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tat tvam asi (was Nature of Ved(a))
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Subject: tat tvam asi (was Nature of Ved(a))
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From: manish@cadence.com (Manish Tandon)
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Date: Tue, 31 Jan 1995 20:18:10 GMT
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Apparently-To: alt-hindu@uunet.uu.net
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From news@cadence.com Tue Jan 31 15: 08:30 1995
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Newsgroups: alt.hindu
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Organization: Cadence Design Systems
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References: <3g8mct$97k@ucunix.san.uc.edu>
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Sender: news@cadence.com
In article #2144, f0g1@jupiter.sun.csd.unb.ca (Prasad Gokhale) writes:
|> Nature of Ved(a)
|> ================
|> by Pawan Varma
|>
[...]
|> For the Rishi, all that we see is nothing but Brahm (God); therefore, at the
|> finest level of reality, you ARE the rose that you were looking at and you
|> ARE you and you ARE God.
tat tvam asi - thou art that
or a more orthodox translation is 'you are that truth'
Now let us analyse what that really means.
My name is Manish but there is also a "Tandon" at the end. The reason that is
there is because I inherit it from my father. Since he has a "Tandon" sitting
in his name, so do I. Now, if my father was to have say 5 children, all of them
would be Tandons. Suppose one of these 5 somehow got lost/raised elsewhere so
that (s)he did not knew (s)he was a Tandon rather it realized/was told that
at some later stage. So from that point on, (s)he also formally becomes a
"Tandon".
Now, all of us, me, my father, you, your father, mother, the plants, birds, etc.
etc. are all children of God. Lord Krishna says in the BG, 15.7 "mamaivamso jiva-
loke". The reason we are here is because we all forgot who is our father/cause,
rather we wanted to be _fathers_ ourself.
Krishna (God) is the Absolute Truth (tat) and since we are His children, we are
also 'tat' just as I am Tandon for the fact that my father is.
Self-realization really is to understand who we really are. When we get to that
point, we realize that we are also truths because we come from The Truth.
But here is the important distinction, getting back to my metaphor, that one of
the five children who did not know who he was, does (s)he on realizing that (s)he
is also a "Tandon" becomes the Tandon that his/her father is?
When we realize that we are parts and parcels of the Supreme Lord, who is the
Absolute Truth, thus we are also truths, do we become The Truth?
So much so that the Absolute Truth Himself looses His Individuality/Identity??
Can the effect(s) of a cause on realizing its _cause_ become the _cause_??
The answer is NO.
Dear Prasad, often these self-proclaimed self-realized persons claim that we are
also God, everyone is God, etc. etc. The reason they cite is that since ultimately
we are all the same, so we all, including God, must be the same in all respects.
But that is a big leap of faith. Logic and reason does not support that.
The reason some people arrive at that conclusion is either due to false ego (the
desire to be God) and/or the fact that they only analyze the _How_ part of our
existence, and not the _Why_ part.
In a recent discuss with a physicist, we arrived at the same conclusion about
science, empiricism is inherently limited because it only investigates the How
question, not the Why question.
Did you ever ask yourself, why you are that what you are? Why are we 'tat'?
If you only look at How we are 'tat' (tat tvam asi), it is quite possibe that
you may conclude since you are truth and everyone else also is, so that must be
all the truth that there is.
When you try to understand Why it is that you are the truth, only than you may
understand that you and everyone else is 'tat' because our cause is 'tat' and
because our cause is 'tat', that cause MUST reamin so for us to be 'tat'.
The moment one thinks that now (s)he has realized that (s)he is 'tat' so (s)he
has become that cause of which (s)he is the effect, (s)he would automatically
become unrealized for (s)he at that very moment denies the status of Truth to
his/her own cause.
Lord Chaitanya philosophy of 'acintya behda-abheda tattva' very clearly defines
what it means to be 'tat' and thus shows the shallowness of the 'advaita'
philosophy.
Yes, we are all true, we are all Brahman also for that is our very nature and
it is our nature only because it is the nature of our source, Krishna. That
DOES NOT mean we are all Krishna.
So 'tat tvam asi' is true, but go beyond the How, ask Why.
How can you not be that what you are?
How can you become that what you you are?
How can the effect become its own cause on realizing what is it the effect of?
Why is it that 'tat' you are?
Hare Krishna!
Manish
PS. You may also want to read my post on "aham brahmasmi" to see why such apparent
monoist statements really aren't monoistic.
