Advaita and MAdhyamaka

[nanda chandran]

>ps. Re: your previous mail, I refused to take the bait, with
>all its words of learned length and thundering sound. If you
>can give me at least one quotation from an advaita text that
>says samsAra = nirvANa, I will think about discussing it with
>you.

If it were as simple as that we wouldn't be having an argument
about it, would we? The reason why you'll not find such a
statement in Advaita texts is the difference in the angle
from which the problem is approached by both schools.

NAgArjuna's concentration is entirely on the phenomenal world.
But to limit the scope of his dialectic as either a tool to
prove all theories as empty or to invalidate knowledge itself
doesn't do it full justice.

His destructive dialectic exposes the weakness of our
understanding of what we claim to be reality. The world is only
the world we know, but this knowing is ultimately deficient.
So that world is not what we assume it to be - in reality
there's neither production nor destruction, neither nihilism
nor eternalism, neither unity nor plurality, neither coming in
nor going out. With this the traditional way in which the
world is viewed by philosophers - as desire being the cause
of misery, spiritual progress and the eternal Self, liberation
as escape from the cycle of birth and death, knowledge being
the means to liberation are all invalidated. All these are just
conceptions and the true path to liberation starts only when
all views are relinquished.

But the ontological implication of his dialectic - the tattva
which is to be directly experienced and where all plurality is
merged - other than saying that it is only samsAra when not
viewed through the lens of causality and relativity, NAgArjuna
doesn't go beyond that.

That GaudapAda himself approves of AjAtivAda of the MAdhyamaka
is itself enough to prove Advaita's view of samsAra is only
the same as the MAdhyamikas. When there's neither production
nor destruction, where's birth and death or bondage and
liberation? But again as said before Advaita approaches the
problem from a different angle.

While NAgArjuna approaches reality from the phenomenal, Advaita
comes the other way. On the strength of the shruti and spiritual
experience, brahman is asserted as the truth - one without a
second. So what of the world? The world is mithya (unreal) and
mAyA (an illusion). The nature of this illusion? Shankara says
it is anirvAchaniya - neither real, nor unreal, nor both, nor
neither (the classic MAdhyamika chatushkoti). Beyond that Shankara
doesn't waste much effort trying to prove the unreality of the
world - he does his best to ignore it.

So why isn't Shankara saying the samsara is nirvAna? Because
only when you approach nirvAna from samsAra, would that question
arise. For when approaching reality through the phenomenal, the
phenomenal has some value and relation to the noumenal. But when
approached from nirvAna, where is samsAra? The point of
distinction is between the real and the unreal. From the unreal,
both the unreal and the real have value. But from the real, only
the real has value and not the unreal. The distinction is also
due to the approach of a philosopher who tries to teach reality
from the phenomenal and the jnaani who expounds reality based on
personal experience.

Let us take this argument further. If according to you in Advaita
the samsara = nirvAna + avidhya, equation doesn't work, then :

Logically mAyA can be interpreted in two ways : 1. The world is
merely an illusion and it vanishes after jnAna. 2. The world doesn't
vanish, but it is the duality that we perceive in the world that
ceases (the MAdhyamika position). So it is ontology Vs epistemology.

If the world is an illusion in the normal sense - i.e, it doesn't
exist for the jnAni after liberation, this would make a subjective
idealism of Advaita - i.e, then only the subject would be real. But
again if for the jnAni the world is an illusion in the normal
sense i.e, it doesn't exist for him, then to whom would he
teach jnAna to? For since the world is an illusion there's
nobody else apart from him. This would make the life of Shankara
who travelled around teaching Advaita, meaningless.

If it is said that for a jnAni though the world is an illusion,
he can still perceive it even after liberation, that would saying
that reality and unreality exists together. For when the jnAni
himself has "become reality" - brahmavid brahmaiva bhavati - how
can unreality exist along with him? Only as feasible, as light and
darkness existing together.

That jnAnis taught to others itself is the spanner in the works
for those who propound the "illusion" theory. It is also the proof
that the world doesn't "vanish into nothing" after jnAna - for then
they wouldn't have been able to teach it to others. The trick lies
in finding common ground between reality and unreality. An ontological
solution is impossible. So the samsAra = nirvAna + avidhya - the
epistemological solution, is the only answer.

Even modern sages like Ramana Maharishi have taught that it is
not the world itself which is the illusion, but only the duality
that we perceive in the world, that is the illusion.

>If you cannot, you have misunderstood both Sankara and
>Nagarjuna, so there is little point in the exercise.

...
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