It becomes
difficult for the orthodoxy to accept anything else as truth other than
their accepted belief, which they hold as truth. Although all religious
followers are participants alike in the spiritual endeavour of the world,
overzealous followers of each religion
are not prepared to accord equal status to other faiths and assert the
superiority of their own. Thus universal brother hood is total impossibility
because it is difficult to accept anything other than their inherited belief
system.
Most of the
pundits are egoic and they try to snub others who question them. They think they are unquestionable
authority. They quote the citation from
the scriptures as proof without verifying the validity. All punditry is a great obstacle in realizing
the Advaitic truth expounded by the Sri, Sankara and Goudapada.
One finds lots of differences between Advaita preaching and practice.
There is need to bifurcate religion, concept of god and scriptures from
Advaitic philosophy to assimilate the essence of Advaita.
Sri, Sankara says in Brahma Sutras: that Brahman is the cause of the
world, whereas in Mandukya he denies it. This is because he says that at the
lower stage of understanding, the former teaching must be given, for people
will get frightened as they cannot understand how the world can be without a
cause, but to those in a higher stage, the truth of non-causality can be
revealed.
Sri, Sankara himself has warned us not to use ambiguous words, and to
practice semantic analysis in his book "Definition of one's own Self.( Page 199, v.24 of "Sankara's Selected Works)
Sri, Sankara founded his Advaita
Vedanta either on reason independent of sruti or on sruti confirmed by
reason." Sri, Sankara's commentary on the Mandukya Upanishad,
II, 1: This [the unreality of duality] is borne out by the Srutis
... But it is possible also to show the unreality of the object world even from
pure reasoning, and this second chapter is undertaken for that purpose.
Sri, Sankara himself had often said that his philosophy was based on Sruti,
or revealed scripture. This may be because Sri, Sankara addressed the
ordinary man, who finds security in the idea of causality and thus in the idea
of God—and Revelation is indispensable to prove the latter. He believed
that those of superior intelligence, have no need of this idea of divine
causality, and can therefore dispense with Sruti and arrive at the
truth of Non-Dualism by pure reason.
Non-duality does not need the support
of any Scripture or Revelation like the Veda. For it is based, not upon the
varying theological fancies, which are as numerous as the sands of the sea, but
upon reason, the common heritage of all mankind, irrespective of colour or
creed or clime.
When Upanishad
itself declares:- sarvam khalvidam brahma - all this
(universe) is verily Brahman. By following back all of the relative appearances
in the world, we eventually return to that from which it is all manifest – the
non-dual reality ( Chandogya Upanishad).
Then it is no use going roundabout way, trace the Brahman which is the
formless substance and witness of the universe, which is in the form of
mind. By tracing the source of the mind
or universe one will be able to realize the Brahman.
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