16 Dec 2022
1. Why are Brahma Sūtrās referred as Nyāya Prasthāna?
[Shri Ganesh asked: Padanamskaram Swamiji, Why are the Brahma Sūtrās known as Nyāya Prasthāna? At Your divine feet, Ganesh V]
Swami replied: The various statements in the Upanishads appear to be contradicting each other. Through the Brahma Sutras, Sage Vyasa gave the logical analysis to remove these apparent contradictions and correlate them. Nyaya is another word for logic. Hence, the Brahma Sutras are known as Nyaya Prasthana.
2. Why are the Vedas, Bhagavad Gita, and Brahma Sutras important to prove the existence of God?
[Padanamskaram Swamiji, Why are the Vedas, Bhagavad Gita and Brahma Sutras important for theists to prove the existence of God? Aren't genuine miracles enough? At Your divine feet, Ganesh V]
Swami replied: There should be some theoretical background with logical analysis as we find both theory and experiments in science, engineering and medicine etc. These three Prasthanas are the text books of the theoretical side.
3. Why can't the svarūpa lakṣaṇam and taṭastha lakṣaṇam be the same?
[Padanamskaram Swamiji, Why can't the svarūpa lakṣaṇam be the same as taṭastha lakṣaṇam? At Your divine feet, Ganesh V]
Swami replied: Sometimes, the associated characteristic (Tatastha Lakshanam) can act as inherent characteristic (Svaruupa Lakshanam), but, it can’t become exactly inherent characteristic. A yellow thread on the neck of a married lady is an associated characteristic by itself since it can be separated from her at any time. But, she will never remove that and thus, the associated characteristic (yellow thread) is acting like the inherent characteristic for a married lady. Similarly, the Veda says that God is excellent spiritual knowledge and here actually, this should be taken that God is the embodiment of excellent spiritual knowledge. When a quality is in excess in a person, that person is told as that quality (Guṇātiśaye guṇini guṇa vyapadeśaḥ).
God is associated with a human medium while becoming the human incarnation to preach excellent spiritual knowledge to humanity. In this way also, the associated characteristic (excellent spiritual knowledge) can act as inherent characteristic since such knowledge is never separated from God. In this way, the Vedic statement that God is excellent spiritual knowledge (Prajñānaṃ Brahma) can be explained in both ways:-
1) Treating the possessor of a quality as the quality itself if the quality is in excess.
2) The associated characteristic can act as inherent characteristic when it is not separated from its possessor.
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