Jahnu das wrote: > > Hare Krishna! > > On 4 Apr 1997 14:52:53 GMT, Agrahya das wrote: > > >If we are ever to establish brahminical culture, recitation of the Vedas > >is an important part of it and is a duty of all brahmanas. > > I'm not arguing against the recitation of the Vedas. I'm arguing > against the idea that we should quote mainly from Shruti to establish > our siddhanta. Well, certain of your statements certainly _seemed_ to minimize the importance of zruti. Besides, I never said we should quote mainly from zruti but I have yet to see a work by a Vaishnava acarya in our line that does _not_ provide support from zruti. Providing support from zruti is important because, as pointed out by Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakur in Jaiva-dharma, it is accepted by everyone (at least for well-known Upanishads). [snip] > >No one has said the Vedas do not emanate from NArAyaNa. You are > >apparently not understanding some fine points of distinction here. Had > >you read all of Mani's posts carefully as I have, you would find this > >idea quite clear. As far as I understand, he is stating a canonical > >understanding common not only to ViziSTAdvaita but to Dvaita as well, > >namely that systematic proofs rest on understanding the un-authored > >nature of zruti. And as I've explained before, un-authored is > >roughly equivalent to saying that Vishnu incarnations are un-born. You > >can also cite ete cAMsa-kalAH showing that Vishnu incarnations "come" > >from Krishna, but there is no beginning or birth to this relationship > >any more than there is an act of authorship for zruti. > > In that case I would really like to know what you mean by > 'unauthored.' If you by unauthored mean anadi or eternal, why don't > you just say anadi or eternal? Why use such an awkward term as > unauthored? I have consulted several devotees who are learned in > Sanskrit and none of them agree that 'apaurusheya' can mean > unauthored. I told you, and Mani told you, what apaurusheya's direct meaning is. The simple fact is that there are systematic proofs to avoid circular reasoning based on the un-authored nature of zruti. Consider as an example the following discussion one might have with an atheist: A: How do you know God exists? D: Because He told me so. A: Ha, ha ha! That's circular reasoning for you. Blah blah blah... The strength of the ontological argument presented above for the existence of God is extremely weak, to say the least. It really won't do more to convince an intelligent person than the simplest of charismatic Christian arguments, "'cause the Bible told me so." Of course, some people won't accept good logic if it dropped from the sky and hit them on the head simply because they don't _want_ to believe in God. But our predecessor AcAryas have constructed some pretty elaborate arguments to deal with atheist, voidist, and nihilist arguments, and many of these arguments avoid the circular reasoning inherent in the above snippet by focusing on the un-authored nature of zruti. You keep asking for proof that some Vaishnava acarya has made these arguments for un-authoredness of zruti, which you claim are foolish and atheistic. You need look no further than Sri Jayatirtha's NyAya-sudhA commentary on Sri Madhvacarya's Vedanta commentary. You can find it via the Dvaita home page: http://www.rit.edu/~mrreee/dvaita.html Please, someone from the Dvaita school correct me if I've got this wrong, but I believe the line of reasoning is explicitly clear and rests on the un-authoredness of zruti. > In the Gita Krishna says, aham sarvasya prabhavo, I'm the source of > everything, material or spiritual, ergo He is also the source of the > Vedas, and hence there can be nothing wrong in saying that the Vedas > are authored by God. Do you hold the position that it is correct to > say that Krishna is the origin of everything, but it is incorrect to > say that Krishna is the author of the Vedas? ergo Krishna is also the source of Himself? You're missing the point here: that the Vedas emanate from Narayana is confirmed in zruti. You're confusing emanation with the act of authorship, or with any other such chronological concept of creation. Time does not exist outside the mahat-tattva. According to Brahma-samhitA, zruti emanates from Krishna's flute-sound and enters the ears of BrahmA, the first created being. zruti appears in various ways in this world but is never "authored." Ontological arguments of our acaryas rest on this. My goal here is not to engage in an ontological discussion on the nature of zruti - for which I am not well equipped - but to dissuade you from making rash statements on the discussions our predecessor acaryas have already made. > >So please, give us a reference referring to the birth of incarnations or > >expansions, or to the act of authorship for zruti. You won't because > >such references don't exist. > > In the 3rd canto of Srimad Bhagavatam it is explained that Lord Varaha > is the personality of the Vedas and they emanate from His breathing. > Else where, in the 6th canto, it is stated, vedo narayanah sakshat, > the Vedas are directly Narayana. How can the Vedas be unauthored by > Narayana if they are directly Narayana, being His words? I think you've answered your own question: how can Narayana be created by Narayana? He can't because He isn't. Narayana is not created by anyone, including God (who He is). This is not an atheistic or foolish statement. There is no creation of expansions, either in the vishnu-tattva, zakti-tattva, or jIva-tattva. Neither is there an act of authorship of zruti, as clearly indicated by the statements you refer to. Otherwise, how could something that is directly Narayana Himself come into being (i.e. "be authored") at some later point? That would imply any one of a number of logical fallacies. In our sampradaya we do not rely heavily on exacting philosophical wrangling, but neither do we refrain from it. We merely say there are limits beyond which logic won't take us. Our own Srila Prabhupada used logic extensively, as did our predecessor acaryas such as Srila Baladeva Vidyabhushana (to whom Srila Prabhupada dedicated BGAII). > Further more Krishna says that everything comes from Him, that He is > the cause of all causes. Isn't He then the cause and origin of the > Vedas as well? Isn't He then the origin