[Advaita-l] [advaitin] 'Dvaita accepts body-adhyasa'

[Vinodh]

Sri Subbuji and Sri Chandramouli, thank you for your explanations. If I
understood correctly, the essence of your explanation is that a
superposition of the mind-body on the self is necessary for any vyavahara
including perception of the world. As already mentioned, this much is clear
from the adhyaasa bhashya.

The question that remains from a dvaita point of view is why the self is
considered real whereas the body-mind is not. In my understanding, both
your answers, just like the adhyasa bhashya assert the unreal-ness of the
body-mind without any further analysis of this assertion; and without an
analysis of this assertion, accepting adhyasa alone does not lead dvaita to
the same conclusion as advaita. Please do correct me if I have
misunderstood anything.

Sri Prasadji, your explanation seems to be the most convincing I have been
able to find so far and it is not very different from how Sri
Chandrashekara Saraswathi puts it in one of his discourses. It is because
of the dvaitis strong desire to hold on to dvaita to be able to separate
themselves as Jivas from Paramatma in order to worship Him with bhakti,
that their intellect has construed the philosophy of dvaita. And because of
their bhakti and their desire to serve the Lord, the Lord has given them
the ability to so through their intellect. Due to their strong bhakti,
their mind is unable to qualitatively equate the atma of the Jiva with the
atma of the Paramatma (even as the Vishtadvaitins do), much less claim
their identity. I also agree with your second point about the useless of
the elaborations of the technical points regarding the differences between
these philosophies. Eventually, when one accepts Advaita, there is nothing
to be really said or done and the only practical aspect that matters is
karma and bhakti, which is anyway common between Advaita and Dvaita.
Despite this, I guess there is a lingering desire within oneself, due to
one's own ajnana, for an "intellectual" resolution to the differences in
philosophy, which is what I suppose has provoked me into this discussion.
🙏



On Sat, Oct 16, 2021 at 2:28 PM H S Chandramouli <hschandramouli at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Namaste Vinodh Ji,
>
> Reg  <<  In essence, I am trying to understand where and why the Dvaitic
> schools
> differ in their conclusion from Advaita even though they accept the same
> Sruti and accept several things that are common with Advaita like body-mind
> adhyaasa. Why do they stop short of the final conclusion of Advaita even
> while there are many similarities? What is it they are unable to agree with
> on Advaita and why? >>,
>
> I have selected arbitrarily one part from your posts to explain my
> understanding of the position. Several other parts could also have been
> selected for the same purpose.
>
> The adhyAsa advanced by Sri Bhagavatpada involves a combination of the
> Real and the Unreal. AdhyAsa Bhashya in the second line declares **
> सत्यानृते मिथुनीकृत्य ** (**satyAnRRite mithunIkRRitya** ). All vyavahAra
> is founded  on such an adhyAsa only. In other words all vyavahAra involves
> a combination of the Real and the Unreal. None of the other schools of
> thought accept such a position even if they were to accept some type of
> adhyAsa. In their Systems, all entities involved in vyavahAra are Real.
>
> AdhyAsa Bhashya has five sections  namely प्रतिज्ञा (pratij~nA), लक्षण
> (lakShaNa), उपपत्ति (upapatti), प्रमाण (pramANa), and उपसंहार
> (upasaMhAra). What I have cited above is from the  प्रतिज्ञा (pratij~nA)
> section. The Shruti pramANa for the same is covered in the appropriate
> section.
>
> Hope this answers the fundamental issue raised by you. Once this position
> of Sidhanta is understood, I believe many of the other doubts raised stand
> automatically cleared.
>
> Regards
> Chandramouli
>
> On Sat, Oct 16, 2021 at 8:31 AM Vinodh via Advaita-l <
> advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> wrote:
>
>> Namaskaram Sri Prasadji,
>>
>> Thank you for your kind explanation. If I understood it correctly, you are
>> presenting the Advaitic viewpoint based on Sruthi, which I am able to
>> follow.
>>
>> At the same time, other Astika schools which also accept the authority of
>> the Sruti seem to claim something different from Advaita while still
>> accepting the superposition of the body-mind on the Self. In this context,
>> my question is whether the superposition alone is enough (read as
>> 'sufficient condition' in terms of mathematical language) to establish
>> that
>> the body-mind is also avidya. This does not seem to be the case because,
>> at
>> least in my limited understanding, schools like Sankhya posit a Pradhana
>> that is inert and independent of the Purusha and the Purusha experiences
>> the Pradhana without clearly seeing the difference between itself and
>> Pradhana. The Dvaita school also posits that a Paramatma has created this
>> world (including individual body-mind) as well as all the Jivas which
>> reside in them, but the Jivas suffer because of the superposition of the
>> body-mind on themselves thinking "I am this body" or "This is mine" etc.
>>
>> This question arises because of the thread's subject being "Dvaita accepts
>> body-adhyaasa" and the subsequent claim by Sri Subbuji that this
>> superposition alone implies that all vyavahara is in avidya and
>> consequently the Dvaitic schools must also accept the Advaitic view only.
>> The Adhyasa Bhashya was referenced for supporting this claim. In it, an
>> additional assertion (by which I mean a statement without a substantiating
>> evidence or argument) appears to be made that the body-mind has avidya for
>> a material cause. When this  assertion is taken together with the adhyaasa
>> of the body-mind on the self (adhyaasa being an effect of avidya) and the
>> fact that such an adhyaasa is necessary for any vyavahara implies that all
>> vyavahara happens in avidya. However, it seems that without this assertion
>> the same conclusion cannot be made.
>>
>> Therefore, my question is whether dvaitic schools do not accept the
>> assertion that the body-mind has avidya for a material cause and therefore
>> whether this is the reason why although they accept the body-mind adhyaasa
>> they do not necessarily reach the same conclusion as Advaita. If this is
>> the case, then why is it that they are unable to accept that body-mind as
>> springing out of avidya? Is it because they posit that a Paramatma is the
>> cause for the jagat and that He is not touched by avidya?
>>
>> In essence, I am trying to understand where and why the Dvaitic schools
>> differ in their conclusion from Advaita even though they accept the same
>> Sruti and accept several things that are common with Advaita like
>> body-mind
>> adhyaasa. Why do they stop short of the final conclusion of Advaita even
>> while there are many similarities? What is it they are unable to agree
>> with
>> on Advaita and why?
>>
>> I hope I have been able to explain my question a bit more clearly now. I
>> would appreciate any thoughts on the above. 🙏
>>
>>
>>
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