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Re: REQUEST : Can some one identify the characters in the story?
Sankar Jayanarayanan (kartik@Eng.Auburn.EDU) wrote:
: Gopal wrote:
: [..]
: > the boy comes back and tells his mother what happened.
: > she asks him to return to the sage the next day with
: > an answer. the boy says to the sage, in front of all
: > his desciples, without hesitation: 'oh sage, i have
: > told you about my mother. but, her having served
: > many men, she herself does not know who my father is,
: > and so says she'
: >
: > the sage is impressed at the honesty of the women and
: > the boy, and declares that there is no better qualification
: > for learning vedas than being honest, and takes him as
: > his desciple. the boy later becomes a great rishi.
: >
: > gopal
: Hari Krishna Susarla replied:
: > This is from one of the Upanishads. The boy's name is Satyakama Jabala
: > (sp?). I believe he was given the name Satyakama, and his mother's name was
: > Jabala. So, his mother told him that his name was Satyakama Jabala. When he
: > truthfully told the details of his origins to his guru, the guru accepted
: > him even though the details of gotra, etc. were not known, and it could not
: > be known for certain if the boy was indeed born into a brahmin family.
: >
: This is what the conclusion *appears* to be. The actions of the sage seem
: to suggest that he would have accepted the boy as his disciple even if he
: were a shudra.
: But Shankara disagrees with this conclusion. Shankara in his Brahma Sutra
: Bhashya argues that the fact that Satyakama passed the "honesty test" proved
: that he was not of shudra parentage! In other words, absence of shudra-hood
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: was demonstrated by the fact that Satyakama had come honest, for no born shudra
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: would have dared to utter such a truth!
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Shudra-hood is supposed to be different from one's birth into
a Shudra's house. I am not sure as to what exactly Shankara
meant. Or what he exactly said. Perhaps a direct quote from
Adi-Shankar's Sutras would help. However, if we see the life
of the Ad-Shankara, we see a different message. We see that
Lord Shiva himself came to him in form of a Chandal, to
inculate in his-self that goodness and shivtava can be found
in every human being. So, reliance on Bramha-Sutra, (in the context
of the fact that we do not have a direct quote, but rather a mere
allusion) is not wise.
--
Nachiketa Tiwari
