शतभूषणी- Satabhusani (Sata Bhusani Pariksha Paraparyayah)

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The leading Schools of Vedanta are Advaita expounded by Sri Sankara, Visishtadvaita of Sri Ramanuja, Dvaita advanced by Sri Madhya and Bhedabheda view of Sri Bhaskara, Nimbarka and Vallabhacharya. Of these, Advaita possesses both logical and chronological priority. It is declared by Sruti, it is determined by reason and demonstrated in the experience of jivanmuktas. Not with standing that other Acharyas have severally directed their powerful dialectics against it, it remains as valid and as vital as ever. In fact, on a dispassionate view, free from sectarian and theological affiliations, it will apear that Advaita presents an inclusive view of reality which is not opposed in essence to the fundamentals of the other schools, but provides for them all in its comprehensive scheme. It will also appear that when the other Acharyas expounded their particular systems it was not because they were not convinced of the fact of Advaita tattva, but they felt that they had to temper their philosophy to the needs of particular situations and individuals. Thus, for example, the insistence on karma by the Mimamsakas and their apparent opposition to jnana is not to be understood as literally negating the value of jnana, but rather as intended to steady people in the practice of karma. To those who are qualified only for the performance of karma and desire the benefits that will accrue from it, the inducement of jnana is forbidden. The Lord says in the Bhagavad Gita : " Do not disturb the understanding of those who are given to karma ". This is declared by Prabhakara himself in the Brihati : vijnanarupata to vijnaturanasankaniya, anasankitaivat, yuktam cha anasankitam karmapravanatvat, taduktam Bhagavata ; na bud dhibhedam janayet ajnanam karmasanginam. The insistance on karma to the subordination and even apparent negation of jnana totally denying the existence of any devata was to wean men from their atheistic proclivities, to combat nastikya to which men are likely to fall a prey. Vide : kumarila : ityaha nastikya nirakarishnuratmastthitam bashyakrt atra yuktya drtatvametad vishayaprabhodhah prayanti vedanta nishevanena.

When Advaita philosophy prescribes jnana as the only and ultimate means to moksha, it is not to be understood as belittling the value of karma and bhakti. It recognises the need for karma to bring about destruction of selfishness and to produce purification of the mind. Bhakti helps to train the mind to concentrate-a capacity so necessary for meditation. Advaita recognises sagunabrahma upasana in the process of krama mukti. Few will deney the contribution which Sri Sankara has made to the literature of bhakti. Apart from the theologico-philosphical formulations of Sri Ramanuja's system, there is little to distinguish him from Sri Sankara from the point of view of the treatment of Bhakti marga. Mysticism which is the high-water-mark of bhakti is described as the flight of the alone to the Alone in which there is no experience of duality as any trace of it will militate against the plenal character of mystic union. The possibility of such religious union is guaranteed by the philosophic unity. Such mystics who have got merged in the non-dual are then oblivious of the world of duality. Such non-dual experience is the inevitable culmination of bhakti and is the basis of the very possibility of devotion. Vide: Kalpataru vasikrte manaschesham sagunabrahma-silanat tadeva avirbhaved sakshat apetopadhikalpanam. This is abundantly illustrated in the intertwining of bhakti and advaita tattva passages in page after page of Srimad Bhagavata and in the ne plus ultra of Nammalvar's ascent to mystic heights. May it not be that Sri Ramanuja himself did not deny the fact of Advaita, but stopped with the enunciation of bhakti marga as all that was needed for the climate and temper of his times, or for those who did not have the genius and inclination for jnana ? Possibly, at a time when devotion was ebbing from men's minds, in order to confirm them in the practice of bhakti, he felt compelled to criticise the philosophy of Advaita and argue against the doctrine of avidya indicting it with seven-fold inconsistencies. But this should have been, like the conflict between the upholders of Pancharatra and Vaikhanasa Agamas among the Visishtadvaitins themselves, on the basis of nahinindanyaya. The above conclusion is supported by the statement of no less a person than Sri Appayya Dikshita himself who declares in unequivocal language that the absolute truth is the philosophy of Advaita, that it is the paramatatparya of the Smritis and the Srutis, and that since advaita vasana can arise for men only by the grace of Mahesvara, considered as Saguna Brahman, to gain this end, the Sutras are commented on from the Saguna point of view.

Yadyapyadvaita eva sruti sikharagiram agamanam cha nishta

sakam sarvaih purana smrtinikara mahabharatadi prabandhaih

tatraiva brahma sutranyapi cha vimrsatam bhanti visrantimanti

pratnairacharya ratnairapi parijagrhe Sankaradaistadeva.

Tatthapyanugrahadeva tarunendu sikthamaneh advaita vasana pumsamavirbhavati nanyattha.

