Weekly Definition - jIva- THE PHILOSOPHY OF iSHWARA

[Guest guest]

SRI -

 

 

 

Sri tho;melukaalkizhu ( is this a tamizh word ? what a tongue

twister ! ) writes in all humility :

 

( It is the practical conclusion that great > teachers like Sri

Ramakrishna, etc. have echoed. I accept. )

 

Sir , in all fairness would you alsoo be willing to accept what

Swami Vivekananda says on the philosophy of Ishwara in advaita ?

 

Here i quote in its entirety this beautiful passage :

 

 

THE PHILOSOPHY OF ISHVARA

 

Who is Ishvara? Janmadyasya yatah--"From whom is the birth,

continuation, and dissolution of the universe,"--He is Ishvara--"the

Eternal, the Pure, the Ever-Free, the Almighty, the All-knowing, the

All-Merciful, the Teacher of all teachers"; and above all, Sa

Ishvarah anirvachaniya-premasvarupah--"He the Lord is, of His own

nature, inexpressible Love." These certainly are the definitions of

a Personal God. Are there then two Gods--the "Not this, not this,"

the Sat-chit-ananda, the Existence-Knowledge-Bliss of the

philosopher, and this God of Love of the Bhakta? No, it is the same

Sat-chit-ananda who is also the God of Love, the impersonal and

personal in one. It has always to be understood that the Personal

God worshipped by the Bhakta is not separate or different from the

Brahman. All is Brahman, the One without a second; only the Brahman,

as unity or absolute, is too much of an abstraction to be loved and

worshipped; so the Bhakta chooses the relative aspect of Brahman,

that is, Ishvara, the supreme Ruler. To use a simile: Brahman is as

the clay or substance out of which an infinite variety of articles

are fashioned. As clay, they are all one; but form or manifestation

differentiates them. Before every one of them was made, they all

existed potentially in the clay, and, of course, they are identical

substantially; but when formed, and so long as the form remains,

they are separate and different; the clay-mouse can never become a

clay-elephant, because, as manifestations, form alone makes them

what they are, though as unformed clay they are all one. Ishvara is

the highest manifestation of the Absolute Reality, or in other

words, the highest possible reading of the Absolute by the human

mind. Creation is eternal, and so also is Ishvara.

 

(((((((((snip snip))))))))

 

We shall see how the Advaita system maintains all the hopes and

aspirations of the dualist intact, and at the same time propounds

its own solution of the problem in consonance with the high destiny

of divine humanity. Those who aspire to retain their individual mind

even after liberation and to remain distinct will have ample

opportunity of realising their aspirations and enjoying the blessing

of the qualified Brahman. These are they who have been spoken of in

the Bhagavata Purana thus: "O king, such are the glorious qualities

of the Lord that the sages whose only pleasure is in the Self, and

from whom all fetters have fallen off, even they love the

Omnipresent with the love that is for love's sake." These are they

who are spoken of by the Sankhyas as getting merged in nature in

this cycle, so that, after attaining perfection, they may come out

in the next as lords of world-systems. But none of these ever

becomes equal to God (Ishvara). Those who attain to that state where

there is neither creation, nor created, nor creator, where there is

neither knower, nor knowable, nor knowledge, where there is neither

I, nor thou, nor he, where there is neither subject, nor object, nor

relation, "there, who is seen by whom?"--such persons have gone

beyond everything to "where words cannot go nor mind", gone to that

which the Shrutis declare as "Not this, not this"; but for those who

cannot, or will not reach this state, there will inevitably remain

the triune vision of the one undifferentiated Brahman as nature,

soul, and the interpenetrating sustainer of both--Ishvara. So, when

Prahlada forgot himself, he found neither the universe nor its

cause; all was to him one Infinite, indifferentiated by name and

form; but as soon as he remembered that he was Prahlada, there was

the universe before him and with it the Lord of the universe--"the

Repository of an infinite number of blessed qualities". So it was

with the blessed Gopis. So long as they had lost sense of their own

personal identity and individuality, they were all Krishnas, and

when they began again to think of Him as the One to be worshipped,

then they were Gopis again, and immediately "Unto them appeared

Krishna with a smile on His lotus face, clad in yellow robes and

having garlands on, the embodied conqueror (in beauty) of the god of

love."

 

