Can someone explain to me the basic tenets of Hinduism, and if it is related to Yoga? I have met so many yoga teachers that don't know how to answer this yet are free to speak about spiritual yoga stuff, so I remain confused.
Soul Meets Body: An initial examination of the Samkhya school
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Re: Soul Meets Body: An initial examination of the Samkhya school
#22Is wrong for several reasons. As a Samkhyavadin of the arithmetic kind, let me count some of them:
1. What's 'uncontested' would be strongly contested by both their classical interlocutors such as the Mimansakas and by modern scholars - for example, for linguistic reasons mentioned in one of the other comments.
2. Not sure what 'complete' philososophy means, but we might assume that some account of reason and logic is part of a complete philosophical system, in which case the Samkhyavadins like many of their counterparts, took the lead from the Naiyayikas, who were closely related but distinct. Same for grammar, where everyone took their lead from Panini and the grammarians.
3. I think calling it 'Vedic Philosophy' doesn't do justice either to the Vedas or to Philosophy. For example, the accurate, elaborate and intricate performance of ritual action is central to the Vedic experience. We can't reduce that to philosophical beliefs about dualism or monism without serious harm to the original practices. It's a sign of modernity that beliefs (such as dualism) are given precedence over ritual performance.
3. Words like 'derive' and 'axioms' suggest an overly mathematical relationship which would be impossible to justify. Even the Upanisads aren't derived from the Vedas in any axiomatic sense. The Prakriti-Purusa dualism finds a precedent in the Rig Veda which says "Two birds associated together, and mutual friends, take refuge in the same tree; one of them eats the sweet fig; the other abstaining from food, merely looks on" - try deriving the Soul from that imagery.
In fact, the most well known Samkhya (influenced) text isn't the Karika but the Mahabharata, including the Gita, with Arjuna playing the role of Prakriti and Krishna that of Purusa. Which is why - to use a deductive argument - Arjuna fights even when he doesn't want to and Krishna doesn't even when wants to.
I know I am being pedantic, but I find that these kinds of reductive Whig histories of Indian knowledge traditions perpetuate the problems they are trying to remove. Far more interesting, say, from the perspective of modern philosophy of mind, is the somewhat technical question: why did most Indian traditions consider mind, aka Manas, to be a physical entity? What does it say about their account of knowledge since Manas is an Indriya, i.e., an instrument of knowledge. What does it mean for knowledge to be physical and yet normative, i.e., how can something physical be true or false?"
To reduce these subtleties to 'Hindu Philosophy' or even to six schools of Astika philosophy is deeply problematic.
Re: Soul Meets Body: An initial examination of the Samkhya school
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
Indeed. Many Upanishads are, in spirit, opposed to the old Vedas, and some are outright critical of the ritualism that forms the core of the Vedas.
No, they are not. Upanishads are the later chapters of the Vedas. There are four vedas and ten principal upanishads. Hindu philosophy aims to be accessible and useful to everyone. In that, Upanishads offer a way for people who are unable to follow Vedic standards. An alternative is not opposition. It’s available choice. Upanishads are not against the Vedas. They just form the latter portions of Vedas. Eg: consider ch…
They are not a single coherent work of literature. They likely have dozens of authors and were composed over the span of over 1500 years. You can only describe them as "chapters" in the sense of "chapters of history", but not like "chapters" of a novel or series.
In that sense they are like the Torah and the New Testament of the Bible, which are also not books in the modern sense.
Re: Soul Meets Body: An initial examination of the Samkhya school
#24Earlier quoted context omitted.
No, they are not. Upanishads are the later chapters of the Vedas. There are four vedas and ten principal upanishads. Hindu philosophy aims to be accessible and useful to everyone. In that, Upanishads offer a way for people who are unable to follow Vedic standards. An alternative is not opposition. It’s available choice. Upanishads are not against the Vedas. They just form the latter portions of Vedas. Eg: consider ch…
> Upanishads are the later chapters of the Vedas. They are not a single coherent work of literature. They likely have dozens of authors and were composed over the span of over 1500 years. You can only describe them as "chapters" in the sense of "chapters of history", but not like "chapters" of a novel or series. In that sense they are like the Torah and the New Testament of the Bible, which are also not books in the…
And no, they are not ‘like the Torah’ or New Testament.
