Category Archives: Sanskrit Philosophy

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Index Buddhicus at Brill looking for researchers

Brill Academic Publishers is looking for two to four indexers for its new classified bibliography for Buddhist Studies edited in close collaboration with the Center for Religious Studies (CERES), Ruhr University Bochum, Germany.

It is intended that the Index Buddhicus will be the main academic bibliographical reference in the field of Buddhist studies. It will consist of classified bibliographical records for monographs, reviews, chapters in edited volumes, journal articles, reference works, electronic resources, and whatever else is thought relevant in Western language secondary literature.

Supervisor: Richard Mahoney

Workspace: Ruhr University of Bochum, Germany

Requirements:

MA (or higher)-level knowledge of Buddhist studies
The indexers will be appointed on a project basis, but in the longer term a fixed position within the framework of the project is possible. Initial duration: 12 months. Salary is an hourly basis ranging from E 15–E 18. Indexing a sample of articles will be part of the selection procedure.

Official start: December 2013 or January 2014

Deadline for applications: October the 22nd.
Further details are available here:

http://www.ceres.rub.de/en/news/all/en-20131002-job-index-buddhicus/

Please direct all enquires to Prof. Sven Bretfeld, Ruhr University Bochum, Universitaetsstr. 150, FNO 01/176, 44780 Bochum.

sven.bretfeld[at]rub.de

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Who are the Vedāntins?

Who wrote the following quotes?

There is an Upaniṣadic sayiong that the Brahman is one only, without a second. But the existence of something different than the Brahman refutes this. To this we say: in the mention of “without a second” what does the compound intend? Is it a tatpuruṣa or a bahuvrīhi (attributive compound)? […]

Moreover, which consciousness modifies itself (vivṛt-) in the form of the deployment (prapañca)? To begin with, it is not the notion of [simple objects] like a pot, since the [deployment] is seen also when such notions are not present. And since it is not the case that one can say that if such a notion were not produced, or if it were destroyed, the whole world would not exist. And if one were to say it, [one’s assertion] would be invalidated by one’s sense-perception. […]

If X  appears without Y, even Y appears also without X. For instance, [a cloth] appearing even without a pot [and] a pot itself [appearing] without a cloth.

You have surely understood that we are within a Vedāntic framework (i.e.: using the Upaniṣads as one’s foundamental point of reference, evoking the brahman). What else?

Would you have understood that the framework is not-Advaitin? Probably so, given that the last verse mentioned refutes the sahopalambhaniyama (the rule according to which if two things are simultaneously grasped, like cognitions and external objects —which are only grasped through cognitions— they are not different). However, you might be surprised to know that the author is Yāmuna (in his Āgamaprāmāṇya).

In the light of that, what does the distinctive contribution of Śrī Rāmānuja consists in, apart from systematization and more accurate treatment of many detailed features?

You can read some more open questions on Rāmānuja by clicking on the category “Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta”.

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शब्दनित्यत्वविषये शबरवेदान्तदेशिकयोर् मतौ

मीमामसाशास्त्रे, सूत्रषु ६–२४ अनेकाः पूर्वपक्षाः (तेषामुत्तराणि च) कथ्यन्ते । शब्दः कर्तृक इति ते पूर्वपक्षिन मन्यन्ते । यद्येवं स्यात्, शब्दस्यार्थेन नित्यसम्बन्धो ऽप्यसम्भव एव । एतस्मात् करणात् ते पूर्वपक्षाः न मीमांसकानामुक्ताः, अपि तु नैयायिकादीनाम् ।

सूत्राणाम् १।१।६–११पर्यन्तात् शबरस्वामिनः भाष्यं स्वल्पमेव । श्रीवेदान्तदेशिकैस्तु  स्फोटनिरासः, केषांचिच्चोपनिषद्वाक्यानां व्याख्यमपीह लिखितम् ।

६-सूत्रम् “कर्मैके तत्र दर्शनात्” इति । भाष्यपठणात्पूर्वम् “शब्द कर्म एव, इति केचिद्वदन्ति, क्रियानन्तरं शब्दस्य दर्श्नात्” इति मयावगतम् । शाबरभाष्ये ऽपि शब्दो ऽनित्यः क्रियमानत्वादिति व्याख्यातम् ।

श्रीवेदान्तदेशिकानां सेश्वरमीमांसायां तु “कर्म” इति शब्दस्य वाचक्तवं, न तु शब्द एव । “तत्र दर्श्नात्” इति च “संकेते सति वाचकत्वदर्शनात्” इति ।

