[Advaita-l] A tale from the shatapatha brAhmaNa

[Venkateswaran N E]

Dear Subbuji, pranams.
It's a well written article. Thanks to the author.

I have one question regarding the criteria for classifying a Vedic
statement as prAmANya or arthavAda (specifically guNavAda, as in this case)

In the last paragraph before the summary :

" Coming  to  our  context,  that  Siva  is  ISvara  himself  is  repeated
 in  several  places, across  the  sanAtana  dharma  canon  -  within  the
 veda  itself  (Sri  rudram, mahAnArAyaNa  upaniShad  etc),  itihAsa,
 purANa,  etc.

Therefore,  if  Siva/rudra  was the subject  matter  of  this  section, and
 we  take  the  meaning  of  the  arthavAda  at  face value,  it  would  be
 veda  contradicting  itself.

 Therefore,  we  have  to  reinterpret  this  as  a guNavAda,  thereby
 removing  veda  prAmANyam  from  this  section  and  saving  veda from
 internal  contradiction.

 Therefore,  if  rudra  is  the  subject  of  this  section  (he  is  not,
for  reasons  outlined  above),  this  would  be  a  case  of  guNavAda,
 and  there  is  no prAmANya  for  guNavAda.   "

Now my question is, if there are contradicting sentences in Veda, how do
you decide which is prAmANya and which is guNavAda ?

For example if an opponent claims that the status of Rudra or Agni in
shatapatha brAhmaNa is prAmANya while the statements indicating Rudra as
Ishvara are guNavAda and hence not prAmANya, how does one respond ?

Is it based on the number of repetitions of a particular assertion, as the
above paragraph seem to indicate ?

Regards
Venkateshwaran

On 12-Aug-2017 11:00 AM, "V Subrahmanian via Advaita-l" <
advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> wrote:

>  A tale from the shatapatha brAhmaNa
>
> Please find below a mediafire link for an article written by my friend who
> does not want to be identified.
>
> http://www.mediafire.com/file/ahcca4o49dw1b9e/A_tale_from_
> the_Satapatha_brAhmaNa.pdf
>
> Regards,
> subrahmanian.v
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