/lit/ - Literature

>>18940033
Perennialism doesn't work. All Abrahamic truths hinge on the religions being completely true.

>>18940050
And this is the problem. They have many truths(if we compare them to hinduism for example) but fully accepting them is just nonsense.

>>18940033
>Is there any way to reconcile them?
Yes, if you say that the Christian spiritual life (one could even say the non-monastic spiritual life of all religions) insofar as it is followed by non-monastic peoples with families, occupations (i.e. the overwhelming majority of Christians) leads not to moksha but rather to entry into the Brahmaloka, which confers the opportunity to have billions of years to work on attaining moksha while there, but that people who dont attain moksha there start transmigrating again when a new universe begins. In this way, the metaphysics of Advaita remain true, but the framework of Christianity and other religions becomes a valid framework for the masses to enter into Brahmaloka and thereby have the chance to attain moksha, and at the very least have an assured unimaginably-long time to enjoy a blissful heaven. Guenon seems to agree with this way reconciling them since in his book on Vedanta he says that the exoteric aspect of Christianity leads to the Brahmaloka. Whether Christian saints or monastics can attain moksha on earth without accepting a non-dualistic understanding is a separate question, although whichever answer one agrees with on this latter question doesn’t prevent one from reconciling the two in the former sense concerning Brahmaloka.

>>18940133
>>18940133
Guenon is probably right but abrahamists(including their greatest sages and prophets) would never agree with this. So what could be our explanation for this? Were they meant to believe this in order to be "save"(entry into the Brahmaloka?) as many people as possible? Christianity and Islam were religions which appeared in the Kali-Yuga so it makes sense.

I would be careful about reading Advaita Vedanta interpretations such as Shankara's as a commentary to the Upanishads, they are extremely reliant on Buddhist philosophy (Shankara is called a "cryptobuddhist" by most Hindus, and most scholars agree). If you want to read the Upanishads, work through them with editions and commentaries that aren't sectarian, or at least read an interpretation that is closer to the original meaning of the Upanishads, rather than Shankara's 9th century AD quasi-buddhism.

>>18940033
POO IN LOO

>>18940179
go outside, touch grass, take meds, etc.

Finally another textwall thread about the finer doctrinal points of a niche philosophy.

>>18940179
Why do you hate Shankara so much? You post this every time he's mentioned. Weird fixation.

No. If you want to do this just pick up Dualistic Vedanta. Unlike Nihilistic Vedanta, it posits the existence of a deity that does stuff, and unlike Monistic Vedanta it reifies something akin to the Abraham Soul alongside a Creator Deity that engages in judgement (this is a specific formula).

>>18940207
it triggers a couple fags. and it's true

>>18940226
It's not really true though. Sure, he gets accused of crypto-Buddhism a lot but I know lots of scholars who'd disagree and he's "reliant" on Buddhist philosophy a lot because he's trying to refute it.

>>18940239
I said "a lot" too many times

>>18940239
The "Crypto-Buddhist" line isn't a Western analysis, it's a Hindu one. He was pretty quickly tarred as a nihilist and an atheist. The latter is a simple fact, he does deny the existence of Indra, Shiva, Vishnu, Krishna, etc, and the the former is not true in as much that he only argues that 99.9999...999999% of reality doesn't exist rather than just 100% of it. Dualists ended up calling him a Crypto-Buddhist out of the belief that he'd been tricked by Shiva into being stupid, and his stupidity would embarrass Buddhists because they would be associated with Shankara's stupidity, and thus they would convert to Hinduism.

>>18940239

>>18940269
Yeah I'm aware of what later Hindu theists said about him; I just think it's a lazy characterisation.

>>18940239
guenonfag himself confirmed that shankara is a crypto buddhist

>>18940286
it's not just later hindu theists it's everyone

also it was all hindu theists right away like bhaskara. even advaita believers at the time admitted it was identical to buddhism, look at the sriharsa quote in this pic

>>18940296
meant in the pic already posted above
>>18940279

>>18940279
I don't really understand what you're getting at. He was reliant on Buddhism, borrowing ideas but also refuting it and being very strongly not a subjective idealist. Is Advaita not allowed to be influenced by Buddhism? And about the Upanishads: honestly, any vedantic school has dodgy exegesis; I don't think Advaita is uniquely eisegetical. Theologies change and develop over time.
Your main point is that he's influenced by Buddhism. As you acknowledge, everyone, pro or anti-Shankara, admits this. So what's the big deal?