Now to go back to our Acharya Shankara: "Those", he says, "who by

worshipping the qualified Brahman attain conjunction with the

Supreme Ruler, preserving their own mind--is their glory limited or

unlimited? This doubt arising, we get as an argument: Their glory

should be unlimited because of the scriptural texts. 'They attain

their own kingdom', 'To him all the gods offer worship', 'Their

desires are fulfilled in all the worlds'. As an answer to this,

Vyasa writes, 'Without the power of ruling the universe.' Barring

the power of creation etc. of the universe, the other powers such as

Anima etc. are acquired by the liberated. As to ruling the universe,

that belongs to the eternally perfect Ishvara. Why? Because He is

the subject of all the scriptural texts as regards creation etc.,

and the liberated souls are not mentioned therein in any connection

whatsoever. The Supreme Lord indeed is alone engaged in ruling the

universe. The texts as to creation etc. all point to Him. Besides,

there is given the adjective 'ever-perfect'. Also the scriptures say

that the powers Anima etc. of the others are from the search after

and the worship of God. Therefore they have no place in the ruling

of the universe. Again, on account of their possessing their own

minds, it is possible that their wills may differ, and that, whilst

one desires creation, another may desire destruction. The only way

of avoiding this conflict is to make all wills subordinate to some

one will. Therefore the conclusion is that the wills of the

liberated are dependent on the will of the Supreme Ruler." Bhakti,

then, can be directed towards Brahman, only in His personal

aspect."The "The way is more difficult for those whose mind is

attached to the Absolute!" Bhakti has to float on smoothly with the

current of our nature. True it is that we cannot have any idea of

the Brahman which is not anthropomorphic, but is it not equally true

of everything we know? The greatest psychologist the world has ever

known, Bhagavan Kapila, demonstrated ages ago that human

consciousness is one of the elements in the make-up of all objects

of our perception and conception, internal as well as eternal.

Beginning with our bodies and going up to Ishvara, we may see that

every object of our perception is this consciousness plus something

else, whatever that may be; and this unavoidable mixture is what we

ordinarily think of as reality. Indeed it is, and ever will be, all

of the reality that is possible for the human mind to know.

Therefore to say that Ishvara is unreal, because He is

anthropomorphic, is sheer nonsense. It sounds very much like the

occidental squabble on idealism and realism, which fearful-looking

quarrel has for its foundation a mere play on the word "real'. The

idea of Ishvara covers all the ground ever denoted and connected by

the word real, and Ishvara is as real as anything else in the

universe; and after all, the word real means nothing more than what

has now been pointed out. Such is our philosophical conception of

Ishvara. "

 

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Olympus/5208/bhaktiyoga/philosophy.ht

ml

 

So says swamiji , a true messenger of God!

 

A PARAMAJNANI IS ALSO A PARAMA BHAKTA JUST AS A PARAMA BHAKTA IS

ALSO A PARAMA JNANI ! in my mind , there is no doubt about that ...

 

ps: Btw, The Tripura Rahasya is not only agreat treatise on Bhakti ,

it is a great treatise on Jnana as well . Tripura Rahasya was

considered by Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi as one of the greatest

works that expounded advaita philosophy. He often quoted from this

great book !

 

Om Tat Sat !

[Guest guest]

advaitin, "dhyanasaraswati"

<dhyanasaraswati wrote:

>

> SRI -

>

>

>

> Sri tho;melukaalkizhu ( is this a tamizh word ? what a tongue

> twister ! ) writes in all humility :

>

> ( It is the practical conclusion that great > teachers like Sri

> Ramakrishna, etc. have echoed. I accept. )

>

 

Ok last post on this, then I am off for a while.

 

The practical conclusion I mentioned there is with regard to "all

paths lead to the same goal" idea that Sri Dennisji had mentioned, and

getting to the business of practising religion. The lecture of Swami

Vivekananda is very fine; and it is (one of) the natural Advaitic

interpretation of Ishvara. I am fine with the gist of it (don't

challenge me for saying this!!) Here are three other versions that

approach it from the Advaitic perspective, that I had written before.

 

" ... in the relative

plane, to the ego-bound mind, the Ultimate Reality corresponds to

Ishvara. In this sense, Ishvara is the Primal Cause for all things

experienced in the mind. As the mind association is ultimately unreal,

so is this sense of distinction of jiva and Ishvara. Therefore the

ultimate realization is Unity/Him alone."

 

" [ishvara is] the real identity, in which

case the Reality that operates ... in the "false ego-

less" state is recognized as Ishvara."

 

"the identity-associated mind infers

jiva and sees prakrithi ... Shiva as witnessed/reflected in the mind is

Shakthi, in the sense of activity and variation. The mind wants to

infer a separate Reality as Shiva whose Shakthi it is witnessing, and

this is the avidya. The jnani "sees" Shiva where the ajnani sees

prakrithi and infers it as the Shakthi of Shiva."

 

Now if I was not a bit crooked in mind, when Sri Subbuji mentioned of

the acharyas' faith in Ishvara, I would simply have connected it to

the last line there. However intentionally or not, I made much of it.

I have my reasons: I don't like to accept for sentimental reasons or

"because the scripture says so". And truly I am confused as to the

necessity of extending the Advaitic interpretation of Ishvara to Rama,

Krishna, Govinda, incarnation, reincarnation and so on. Mark the word

"necessity". So I ask Advaitins to make such things clear when they

deal with vyavahaarika, since the Advaitic interpretation often

topples into the mythological, and no one knows where to draw the line.

 

I hope this helps

 

thollmelukaalkizhu

 

(yes it is Tamil as you guessed. tholl-shoulder; melu- on top of;

kaal-feet; kizhu -beneath. It refers to the Serpent whose mind is at

the feet of the Lord, and whose body/self the Lord has placed on His

shoulders and given a vision equal to His own.)