When Bhagavatam rejects kaitava dharma why does it talk about Mayavada in many places?
Transcript
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Bhagavatam talks about Paradharma rejects Kaitava Dharma but then there are also places where the Bhagavatam talks Mayavada why is that when that is to be rejected answer the Bhagavatam does not exactly talk Mayavada it talks about impersonal concepts and impersonal terms now first thing to understand is that impersonalism is the impersonal conception is a valid conception of the absolute so the Bhagavatam will be referring to that we will have to look at words by words to see what it will be referring to but secondly and more importantly that we should not equate impersonalism with Mayavada Mayavada is when the impersonal is considered to be the highest and the personal is considered to be just a temporary being so that is Mayavada whereas just a reference to say Brahman that we should not consider to be Mayavada at all unless there are other very clear contextual statements to say that this is referring only to the all-pervading impersonal of the Bhajans because if you see Baldevudhyamushyam it gives a lot of scriptural quotations and recently Bhajans explains that Brahman refers not to the impersonal person Brahman refers to the personal absolute truth so now in the terminology that we use we refer to that as Bhagavan and Brahman as the impersonal absolute but no the word Brahman can also refer to the personal absolute so the word Brahman is not the monopoly of impersonals. Brahman is a generic reference to the absolute truth which can also refer to the impersonal aspect and the personal aspect so just the occurrence of Brahman in similar terms like that should not make us think that this is impersonal and we see this sort of extreme recoiling away from impersonalism as a reactionary tendency that Chaitanya Mahaprabhu differently proves we see that in the reaction of Charvabhattacharya Muktipadesa Dayabham we wanted to change it to Muktipadesa Dayabham so why? because he felt that because he thought that Mukti basically refers to impersonal and he felt that this impersonalism is very bad I have been saved from it I don’t want to do this Chaitanya Mahaprabhu he explained how the Muktipade actually refers to the supreme lord at whose lotus feet the bridge is designed it doesn’t refer to the attainment of Mukti rather it refers to the lord who is the restorer of Mukti so what happens is when we see impersonal terms or impersonal concepts we automatically assume that this is referring to impersonalism and the further mistake that is referring to impersonalism as the highest doctrine is Maya but it doesn’t, it could be very well referring to impersonalism as aspect of the absolute truth or it could be just using words which we associate with the impersonal aspect but the words can very well be referring to the personal aspect also so in general Dibhagavatam is a book focused on renunciation so when Krishnacharya Thakur in his 11th canto commentary in the Uddhava Gita he says that the action calling message of the Bhagavad Gita and the Uddhava Gita are significantly different the Bhagavad Gita is spoken to a person who is about to renounce duty and Krishna wants him to do his duty so therefore Krishna recommends either Karma Yoga or Bhakti Yoga and Krishna almost nowhere in the Gita recommends Yama Yoga because the context calls primarily for engagement not renunciation in contrast the Bhagavatam the Uddhava Gita is spoken to Uddhava who now the whole Guru dynasty has been destroyed and Krishna wants Uddhava to renounce the world and not only the Uddhava Gita like that has that context but the Bhagavatam itself has that context that Krishna Maharaj is about to die the whole focus of the Bhagavatam is you have to get out of the world and therefore he says he analyzes the Uddhava Gita and he says that the Uddhava Gita’s message essentially is that Bhakti is the best way for liberation but if you cannot practice Bhakti you might better practice Yama and disentangle oneself from the world so the Uddhava Gita doesn’t support Karma Yoga at all sometimes it does but very few why? because the focus is on getting liberation you know Jnana Yoga is often associated with impersonation so one of the Bhagavatam’s focus is on disentangling oneself from materialistic now if you see very critically and carefully you will see that the personal aspect is ultimately emphasized as the highest and that we see that in the Tantra very clearly Krishna passed away so vividly and it is clearly talked about how this is due to the highest and this manifestation of the Lord is the highest but then the impersonal is also talked about because that is also one way to liberation and the whole focus is on Jnana Yoga so Dharma Projit it means first of all Dharma and ultimately to its very context that Shukadeva Goswami gives up Moksha that is also talked about but the impersonal references do not refer to Mayavada they can refer to the personal aspect the impersonal aspect as a aspect of the Absolute Truth or they may refer to impersonal Samvidamsa which is a refer to the personal aspect actually or because first is renunciation so Jnana Yoga and the impersonal aspect are considered second favorite after Bhakti Yoga and Bhagavatam is the personal aspect and the purpose of Shrila Prabhupada generally is to Yes, Prabhupada’s purpose is directly devotional it is the essential conclusion whatever is given towards the end of the passage or the book Prabhupada gives consistently throughout now of course there is a elaborate Sanskrit analysis to explain how actually those verses can be explained devotionally also it is not like the verse is saying impersonal and Prabhupada is giving personal the verse itself can be if you look at Sanskrit semantics the verse is explainable in multiple ways and Prabhupada gives us impersonal expression it is not necessarily that each time the default expression of the verse is impersonal and the Acharya is giving personal but rather the default expression of that can also be multiple and the Acharya is giving the personal aspect