of Himself? We wouldn't make such a statement because it is circular reasoning. zruti exists, is not different from Narayana, is His very breathing. Never was there a time when zruti did not exist. It is manifest within this world at some point after creation, but that is no more an act of authorship than Krishna's appearance is His birth, for He is un-born and the zruti, according to Sripad Madhvacarya and Sri Jayatirtha, is un-authored. > >> Why would one want to state that the Vedas are unauthored by God > >> rather than authored by Him? > > > >Because this is a key element of the systematic proofs established by > >_Vaishnava acaryas_ such as RAmAnujAcArya and MadhvAcArya to defeat the > >advaita philosophy of SankarAcArya. > > Is it a key element of the systematic proofs established by our > Vaishnava acaryas to say that the Vedas are unauthored? Please > elaborate. Where do any of these acaryas say that the Vedas are > unauthored rather than without any human origin? Please see above. Yes, this is needed to avoid circular reasoning. > > Be careful, therefore, in applying > >such terms as "atheistic," "foolish," "pashandi," etc. > > Mani, objecting to my statement that God can do anything he likes, > has asked me in a private letter - I haven't seen it appear here in > the conference yet - 'Can God make a stone heavier than He can lift?' > > Now, who but a fool or an atheist would ask such a question? But you > are right, I should be very careful in applying these terms. I guess I'm a fool and an atheist, because I would use that same argument in trying - perhaps futilely - to explain to you why we don't claim that Krishna is His own origin. Please refrain from labelling people. > Well, Srila Prabhupada has explained that it means 'not from a human.' > Krishna is a person. Do you claim that the Vedas do not come from > Krishna? Then how do you explain the statement of Krishna in the Gita, > aham sarvasya prabhavo? vedo nArAyaNaH sAkSAt - The Veda _IS_ NArAyaNa. Why is this hard to understand? > >There is not much in this discussion that I find laughable, but you > >really need to stick to the issues, read what has already been written, > >and address things completely. > > That's exactly what I have done. I have objected to the idea presented > by Mani and others that the Vedas are not even authored by God. Even > if the Vedas are anadi and eternal, still they can be authored by God, > no? I object to this idea because it sounds, in my ears, atheistic. It > is like saying that the Vedas are independent of God. Besides that, no > one here has offered any evidence from any source that apaurusheya > means unauthored. No one has claimed zruti exists independently. Nothing exists independently. This is one difference between acintya-bhedAbheda-tattva and dvaita. However, as some learned scholar pointed out recently, Sripad Madhvacarya has a very similar element to acintya in the "vizeSatA" or concept of specificity. > > I've asked before and ask again, how > >well do you know the Vedanta commentaries of Sripad Ramanujacarya and > >Sripad Madhvacarya? Whether you or I consider it vital to understand > >them or not is beside the point, but that has not stopped you from > >offering brash commentary on the concept of un-authoredness. > > Who cares how well I know them? Why do you make an issue out of that? > Why don't you ask how well Mani knows the commentaries of Jiva Goswami > or Srila Prabhupada? Besides, Mani has not been able to show that the > acaryas you mention have referred to the Vedas as unauthored. He hasn't but I have. Read nyAya-sudhA, which has a translation I vouch for personally. My point is that if you _don't_ know these things _a whole lot better_ than I do (which is not very well at all) don't make such presumptuous, and if you'll pardon my saying so, ignorant statements. > Please note that I understand that the Vedas are unborn and eternal, > like Narayana, but this is not the same as saying that the Vedas are > unauthored. When you say the Vedas are unauthored by Narayana, I take > it to mean that the Vedas are independent of Narayana. No one has said that anything is independent of Narayana. However, this concept is admittedly handled differently in acintya-bhedAbheda-tattva than in dvaita. I don't know viziSTAdvaita that well yet. > I would like to know where it is stated by any acarya that the Vedas > are unauthored. Please see above reference to Sri Jayatirtha on Dvaita home page. > You still haven't substantiated that our acaryas describe the Vedas as > 'unauthored,' neither has Mani. Therefore you should not say that by > calling Mani a fool I'm also calling these stalwart acaryas fools. > This is completely false. I think I have substantiated this, short of cutting and pasting the relevant portions so you can save yourself the trouble of reading some rather long and technical arguments. If he says the same things stalwart acaryas say then you call him an atheist, pasandi and fool, then yes, you are in fact indirectly putting these labels on our predecessor acaryas, albeit out of ignorance rather than malice. > >and whom Srila Prabhupada quotes in his commentaries on the > >Bhagavatam. > > Yes, and where did you ever see in Srila Prabhupada's purports that he > describes the Vedas as unauthored? Here I must confess that I am an heretic who believes that following Srila Prabhupada means to understand shastra as he has taught it, not to take his purports as a body of zruti. You can read all about this and other heresies on my home page, http://www.hgsoft.com/~agrahya/ > And why is it that you object to me > calling Mani a fool, but you don't object to Mani's unbased and biased > criticism of Srila Prabhupada? If this is the real issue, why don't you make your own reply? I have heard and responded to many criticisms of Srila Prabhupada's translations, both publicly and in private correspondence. If you haven't noticed, that's not my problem. I do have the rather odd view that the best response to criticism is not with insults and ad hominem attacks but with firm and sound replies based on shastra. Since you feel that this is needed I shall compose such a posting. Perhaps this should be added to the Gaudiya FAQ if there is not already such a section there. Regards, Agrahya das Agrahya@HGSoft.com http://www.hgsoft.com/~agrahya/