Date of Udhayana

[Vidyasankar Sundaresan]

Birgit Kellner <birgit.kellner at UNIVIE.AC.AT> wrote:

>nanda chandran wrote:
>
> > So given that the God and "no God" argument had been going on for quite
>a
> > while and KumArilla Bhatta himself who came before Shankara had argued
>so
> > forcefully against the concept of a creator God and Shankara himself
>having
> > given up trying to prove the existence of God on logical grounds which
>but
> > reflects the theologicians position (that a creator God cannot be
>logically
> > proven) in the chronology of Indian philosophy, isn't it strange that
> > UdhayAna, if he came after Shankara would try to prove the existence of
>god
> > on logical grounds?
>
>First: I am not familiar with the "Udhayana" referred to by SaGkara, but
>are you
>sure of the spelling? The later NyAya-VaiZeSika philosopher's name is
>correctly
>transliterated as "Udayana".

:-) Wasn't there a recent thread about this sort of transliteration,
involving the use of h's in words?

The only reference connecting Sankara and Udayana is in a hagiographic text,
which provides nothing more than the name, viz. Udayana. There is no
indication that the reference is to the naiyyAyika author of kiraNAvalI,
nyAyakusumAnjali and Atmatattvaviveka. The hagiography can safely be
ignored, when dating these two personalities relatively.

>
>Second: Even if it were admitted to be strange that Udayana should continue
>a
>debate that SaGkara decided not to continue - which I personally would not
>consider strange at all -

To this, I would add the following. It is not as if post-Sankaran
naiyyAyikas simply accepted the mImAMsA/vedAnta arguments against the notion
that God is the author of scripture. The nyAya school rejects the theory
that knowledge is intrinsically valid. It also does not accept an idea of
the eternality of sound. Not only Udayana (vide nyAyakusumAnjali), many
other post-Sankaran naiyyAyikas refute this idea.

Given the nyAya theory that all knowledge derives its validity from
extrinsic sources, irrespective of when he may have lived, Udayana still had
to argue for inferring the existence of a Creator-God (re: universe), who is
also supposed to be the Author-God (re: Vedas). For the naiyyAyika, the
Vedas are valid because they are authored by a trustworthy, omniscient
being. It is invalid to argue that Udayana cannot be post-Sankara, simply
because he provides these kinds of arguments.

Finally, in spite of his being a naiyyAyika, and in spite of arguing that
the universe is real, Udayana's affinity for advaita vedAnta (or soft
corner, perhaps, for advaita vedAntins) is something that has been widely
noticed and commented upon. See for example, the recent paper by Daya
Krishna (Is Udayana a Pracchanna Advaitin?) and response to this by N. S.
Dravid, in Journal of the Indian Council of Philosophical Research, 1996 and
1997. Madhusudana Sarasvati cites Udayana approvingly, in his advaitasiddhi.
> From Atmatattvaviveka, it is clear that Udayana came after Vacaspati Misra
and some post-Sankaran Buddhists like Ratnakirti. Many of his arguments
against the Buddhists end with statements that they should accept advaita
vedAnta positions. In Udayana's opinion, the advaitin theory of the
illusoriness/unreality of the world arises simply because the seeker of
liberation *ignores* the world. And he provides a hierarchical listing of
darSanas, with the vedAnta of Bhaskara occupying a low level, and the
advaita school occupying a level just below nyAya, which is at the top. All
of which suggests that he came after Sankara, not before.

Vidyasankar
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