यथा कात्यायनवार्त्तिके अादौ “सिद्ध शब्दस्यार्थेन संबन्धः“, तथा  मीमांसासूत्रेषु १।१।१–१।१।५ अपि शब्दार्थसंबन्ध  एव नित्यः, न तु शब्द स्वयम् । नैयायिकास्तु शब्द नाद एव इति मन्वानः शब्दस्यानित्यत्वं स्वीकुर्वन्ति ।

अतः मीमांसादृष्टौ वेदान्तदेशिकमतं युक्तमेव ।  नैयायिकदृष्टौ तु शबरस्वामिनः ।

 

एतस्मिन् “ब्लोगे” संस्कृत“पोस्ट्” मासे मासे प्रथमे सोमवासरे पठितव्यानि ।

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“Philosophy is the only thing alive”. An interview with Aleix Ruiz-Falqués (part 2)

Aleix Ruiz-Falqués (his blog is here) studies (in Cambridge) Pāli Grammatical Literature written in Burma. He is an engaged scholar and one who is not shy to get involved in controversies about ideas. You can read the first part of this interview here. This time I will be asking him more general (and more provocative) questions.

EF: In some of your posts (see here and here), you seem to be quite sceptical about Anthropology as applied to Buddhism (i.e., you seem to share the textual-based approach you described in the first part of your interview). You also exhibited some scepticism concerning comparative philosophy and comparatism in general. How do you see interactions with people outside your field? Are they still possible, these premisses notwithstanding?

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How to justify Testimony? Indian and Western views

Concerning the Epistemology of Testimony, one can first distinguish between reductionists (claiming that Testimony is just a subset of Inference) and anti-reductionists (claiming that Testimony is a distinct instrument of knowledge). In India and in the West, we have reductionists (David Hume, Elisabeth Fricker, Buddhist Pramāṇavāda, Vaiśeṣika) and anti-reductionists (Thomas Reid, Jennifer Lackey, Arindam Chakrabarti, Nyāya, Mīmāṃsā).

Interestingly, however, in the West reductionists insist on the need for testimony to be grounded on something else (e.g., on the reliability of the speaker), whereas anti-reductionists claim that  we have a “presumptive right” to accept testimony, so that it “is a source of justification in its own right” (Gelfert 2010).

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Secondary signification for Kumārila, Prabhākara and Rāmānuja

Can the Absolute be at the same time One and still be defined as existence, knowledge and bliss? Rāmānuja discusses this topic with an opponent in his Śrī Bhāṣya on Brahma Sūtra 1.1.1. The opponent says that if the Absolute brahman is only Oneness, then all attributes would end up as having to be understood only  metaphorically (lakṣaṇā). Rāmānuja replies that this would not be a problem, since contextual meaning (tātparyavṛtti) —which, we understand, includes the possibility of secondary signification (lakṣaṇā)— overrules direct meaning (abhidhānavṛtti):

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Is the Veda the body of God? (Yoshimizu 2007–II part)

How can one interpret a Vedic passage by saying that a certain meaning was not “intended” (vivakṣita), while still thinking that the Veda has no personal author?

The Mīmāṃsā cannot renounce the idea that the Veda has no personal author (apauruṣeyatva): its whole theory about the Veda’s validity depends on this principle. However, Kumārila needs also to explain in which sense one can decide whether an interpretation of the Veda is right or not on the basis of whether it is intended (vivakṣita). How can one speak of intention if there is no author?

Rule-extension strategies in ancient India by Elisa Freschi, Tiziana Pontillo (Frankfurt a.M.: Peter Lang, 2013)

This study focuses on the devices implemented in Classical Indian texts on ritual and language in order to develop a structure of rules in an economic and systematic way. These devices presuppose a spatial approach to ritual and language, one which deals for instance with absences as substitutions within a pre-existing grid, and not as temporal disappearances. In this way, the study reveals a key feature of some among the most influential schools of Indian thought. The sources are Kalpasūtra, Vyākaraṇa and Mīmāṃsā, three textual traditions which developed alongside each other, sharing – as the volume shows – common presuppositions and methodologies. In the intentions of its authors, the book will be of interest for Sanskritists, scholars of ritual exegesis and of the history of linguistics.

Further informations here.

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Plurality of subjects in Mīmāṃsā: Kiyotaka Yoshimizu 2007

Is the plurality of subjects compatible with the idea of a Vedāntic kind of liberation (in which there seems to be no distinction among different souls)? And can there be an absolute brahman if there are still distinct subjects?