>>18940296
I've read Deutsch's book. He doesn't believe that Shankara is a crypto Buddhist; he just acknowledges that he's accused of it. A lot of your quotations are this: scholars acknowledging a common accusation.

>>18940324
nothing, we agree completely but look at the post below yours to understand what it has been like posting about this for three years on /lit/

>>18940332
wrong, all these quotations say openly that the accusations are true except for deutsch who only says it's certainly true that shankara got monasticism from buddhism

you read the smallest shortest pic the only one that supports your case even mildly and ignored the rest

>>18940337
I won't lie, both of these are me. I skimmed your images, yes, because it's late and I'm tired, but I have studied Advaita at university and read many books on it. I don't agree that it's the scholarly consensus that Shankara is a crypto-buddhist. Moving on though, genuinely what is your motivation for posting about this whenever Shankara is mentioned? I'm not gonna debate his theology with you because, as you say, we both know that he's influenced by Buddhism; I'm not an Advaitin so I don't have skin in the game.

Check out Wolfgang Smith's books. Same publisher of Guenon's books.
Christian Gnosis
Cosmos and Transcendence
Science and Myth
The Quantum Enigma

>>18940366
scholarly consensus would never say something like "crypto buddhist" but they do agree with the spirit of the accusation which is that advaita is more like buddhist idealism with a vedanta ending than pure vedanta, if there is any consensus its like >>18940304 olivelle who doesn't take sides, but does implicitly note that advaita practitioners are over reaching more than some other vedanta interpreters because their more buddhist ideas simply are not in the upanishads

radakrishnan says the same in the other pic, "many people" have found the advaita reading less plausible. in actuality it is all far more complicated than this because shankara influenced the same later interpreters who reject his interpretation so nothing is simple. i studied shankara too in uni (focused on samkhya though)

i completely agree with what you said, its uncontroversial and everybody except people who think shankara lived 10000 years ago already knows this, so to your question why, same thing i said earlier. it's funny and annoys a couple assholes. but it also educates people who are being lied to by the 10000 year old shankara assholes

>>18940174
>So what could be our explanation for this? Were they meant to believe this in order to be "save"(entry into the Brahmaloka?) as many people as possible? Christianity and Islam were religions which appeared in the Kali-Yuga so it makes sense.
I dont know, but that seems to be the most reasonable explanation I have heard so far

>>18940269
>he does deny the existence of Indra, Shiva, Vishnu, Krishna, etc,
No he doesn’t that’s false, in fact in his Brihadaranyaka Upanishad bhasya he says that they can place obstacles in ones path. Shankara never denies their existence at all, he just says that they like everything are continent upon Brahman. So many pseuds say things about Shankara which aren’t true and which are directly refuted by his writings

>>18940324
>As you acknowledge, everyone, pro or anti-Shankara, admits this
Chandradhar Sharma denied it, as do many of the heads and monks of the traditional Advaita orders, who are the top modern day authorities on Advaita

>>18940296
>look at the sriharsa quote in this pic
Sriharsa in his work “The Sweets of Refutation” writes that there is an essential difference between Advaita and Buddhism insofar as the former says consciousness is independent, eternal and absolutely real while Buddhism denies all of this. For whatever reason, Natalie Isayeva omits this in her book and deceptively presents Sriharsa as viewing Advaita and Buddhism as identical, when in fact Sriharsa just notes they share some similarities but also some unbridgeable differences.

>>18940133
i think this is right. on the other hand, a believer in the advaitist point of view could not in good faith participate in the christian church without being a liar. you wouldn't be able to receive communion honestly. i know that there are guys (i don't know if it's a lot) who do this because they feel an apostolic church is the best home for them culturally despite despite them existing in it as a heretic from the perspective of exoteric christianity. i really don't think this is tenable despite the difficult situation of those of us in the west when it comes to finding a tradition to live in.

any thoughts on this? i know some people point to meister eckhart as someone to look to when it comes to non-dualism and christianity, but i haven't read him.

>>18940033
I don't see a problem.