Philosophy III.

Truth (definitions)

Nyaya: faithfulness with which knowledge reveals its object (objection: can't directly prove itself)

Pragmatism: consists in its practical value and reveals an object that serves some purpose (artha or prayojana) (objection: even a false cognition may lead to the fulfillment of a purpose, e.g. geocentrism)

Vedanta: consists of non-contradictedness (abadhitartha), is intrinsic to knowledge

Visnu and Krsna

Q: Many people worship Laksmi-Narayana and believe Lord Sri Krsna is an expansion of Lord Visnu. Can you explain why do you believe in opposite way?

A: Gaudiya Vaisnavas don't have problem with anyone believing Sri Krsna to be an expansion of Sri Visnu (like e.g. in Sri, or Ramanuja sampradaya) if they are not offensive to Sri Krsna. Our acaryas prove that Sri Krsna is same from the point of view of tattva as Sri Visnu but higher in rasa. He has four special qualities which even Sri Visnu doesn't posses.

About aisvarya & madhurya (corresponding to Vaikuntha & Vraja) bhavas Bhaktivinoda Thakura says in Navadvipa Bhava Taranga, 118: "As much as my Sri Krsna is endowed with utmost sweetness (madhurya), similarly the Lord of Vaikuntha is endowed with absolute opulence and grandeur (aisvarya). Lord Krsna as Vrajendra-nandana never gives up this same opulence, however, but such aspects of His spiritual grandeur are not noticed by His pure devotees."

Related:
Qualities of the Lord

The New War on Ignorance

by Krishna Dharma

The Guardian, Saturday, September 29, 2001
(reprinted with permission from Krishna Dharma)

"Good will prevail over evil," declared President Bush, as he tried to rally his stunned country. Surely, we must all share that hope, but do we all share the same concept of good? Did the people behind the awful events in America believe they were perpetrating evil? Osama bin Laden is urging all Muslims to join a "jihad for the sake of God, urged by his prophet". If the American attacks were, indeed, a part of this so-called jihad, then they were done with the unswerving conviction that it was God's will. And what higher good can there be than that? God is all good, by any religious definition, and his will must mean the good of all creatures.

But how do we know the divine will? Many times it has been invoked in order to justify war. The first crusaders, who attacked Jerusalem a thousand years ago, were promised salvation by Pope Urban II; the defending Muslims also strongly believed the Lord was with them. During the Gulf war, both President Bush Sr and Saddam Hussein declared that God was with him. The Muslims who die in what they see as their jihad believe they will go to paradise and enjoy everlasting pleasures. [on the difference between jihad and irjaf, a better term for terrorism]

Quite a conundrum for God, it seems. How can he support everyone? So what is his definition of good and bad? It might be handy to know before we embark on any fierce campaigns.

A good place to start looking is scripture, though that, of course, is often the root of disagreement. Opposing parties usually have their different scriptures to quote in order to establish that followers of any other scripture are godless barbarians. I once walked into a shop in my priestly robes, and the shopkeeper exclaimed: "Your book is wrong!"

So, whose book is right? Who is actually on God's side, doing his will? Perhaps Christ's instruction to judge a tree by its fruits is helpful. If a person is actually approaching God, then he or she should become godly. The Bhagavad-gita, India's ancient spiritual text, offers a list of godly qualities found in a genuinely God-conscious person: tolerance, humility, kindness, mercy, non-violence and equality toward all living beings. These are a few definitions of goodness given by Krishna, who is accepted as God in the Bhagavad-gita.

Of course, these qualities can be developed by anyone from any faith background. They are not the exclusive preserve of any religion, for we find genuine saints in all traditions.

Real religion, according to the Bhagavad-gita, is that process which aims to please God, thereby taking the practitioner closer to him. This may manifest itself in various forms, different systems and rituals described in different scriptures, but, if the essential aim is to please the Lord, then why should we squabble?

If I am actually trying to please a person I love, then how can I hate others trying to please the same person, even if they are doing it in a different way? Hating others in the name of God because they are different defeats the purpose of pleasing God. Rather than pleasure, it would be more likely to give the Lord pain, just as a father is pained when he sees his sons fight. And if I hold such hatred, I myself am not actually coming close to God.

But is there ever any justification for a holy war? How about rooting out unbelievers? Surely, that must please God. And, clearly, some self-styled holy warriors see things in those terms, believing they are purging the earth of its scourge of atheists. But how can that please the Lord? If my brother turns away from my father, and I kill him, what would my father think?

