Re: On the worship of Vedic Gods and anya-devatas

From the Bhakti List Archives

• June 2, 1999


"Madhavkkannan, Vasudevan" wrote:

> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Venkatesh K. Elayavalli [SMTP:vke@cypress.com]
> > Sent: Wednesday, June 02, 1999 3:33 AM
> > To:   bhakti@lists.best.com
> > Subject:      On the worship of Vedic Gods and anya-devatas
> >
> > However, Pillai Lokacharya does not address the Vedic Gods directly
> > and some present day scholars have included Indra, Agni etc as well
> > as Buddha, (with respect to non-worshipable forms of Narayana),
> > which, in my opinion, is incorrect.
> >
> >
> Dear Sri Venkatesh,
>
> When you said "incorrect" do I interpret you that we can worship
> Buddha, along with agni, Indra.. Am I misunderstanding you?
>
> Regards
>
> Narayana Narayana
>
> dAsan

Dear Sri Madhavakkannan,

What I meant to say regarding that was, It is incorrect to include
Vedic gods like Agni, Indra among un-worshipable forms/manifestations
of  Vishnu, while it is even more erroneous to include Buddha as
an incarnation/manifestations of Narayana.

The expalnation for includig Buddha as an incarnation of Narayana is,
as Buddha he discredited Vedas to save it from its misuse by jivas
at that time. To me it appears similar to saying two wrongs make a
right. I have not come across any of our purvacharyas and present
day acharyas included Buddha as an avatar of Narayana, be it
the 10 important ones or the 39  vaibhava avatars of Narayana.
I will be glad to reconsider my view  if some one can point to works
of our purvacharyas who have included Buddha as an incarnation of
Narayana.


adiyen

Venkatesh