Re: Soul Meets Body: An initial examination of the Samkhya school
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can you provide some sources for your information ? From what I have read they are considered to be that part of the Vedas.
Here's an article that gets into the differences between the Vedic hymns and the later material that grew around them (in section 2): https://lrc.la.utexas.edu/eieol/vedol In particular: ”Over time a body of dependent and scholastic material grew up around the poems, known loosely as 'the Veda'. Perhaps around 1000 BC (all dating in prehistoric India is only approximate), editors gathered the ancient poems together a…
Re: Soul Meets Body: An initial examination of the Samkhya school
#26Samkhya school of thought makes space for non-deism and subscribe to duality. This is unique because dualism has always been associated with worship of the god head as often embraced by Vaishnavite sects. Samkhya offers a different perspective. The non deistic approach in Vedanta(the non dualism school of thought that is the opposite of samkhya school) is less significant than probably the Mimamsa school. All six ast…
It's convenient the natural hierarchy tells one lineage of human beings their entire purpose in life is to serve the people who discovered the "natural hierarchy". Reminds me of more recent discoverors of the "natural hierarchy" and their methods of educating others...
Re: Soul Meets Body: An initial examination of the Samkhya school
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ramakrishna is surprising to me. He literally grew up in a small village. Are you saying he was influenced later?
It's probably more accurate to ascribe it to his movement than Ramakrishna himself, but everyone would have been influenced by it. The "infrastructure" of philosophical discourse and spreading of ideas had largely atrophied away from neglect before the British even arrived in India. The big centers of learning, like Nalanda or Takshasila, had been burned out long ago. The traveling orders of priests were greatly dimi…
The atmosphere of philosophical debate was definitely alive during the time of Shankara. At what point between then and now did it die out?
Re: Soul Meets Body: An initial examination of the Samkhya school
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Upanishads are the later chapters of the Vedas. They are not a single coherent work of literature. They likely have dozens of authors and were composed over the span of over 1500 years. You can only describe them as "chapters" in the sense of "chapters of history", but not like "chapters" of a novel or series. In that sense they are like the Torah and the New Testament of the Bible, which are also not books in the…
Right then. But that doesn’t have anything to do with what I said. And no, they are not ‘like the Torah’ or New Testament.
My comment was narrowly addressing the use of the term "chapters" as used in literature being applied to the texts under discussion.
I made no comment about the spiritual functional claims you made about Hinduism.
> And no, they are not ‘like the Torah’ or New Testament
Yes they are like the Torah in the New Testament in that they are texts that developed over thousands of years predominantly in the ancient period, and only later were canonized. This is a relatively uncontroversial comparison between the historical development of ancient religious texts.
I made no claim about the similarity of their content, if that's what you are taking issue with.
Re: Soul Meets Body: An initial examination of the Samkhya school
#29(b) The notion of 'transcendence' is problematic to describe Sankya or any Indian traditions. In Semitic religions, God is outside of the cosmos that was, is and shall be. In other words, outside the space time. That's why He is transcendent. Yet He plays a causal role in this Cosmos; that's why he is immanent. This leads to huge problems in Semitic theologies.
(c) Purusha is "beyond any possible perception that is mediated by the mind or senses". If it is beyond senses, why bother? Isn't how this stuff is sold as transcendent (beyond space time), supra-mundane (beyond the mundane), etc? If one reads the text of Chandogya Upanishad carefully (but not all pages of commentaries), Prajapati makes the claim that Atman/Brhaman is seeable, accessible.
Re: Soul Meets Body: An initial examination of the Samkhya school
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
Right then. But that doesn’t have anything to do with what I said. And no, they are not ‘like the Torah’ or New Testament.
> But that doesn’t have anything to do with what I said. My comment was narrowly addressing the use of the term "chapters" as used in literature being applied to the texts under discussion. I made no comment about the spiritual functional claims you made about Hinduism. > And no, they are not ‘like the Torah’ or New Testament Yes they are like the Torah in the New Testament in that they are texts that developed over…