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Re: Vibhava lokas

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Sadagopan • September 9, 1999 


Dear Sri Srikanth:

Most of us have been trained in Scientific 
disciplines and yet come from VedAnthic
backgrounds .It is in this context your
excellent analysis of the case in point 
impresses me as a credible synthesis 
of the two views . I like your reference
to the explanation of some thing that is
beyond description for functional understanding . 

Thanks very much ,

V.Sadagopan 
 
At 03:32 AM 9/8/99 -0500, you wrote:
>
>Hi,
>
>On Tue, 7 Sep 1999, Murali Kadambi wrote:
>
>> Mani, the existence of the VishNu lOka is unmistakable according to the
>> pAncarAtra texts and also in the vEdas.  e.g.,
>> 1.  "na tatra suryObhAti, na candra tArakam ...":  In that lOka of
>> vishNu, there are no suns, moons, and stars.
>
>To comment from the infinitessimalitude of my personal experience and
>reflection upon this topic, rather than from actual erudition of the
>relevant scriptures, I suggest that the above description need not be
>taken to imply solely the spatio-physical character of Sri VaikunTham. 
>
>Those lines are no more indicative of Sri VainkunTham as a place than
>is Sri Krishna's elucidation of the Atman, when He asserts "na enam
>cindanti SastrAni, na ca enam kledayati apaH..." (weapons do not cleave
>it, water does not wet it, the Wind does not dry it...), indicative of 
>the Atman as a physical thing!
>
>In both instances, it is purely a case of resorting to a picturesque and
>at the same time functional explanation of the highest order in the face
>of verbal description being unsuitable to express a profound,
>reference-less experience,
>
>For example, how do we describe the sweetness of a sugarcane to a person
>devoid of the sense of taste? We could adopt the mundane approach to
>elaborate its orthogonality to senses like vision, touch, etc., or adopt
>the vividness of the Vedas' and Sri Krishna's technique, by negating
>specific spatial, visual etc. experiences.
>
>However, I think that visualization of Paramapadam as a spatial realm
>might be felt to be an aid to meditation. I strongly suspect that it is in
>this sense that the more physical descriptions are to be rightly viewed.
>
>Hari Om,
>Srikanth