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Re: Problems in Advaita
Sankar Jayanarayanan wrote:
>
>
> First problem :
>
> Since Advaita states that everything is illusory, it states its own unreality.
> So the doctrine of Advaita itself does not exist. But in coming to the
> conclusion that Advaita does not exist, we have made use of the doctrine of
> Advaita. So it does exist.
Rather than playing word games with the verb "exist" it might be better
to spend some time understanding the sophistication of the system of two
truths (pAramArthika vs. vyAvahArika) in advaita. It is very misleading
and quite often a fundamental misunderstanding of advaita to state that
"advaita states that everything is illusory". That is just not the case.
All doctrines, including advaita and dvaita "exist" in the common-place
sense of the verb, at the level of reality that is perceived and
understood by the senses. This is the level of vyavahAra. At this level,
the senses are directed outwards, and they receive sensory input and the
manas and the buddhi process such sensory input.
Beyond this level of vyavahAra, and in fact, transcending it, is the
level of paramArtha. In this state, no doctrine "exists", because no
doctrine manages to capture the essence of this state completely. It is
essentially "vAcAm agocaram" - unapproachable by mere words. The minute
you want doctrine specified for you in great detail, you are insisting
that you want to be limited by and to verbal descriptions. The whole
point that is emphasized in advaita and in upanishads like the mANDUkya
is that this Atman-state is completely beyond words. It is this
realization that prompts advaitins to say that even the doctrine of
advaita, which is elaborated by verbal techniques, is itself not the
Absolute Truth. Advaita does not "exist" only at the paramArtha level.
At the vyavahAra level, all doctrines exist.
The Experience of this paramArtha level may be called a mystical
experience, if you will. And those who have had this experience are of
the firm opinion that for them nothing else exists. It is a drastic
mistake to attempt to understand advaita purely intellectually, without
grounding it in the "Experience" of those who tell you they have had it.
I use "E" for Experience in order to emphasize the fact that at this
level, there is no talk of experiencer, experienced and the experience
itself. For that matter, there is no talk, period.
> So where does the philosophy of Advaita stand-on the side of existence or on
> the side of non-existence?
In your question, please clarify what you mean by existence and
non-existence? Does your idea of existence necessarily entail
multiplicity of entities that exist? Then advaita's answer to you is
that such existence is characteristic of bondage, from which the seeker
seeks liberation. Every issue of advaita is related intimately to the
questions of baddhatvam (being bound) and moksha. Advaita is on the side
of Existence, with a capital E, in which there is no multiplicity i.e.
yatra AtmA eva sarvam abhUt - where the Atman itself has become all.
Again, do not get misled by the use of the verb "become". The reality is
that the AtmA always was, is and will be All. The becoming refers only
to the realization that this is so.
>
> [ This is a glaring example of a Goedel's string at work. In Wittgenstein's
> philosophy, I heard, he comes to the conclusion that everything that can be
> expressed in words is nonsense(in the strict sense of the word). But if that
> is so, then his own result should make no sense! ]
>
But neither Goedel nor Wittgenstein make such a clear demarcation of two
levels of truth as classical advaita does. Once you insist that these
two levels of truth are completely separate, the application of Goedel's
string does not make sense. Does Wittgenstein insist that there is an
Unborn which is not describable by words, and that therefore anything
that can be expressed in words is nonsense? Not to my knowledge.
On the other hand, advaita is ambivalent or distrustful of words only
when it comes to describing Brahman. In the ordinary world, where we do
not perceive Brahman by any of our senses, and words make as sense as we
want them to. Quite unlike Wittgenstein, advaita does not dismiss all
words as nonsense. There is always the question, "what purpose do these
words serve?"
> Second Problem :
>
> Does Avidya exist or not? If it does, then you have two existent things: Atman
> and Avidya. If it does not, then there should be no reason to practise religion.
> Why practise religion at all, since Avidya is anyway unreal, and the self is
> already known ?
Au contraire, avidya is synonymous with the Self not being really known.
You think you know it, but do you? Avidya exists for him who sees it.
