[Guruvayur/Guruvayoor] Dasavathara

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Dear all,

Radhe Krishna!

 

Our Sarojamji is 100% right, as it goes well with the quotation from

the Upanishad. To reckon divinity with our system of arithmetic is

wrong. This is the mistake I committed when I said that if Balarama

and Krishna were avataras of the Lord, and the avataras were

simultaneous, one cannot be a complete avatara. (Poornavatara.),

although, in many places, we have seen Krishna being mentioned as

Poorna-punyavataram. In fact, something also was in my mind, that

when I was reading Bhagavatam last week, I read in many places as

Krishna being mentioned as "Amsam" of the Lord. This was also

puzzling to me. I shall quote chapter and verse later, as a rejoinder

to this. I have myself written in many places in the Narayaneeyam

commentary that Krishna is the only Poornavatara. In other words, I

was trying to say that Balarama, as considered by many people as an

avatara of Vishnu may not be right, as Balarama (as Lakshmana was in

the Ramavathara), is considered to be an avatara of Adisesha..

 

These doubts are never-ending. That is why I put a lid to it saying

that everything is an aspect of Vishnu anyway, as "Sarvam Vishnumayam

Jagat"

 

But coming back to the logic pointed out by Smt. Sarojamji, and

considering the truth of the Upanishadic verdict, one has to admit that

the Lord's ways are inscrutable and beyond human comprehension.

 

Love

KVG

 

 

 

sarojram18 wrote:

 

 

This question has comup already in thegroup and has been dscussed

in

deail. I am reproducing What I wrote then,Moreover SRt KVG ha also

quoted from Bhagavath etc to provre this but I don't underatand whyhe

has said that ifBalarama is also an avathara then Krushna cannot be

poornAvathAra.The upanishad says

Poornamadhah poornamidham poornAth poornamudhachyathE

poorNasta poorNam AdhAya poorNmva avasishyathE.

That is poorna(meaning Brahman , synonymous wuth Narayana of

Visishtadhvaitha.)THias is poorna (Meaning the manifestation of

GOd

in the world as avathara or even as the world.)THis poorna comes from

that poorna. Taking away poorna from poorna what remains is also

poorna.

Lord Narayana is said to have manifested as Rama ,Krishna etc. That

does not mean that the HIs natural abode, say vaikunta or the world

as awhole or the cave of the heart as the antharyamin,has become

empty. He is srvavyApee sarvabhoothAntharAthma says upanishad.The

avathara are said to be his amsa in the sense that a quarter of a

circle is said to be the amsa of the whole.

The smrthi says, 'yadha yadha hi dharmasya glanirbhavathi bharatha

abhyutthanam adhrmasya thqdhathmanam srjamyaham.'Yhat is wherever

there is adharma aHe will create HImself.Rama or Krishna are not born

in the natural course. The Lord has manifested Himself as such.So is

Narasimha,varaha etc.The one who has createdeveryhting and he

indweller of all is He not able to create a form for Himself and come

in the world as such?

Krishna using the first person singular inGita talks as the supreme

self, the paramathman.THat is not decrying His avathara as

DEvakisutha.All are avatharas as God is the indweller and the Self

of

all and the real meaning of "I" is the real self only.But only in

certain places the divinity shine forth in its full splendour.

Regading the concept of ISKCON that Krishan alone is the supreme self

and not an avathara, sure He is and so is Rama Narasimha even Siva Or

Devi,because supremeself is Brahman whose manifestations are

all.Ithihasa and puraNa e4xisted earlier than all oher schools of

thought and what is said there has to be taken as authority. Finally

saying Krishan is an avathara does not ah nyway undermine His being

the supreme godhead because He is that.

 

Regarding Dasavathara our earliest scriptural authority is

srimadbhagavatha and vishnupurana according to which Krishna is

definitely an avathar. I have not read Prabhupada's bhagavatha but

if Krishna is not an avathar how is the birth of Ksrishna as the son

of vasudeva and devaki is explained?As for Jayadeva the reason he has

not mentioned Krishnavathara is not because he considered Him as

Supreme soul, whcih nodubt He is, not only as Krishna but also as

Narsimha ,Rama or any of His manifestations as mentioned clearly in

Ramayana and Bhagavatha, but Jayadeva was addressing Krishna in his

ashtapadi, 'Pralaya payOdhijale' and hence he mentioned Krishna as

the one who had been taking all the avatharas. as nNarayana bhattadri

did in Narayaneeyam. He must have included Buddha for

sankhyaApooraNam, that is to complete the number to ten, perhaps by

that time Buddha has come to be accepted by the people as the tenth

avathara of Vishnu. That is only by popular belief and not authorised

by scriptures.in fact Bhagavatha mentions buddha indirectly saying

that the Lord has taken the form of one who created illusion in the

minds of those who misconstrued vedic injunctions and proceeded

towards the forbidden path and Rshabha and Kapila, the founders of

Jainism and sankhya have been mentioned directly as the avathatras of

Vishnu though not included in the prime ten.Bhagavatha says the Lord

took 24 avatharas of which buddha is also one besides numerous

avatharas He took in order to save the world.(Ref.Bhagvath a-2nd

skandha-chapter 7) From time immemorial devotees of Lord Narayana

considered te ten avathars of the Lord as invluding Krishna excluding

Buddha . Inthe vaishanvite tradition, I mean the followeers of

Ramanuja , after whom the vaishnavite religion started to flourish,

though it was Sankara who formulated the six mathams of worship

including that of Vishnu, all the vaishnavite acharyas like Desika

have extolled only the ten avatharas, namely, matsya,kurma,

varaha,nrsimha, vamana,parasuram a,rama,balarama, krishna and

kalki.Morover the aim of the incarnation has been set out in the Gita

as 'parithranaya sadhunam vinasayacha dushkrtham' which point out

only to these ten as avatharas.