[Advaita-l] Omniscient Lord and free will.

[Venkatraghavan S]

Namaste Subbuji,

Your post reminded me of an old verse from the chitsukhI - there it is said
omniscience is of two types - svarUpatah sarvajnatva and pramANatah.

स्वरूपतः प्रमाणैव सर्वज्ञत्वं द्विधा स्थितम् ।
तच्चोभयं विनाऽविद्यासंबन्धं नैव सिध्यति ॥

The former refers to jnapti, which is the sarvAvabhAsaka kshamatvam that
you refer to. The latter sarvajnatva is of the nature of knowing everything
that I think Kaushik ji is referring to.

Both, says chitsukhAchArya, are because of consciousness's association with
ignorance.

Reminds one of the bhAShyakAra's words from the ArambhaNAdhikaraNam -

तदेवमविद्यात्मकोपाधिपरिच्छेदापेक्षमेवेश्वरस्येश्वरत्वं सर्वज्ञत्वं
सर्वशक्तित्वं च, न परमार्थतो विद्यया अपास्तसर्वोपाधिस्वरूपे आत्मनि
ईशित्रीशितव्यसर्वज्ञत्वादिव्यवहार उपपद्यते ;

Regards,
Venkatraghavan


On Wed, 14 Jul 2021, 23:39 V Subrahmanian, <v.subrahmanian at gmail.com> wrote:

> This is very nice Venkat ji. Advaitins have defined 'sarvajnatvam' as
> 'sarva-avabhAsana-kshamatvam' which means 'capacity/ability to illuminate
> everything'.
>
> regards
> subbu
>
> On Thu, 15 Jul 2021, 1:26 am Venkatraghavan S via Advaita-l, <
> advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> wrote:
>
>> Namaste,
>> Ishvara knows everything in all periods of time not because it is
>> predestined or people lack free will, rather He directly perceives the
>> past, present and future continuously.
>>
>> Me seeing someone's actions in the present does not mean that I have
>> influence over their actions or they lack free will in acting the way they
>> do. I am merely a witness to their actions.
>>
>> The same principle applies for Ishvara's omniscience and individual free
>> will in all time and space.
>>
>> Regards,
>> Venkatraghavan
>>
>>
>>
>> On Wed, 14 Jul 2021, 20:29 Kaushik Chevendra via Advaita-l, <
>> advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> wrote:
>>
>> > Namaste.
>> > If isvara is omniscient then he knows every action committed by
>> everyone.
>> > Then if he knows what will happen, then where is the free will as it's
>> > already predestined.
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