The Fodder of First causes

[Edwin Bryant]

On Sat, 18 Dec 1999, Vidyasankar Sundaresan wrote:

> Well, in the Advaita two-level perspective, the question of avidyA arises
> only at a level that presumes avidyA. It does not arise at the level of the
> highest Brahman. So he does not have to explain the samyoga, as he has just
> denied its reality.

OK.  But philosophy, after all, takes place on the level of conventional
reality, and it is on this level that the exchanges between those schools
that subscribe to philosophical discourse and the rules of nyaya, etc,
take place.  It is precisely when they depart from philosophical concepts
and take recourse to notions such as anirvacaniya, lila, or acintya, etc,
that they provide fodder for their opponents.

> Each of Sankara's detractors has his own version of problem that poses
> as a solution. No one can adequately "explain" the first karma that
> causes saMsAra.  To say that it is beginningless is one solution, but
> this is exactly Sankara's position too, and I suspect that it won't be
> a satisfactory solution for contemporary sensibilities. One has to say
> that it is all lIla, which can serve as an "explanation" for anything
> and everything, while another has to invoke a strangely alien doctrine
> of eternal damnation. A third detractor creates more logical
> difficulties than he solves, by saying that Brahman is at once one and
> many. To qualify this by the term acintya does not really solve the
> problem. Somehow, the overwhelming reliance on a saviour God in the
> theistic schools masks these issues, perhaps because the emphasis
> within the tradition shifts from philosophy to other issues. But dig
> deep enough, and the same intractable problems come out, only couched
> in different terms and in different contexts.

Yes, the theists have their own problems, and the same basic arguments
against them keep surfacing in Mimamsa, Jain, Buddhist and other sources.
If the Jiva is distinct from an eternal Isvara in so far as the jiva is
subject to maya while the former is not, then how did jiva find itself
under the influence of Maya? If Isvara placed it there (and Madhva is
indeed peculiar here in his extreme position of jivas being placed in
samsara for eternity), then Isvara is cruel. If some are placed in samsara
and others (nityaparSad) are not, then Isvara is partial.  If jiva's own
desire is the cause, and karma then reacts to this desire and triggers off
samsaric existence, then wherefrom the first inappropriate desire and
karmic act?  So Samkara is by no means alone in taking recourse to notions
of anirvananiya (acintya, etc) as you point out.  Obviously, first causes
are a problem for everyone throughout the history of human thought.

Edwin Bryant