[Advaita-l] The 'Snake-and-ladder' game - The Spiritual path

V Subrahmanian v.subrahmanian at gmail.com
Thu Aug 9 22:08:50 EDT 2018


On Fri, Aug 10, 2018 at 3:17 AM Raghav Kumar Dwivedula via Advaita-l <
advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> wrote:

> I am afraid you are getting in to a level of theological detail that is
> outside the scope of this list.
>
> We can replace Rama with Krishna, Ramana  etc. Because the meanings of
> these words and their connotations are very well analyzed in the Vedic
> tradition and are shorn of any bigoted sectarian baggage.
> When you wish to replace the word Krishna with Jesus or Allah, you have to
> firstly answer the question
>
> What do you mean by the word 'Jesus' or Allah? The onus is on whoever wants
> to fiddle around with traditional Hindu bhakti songs,  to clarify.
>
>  Because the organized Church which is very interested in this replacement
> of Hindu divine names with words like Jesus etc, abetted unwittingly  by a
> few non-thinking hare-brained Hindus,  promotes a 'Jesus' of a certain
> Nicene creed which punishes so-called idolaters and sends off Hindus to
> limbo/hell for merely worshipping an altar in a Hindu temple, then such a
> theological baggage-ridden meaning of the word Jesus is not acceptable for
> replacement. Until these organizations like the archdiocese of madurai
> which want to replace Rama with Jesus, give up with their bigoted Nicene
> creed which for these organized Churches is a non-negotiable theological
> dogma, there is no question of allowing such replacements with ulterior
> proselytizing motives.
>

Thanks Raghav ji, for articulating this.  This is the crux of the entire
issue that is being discussed now.  There is no problem for Advaita if
anyone on the planet taking to the path of Advaita in the proper ways.  The
point on hand is the ulterior motives of those who want to convert Hindu
deities, practices, temples, etc. in order to meet their motives of
appealing to and drawing the gullible public to their fold.  This is what
is sought to be addressed in this entire issue.  HH Chandrashekhara Bharati
sent the picture of His Guru to a European who sought the acharya's
guidance in sadhana.  Along with that picture the Acharya gave him guidance
as to what he should contemplate upon etc. a daily routine, tips on
saattvic food, etc. In essence, the Acharya had given him yama and niyama.
Niyama includes Ishwara pranidhanam, shoucha, tapas, etc..This is not
disputed.  The Patanjali sutra says: yathaabhimata dhyaanaad vaa (samadhi
siddhih) - one can take up 'any' object that appeals to him and contemplate
on it and attain samadhi.  The caveat is that such an object should not be
a shaastra nishiddha one.

regards
subrahmanian.v

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