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RE: "sandhyavandanam" and Sri.Sridhar Srinivasan

From the Bhakti List Archives

Mani Varadarajan • August 4, 1999 


Srimaan Krishna Kalale wrote:
> Visistadvaita subscribes to the view that one should only leave 
> the karma-phala or fruits of karmas and kartrtva ie. not consider that the 
> he/performer is the agent of the karma. 

> Visistadvaita does not 
> subscribe for karma-svarupa tyaga or total relinquishing of the activities 
> themselves.

I am glad Krishna, a veritable export on the Gita, has clarified
things for us. What Krishna has written is exactly in line with
what Swami Alavandar explains in sloka 31 of the Gitarthasangraha:

	[The highest devotee] performs all acts, from the enjoined
	ones upto bhakti, only out of selfless love of the Supreme.
	Abandoning the notion that these various activities form 
	a means (upAya)	to moksha, he should consider the Lord himself
	as the means thereof.

	nijakarmAdi-bhaktyantam kuryAt prItyaiva kAritaH |
	upAyatAm parityajya naset deve tu tAmabhiH ||

The enjoined religious acts are not abandoned. What is abandoned is the 
fruit of any of these activities (karma-phala-tyAga), the notion that one 
is the doer (kartRtva-tyAga), and the notion that any of these activities 
(karma-yoga, sandhyAvandana, or even bhakti) are a "means" of getting moksha.  
The Lord himself is the means.

adiyEn rAmAnuja dAsan
Mani