Attention shri.Panduji

[Guest guest]

Dear panduji,

Hare Krishna.Bhagawan ramana insists on

practice of atma vichara more than anything else. And if we take him as our

personal guru, then his words are upadesa for a sadhaka.And for the personal spiritual

development, as a sadhaka, its better we treat gurus words as bible or gita

more than the actual gita and bible. I think we loose precious time in discussing

and comparing different schools of religion and different masters. Better stick

to the tradition which is acceptable to each one of us and invest more time and

energy on that accepted path.

If

you believe in Sri Caitanya mahaprabhu teaching, then please follow it whole heartedly.

But don't expect the followers of ramana to toe caitanyas philosophy.

This group discusses teaching of ramana for further development of ramana

followers and not to compare different paths.

Coming

to blasphemy, it is doubting guru's word that is more blasphemous than

anything else.Sravana, manana and nidhidhyasana of gurus teaching is the path

to realize. Correct me if iam wrong.

With love

Vijay

Note: Moderator may please intervene and stop

people comparing from different traditions.

 

 

 

 

Pandu

[Pandu108.bms]

Saturday, August 30, 2008

11:22 PM

 

RE: Re:

Peace is our real nature

 

 

 

 

 

>> if they present a contrary view. Although I

have studied Ramana's

>teachings

>> for years, I presume others here have a more complete understanding

>of them

>> and could help me to see how they align with Vedanta.

>>

>>

>Dear Pandu-ji,

>If you are looking for scholars of Vedanta, may I suggest the Advaitin

>list here on . There are many learned people on that list who

>could more adequately answer your questions.

>Best wishes,

>Gloria

 

Thanks, but it's actually that I know Vedanta and am looking to see how

Ramana's teachings fit in. In my training I've been taught that knowledge

must be checked between guru, sadhu, and sastra. There's one's guru, there

are other saintly persons, and there is the Veda. A person can be certain

of some answer when there is agreement between the three.

 

Take for example the fact that Ramana is given the title of Sri Bhagavan.

Sri means Laksmi, the Goddess of Fortune, and Bhagavan means the possessor

of all opulence. Bhagavan can sometimes indicate a ordinary, highly opulent

person, and Sri can sometimes mean " wealth, " but " Sri " is

placed together

with " Bhagavan, " it means the Personality of Godhead and His consort,

Laksmi.

 

All avatars of God are named in the Vedik literatures. For example, Sri

Caitanya Mahaprabhu is described in numerous places in the Veda giving His

name, His parents names, His bodily appearance, His place of appearance, His

activities, etc. (http://www.gosai.com/dvaita/madhvacarya/Caitanya.html)

I

am interested to know if there is any similar reference to Ramana Maharsi.

 

Then there is the question of whether his teachings are consistent with the

Vedik conclusion. The Veda is given by Vyasadev. He has summarized the

Veda in the Vedanta Sutra and given His purport to the Vedanta Sutra as the

Bhagavat Purana. The Bhagavat-Purana makes a definite distinction between

Brahman and Parambrahman, with the individual living souls as Brahman and

the Personality of Godhead as Parambrahman. If I understand Ramana's

teachings correctly, he makes no such distinction.

 

This is problematic because in the Bhagavad-gita 18.66, for example, Krishna

says, " sarva dharman parityajya mam ekam saranam vraja - Abandon all

varieties of religion and just surrender unto Me. " If one proposes that

there is no difference between the soul of the individual living entities

and the Personality of Godhead, then Krishna

would not have said " Me, " a

personal pronoun indicating Himself. Those who comment on Bhagavad-gita but

do not accept Krishna's supremacy say that Krishna

is instructing to

surrender to the " Self within " Krishna,

thereby proposing a difference

between Krishna and Himself, saying that one

can surrender to a person other

than Krishna for the same effect. In other

words, they say that when He

says " Me, " Krishna means Himself or

someone else. The philosophy of

nondualism appears self-contradictory by proposing that there is no

difference between Krishna and the individual

living entities, but that

there is a difference between Krishna and

Himself when He says " Me. "

 

Ramana explicitly affirms this by saying, " Iswara has individuality in

mind

and body, which are perishable, but at the same time he has also the

transcendental consciousness and liberation inwardly, "

(http://www.hinduism.co.za/god.htm)

while also indicating that Krishna's

form is material ( " perishable " ). Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu

responds to this

philosophy by saying, " One who considers the transcendental body of Lord

Visnu to be made of material nature is the greatest offender at the lotus

feet of the Lord. There is no greater blasphemy against the Supreme

Personality of Godhead. " He continues, " The Mayavada philosophy is so

degraded that it has taken the insignificant living entities to be the Lord,

the Supreme Truth, thus covering the glory and supremacy of the Absolute

Truth with monism. " The philosophy of monism is known as mayavada because

in taking the individual living entities as nondifferent from God, it

suggests that illusion, maya, is greater than Brahman and capable of

overpowering God; in other words, that maya is the supreme power. Sri

Caitanya Mahaprabhu's defeat of this misconception is described in Sri

Caitanya Caritamrta, Adi-lila, Chapter 7: http://vedabase.net/cc/adi/7/en

 

 

In Bhagavad-gita 10.10, Krishna says that He

is known by Bhakti, devotional

service; but the acceptance of the philosophy of nondualism destroys Bhakti.

Therefore Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu has said, " Sankaracarya, who is an

incarnation of Lord Siva, is faultless because he is a servant carrying out

the orders of the Lord. But those who follow his Mayavadi philosophy are

doomed. They will lose all their advancement in spiritual knowledge. " Even

he, Sankaracarya, finally instructed his followers in Bhaja Govindam to give

up the jugglery of words to justify the advaita conception and just worship

Krishna. Ramana Maharshi teaches that the form

of the Lord is maya, but Sri

Caitanya Mahaprabhu instructs that the teachings Ramana gives are maya. How

would the folks here resolve this conflict?

 

Sincerely, your servant,

Pandu das

 

 

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