SB 11.23.52 – Dismissing our suffering as illusion is no solution

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Shri Bhagavatam 11.23.52 so here Avanti Brahmana is continuing analysis of the various causes of suffering Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting so now he is analysing is the soul himself the cause of his suffering normally you will say yes I am the cause of my suffering and we should be able to place the responsibility on the soul but surprisingly Avanti Brahmana disagrees and he gives a penetrating analysis to support his thesis Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting Chanting whereas we know from the philosophy from the scriptures that the soul does not have the pain as a part of its nature the soul is Sat Chit Anand so its nature cannot be happiness and pain cannot be a part of its nature it’s only happiness that can be a part of its nature that is its intrinsic nature Chanting Chanting so in this proposition actually the only soul exists and everything is illusion. So here he’s talking about the different conception of the soul often likened to the impersonalist conception where the soul is considered to be the only reality then which is a inference from the proposition that the soul is the causal reality. Causal reality means that which is a part of reality that comprises a cause.
So if the soul himself is the cause of suffering, if the soul is the causal reality then from there we inference that soul is the only reality that’s the impersonalist idea and everything else is illusion. So we are all one and we are that one soul which can be called as Brahman and then So actually nothing apart from the Atma exists and everything else is illusion. So if everything is illusion then where is the scope for suffering over there.
So here we see the self-contradiction that Mayavad eventually leads to that actually the soul itself like the idea is Brahman himself is the Brahman himself is performing some Leela and that’s why the Brahman himself is coming under suffering then actually nothing exists apart from Brahman. So either how is suffering there suffering either the part of the two possibilities that if Brahman has its intrinsic part as a Svabhava Sukha Dukha both happiness and distress and that is false. The other proposition is that how can the question is how can the Brahman suffer.
So the other proposition is that the Brahman alone exists and all suffering is an illusion. Actually nothing else exists only. So then if nothing else exists then even suffering doesn’t exist and why are we so worked up by suffering but we are definitely worked up by suffering.
So the idea that the self itself is the cause of all suffering is doesn’t stand logical scrutiny because it can’t answer the question whether it says that the suffering is a part of the intrinsic nature of the soul or suffering is just an illusion. Suffering cannot be a part of the intrinsic nature of the soul because that is not a scriptural verdict. In contrast suffering cannot be just an illusion because we experience it to be real and we need we can’t dismiss suffering away as real at our stage.
We have to do something real to deal with the suffering. So kruddheta kasmana sukham dukkham and further if at all we were to say that suffering is just an illusion then there will be no reason to become angry also. Actually there is no happiness and there is no distress so there is no kruddheta kasmana what is the need for becoming angry and in this way also there would be no reason for suffering.
So as devotees we have to understand that we don’t subscribe to this idea that there is no suffering in the world or that everything apart from the brahman is unreal. It’s unreal in the sense that it is temporary but it is not illusion. Our suffering in this world is real and that’s why rather than comparing it to an illusion it’s more often compared to a disease like amnesia.
So when there is amnesia there has to be a proper cure and that’s why in the bhakti scriptures more than moha or equivalent to moha it is the term that is used is smriti and the forgetfulness and smriti is what is required to revive that to break free from the forgetfulness and that’s why the scripture injunction is remember Krishna. And revive our spiritual memory so we can’t dismiss the world away as an illusion but rather we recognize that it is peripheral to us and we cure that amnesia that disease which has made us identify this peripheral reality as a central reality and this cure which centers in the cultivation of remembrance is most efficiently promoted through the chanting of the holy names. The holy name offers us a potent means by which we can easily remember