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Chapter 4.
Advaita Vedanta And Its Readers |
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1. For an epistemologically sensitive presentation of some of the issues addressed here, see Bilimoria 1988, pp. 292-302. |
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2. Vedantins in general agree that knowledge itself cannot be enjoined, though the upanisadic texts clearly encourage some complex activity. The Advaitins and the Visistadvaitins dispute various technical points regarding the Brhadaranyaka text, pertaining to the apparent injunctiveness of each apparently injunctive partmust be seen, must be heard, must be understood, must be meditated onand thence of the statement as a whole. |
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3. Though "seeing" appears to be the beginning of the process, in Vedanta it is identified as the end of the process too. The logic of the text may be that earlier moments of vision initiate new cycles of hearing, understanding, meditation, vision. |
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4. Let us also recall from Chapter 1 how Appaya Diksita, in commenting on Amalananda's introductory sloka 2 to the Vedantakalpataru,sketched the connection between the steps of meditation, as described in the Brhadaranyaka text, and progress in Advaitic knowledge. The parallel and interconnected structures of knowledge and meditation are replicated in that specifically Advaita knowledge which is generated by reading one's way through the Text. For another use of the Brhadaranyaka text, see Amalananda's comments on UMS III.4.47 and 50, where he correlates sravana, manana and nididhyasana with the categories of learning (patditya),childlikeness (balya) and silence (mauna). |
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5. The portion considered here is found in the translation, pp. 34-36. |
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6. Tr. 35; Skt. 129. |
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7. Tr. 35; Skt. 129. Vacaspati says that such apparent injunctions of knowledge refer back to the basic command that one should memorize one's texts in the proper fashion (i.e., perform svadhyaya)and so become literate in a preliminary fashion. (Skt. 130) This preliminary memorization, which can be commanded, is the material prerequisite for engagement in the intelligent inquiry which is the activity of Advaita; it is therefore preliminary to knowledge of Brahman, which cannot be commanded. This reference back to prior learning affords the commands to hear and understand a definite role in the extended learning process of Advaita. |
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8. Amalananda explains in more detail why the knowledge of Brahman cannot be enjoined, even as an act of reading texts: "Hearing is the apprehension of the purport of the text 'you are that,' in regard to Brahman [as] the self; |
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