Mediation and Immediacy by Jenny Ponzo Robert A. Yelle Massimo Leone

Author:Jenny Ponzo, Robert A. Yelle, Massimo Leone
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: De Gruyter
Published: 2020-12-07T11:46:58.101000+00:00

Notes

1 The Upaniṣads themselves are called ‘Vedānta’ (“end of the Veda”) as well as their exegesis and systematization by Śaṅkara and others. Usually it is the latter, being one of the six schools of Indian philosophy, that is referred to as ‘Vedānta.’ It is based on three major sources: the Upaniṣads, the Bhagavadgītā and the Brahmasūtras.

2 See for this and other statements and quotes Swami Tapovan (2015: 11 – 20), who gives many more examples of negative and affirmative statements.

3 Yad eva sākṣād-aparokṣād-brahma ya ātmā sarvāntaraḥ taṃ me vyācakṣveti […] eṣa ta ātmā sarvāntaraḥ.

4 See also Chakraborty (2015: 88 – 89).

5 Similarly Tapovan (2015: 16), referring to Taittirīya Up. On the knowledge-bliss nature of Brahman and the self and its consummation as a sign of liberation see also Bṛhadāraṇyaka Up. Bhāṣya 3.9.28,7. Śaṅkara comments, since supreme bliss is Brahman/Ātman’s very nature, it is directly experienced at all times. However, overlooking all his commentaries the term ‘bliss’ (ānanda) is sparingly used; the prime term is cit (consciousness, awareness) along with terms of “self-luminosity” (svayaṃ-jyotiḥ; svataḥ-prakāśa), pure existence/being(ness) (sat, satyam) and limitlessness (nityam, anantam), and tropes like “reveling in one’s self” (ātmarati, ātmakrīda) and “having done what is to be done” (kṛtakṛtyaḥ).

6 These terms and synonymous formulas (like svataḥ-siddhiḥ, “self-accomplished,” etc.) are frequently used in both parts of the Upadeśa Sāhasrī (“US”) and summarize its essential teaching: see US, Gadyabandha 2.79; 2.91, 93, 105, 107, and Padyabandha 10.3; 11.11; 17.69; 18.26, 98, 101, 200, 220. See also Śaṅkara’s Bṛhadāraṇyaka Up. Bhāṣya 4.3.7.

7 Bṛhadāraṇyaka Up. Bhāṣya 3.9.26.

8 See Śaṅkara’s US, Padyabandha 15.39, 18.28, 18.30, 19.24, and for the whole argument Wilke and Moebus 2011: 589 – 615.

9 US, Padyabandha 18.57; transl. Wilke and Moebus 2011: 591.

10 The tat tvam asi hermeneutics are elaborately dealt with in US, Padyabandha 18 and 12.1 – 19 (where mostly verbal forms like lakṣayeyuḥ or lakṣayet are used, for instance in 18.29 and 18.80); see also Śaṅkara’s commentary on Chāndogya Up. 6.8.7 ff. (which presents the same interpretation, but without using the technical term). The full lakṣaṇa theory in the context of tat tvam asi hermeneutics was developed later (post-Śaṅkara) in texts like Sadānanda’s Vedāntasāra.

11 See for the following Śaṅkara’s Chāndogya Up. Bhāṣya 6.16.3.

12 Śaṅkara reads Chāndogya Up. 6.8 – 16, in which tat tvam asi appears nine times, as a conceptual whole. To determine relevant text units for the meaning of single phrases is vital to the Advaita-Vedānta hermeneutics. Similarly, the teaching by repetitions and similes is important, a strategy for which Chāndogya Up. 6.8 – 16 was the first-hand model.

13 An almost identical statement can be found in US, Padyabandha 18.200. The chapter 18 deals extensively with the tat tvam asi and its correct understanding. The foundational scriptural authority for the self-effulgent light of tvam which corresponds with tat is found in the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Up. 4.3.7 and Śaṅkara’s extensive commentary.

14 The method of anvaya-vyatireka (continuity-and-discontinuity; “going through and leaving”) is mentioned several times in the US (e. g. Padyabandha 18.96 – 97, 170 – 180, 189) and also applied in Sureśvara’s Naiṣkarmyasiddhi (Halbfass 1991:162 – 180). It goes originally back to grammar (denoting here root form and flections).

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