[Advaita-l] Unmanifest and its Secrets

[rajaramvenk at gmail.com]

One can imagine any thing and certain imaginations may even make one feel good. However, kalpana is not a pramana. A disciple's imagination about a guru is not pramana. I'm not discounting the possibility that a guru can an avatara. All I'm saying is that it has to be through a valid means of knowledge. A seeker of truth will reject false knowledge. Brahman can appear in the form of a guru, who has attained videha mukti, if out of gratitude,  a disciple considers that the most dear. It does mean that form is eternal if it is a product of karma. After the life span of devotees who know such a seer, there will be no one who will aspire to see brahman in his form but in every kalpa there will be devotees who will want to see Rama, Krishna etc. as they are known through sastras. 

Every form is eternal in the sense that it is part of Ishwara's jnanam but the eternality of the forms of avataras is of a different class. As sabda is eternal, the forms and activities described therein are eternal. If keen, one can, whichever kalpa he may live in, know these through bhagavat sakshatkaram for which there are methods as you know. In addition to that one can have, through required tapas, pratyaksha of mantra, which describe the lord's forms and activities. This is not possible in the case of bodies created through karma because there won't be an associated nitya mantra. Regarding transformations of the forms, vamana to trivikarama, that which is seen as it is dependent on manas is anitya but that which is in the sabda is nitya because manas is anitya whereas sabda is nitya. Of that in sabda, that in the apaurusheya is nitya whereas paurusheya is only if it is said to be so.
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-----Original Message-----
From: V Subrahmanian <v.subrahmanian at gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 8 Jul 2013 23:39:40 
To: <rajaramvenk at gmail.com>; A discussion group for Advaita Vedanta<advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org>
Subject: Re: [Advaita-l] Unmanifest and its Secrets

On Mon, Jul 8, 2013 at 9:20 PM, <rajaramvenk at gmail.com> wrote:

> :)
>
> How about giving our dharma some chance? The bodies of the realised
> masters are made of 5 elements born of karma. Rama and Krishna have eternal
> bodies not born of karma.
>

There are some problems in such a thinking.  All the bodies, Rama, Krishna,
etc. appeared at a particular point of time and also disappeared after the
purpose for which they specifically appeared.  The Lord Himself
acknowledges this in the 4th ch. of the BG: bahUni mE vyatItAni janmAni tava
cha arjuna....Many lives of Mine have passed...also yours....A 'janma'
cannot be without a body and that is what the Lord, as Parameswara, is
referring to here.  We cannot say that those bodies are eternal any more
than the bodies of humans, however exalted they might have been.  Even
today, and all times to come, such great personalities who have lived and
passed away, can be related to/with by devotees.  They appear in the
waking, in forms of visions, and in dreams too, to bless these devotees.
So are the forms of Rama, Krishna, etc.  It is only in that way their
bodies can be said to be eternal.  An ardent devotee has every right to
hold his Acharya to be an avatAra.  He might very strongly argue that his
Acharya descended on this earth to  bless him and others and that his birth
is not karma-driven.  Such beliefs will certainly give some benefits to the
person who holds them.


Krishna might get the status of pravAha nityatva just because his name
appears in the Chandogya upanishad.  What about Rama and Buddha (who is
also acknowledged as an avatAra) and parashurama and balarAma whose names
are not mentioned in the popular upanishads? Would we hold Kapila's body
(of the bhAgavatam) too to be eternal?  The vAmana, an avatAra of the Lord,
itself came to an end when it transformed to Trivikrama.   Then we will
have to hold each of the stages of Krishna, bAlakrishna, gopikrishna,
parthasarathy, etc. as eternal bodies.



> Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device
>