The Bhagavad-gita says that a godly person feels compassion for others, seeing that their suffering is caused by ignorance - by not knowing that we are all eternal parts of the supreme spirit, capable of enjoying eternal happiness. Feeling that happiness himself, he wants only to share it with others by sharing his knowledge. He loves all beings as much as he loves God.

The real war, then, is against ignorance, first of all in ourselves. This is the actual triumph of good over evil, gaining knowledge of who we really are, and of God - and of how to reach him.

If we really do want good to prevail, then we should come together with a desire to know and satisfy the Supreme, peacefully discussing how that can best be done. We should recognise the integrity of other people's faiths, and see that they too are children of the same God we are trying to worship, and are equally loved by him - even if, at present, they choose to turn away from him. After all, has not the Lord himself given us that free choice?

The ultimate definition of good must be that which is conducive to the permanent happiness of all beings. Only God has that vision, and thus our highest good lies in approaching Him. The Bhagavad-gita says the Lord will reciprocate with such an attempt, and free us from all suffering. And that must undoubtedly be the aim of all human endeavours.

Krishna Dharma is a Vaishnava Hindu priest and author of a translation of the Mahabharata.

Source: www.theguardian.com/world/2001/sep/29/afghanistan.terrorism6

Word As Weapon: The Polemically Charged Use of Terminology in Euro-American Discourse on Hinduism

Dr. Frank Gaetano Morales

An Introduction: The Power of the Word

The inherent power of the word is a phenomenon that has been both omnipresent and essential throughout the long histories of literature, philosophy, religion and politics. The power of words has always been recognized for both its potentially constructive, as well as its devastatingly destructive, force. In the Vedic era, the potency of sabda (or the divine word) was lauded for its soteriological, liberating properties, as well as for its role as a means of epistemic insight into the nature of the Absolute. The Word both liberated and revealed - and both of these functions were accomplished via mantra, sound frequencies precisely sequenced in such patterns as to most optimally utilize the inherent sakti - or potency - of sound vibration. The divine word in the form of mantra could heal illness, relieve suffering and deliver freedom. Many millennia later, we find similar parallels in the Biblical literature, in which the Word is seen as being ontologically non-differentiated from the natura esse, or essential nature, of God. "In the beginning was the Word", the Gospel of John assures us, "and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."

The converse side of the positive power of words is seen in the destructive employment of words used, not to convey truth or to heal, but to obscure and deconstruct reality. Whether we speak of the sinister slogans of Joseph Goebbels or the propaganda ministries of defunct Stalinist states, words have been used with pointed polemic accuracy throughout the long history of human discourse. Words have always been employed by one group of individuals to control and delegitimize the political, social and philosophical freedoms of other groups. Academia has, unfortunately, not been free from the use of such ideologically charged - even if infinitely more subtle - polemic terminology. Such biased and politically motivated scholarship has led in the last few decades to the necessary creation of such fields as African-American Studies, Women's Studies and Holocaust Studies as new academic institutions designed to balance previously perpetrated intellectual injustices.

In the following, I will explore only a few of the more insidious terms used specifically throughout the history of South Asian Studies that have been traditionally used to denote various phenomena and features of the Hindu religion. Such words have been used to obscure the factual meaning of many philosophical, theological, social and ritual phenomena found within the Hindu context. I will proceed by outlining 1) the commonly accepted academic terms for these phenomena, 2) the proper indigenous view of the actual nature of these phenomena, and 3) I will offer several alternative terminological devices that will hopefully be more accurate indicators of the full nature and extent of these phenomena.

The Right to Self-Referential Terminology

The first two terms that we will examine are the terms usually used to indicate the overarching spiritual/cultural matrix of traditional, indigenous South Asian religion itself. These are the very terms "Hindu/Hinduism" themselves. The term "Hinduism" is not a term that is inherent to the religion itself. Rather, the term was first coined by individuals who were culturally and perspectivelly extrinsic to the culture in order to designate the ancient Vedic spiritual culture as a primarily geographic and ethnic phenomenon. The terms "Hindu/Hinduism" are not self-referential terms that the practitioners of the Vedic world-view chose for themselves. These words are not attested to in any of the ancient Vedic or Classical Sanskrit literatures, or even in the many local dialects until the medieval era. It was not until the 19th century under the rule of the British Raj that these dual terms even acquired legal significance on a national scale in India.