What Sri Dikshita felt convinced about before he began to write his Dipika on Sri Srikantha's bhashya on the Brahmasutras which expounds a Visishtadvaita of Saivite persuasion, may, by parity of reasoning, be held to apply in the case of Sri Ramanuja's Sri Bhashya which has much in common with Srikantha's Sutra Bhashya, Even as there are gradations in bhakti as, gauni, Para and parama bhakti based on differences of qualifications, capacities and achievements, spiritual education and enlightenment has to take note of individual differences of adhikara. Karma, upasana and jnana are to be taken as stressed by the several Acharyas in accord with these distinctions. The criticisms of Advaita by the other schools should therefore be taken as intended to confirm the several adhikaris in the pursuit of the spiritual training in the method suited to the climate of their mind and heart so that, upon its fulfilment, they may be eligible for the next `assault' on the heights of Advaita.

The quarrels of Visishtadvaitins and Dvaitins with Advaita seeming to be unending, it is worth while to be reminded that they are based, not on the identity of fundamental positions, but on disagreement., respecting them. Where the disputants do not agree on preliminaries like theory of knowledge and theory of causation, the course of their eschatological, cosmological and ontological speculations is bound to differ in consequence. It has also to be remembered that the special feature of Vedantic thought is not that it is woven out of a particular person's brain, but that it is the systematised exposition of the accepted canonical literature and any such exegesis must be true to the spirit of the body of scriptural works establishing a co-ordination among them. Here again the two great Acharyas who came after Sri Sankara differ from him and from each other. In a country where allegiance to a philosophical school is determined by birth, few have the inclination to be acquainted with other schools and understand them dispassionately. Deep rooted theological proclivities confirm the resistance to unblassed intellectual approach to metaphysical questions.

While it has to be conceded that the last sentence cuts both ways, it must be urged, however, that in all reason, truth lies where an inclusive view is presented and not in one which is exclusive. Taking but one among numerous examples, in the interpretation of the nirguna and saguna texts of Sruti, the opponents of Advaita have to give a secondary meaning to the nriguna texts. The Advaitins, on the other hand, are not constrained to do so. They do not have to say that saguna' is really nirguna after the manner of Visishtadvaitins, who contend that nirguna means nirheyaguna and not totally nirguna. Advaita as a system provides for the Dvaitic and Visishtadvaitic attitudes and practices ; but these latter schools do not admit either the theory or fact of Advaitic anubhava. Apart from determination by dialectics, the best proof of Advaita is provided by realisation of it and its declarations by those who have attained such realisation. Such realised souls (jivanmuktas) have shown by their utterance and their activity that the persistent climate of their Advaitic experience need have no quarrel with consecrated karma and confluent devotion. This has been made abundantly clear by Sir Sankara Bhagavatpada and Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, It is the pronounced theists and deists that cannot accommodate Advaita within their scheme of thought or activity. In that sense, Advaita makes for synthesis and harmony in a manner not found in other systems. As a philosophical system, it embodies the characteristic genius of our country which is identity in difference. It includes many hues within its radiance of the pure white. Vedanta as a study and as a discipline must make, not for wrangling disputations intended to discomfit and destroy, but for a fellowship of spiritual quest sustained by fidelity to a common source and determined by fervour for acheiving a common goal.

It will contribute to a proper estimate of Advaita if the concepts fundamental to it are understood in their true light. Taking first the concept of avidya or mays, this is accepted by all schools of Indian philosophy as bhava rupa. All satkaryavadins generally associate vikshepa sakti, the power of projection with maya. In this the Visishadvaitin is not different from the Sankhya, Yoga and Dvaita philosophers though they call it by different names. But the Advaitin holds that Maya has another power, that of concealment or avarana on account of which alone Brahman is vivartopadana. On the disappearance of avarana sakti, maya or avidya ipso facto disappears, though by residual samskara, the vikshepa sakti may persist for a time even after the disappearance of avarana. This is characteristic of the jivanmukta stage in which there is bhaditanuvritti. The question may be raised how the residual effect of vikshepa sakti disappears after the disappearance of avarana sakti. The Sutrakara of course answers in the words bhogena tvitarekshapayitva tatassampadyate, meaning that it is destroyed by subjection to it. But the effect of vikshepa is as false as avarana and both must be destroyed only by tattvajnana. That does not seem to be referred to in the sutra quoted. Does it mean that the effect of vikshepa disappears of its own accord ? If so, what is the need for tattvajnana at all ? How then can it be called mitthya as mitthya really means what is destroyed by jnana? In almost all the Advaitic works, it seems to be said that the residual effect disappears of its own accord. But the possibility of ahetukanasa, or destruction without agency is objected to. The answer to this is found in the Bindutika and Laghu Chandrika by Brahmananda where he says that bhogena in the sutra under reference means bogaparyanta tattvajnanena, i.e., by tattvajnana which is co-terminous with undergoing subjection to residual vikshepa. The source of this explanation is to be found in the mukti prakarana of Brahma Siddhi.

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