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Re: superstitions (2 of 2)
Manish Tandon (manish@cadence.com) writes:
> Veda Vyasa wrote the Bhagvatam (I dont care what your great scholarly
> Meemakshas have to say on this), and he called the Puranas and the itihas
> as the fifth Veda.
The Bhagavata Purana was composed in the 9th-10th centuries AD
by Southern Vaishnavas who were greatly influenced by the Tamil
saints known as the Alvars. Please see the excellent work done
by J.A.B. van Buitenen and Friedhelm Hardy in this regard. Both
of these authors are available at any good university library
near you.
The Purana is a wonderfully inspired work, but antiquity it has none.
It may be blessed by the spirit of Veda Vyasa, but unfortunately,
this is as close as his hands have come to it.
>
> Neither the Vedanta Sutra nor the Upanisads come under the category of "Sruti".
>
> How come they have higher authority than the "sruti"???
The Upanishads have always been considered Sruti. Consider the
mangaLa Sloka of Ramanuja's Sri Bhashya:
SrutiSirasi vidIpte brahmaNi srInivase...
Here, "SrutiSiras" means the "head" or the "best" of Sruti, the
Upanishads.
The Vedanta Sutras are not authoritative as words by themselves,
(unless you accept Madhva's revolutionary view of the 3rd Adhyaya).
Rather, they are the authoritative *guide* to understanding the
jnaana-kaaNDa (the Upanishads) of the Veda. In this sense, they
are neither Sruti nor smriti, technically.
> "Sruti" in itself does not implies Higher status.
>
> "Smriti" implies to 'memory' or what is written from memory.
>
> Do you also say that the Upanisads and the Vedanta is bogus because they
> are also smriti? Why not???
As I have pointed out, you are very wrong here. Please learn more
about Vedanta before you try to argue it. Sruti is *always* higher
and more authoritative than smriti. It is *only* Sruti that is
apauruSeya, i.e., eternal.
Mani