The actual term that the Vedic tradition uses to refer to itself is "Sanatana Dharma". While many non-Hindu academicians have no doubt encountered this term before, not every South Asian Specialist is necessarily as familiar with the full philosophical implications of its meaning. Thus it is necessary to explicate the term's full meaning. The Sanskrit word "Sanatana" denotes that which always is, that which has neither beginning nor end, that which is eternal. The term "Dharma", on the other hand, is a term that can be properly rendered into the English language only with the greatest of difficulty. This is the case because there is no one corresponding English term that fully renders both the denotative and the connotative meanings of the term with maximal sufficiency. The denotative meaning of "Dharma" is an essential attribute of x object - an attribute whose absence renders the object devoid of either rational meaning or existential significance. To illustrate the full meaning of this term: "it is the dharma of water to be wet". Without the essential attribute of wetness, water loses all meaning. Likewise, it is the dharma of fire to be hot, etc. It is, however, when we come to the connotative meaning of the term "Dharma" that we then leave the concerns of Vaisesika categoriology behind and then enter the realm of the overtly philosophical.

For, according to the tradition itself, the very empirical cosmos in which we find ourselves currently situated also has its own inherent dharma, its essential attributive nature. In this more cosmological sense, the term dharma is designed to communicate the view that there is an underlying structure of natural law that is inherent in the very constitution of Being itself. Thus, if we needed to render the entire term "Sanatana Dharma" into English, we can cautiously translate it as "The Eternal Natural Way". The term "Sanatana Dharma" more accurately communicates the axiomatic metaphysical nature of this concept than do the terms "Hindu/Hinduism". Thus, when the terms "Hindu/Hinduism" are repeatedly appealed to by both Euro-American and Indian academicians, we fall very short from fully communicating the metaphysical, ethical and ontological components of the world-view of Sanatana Dharma. The former - i.e. Hinduism - is a religious tradition, which finds itself currently tied to ethnic, national and social concerns. The latter - Sanatana Dharma - is a science of Being in a purely philosophical - and therefore highly rational - sense.

The Misapplication of Western Theological Terms to Distinctly South Asian Religious Phenomena

Having examined the problematic issues of a very broad misapplied academic term, I will now briefly examine several more specific terms that have been misemployed in the 200 year history of South Asian Studies. The first of these more specific polemically charged words is the term "idol". This word has been repeatedly misused by purported scholars of Hinduism - and again, by both Euro-American, as well as Indian scholars - and it has been continuously and unthinkingly used by even religious Hindus to this very day. At least once a month I get notices from Hindu temples inviting me to "idol" installations, pujas to the "idol", etc.

Unbeknownst to the vast majority of Hindu practitioners, the term "idol" is not a neutral term meant only to signify the objective reality of a statue or some other focal point used as a means of meditation upon the Divine, but it is a term that is historically devoid of any positive connotations. First arising from a purely Christian/Islamic religious and cultural context, the theologically derived terms "Idol/Idolatry" were quite clearly designed to signify the misguided worship of the graven images of fictitious gods. In the Old Testament, idol worshipers are condemned to death. In the Koran, the worshipers of idols are relegated to the category of the demonic. The theological baggage attendant upon the word "idol" was understandably imported into the nascent field of Indology by the 18th and 19th century European founders of modern Vedic studies. Thus, over time, what originated as a purely religious term specifically meant to designate a false practice and erroneous theological view, progressed to being accepted as an academic term meant to describe the practices and views of a "foreign" religion. In turn, tragically, the greater Hindu community has itself now thoroughly embraced this term as a legitimate word meant to convey one of the most sacred and integral mechanisms of Hindu worship. Unfortunately, when a Christian theologian, a Muslim cleric or a colonialist-tempered scholar is using the term "idol", they are interpreting a specific religious phenomenon in a radically different manner than is the typical Hindu worshiper.