There is no necessity to absolutize each and every concept. In an
absolute sense, since Brahman alone exists, avidya is unreal. In the
relative sense, do you really, really know that Brahman alone exists? It
is not enough to quote something from an upanishad to that effect. Can
you say out of your own conviction that Brahman alone exists? If not,
avidya exists for you. If you can say that Brahman alone exists, where
is the question of avidya then?
>
> More clearly---
> If there is nothing other than the self, whence this delusion? If there is no
> delusion, practise of religion will amount to nothing, since as Sankara himself
> says, the way to salvation is the removal of delusion, and which itself does
> not exist according to Advaita. So...why practise?
Whence this delusion? From ignorance of the fact that there is nothing
other than the Self. Here, advaita has no answer to give you, except to
ask you, "do you doubt the word of Sruti - sarvam AtmA?" If you do,
fine, advaita is not for you. If you do not doubt it, but still are not
able to say it yourself with any conviction, how else do you describe
this, except as ignorance of the truth that Sruti states i.e. avidyA?
That is all there is to the question of avidyA.
Practice of religion is for the sake of citta-Suddhi. The path is not in
raising unasnwerable questions about the origin of delusion, but in
acknowledging that it seems to exist for you, and seek to remove it, or
to transcend it. If you wish to transcend it, then practise religion.
I say some questions are unanswerable, because no system of vedanta can
escape from this. If not avidyA, they resort to karma, the rationale of
which is also unanswerable. Or else, another school resorts to saying
that all difference is eternal, which does not answer your question any
better.
>
> Third problem :
>
> Is there anything to "achieve"-like salvation, etc? If there is, you must accept
> the existence of time: because you speak of a "now-there-is-no-salvation" and
> "afterwards-there-will-be-salvation". Hence time would exist, which would be
> contradictory to Advaita, because there is something called time which exists
> along with the Atman.
Time is also one of those categories which exists vyAvahArically
speaking, but not pAramArthically speaking. Brahman/Atman transcends
time, and is not affected by time, so again time does not matter from
the paramArtha standpoint.
> You mean there is no time? That we are ever free? Then why practise at all-since
> we are ever free and there is nothing to be lost or gained by practise of
> religion?
Advaita rarely says "there is X" or "there is not-X" in such simplistic
terms as you portray. The logical development in many Indian schools
does not limit itself to X and not-X categories. Negation is developed
in very complicated ways e.g. four-fold negation, and this sort of
simplistic reasoning about the existence or otherwise of time ignores
the complexity of the ideas of time and causality in the advaita school.
>
> The basic problem is:Advaita has a lot of problems asking people to practise.
> Saying it's already "out there" means that there is really no need to practise.
>
> -----------------------------------------------------
Agreed. Advaita does not portray itself as a system that exhorts people
to practice. Ethical and moral imperatives are presupposed, and
advaitins have not thought it very worthwhile to preach practice to
people. Their answer to the question of practice is summarized in the
following statement - "What is the use of talking about advaita to those
who do not even follow sAmAnya dharma? Everyone knows it is wrong to
cheat and steal, but corruption and embezzlement have become ingrained
in their lives. Why talk about advaita to them?" - This was said in very
recent times by Sri Chandrasekhara Bharati, a renowned advaitin. In
other words, the response of the orthodox advaitin is this - if you are
not prepared to follow basic dharma i.e. practice, then we won't talk to
you about advaita. They will agree - saying it is "out there" does not
really exhort people to practice. Their response is fine, "we won't say
anything about advaita at all, rather than saying something contrary to
our philosophy for the purpose of exhorting people to practice." For
exhorting people to practice, those advaitins who are in the business of
preaching to multitudes use other schemes, most often bhakti, yoga,
karma, varNASrama dharma etc.
>
> Curiously, Buddha said---
>
> " If the 'I' perishes [Please note that change is a form of perishing,since
> change means that the object is not what it was, in other words, the object
> which once was, does not exist anymore], then there would be no need to
> worry about the hereafter [ basically, no need to worry about your karma,
> for which you may reap good or bad rewards after death ].
