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Re: Advaita and personal existence (was something else)
The One wrote:
>>Once more, you make bold assertions as if they are self-evident, preferring
>>always to stay away from detail. The interesting thing is, it was from YOU
>>whom I learned that one must deny his personal existence.
>>
> >In fact, Advaita starts from the
>>>opposite end, one's personal existence is the only thing which always IS and
>>>verifiable directly.
>
>Is it? One knows that one exists during waking and dream states. Also the
>feeling "I slept" exists and continuity in the "I" is always present. Thus
it is
>obvious that one's personal existence is never doubted. This is the first thing
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>any Advaitic book talks about. But then you prefer to remain in ignorance and
>form your opinions from fifth rate articles, what can I do?
Well, you could read those books. You were the one who said, "according to
advaita, there is no Sankaracharya or Shiva." You also stated that there
were no individual jivas.
If our personal existence is a fact, then you acknowledge that we are all
individual, conscious entities (jivas). Do you now accept that?
>If you read the "talks with Ramana" or "Vicharasangraham" etc this is the FIRST
>point always emphasized. In fact, my father, who introduced me to philosophy
>asked me this question when I was in high school and explained the principle of
>Advaita. Oh, ofcourse THE man himself explains it in Gaudapada karika. So I
>would have never said that "I" don't exist.
Well, you did say that Sankaracharya (THE man?) did not exist. But I will
assume you are now changing that position. Now that both you and
Sankaracharya are real again, we can progress in this discussion.
>
>Please point out when I denied my personal existence. I would have said "I"
It was implicit when you said that "there is no Sankara or Shiva, according
to advaita." I assumed you were referring to the theory of illusion, the
extension of which would state that neither you nor I individually exist.
>don't exist in the sense of mind or senses, but the true "I" is beyond these
>two.
That I also accept.
This is seen by using elementary arguments (see for ex. Vicharasangraham).
>In any case it should have been obvious from the context, but I did presume
>that the reader had atleast average intelligence and knew the basics of
>advaita, well I guess I have to live and learn. Ken seemed to follow what I
>was saying perfectly, I had an extended discussion with him on this topic.
>I had a small discussion with Shrisha Rao and Vidya also, if I remember.
Well, you will just have to humor me. Frankly, I see personal attacks as
indicative of insecurity. So let's proceed with your philosophy of life and
see how well it stands up to my questions.
>
>>First you say that you have no personal existence, and now you say you do.
>>It's clear to me that you have no idea what Advaita is, what to speak of
other
>>systems of Vedanta.
>
>It is clear to me that you need a pair of spectacles and/or a basic course in
>English and more importantly logic.
Since you say I need these things, I am assuming that they are in fact real,
and not illusions.
>>Anyway, the orignal point stands. For you, the whole world is an illusion. So
>>why should I accept anything you say? You are also an illusion, according to
>>your own so-called philosophy.
>
>I did not ask you to accept anything sir, you can wallow in your own ignorance.
>I presume you know Newton's law of inertia.
I will ask the question again, since you did not address it.
For you, the whole world is an illusion. Therefore, your statements are also
an illusion. So why should I accept your philosophy? If both of our
philosophies are illusions, then what makes your illusion better than my
illusion?
>
>>Once again, carefully avoiding substance, you make assertions you cannot
>>support. I find it amusing that you believe I have shown myself "to be
>>unwilling to engage in any logical argument," you who are not even sure of
>>your own existence. Then you state that "your arguments on paramparaa has
>>[sic] been taken apart by Ken and I many times." I will give you a chance to
>>argue against paramparaa in my other reply. For now, I can only say it
>>is amusing that you must rely on Ken, who equates worship of Beavis and
>>Butt-head and TVs with worship of Vishnu.
>
>Poor Ken. He merely said that going to the temple and thinking about Beavis and
>Butthead is worse than thinking the true form of God to be B&B and worshiping
>them. You comprehension of simple statements is quite astounding. I am
>reminded of the adage "A jaundiced man sees everything yellow".
No. Actually, I remember this conversation quite well. He said everything
was God. So I challenged that if everything is God, then it is okay to
worship TV's and Beavis and Butt-head as God. He replied that it was better
to worship Beavis and Butt-head as God with that understanding (by which,
from the context, he meant realization) than to go to the temple and worship
there without this realization.
>
>>Anyway, I am not going to further this discussion about who pulled whose nose
>>and when. You stated that you find Prabhupada's translation is absurd. What
>>translation was absurd? Tell us how it ought to be translated, or admit your
>>ignorance and leave the discussion peacefully. The bottom line here, is that
>
>The bottom line here is your ignorance. The verse from Shiva puraaNa was
>translated AND interpreted absurdly. I pointed it out before.
Well, pardon me for being so ignorant, Ramakrishnaji. In my ignorant state I
have this belief that one must know some Sanskrit in order to be capable of
judging a translation of Sanskrit. And you admitted that you were not a
Sanskrit scholar.
For what it's worth, i responded to your response about the verse from Shiva
Puraana, but I did not see any further responses from you. I also did a Deja
news search for it, but could not find any further responses. Perhaps your
response got lost. In any case, I saw no word-for-word translation from you
of that verse, nor did I see any reply from you about my point that the
verse was translated in context (you ignored the other Puranic verses that
very clearly DID talk about mayavadi philosophy) and was thus acceptable.
Can you repost your response to my response? I'm assuming that it contained
something other than blanket statements of "that's absurd, utter tripe, etc
etc." and so probably I can analyze it and respond to it now.
>Well, I remember how you ran for it when I explained how I did not personally
>attack you, there was no reply :-).
Huh? I'm not sure which post you are referring to, but rest assured if it
contained anything intelligent I would have responded to it.
Also when Giri posted your esoteric
>questions you again ran for it.
I'm not sure what you are referring to. It's true I have not checked SRH for
several days. That is because I have other things to take care of in my life.
Please post the answers you get for your
>esoteric questions. I am not getting enough jokes from rhf and rec.humor is too
>big to go through.
What esoteric questions? Here I am, trying to learn your philosophy, but
instead of teaching me, you simply call me names.
I think that a person with strong convictions in his religion would not mind
presenting it to others for close scrutiny. So, here I am. I am now
presenting myself as an ignorant person. I desire to learn advaita. Please
teach me now.
I hope you are not going to "run for it."
