adwaita ISKCON and padma purana

[Guest guest]

ISKCON is outwardly anti-adwaita but most of the senior ups do

believe in Adwaita; in fact they consider adwaita to be the truth.

There is a book by Prabhupada for advanced shishyas where he says

that Sankara Bhagavadpada was correct and an avatar of God.

 

So why do they publicly denounce Adwaita- this is in keeping with

how Chaitanya practiced it- Chaitanya had taken mantra diksha from a

Dashanama(Sankarite) monk and during his time adwaita had become

reduced to lazy swamis who all they do is chant aham brahmasmi

without realizing the true essence of this mantra. In fact in the

Chaityanya Charitamrita, he tells Ramananda Raya(a great shishya) -

ADWAITA SATYAM but told him to not to reveal this to the masses. As a

matter of fact Adwaita is the cornerstone of every school of

philisophy(outside of the six classical darshanas) - Saiva Siddhanta,

Kashmir Saivism, Shakta Tantrism etc all of which predated Adi

Sankara by several hundred if not thousand years.

 

On padma purana; of the 18 major puranas 6 are for Vishnu, 6 are for

Siva and 6 are neutral. Of each of the 6 Saiva and Vaishnava puranas,

there are some which openly blasphemise Siva or Visnu, and some which

consider them to be equal- in truth each purana is for each person

according to the stage of sadhana he/she is in. Not all may have the

cosmic vision of oneness, so for such a person, considering his own

ishta as supreme is acceptable; as one progresses others puranas

become more relevant.

 

Similar to the story of Siva in padma purana, there are plenty of

stories where Visnu is insulted/denigrated in the Saiva puranas. So

Ganeshupda, i could cite some other stories from scripture that your

ISCKON friend may not like. So why did Vyasa write all the puranas in

the polemical manner- was there a better way to done it without hte

strife? I am going to ask this to Amma this winter

 

Aum Namasivaya

yogaman

 

ps. in spite of all the controversy that ISKCON generates, I have to

admit that the best meals that I ever had were at ISKCON gatherings-

this at least for me was the only reason to attend them LOL

Ammachi, Girish <girishv@e...> wrote:

> Much of the ISKCON literature seems to me highly bigoted, heaping

abuse on

> all deities other than Krishna and not much different from the

fundamentalist

> Christian/Muslim thoughts - my way and none other is right.

>

> On Sun, 12 Oct 2003, Ganesha Udupa wrote:

>

[Guest guest]

Ammachi, "childofdevi" <childofdevi>

wrote:

> ISKCON is outwardly anti-adwaita but most of the senior ups do

> believe in Adwaita; in fact they consider adwaita to be the truth.

> There is a book by Prabhupada for advanced shishyas where he says

> that Sankara Bhagavadpada was correct and an avatar of God.

 

Dear Yogman,

this could be true. Srila Prabhupada (to the best of my knowledge)

has never criticized Advaita publicly. But he insisted passionately

that people follow Krishna unreservedly. I imagine that, if some

devotee ever asked him about Advaita, he might have said "do not

worry about; focus on Krishna".

The reason is that he truly believed that for the masses, Krishna's

name was the best possible path (hence the Hare Krishna mahamantra).

 

> Similar to the story of Siva in padma purana, there are plenty of

> stories where Visnu is insulted/denigrated in the Saiva puranas.

So

> Ganeshupda, i could cite some other stories from scripture that

your

> ISCKON friend may not like. So why did Vyasa write all the puranas

in

> the polemical manner- was there a better way to done it without

hte

> strife? I am going to ask this to Amma this winter

>

> Aum Namasivaya

> yogaman

 

Please do ask Amma the question and share Her answer with this....

But I would like to volunteer a theory that I picked off

Autobiography of a Yogi.

 

Theory begins:

What Vyasa did is a principle that goes by the name of "arthavada".

It is a means to prove you are good by showing the bad or

undesirable qualities in others (TV commercials use this principle

abundantly!). What Vyasa was doing was, when writing about Vishnu,

prove Vishnu is good that "even Siva is inferior".

 

Why he was doing it?

Because, in this way, he was attempting to generate a sense of awe

in the devotee's mind for Vishnu. A discerning devotee would see

through the ploy, but will still definitely find a deepening of

devotion to Vishnu. The beneficiaries of such a text would be "raw

but true" devotees of Vishnu.

 

Theory ends:

 

General musing:

A discerning Saiva or other devotee or Advaitin would ignore the

silly comparison while reminding himself of God's omnipotence,

whereas an ignorant person would need to be guided when he confronts

this. If no guidance is available, he may find inner guidance. If

not, then he develops one prejudice or the other depending on

his 'samskara'. Accumulation of such (and other dis-similar)

prejudices leads to a complicated system of samskaras, i.e.

ignorance (which may also lead to ego and arrogance). Then when he

meets a realized master like Ammachi and ends up following the

master, the master ends up 'pushing his buttons' till he throws out

all the wrong concepts, and becomes pure again!

 

oh the play of maya!

 

Jai Ma!