Tuesday, May 1, 2007

Conflicts between Buddha Teaching and Veda -2

Recently I came across a famous well-known book among followers of Vedic Teaching named "The True History and the Religion of India", a concise Encyclopedia of Authentic Hinduism written by "His Divinity,Dharm Chakrvarti, Swami Prakashanand Saraswati".
For more details on the author read http://barsanadham.org/shree_swamiji.html

Now i will reproduce text "as it is" of pages 568-571 of the above book which can be treated as conflicts . This time by Vedic scholars on Buddha's Teaching.
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Gautam Buddh, although he was a Divine Personality, did not introduce the Divinity at all in his teachings. According to the need of the existing social conditions of that time, he only introduced the path of compassion for the beings of the world which is just the sattvic quality of maya. Maya is such a peculiar power which exists like 'nothing' for a God realized Saint, and, during the maha pralaya, it exists like 'absolute nothingness.' So, Gautam Buddh designed his theory of "nothingness." Accordingly, it is called "shoonya vad," which means the philosophy of nothingness or the philosophy of mayavad. There are four branches of Buddhism, called: Madhyamik, Yogachar, Vaibhashik and Sautrantik. There are slight differences in their philosophy, but all of them, in general, are called shoonya val. That's why Buddhism is called a non-Godly religion.

The secret of Gautam Buddh's 'enlightenment' and his term 'nirvan':
When Gautam Buddh said that he got enlightenment after 49 days of fasting and meditation, it doesn't mean that previously he was ignorant and then he become enlightened in a literal sense. His 'enlightenment' only meant 'the discovery of a truth,' and the truth was that desires are the causes of pain; so, removethe desires, and the pain is gone.

Gautam Buddh used the word nirvan for this kind of desireless and thoughtless state of mind. Nirvan word means to extinguish (the flame of the desires). Desires create anxieties and excite the heart so they are paraphrased as a flame, like the flame of a candle. Now take an example: A candle is burning. You extinguish it. But, as long as the candle is there, it can again be ignited, because the burning element, the wick and wax, is still there. This is nirvan, to temporarily extinguish the flame of the desires.

Thus, nirvan is not liberation from the mayic bondage, it is only an intermediate state. Liberation means the total elimination of the mind along with the past uncountable accumulated karmas of a soul (which means the total destruction of the candle according to the above example). The same is the case with the practises of Jain religion. So, after attainingthe ultimate height, the nirvan (according to both, the Jain and Buddh religions), the practitioner has to adopt the guidelines of the scriptures (Sanatan Dharm) and do bhakti to a personal form of God. Only then hemay receive liberation from the mayic bondage of birth and death with the Grace of God, otherwise not. But the approach of Gautam Buddh was only up to nirvan and the 'absolute nothingness(Shoonya Vad) which is a mayic state, and so his theory was formulated on non-Godly grounds.

The self-contradictions of his philosophy:

His philosophy is self-contradictory. It says that out of nothing the whole universe was created and mind(Vgyanskand) is only an accumulation of informations which a person receives through his senses. Mind has the ability to create the body and the visual world. Mind, along with its emotions, attachments and informations, is the prime thing called antarsamudaya, the inner accumulated thing that creates the vahyasamydaya, the outside world which is changing every moment. Liberation from the pains of the world is called nirvan in Buddh religion which is a state of mind when all the thoughts, all the desires and all the attachments are totally removed from the mind through the practise of meditation and renunciation. This is the theory of Buddhism.

If you carefully examine their theory you will find that its every aspect is self-contradictory. Its is an axiom that nothing could be produced out of total nothingness; then how was the whole universe created out of total nothingness? When mind itself is only the accumulation of informations and thoughts, how then was the mind initially formed when there was no human body, no visual world and thus no information? Thoughts are the cause of every action on the body. Total elimination of thoughts and desires from the mind, which is the nirvan state of Buddhism, would cause the body of the doer to appear like a dead log. Such a nirvan is not even witnessed in the history of Buddhism. The particles of an atom are bound with its nuclear power otherwise they would be wandering loose in the space. When the 'mind' aspect in Buddhism is only the accumulation of thoughts and informations, what is then the binding factor of those individual thoughts and informations which holds them together in the form of a mind? Such contradictions are the basic faults of Buddhism on which its entire theory if formulated.

Reconciliation of Buddh and Jain theories: A question arises: What was the use of creating such a theory of nothingness, or the imaginative theory of soul ( in Jainism) where it is lighter or heavier and smaller or larger?

It has already been stated that both Jain and Buddh religions were introduced for only a particular and specific purpose of showing the path of humbleness and compassion, because the animal killers, meat eaters, and non-Godly chatriya rulers of those days had no interest in God. So they needed the lesson of compassion which was the best thing for them to become good people, and thus, gradually practicing to renounce their wordly ambitions, they may become happier in their life. The talk of God was not needed for them. Thus, whatever theory was created was enough for them, and the main thing was that the practise of being humble and compassionate, and the procedures of penance, fasting, renunciation and meditation, or whatever was formulated in those two religions was to improve the sattivic quality of the doer. By practicing these religions, when the person has released his worldly desires and attachments, he would naturally being to think of God and God realization and His absolute Bliss; and in that case he would naturally be drawn towards the greatness of Hindu scriptures and begin to follow the path of Sanatan Dharm. That was the hidden secret behind the formation of both the dharmas, Jain and Buddh. But the common people of kaliyug always take things in their wanted style, and thus, instead of following the universal tachings of Sanatan Dharm, the followers of Jain and Buddh dharmas made it an excuse to criticize the Sanatan Dharm.

Buddhism after Gautam Buddh: Sometime after Gautam Buddh the integrity of Buddhism began to fall and the Buddhists, instead of following the path of purity, humbleness and giving respect to others, become involved in religions politics, self praise and opposing Vedic dharm
. Their vanity and opposition had become so strong that when Shankaracharya was born, at that time they were acting as a headstrong born enemy of Vedic dharm. They destroyed our religious books and tried to kill Kumaril Bhattas he was a follower of Vedic dharm. Their monasteries grew in numbers and they were quite prosperous in India in those days. Jains were not so popular as Buddhists in those days but they also freely criticized Vedic dharm. So, to overthrow the effect of Buddhism from India, Shankarcharya used the philosophy of advait vad and re-establised Sanatan Vedic dharm.

The present situation: It is general rule that when a person neglects, disrespects or criticizes the supreme Divinity ( Krishn, Ram, Vishnu, Shiv or Durga) or His devotion ( bhakti) or His Divine love, leelas or abodes, in any way, or allegorizes and misinterprets the Divine events and the Divine facts of our scriptures, it becomes a spiritual transgression. Such a transgression pollutes the heart of the doer as it is a direct contempt against the supreme Divine power. The second thing is that although honestly and sincerely following the spiritual practises as prescribed by a religion ( which is introduced by a holy man) purify the heart to some extent if they are humbly practiced, but if the practitioner commits spiritual transgressions, his heart becomes more and more polluted, even if he follows a religion as a routine; and in general, this is the case with the monks of both the these religions.