For those scholars who have allowed themselves to develop a more sophisticated and objective understanding of the phenomenon - that is, one that arises from an indigenous and thus an insider perspective - it becomes rather apparent that the practice that is occurring via the process of archa-puja is something radically distinct from the stereotyped image of idol worship that is painted by rabidly iconoclastic ideologies. Followers of Sanatana Dharma are not blindly worshiping false idols, but are using divine images whose forms have been revealed via the non-mediated intuitive perception of the Absolute experienced by the rsis. Moreover, such images are used primarily as focal points designed as aids to meditative awareness. Archa-puja is not a superstition, is not a debasement of religion, is not fetishism, but is a tried and tested soteriological device. This being the case, I urge both scholars of Hindu Studies, as well as everyday practitioners of Sanatana Dharma, to refrain from using the derogatory term "idol" and to instead use one of the more culturally sensitive, and academically accurate terms that is used by the tradition itself. Such terms include: murti, archa, etc. Take your pick.

Misdefining Dharma as a Lie: Objective Scholarship or Bigoted Polemic?

The next term that we will examine is the word "myth". The related terms "myth", "mythology", "mythological", etc., have had an interesting history and a very pointed polemic use in Euro-American discourse on Sanatana Dharma. That the terms are rife with very negative connotations is doubted by very few. The way the terms are used today both within academia, as well as by the general public, is to denote something which is untrue, false, a lie, "primitive" (i.e., not Euro-American). Several months ago, during a visit to the dentist's office, I saw a pamphlet on the table called "The Myths About Sexually Transmitted Diseases". The ultimate question that needs to be determined is: is it really of any scholarly necessity that such powerfully negative terms also be associated with the sacred stories, teachings and history of Sanatana Dharma?

Polemically speaking, one culture's "myth" is another culture's sacred history...and visa versa. The academic field of the study of "mythological" literature was founded by 18th century European Classicists who took their misconceptions about their own Greco-Roman pre-Christian religious and cultural heritage and attempted to then apply these misconceptions to all contemporary non-Christian cultures - including that of India. These founders of "mythology" studies - including such individuals as Sir George Grey, Rudolph Otto and Karl Kerenyi - were convinced, as is unarguably evident in their writings, that the entire realm of religious story could be clearly demarcated into two radically distinct camps:

1) "Myth", that is the "primitive" stories about gods, goddesses, spirits, demons, magic and mysticism, etc. found throughout all of the indigenous and non-Biblical cultures of the world. Such stories are all considered to be certainly no more than ignorant "pre-scientific" attempts by "primitive peoples" (THEIR words, not mine) to come to terms with and explain such frightening mysteries as natural weather phenomena. The study of such mythologically ridden cultures was then relegated to the nascent fields of anthropology, folk-lore and aesthetic studies.

2) The second category that religious stories were placed in was termed "History", that is Biblical literature and all supposedly factual accounts of events proceeding such literature to be found throughout the history of Europe and the post-Columbian Americas. In order to study these supposed historical facts, Euro-American scholars employed a different battery of academic disciplines entirely, including philosophical, ethical, literary, psychological, etc. The only overlapping exception being the field of philology, which was employed to research both the glorious history of Europe, as well as the primitive utterings of the Rg Veda.

There is the wonderful saying that we have all encountered that assures us that "history" is written by the victors. Consequently, the stories of the Garden of Eden, Noah's Ark, Abraham, Moses, the Judges, David, etc. are unquestioningly accepted by most European historians - and interestingly by many Indian historians! - as being incontrovertible and established fact. This, even though the evidence for these supposed historical facts are in many cases no stronger, or even less so, than the evidence supporting the historicity of the ancient stories of Sanatana Dharma. What these Western scholars and their Westernized Indian counterparts called the "mythical" Sarasvati River, for example, was discovered to be a concrete geological fact in our century by no less empirical evidence than satellite photography; Krishna's "mythological" city of Dvaraka was, likewise, impertinently discovered off the coast of Gujarat about two decades ago (anyone out there have a crane?). Despite these geological facts, the Puranas, Itihasas and traditional histories of India, unlike the Biblical "myths", are relegated by modern Euro-American scholars to the misty realm of "myth". Or more bluntly: primitive fables.

If we would venture to speculate that what has brought this stark double standard about has been nothing less than European racism and intellectual colonialism, coupled with a strong element of Hindu inferiority complex, we would not be far from the mark! The terms "myth", "mythology", "mythological", etc., have been used as a powerful weapon for decades as a way of delegitimizing the world-view of Sanatana Dharma, as well as the Hindu and Indian way of life.

Whether such unscholarly use of these otherwise legitimate terms will be allowed to continue as a weapon against the sacred stories of Vedic culture, or whether the use of such terms will be relegated to the same dust-bin of other such derogatory terms is up to both the greater community of ethical scholars, as well as practitioners of Sanatana Dharma. Such terms should be absolutely anathema to every sincere and self-respecting scholar when speaking about the sacred stories of Sanatana Dharma.

