|
|
|
|
|
|
|
explore the nature of this textual access to Advaita and how it enables a practical transformation of the theologian, not merely through the discovery of an already shared background of views about the world as such, or a shared operation of reasonthough these may also be in placebut also through the acquisition of an ampler language in the use of which one can think, read, speak and write differently. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Throughout, the tension will remain between the content and conclusions of reading, and the act of reading itself, and it is the possibilities of this unsettling tension which interest us here. We already know that one cannot become a believing Advaitin simply for the sake of good scholarship. Faith issues aside, we cannot hope to reproduce for our scrutiny the mind of a theologian of a vastly different time and place; study, however prolonged, will not enable us to use the upanisads precisely as Sankara does, and in the end we will still not being reasoning from within his version of the upanisadic worldview. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Nevertheless, we do read the upanisads, and we are able to understand them in part; we do read the Advaita theological texts, and we are able to understand them in part; we check our readings against those of the commentators, and learn to read in ways which approximate the ways in which they read. This partially adequate reading and understanding is a true engagement in these texts and so too in Advaita thinking; it is also an engagement, provisional and partial, but real and rich in implications, in the practice and faith inscribed within those texts. A patient engagement in the commentarial project is therefore a plausible pathway into Advaita, though its price is a reassessment of Advaita which brings to the fore its self-presentation as a commentarial tradition. Some observations on how this textual reading of Advaita will proceed conclude this chapter. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
V. Practical Implications |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
1. Retrieving the Advaita "Text" |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
The task of retrieving the possibility of a reflective engagement in the textual, practical and theological aspects of Advaita |
|
|
|
|
|