[Advaita-l] vedAntins at the time of shankara

[Praveen R. Bhat]

Namaste Jaldharji,

On Fri, Sep 15, 2017 at 10:38 PM, Jaldhar H. Vyas via Advaita-l <
advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> wrote:

> Technically both these statements are true.
>
> There are (and were) several different varieties of bhedabhedavada but
> they all agree that jivatma and paramatma are identical on some level.
> (That's the abheda part.) Where they differ from Advaitavada is that they
> do not think the two are _completely_ equivalent. (That's the bheda part.)
>
> Completely dualistic schools of Vedanta are a relatively recent
> development.  The only dualists in early times were Samkhyas.  It is they
> that Shankaracharya is contrasting with "followers of the Upanishads."


I particularly feel that the fundamental reasoning used by Bhashyakara for
dismissal of all other Vaidika (not only Vedanta) schools of thoughts is
applicable to the later Vedanta schools also. The depth being quite
different though, through navyanyAya, that is handled by the juggernauts in
the form of Sriharshacharya, Chitsukhacharya and Madhusudanacharya.

The basic foundation of ekavAkyatA of Shruti and arthApatti of
impossibility of mokSha otherwise can potentially overthrow erroneous
conclusion of all Vaidika opponents. On a related note, I wonder what other
Vedanta schools of thought use for tAparyanishchaya instead of the
ShaDliMgas of Advaita Vedantins.

Kind rgds,
--Praveen R. Bhat
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