Re:Intra-religious discussions and related postings

[Guest guest]

Sri Dileepan writes

>Sridhar, your article showed scant respect for an elderly and knowledgable

>person......I hope you are less strident when you express your

disagreements >with any member of this group, let alone a person like Sri

Ramaswamy.

>BTW, would you please highlight view of Sri Ramaswamy that you found to

>be bigoted etc. that were his own and not shared by our Acharyas.

 

Dear Sri Dileepan,

 

At the outset, I would like to apologize for any offense taken or

communicated by my rather excoriatory (and on hind sight, quite

inappropriate) comments on the O-My-God series and intra-religious

distinctions pieces. My stridency is necessarily with the virulent tone of

some sections of Mr. Ramaswamy's articles posted here and not with Mr.

Ramaswamy, i.e., my difficulties are with the VIEWS, not the person. I

would like to thank him for the extent and the breadth of his effort and his

generosity in sharing his thoughts with us. Further, anything I say here is

only to refute some view points, and not to hurt or belittle anyone or

anything. I would beg other learned prapannas in this group to construe my

comments as such and that if I perpertrate any bhaagavatha apacharam, that

you find the kindness in yourselves to forgive the ignorance of one still

trying to learn.

 

It would be superfluous to say that often Mr. Ramaswamy's representations on

Advaitha and dwaitha are simply incorrect and sometimes over-simplified. By

accepting some myopic view points as representative of Visishtadwaitic

philosophy as laid down by our Acharyas, I believe we would be doing a great

disservice to Sri Vaishnavism and our claims of tolerance. I quote Mr.

Ramaswamy,

 

"The only REAL thing in the process was the SNAFU (Nirguna Brahman) they

(Advaithins) had created for themselves".

 

To claim Sri Shankara's description of the Supreme Brahman as a SNAFU is

mean-spirited and belittling a great thinker's logical brilliance. If the

real meaning had been given here that the notion of attributes (subjective)

in the real world sense is representative of materialistic transience which

necessarily cannot be associated with the ABSOLUTE AND ALL PERVASIVE,

PERMANENT notion of Brahman as laid down in the SHRUTI, then it would form

the ideal backdrop to introduce the attractiveness and the basis for a

Saguna Brahman (As Emberumaanaar proves in his Sri Bhashya that Sakala

KalyaaNaGuNa paripoorNa UpanishathPrathipaadya paramaatmaswaroopi is

SriManNarayaNa) (If you would like a point by point refutation of some of

Sri Ramaswamy's VIEWS, I think we can puruse it by email) .

 

Further, I was surprised and pained by Sri Kaushik's comparison of

Emberumaanaar's Sri Bhashya in the same breath as Sri Ramaswamy's VIEWS.

Sri Bhashya is considered the pinnacle piece amongst Emberumaanaaar's

Navaratna Divya krithis. To see a similarity between Emberumaanaaar's

expositions and Mr. Ramaswamy's VIEWS ignores the parvatha-paramaaNu

difference that exists between us (whose nescience is often the source of

our prapatti) and our Acharyas.

 

Sri Pillai Lokacharyar in Sri VachanaBhushaNam (43rd sutram) says

 

AGNYAANATHAALE PRAPANNAR ASMADAADIGAL

Gnyanaadhikyathaale prapannar poorvaachaaryargaL

bhakthi-paaravasyathaale prapannar AazhwargaL

 

Emberumaanar in Sharanagathi gadyam asks forgiveness for all our follies thus:

 

ManoVakkayai AnaadikaalaPravrIthaanantha

krithyakaraNa krithyaakaraNa bhagavadapachaara

BHAAGAVATHAPACHAARA ASAHYAAPACHAARAROOPA

naanaavidhananthaapachaaraan

Aarabdhakaaryaan anaarabdhakaaryaan

krithaan kriyamaaNaan karishyaMaaNamscha

sarvaan aseshathaha kshamaswa.

 

In conclusion, I would like to reiterate that I have little desire to hurt

anyone's feelings or pull anyone down. I do feel that this forum would be

better served by exchanges (as has been the norm) that provide us an

opportunity to discuss the Lord's glory as Sung by our pooravacharyas ( Mat

chittaa MadgathaPraaNaa bodhayantha parasparam, Kathayanthi cha maam nithyam

thushyanthi cha ramanthi cha). Anything else simply would appear to be

glorification of one's own ego and outside the notions of Sri Vaishnavism as

laid down by our Acharyas.

 

Emberumaanaar thiruvadigaLe SharNam

Azhwaar thivadigaLe SharaNam

 

Sridhar