As a more positive alternative to these terms, I propose that South Asianists who study the religions of South Asia approach their purported object of research in a similar manner as do scholars who study many other formally oppressed non-Christian cultures (such as those who study Native American tribes). In these fields the religious stories of the subjects under study are often referred to by the more culturally sensitive term "Sacred Stories". We can later, as informed scholars, debate over the actual meaning of these stories - whether they are literal history (which in many cases they very clearly are), or meant to be taken allegorically or metaphorically. Let us all, in any case be in agreement that these Sacred Stories must never be degraded again by terming them "myth".

The Depolemicizing of South Asian Studies

The perennial use of politically surcharged words to stifle the aspirations of a people, to deflect the actual meaning of an action or concept, and to otherwise keep a people subservient to the dominant cultural mainstream is nothing new. Additionally, it is not new that the very people who have been the victims of such propangandistic terminology will inevitably come to adopt such terms in self-referential ways. We have the case of the Ethiopian Jews who for hundreds of years were termed "Falashas" - an incredibly derogatory term in the Ethiopian language - by those who persecuted them. After hundreds of years of such persecution, the Jews of Ethiopia even began to refer to themselves as the "Falasha" community. Such instances of the victims' adopting the polemic terminology of their oppressors has been witnessed repeatedly over the long course of human history - among the Jews, Native Americans, European Pagans, and now among the so-called Hindus.

Consequently, the use of inaccurate, and often consciously and maliciously distorted terminology has been a double-edged source of oppressive discourse. The use of such terms has been made use of by an intellectually lethargic tradition of South Asian scholars who view the religion of Sanatana Dharma not as the noble and vibrant living tradition that it is, but as their own personal academic plaything. On the other hand, followers of Sanatana Dharma have, in turn, blindly accepted these non-indigenous and inaccurate terms and adopted them as their own. Thus, while the bulk of the blame must placed squarely on the shoulders of the oppressors, the victims too need to free themselves of a colonialist-induced mentality of inferiority and acceptance of their oppression. It is my fervent hope, and I know it is the hope of the majority of ethical scholars of South Asian religions, that we will soon witness the beginning of a new way of viewing the nature, history and future of Sanatana Dharma.

Every revolution, however, begins with thoroughly grasping the power of the word.

Copyright Frank Morales, 2002

This article can be forwarded only in unaltered form and with due citation of author and source.

Dr. Frank Gaetano Morales, fmoralesATdharmacentral.com, (608) 280-8375, www.dharmacentral.com

Causation, four causes (karana)

Suhotra Prabhu: Substance and Shadow, Govinda Press, 1st ed. 1996, ISBN 3-906347-35-4, pp. 126-128:

"Aristotle proposed four causes (*aitiai* in Greek, or "reasons for something happening"). These are the material, formal, efficient, and final causes. Something created must have substance. That substance is the material (or ingredient) cause (causa materialis). Something created must have shape. That shape is the formal cause (causa formalis). Creating something is an act, and that act must be initiated. That which initiates creation is the efficient cause (causa efficiens). Something created must have a purpose. That purpose is the final cause (causa finalis).

"Any realistic plan of creation must account for these four causes. For instance, to create a house, there must be materials, an architectural design, a skilled construction crew, and a purpose that makes the building of the house worth the time and money. That, we would agree, is only reasonable. But we would not think it very reasonable if we were told that behind the four causes of the house there is a completely self-absorbed impersonal being that has no concern whatsoever whether the house is built or not. We reasonably expect that only a person with the will to see the job done can be responsible for the four-fold causation of the house. A personal controller of the four causes is coherent. An impersonal controller of the four causes is incoherent, because something impersonal has no intention and purpose. How, then, can impersonalists coherently answer the question "why?" (...)

"That Krsna is Himself the four causes proposed by Aristotle is indicated in Srimad-Bhagavatam 6.9.42. As *upadana*, He is the giver of the ingredients of creation. As *sva-rupena pradhana-rupena*, all material forms emanate from His eternal personal spiritual form. As *nimittayamana*, He is the efficient cause. And as *artha-visesa*, He manifests the special necessity or purpose of every living entity."

Note: Artha-visesa corresponds to dharma, nimittayamana is usually called nimitta-karana.

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