Advaitavada in Ancient Times

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Advaitavada in Ancient Times

 

Some say that Ravana's ten heads are related with the ten main thesis of advaitavada: one head is nirakara (the Supreme is formless), other is nirsakti (the Supreme has no potencies), and thereafter nihlila (the Supreme does not performs any activities), and also nirguna (the Supreme has no qualities) and so on.

 

The whole set of ten heads establish the precept that the Supreme is nirvisesa, devoid of all atributes.

 

As Bhagavan Siva is always the sponsor of advaitavada in the three phases of the material time, he has given a boon to Ravana that even if one, two or even all of his heads were chop off, they would automatically regenerate and grow again to re-established the whole philosophical precept of nirvisesa-vada.

 

Ravana was indeed very powerful at his time, and could spread wildly his ten-headed precept of advaitavada. No rsi, devata, muni, naga, gandharva, or even Vaisnava could ever defeat him in a philosophical debate or in any other kind of dispute. Ravana reined sovereign all over tri-bhuvana and his kingdom was very prosperous and opulent in all aspects.

 

But actually who was this Ravana, and who finally has defeated him and why?

 

Any comment on this thesis?

 

dasa dasanudasa

Satyaraja dasa

 

 

[shvu]

 

Hi SD,

 

A couple of comments, although they are not directly about the story.

 

Of late, I have seeing a number of false stories related to Advaita and Shankara. Some people for some reason, have taken the liberty to spread misconceptions about Advaita and unfortunately many others, who read such literature are not in a position to know that it is false and continue to nurture these misconceptions. It is a big responsibiity to be an author because the author can break or make something with his pen. Realizing this power, an author should be always be judicious about his/her writings. A good example is Wendy Donigher's translation of the Vedas. Poeple who read her works having no prior knowledge of the Vedas will get a totally false picture what it is. I guess such problems are inevitable. There will always be someone playing such roles.

 

Cheers

[Guest guest]

We fully agree with your rational explanation. As you known, many interpolations are placed into all Vedic lore, and what to say in biographies. In India hagiography is the main method of biography (do you known what hagiography means?) and therefore it is very difficult to assert what is false and what is true in all sort of biographies, either officials or not.

 

H.H. Wilson who was the first Western scholar to translate a Purana circa 1840, has mentioned that he got 14 different versions on Visnu Purana, all of them from old manuscripts and it was very hard to determine each one was the most authentic.

 

There are some techniques mentioned in some Puranas, such as Narada Purana, on who to discover interpolations on the text, explaining that there are some different keys among the sequence of slokas that should be observed while one is reading it. It is a very elaborated method, but no one can be sure if this text is not itself an interpolation.

 

Therefore, the only valid method to really prevent this many kinds of frauds is to hear the meaning of the lore from a tattva-vrtti preceptor. One should notice that yoga is a science and therefore its results must to be reproducible. Otherwise it would be considered as an art and not as a science. If by practicing the method taught by one's preceptor, no knowledge is attained, it is better to seek after the fault in the process. It may be personal's or it may be preceptor's fault. It is not easy to follow yoga marga by a selfish account. That's why Krsna says in Gita; "First surrender to Me, thereafter I'll personally help you to find a bona fide guidance into that way."

 

There is no yoga without guru! Besides one will also need sastra and sadhu-sanga. This is the threefold support of any yoga path. If one takes off one of these supports of the yoga's tripod, all the structure ruins.

 

dasa dasanudasa

Satyaraja dasa

 

BTW: Let's comment Ravana's brahman realization?

 

[kailasa]

Goloka protect ten guards in ten directions.

[Guest guest]

Empowered by Sambhu's boon, Ravana was fully convinced of advaitavada precepts, and on his oneness with Brahman.

 

Sri Tulasidasa Goswami describes his situation as follows:

 

"With the eyes full of tears Masndodari, Ravana's wife, once told him:

 

"O Lord of my life, please hear to my supplication. My dear, cease hostilities against Sri Rama. Don't continue being so obstinate by judging that He is a simple human being. Believe in my words. This universe is Sri Rama's form and the Vedas attribute His several limbs to different worlds.

 

"The underground areas (Patala) are His feet and Brahma's home is His head, the intermediate areas are His members. The terrible death is merely a blink of His eyes, the sun is His eye and the clouds are His hairs. The twin demigods, Asvinikumaras (celestial doctors), are His nostrils and the days and nights constitute the repeated blinking His eyes. The ten directions of sky are His ears: That is what the Vedas declare.

 

" The winds are His breathing and the Vedas are His speech. The avarice is His inferior lip and Yama is His terrible teeth. Maya is His laughter and the ten regents of directions are His arms. The fire is His mouth and Varuna is His language. The creation, preservation and destruction of the Universe are His gestures. The eighteen principal species of vegetables are the line of hair in His belly, the mountains are His bones and the rivers represent the itinerary of His veins. The ocean is the depression of His navel and His excretion organs are the hell.

 

" Therefore, the Universe is a manifestation of the Lord and there is no need to enter into larger details. Siva is His ego, Brahma is His reason, the moon is His mind and great Visnu His understanding capacity. This same Sri Rama, who is manifested in the form of all lively and inanimate creation, now had assumed a human likeness. Consider all this, my dear one, and hear me:' Stop hostilities against Sri Rama and cultivate devotion to His lotus feet, and so the good luck will never abandon me...'

 

"Ravana laughed when hearing his wife's words: ' Oh, see as the power of arrogance is so big! Arrogance is well observed in a woman's heart that follows eight perversities: audacity, hypocrisy, frivolity, duplicity, shyness, indiscreetness, immaturity and impurity. You described the enemy's cosmic form to tell me something alarming. But this incomprehensible cosmic form, my beloved, obviously is under my control. Now that you described it, it seems more clearer for me. I am more aware of your ingenuousness, my darling. You has just has described my own greatness. This is my own Universal form! Your words are deep: They grant delight to those who understand them and they dissipate the fear of those who hear them.'

Mandodari was now fully convinced of her husband's illusion and of his imminent death.

 

dasa dasanudasa

Satyaraja dasa