> If the 'I' doesnot perish [ also taken to mean 'does not change' ], then
> all these moral values, this striving to be perfect, would have no use-
> for if the 'I' is already [unchanging and also] perfect, what need is there
> to perfect the Perfect ?
> BOTH VIEWS ARE WRONG AND THEIR ERRORS ARE MOST GRIEVOUS."
>
> And significantly, in the Gita,(15.18), Krishna says,"...I transcend the
> mutable and the immutable."
>
> Also, Sankara, in his opinion of which students to accept for instruction,
> gives one of the conditions as," He must have lost detachment and must be
> willing to proceed towards the knowledge of the Self."
>
> Clearly, by accepting only those students who're already on the path towards
> the Self, Sankara gives no reason for "practise". As was pointed out by
> someone, the ethical, practical values simply don't seem to "come out" in
> Sankara's teaching. There is only pure theory.
Read Prof. Karl Potter's well-written introductory chapter in vol. 3 of
The Encyclopedia of Indian Philosophies, about the place of ethical and
practical values in advaita. I don't see why every school of philosophy
needs to say something about everything. Sankara chooses to address
those whose ethical, moral and practical values are exemplary, so why
preach to the converted, so to speak?
>
> I also saw this- "Sankara does not dwell on the topic of Avidya, since it is
> apparent to him that the topic, when expanded, would traverse toward dualism."
>
> One of his fore-most disciples, Suresvara, wrote more on Avidya. But the topic
> did not stop with him.A disciple of Suresvara expands on Suresvara's views on
> Avidya. So Avidya is quite a bother to Advaita!
avidyA is a bother, because of the nature of philosophical debate among
vedAnta schools. Sankara is very adroit in handling avidyA. I am not
very conversant with the works of later advaitins, but I do know this
much. All of them develop different strands of thought implied in
Sankara's works. As avidyA is closely related to karma, and the cycle of
rebirths and redeaths, I don't see that avidyA is a real problem for
advaita alone. All Indian schools have some problem or the other trying
to fit linear, logical thinking to the circular nature of karma theory.
advaita attempts to reconcile this by breaking out of the circle, which
if you think about it, is the very motive for moksha - breaking out of
the circle of samsAra.
>
> The Bhedabheda school of thought by Bhaskara starts off,"Perhaps you reason thus
> : '...when there is the true Atman, we can throw away this world.' what sort
> of logic is this?"
>
Probably the answer to this is "Yes, there may be no logic, but it is
what the Sruti says." Besides, for the mumukshu who seeks to break out
of rebirths, what use is the world characterized by such rebirth? One
attempts to get rid of a thing only if one does not value it much.
Having gotten rid of it, why bother about it any more? It does not
become Somebody Else's Problem, because there is Nobody Else.
> In fact, Bhaskara's treatise gives this argument,"If you say that Avidya is
> beginningless, then there can be no such thing called 'release', for it could
> be no more destroyed than Bramhan. Or, if it has a beginning, whence does it
> arise? And if it does arise, since it is an effect, it must be a real thing;
> whereby your thesis is destroyed that ignorance is unreal, for no unreal thing
> like a hare's horn arises. Again, Avidya cannot belong to Bramhan, for the
> nature of Bramhan is pure consciousness and incomparable bliss; nor can it
> belong to the individual soul, for you admit the existence of no individual
> soul different from Bramhan."
>
> -Kartik
>
Paul Hacker has written an excellent article titled "Whose is avidyA?"
analyzing this question from a variety of texts. It is most instructive,
in this regard.
> ----------------------------------------
>
> The disciple asks,"Master, can I realise the Buddha?"
> The master replies," 'I' is a delusion."
> The pupil continues," Have you realised the Buddha?"
> The master says"Seeing separate-ness, such as 'you' and 'I' is a delusion."
> The pupil thinks for a while and asks,"Is there anyone who has realised the
> Buddha?"
>
> "When there is neither 'you' nor 'I', who is the one that wants to realise
> the Buddha?"
>
No comment, because Buddhist schools are diametrically opposed in their
approach to many issues.
S. Vidyasankar
