name of Lord Vishnu is "Shunya" and Lord Shiva also has one name as "Shunya".

Regards,
Sunil KB




________________________________
 From: vinayaka ns <brahmavadin at gmail.com>
To: A discussion group for Advaita Vedanta <advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> 
Sent: Monday, March 4, 2013 4:44 AM
Subject: Re: [Advaita-l] Alaya vijnana and Adwaita.
 
On Mon, Mar 4, 2013 at 5:13 PM, Srikanta Narayanaswami <
srikanta.narayanaswami at yahoo.com> wrote:

>
> Though Nagarjuna shouted from the roof tops that Shunyata is not nothing
> ness the Buddhistic logic has further gone to define what is Shunyata.Many
> Buddhist scholars have written books on this and continue to write down to
> the present HHDalai Lama.....


Namaste,

Here is one clarification on shUnyavAda of the mAdhyamikas:

"Unfortunately the word ‘Shūnya’ has been
gravely misunderstood. The literal meaning of
the word which is negation or void has been
the cause of much misunderstanding. The
word is used by the Mādhyamikas in a different philosophical sense.
Ignoring the real
philosophical meaning of the word ‘Shūnya’
and taking it only in its literal sense, many
thinkers, eastern and western, ancient, medieval and modern have
unfortunately committed that horrible blunder which has led them
to thoroughly misunderstand Shūnyavada and
to condemn it as a hopeless scepticism and a
self-condemned nihilism. Shūnya, according
to the Mādhyamika, we emphatically maintain, does not mean a ‘nothing’ or
an ‘empty
void’ or a ‘negative abyss’. Shūnya essentially
means Indescribable (avāchya or anabhilāpya)
as it is beyond the four categories of intellect
(chatuṣkoṭi-vinirmukta). It is Reality which ultimately transcends
existence, non-existence,
both and neither. It is neither affirmation nor
negation nor both nor neither."

Source: Chandradhar Sharma, A Critical Survey of Indian Philosophy(Motilal
Banarsidass)

-- 
Best Wishes,

Vinayaka
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