SHANKARAJAYANTHI

April 30, 2006

H.N.Sreenivasa Murthy

On the day of the appearance of the Brahman as Shankara at Kaladi

let us remember and prostrate at the lotus feet of Sri Shankarabhagavatpada.

The unique work by the Master and his non-sectarian teachings:

Quote:

Sri Shankara was the first to extricate the Upanishadic teaching from the exclussively theological trends to which they were drifting in the hands of the ancient Advaitins.

Essence of the Teaching:

a) All the Upanishads purport to teach the knowledge of the Unity of Atman[ AtmaikatvavidyApratipattayE |]

b) The Atman as the Witnessing Consciousness, as distinct from the indibidual jiva is the REAL SELF of each and every creature, and is identical with Brahman or Divinity itself.

c) The Witnessing Atman is to be known and can be known ONLY FROM THE UPANISHADS and there is no inkling of this concept in any theological writing or speculative system.

This self-evident concept of Atman as the Eternal Unchanging Witnessing Principle in each one of us, is known only through the Upanishads and can never be traced to any other source. And Sri Shankara is the only thinker who has clarified this Vedantic concept. With an unsurpassed and unsurpassable spiritual intuition he found that the Upanishadic pronouncement was convincing and contained the only final soul-saving Truth. Unquote.

[Extracts from the book "Shankara's clarification of certain vedantic concepts" written by Sri Sri SatchidAnandEndrasaraswati swAmiji of Holenarasipur, Karnataka, India]

On this auspicious day let is all pray to the Master for bestowing upon us Atmaj~JAna.

With pranams to all the members,

Sreenivasa Murthy

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Discussion of Shankara's Advaita Vedanta Philosophy of nonseparablity of Atman and Brahman.

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