Yet another unstructured thread
(Will focus on ancient schools of philosophy in this edition)
Sankara – Brahm is attributeless
Ramanuja – Brahm is infinite and made of infinite benign attributes
Madhava – Brahm is source and cause of events. Human beings are mere agents or tools that aid in theses events.
Brahm, world and soul –
Ramanuja,Vallabh – Brahm is an organic body, soul and world are it’s body parts
Madhav – They are interdependent
Nimbarka – World and soul work on binary code of Brahm (Just like a switch is either on or off, they are sentient/non sentient)
Schrödinger’s Cat version of perception –
Achintya BhedAbhed philosophy ( by Chaitanya)
Achintya – inconceivable
Bhed – differentiatable
Abhed – undifferentiatable
God and humans are linked, but not same.
Maybe 🙂
Advaitvaadis state that God and soul are same. Soul’s power are unrevealed and hence they appear superficially inferior.
Dvaitvaadi like Chaitanya believe that soul’s powers are inherently inferior to God’s.
You are free to choose ur beliefs
Even though Sankara’s school believes that Brahm is non attributable, Commentaries of Brahma Sutras say “Knowledge of Brahm give Moksh” i.e. an attribute
How ?
This is modernly explained by analogy of ‘rope appearing like snake in specific conditions’
“When all this is nothing but self, how could one see anything else?” Brihadaranyak Upanishad 2.4.14
Just like clay takes form of several pots and becomes clay again, Brahm gives an Illusion of Maya and destroys it.
Overall, it always was and always will remain as Brahm.
This attribute paradox is applicable across all sects and religions. Like even Allah is said to have qualities beyond human perception, but he has mercy,kindness, mightiness etc. which are perceptible attributes.
Only a man as wise as Sankara could dissect these things.
Sankara made a system to classify Vedic knowledge into two parts.
The portions about attributes were called lower knowledge. These hymns could appeal the masses.
The attributeless portions were called ‘higher knowledge’ and these were for ascetics.
How does a common man progress upto higher knowledge ?
By 3 steps –
Achieve lower knowledge AND practice differentiating eternalness and temporariness of world
Practice indifference to THESE temporary fruits of labour
Doing moral deeds by using those fruits of labour
Buddhists believed that nothing like ‘self’ exists.
‘Self’ is just a series of illusionary temporary psychological states.
Sankara said that since a human being has –
Sense of identity + Memory ,
he exists.
(Oh look ‘I’ read this book yesterday as well.)
Are self and consciousness same ?
No Consciousness is a mere component of self.
‘Self’ is ‘Sat Chit Anand’
Sat – truth Chit – consciousness Anand – bliss
Sikhism has a unique perspective about human beings.
Kaal (time) is seen as supreme God.
All the avtars of Vishnu took birth and died, just like us humans.
Hence, all of us are Avtars who can derive divine energy from Parmatma and become brave and powerful
There is also an interesting clash in concept of Allah and Brahm that is too unvisualisable entities.
Sikh supreme God is Akaal Moorat i.e. ‘image of undying’. And he is ajooni saivam i.e. self existent.
He has an image, but it is unpercievable by us mortals
Where Shankara parts company with both realists and idealists is-
(a) that he regarded what we normally regard as subject and object as being both contained in a Self which was neither subject nor object
(b) that he regarded, the Self as pervading both subject and object
What money reserves are to Kubera,
Antahkaran is to self.
Antahkaran is as big as physical body, but it is ethereal.
It is ’embodiment’ of self.
If you have seen Shaktiman, you know that it looks like the ‘astral body’.
When Yashoda tries to investigate whether her son had eaten dirt, Krishna open his mouth and inside she sees whole universe..
That’s Antahkaran of Krishna.
Nomenclature scheme –
Self = Aatma (capital S)
self = Jeevatma
Annamay Kosha = sthool shareer
Prana, Mano, Vignana = sookshma shareer
Anandamay Kosha = Karan shareer
In a pot,
Clay is Upadaan
Potter is Nimitta
Water to be filled is Prayojan
Ishwar is Sat Chitt Anand because he is his own consciousness, law of existence and product of existence.
An antahkaran in doubt and indeterminate state is mind
An antahkaran in clarity is in state of intellect
An antahkaran reflecting on clarity is in state of attention
When you see a tomato, it has property or Gunà of being red.
But, your eye too has a Gunà of percieving red.
It is only the ‘Self’ that is Nirgunà
Out of all qualities of Antahkaran, attention or dhyana is the most important.
A person who can not focus his attention can not do anything big.
And then there is famous Aristotle’s paradox that only and only a man as genius as Sankaracharya could solve.
Body is divided at 3 levels-
Self/soul Antahkaran/ethereal body Physical body
‘Spirit’ has long been looked as a connecting link between ethereal and physical body.
Aristotle said,
“If spirit influences the material body, then what kind of influence is it ?
1. If its a SPIRITual influence, then material body must be spiritual too
2. If its a Material influence, then spirit should be material too.
How is that possible?”
Sankara shifted whole paradigm.
He said that “Spirit is not the link between material and ethereal body at all. Rather, its the link between soul and ethereal body.” . West looks things from outward to inward. It’s us Indians who fathom inward to outward.