[Advaita-l] Dashavataras as per Harivamsha

[Sunil Bhattacharjya]

 Dear Kripa,
 
 Lord Buddha was Hindu and he died a Hindu. He never said
 that he was promulgating a new dharma. He said that he was
 from the Ikshaku vamsha and that is confirmed by the
 Pauranic chronology.  In the Jataka stories (giving his
 previous births)  he said that he was Lord Rama in one of
 his earlier births. Pauranic chronology shows that Lord Rama
 was also from the Ikshaku vamsha. Hindus do believe that the
 ancestors do take rebirth in their lineage. 
 
 Lord Buddha was never against the Veda.  When he saw that a
 very large number of animals being taken for yajna, he
 advised the king Bimbisara  to continue his yajna, but
 without animal sacrifice, and did not ask the king not to
 perform the yajna. Nowhere in Veda it is said that a large
 number of animals have to be sacrificed. That may be the
 reason why Bhishma said in the Mahabharata that animal
 sacrifice was promoted by the hypocrites (in order to
 satiate their great desire for eating meat).
 
 Lord Buddha asked the brahmins of his time, as to what the
 Vedas say regarding the way to cross the cycle of birth and
 death, but they said that Vedas have not said any such
 thing. Obviously the Vedic scholars ignored the Upanishadic
 teachings ( which are the essence of the Veda). Lord Buddha
 asked the brahmins to concentrate on the essence of the
 Vedas. 
 
 The colonial historians wanted to prove the pauranic
 chronology to be fake and they tried to show that Lord
 Mahavira was born before Lord Buddha, by reducing the
 antiquity of Lord Buddha.  The colonial historians were
 wrong as Lord Buddha  was born thirteen hundred (1300)
 years before Lord Mahavira.  Lord Mahavira too learned the
 Sankhya and Yoga, but he did not go to the advayavada like
 Lord Buddha did. 
 
 Buddha means Jnani and Buddhists believe that there were
 many jnanis before Lord Buddha. 
 
 Sometime ago, I read one verse (quoted from a Dashavatara
 stora) in a book on the date of AdiShankara and it was
 written by one Kulkarni. That verse says that Lord Buddha
 was an avatara of Lord Vishnu. Some puranas (called as the
 fifth veda by two of the major upanishads) too say that Lord
 Buddha was an avatara of Lord Vshnu. Late President Dr.
 Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan said that Lord Buddha was a great
 reformer of Hinduism, I agree with Dr. Radhakrishnanand and
 I shall also say that  Adi Shankara too was a great
 reformer of Hinduism. 
 
 Regards,
 Sunil KB 
 
 
 
 --------------------------------------------
 On Sat, 1/7/17, Kripa Shankar <kripa.shankar.0294 at gmail.com>
 wrote:
 
  Subject: Re: [Advaita-l] Dashavataras as per Harivamsha
  To: "Sunil Bhattacharjya" <sunil_bhattacharjya at yahoo.com>,
 "V Subrahmanian" <v.subrahmanian at gmail.com>,
 "A discussion group for Advaita Vedanta" <advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org>,
 "Sunil Bhattacharjya" <sunil_bhattacharjya at yahoo.com>
  Date: Saturday, January 7, 2017, 4:15 AM
  
  Namaste Sunil, 
  
  Like I mentioned before, there
  are a lot of historical lies in the Buddhists history and
  the same was exploited by the indologists. For eg, Ashoka
  persecutes all the jain monks in his kingdom just because
  someone painted a picture depicting Buddha falling at the
  feet of a shramana. But we regard him as the great king.
 As
  a matter of fact, Mahavira is a more illustrious character
  and preached the same non-violence much before Buddha 0.1
  was even born. So why is he not a Vishnu  avatar? Are we
 so
  gullible to think that Buddha preached something new that
 we
  didn't already know. 
  
  If Buddha 0.1 was a well wisher of people and
  hence out of compassion, corrected the wrong views held by
  the Vaidiks, he should have first accepted the validity of
  Vedas. But there is no such evidence either in truth or
  fiction. 
  
  Whether there
  were 2 or 20 Buddhas, whether he preached the same
  philosophy or not, the fundamental question is, did he
  accept the validity of the Vedas? Can you come up with
  something to prove that? I guess not. Hence it is a
 nAstika
  school. This is the difference between Shankara and
 Buddha,
  like day and night. ‎So calling adi Shankara a prachanna
  baudha is limited to a cult like Vaishnavas. 
  
  If we contrast with the truth,
  according to which Veda Vyasa is the actual avatar of
  Vishnu, think of everything that he accomplished. The
  progenitor of both kauravas and pandavas, the author of
  sharirika sutras, the compiler of Vedas, the author of all
  Puranas, the Brahmarshi of incomparable intelligence. 
  
  No one ever has heard of
  dashavatara stotra composed by Adi Shankaracharya. So
  sparing kindergarten children,  no one else  will buy
 this
  mere statement.  
  
  Regards 
  Kripa 
  
  Vyasaya Vishnu roopaya Vyasa roopaya Vishnave 
  Namo vai Brahma nidhaye Vasishtaya namo namaha