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UbhayaVedanta Sabha
The desire to do beneficial or good things arose with the birth of the human being . To fulfil this desire ,the human being started a search . The path of the westerners to attain this is different from the approach of the Indians. For the Westerners , good conduct , beneficial conduct , the search for the true Self are all the same. For them, none of the above is separate from their religion. All their attempts to do good things flow
only from their religious books.
In the tradition of the Indians religion is different and good conduct is different .In our country ,the
Sruthis and the Smruthis direct that the principles of good conduct as laid down in the four "varnas" and the
four stages in life are asramas , viz. the Brahmacharya , Grihastha ,Vaanaprasta and Sanyasa Asramas should
be followed. That is why we are first Jivas and thereafter only beings . Thereafter , we are governed by the
Varnasrama and only there after we belong to our religion. Thus , the Indian tradition is that the Jiva ,the
Being and the principles of the Varnasrama are different from religion. In India ,to whatever caste among
the four castes a person may belong , things like the naming ceremony , the first feeding , and such other
traditions are all the same . Similarly , only after dealing with food , sleep , fear , union , and principles of
human conduct like truth , non-violence, and after mentioning the activities like the naming ceremony , then only a reference is made [a place given ] to religion . These priniciples were explained by Maharshis like
Aapasthambha, Bodaayana, Kartyaayana, Yaagnavalkya and others in their great works of aphorisms.
Ancient seers like Manu , Parasara and others explained these in their Smruthis .All these followed what
was already indicated in the Vedas . After this , the thought process began pertaining to the reality of the
Truth , beneficial conduct and the end objects of life . Those who accepted the Vedas as the Authority in
the above analysis relating tothe Reality were regarded as believers or Aasthikas and those who did not
accept the authority of the Vedas were called non -believers are Naasthikas.The Manu Smruthi [2-11]says :
The six important creeds in the Vedic religion are the Nyaaya of Gautama , theVaiseshika of Kaana , the Sankhya of Kapila, theYoga of Patanjali , the Poorva Mimaamsa of Jaimini, and the Uttara Mimaamsa of Baadaraayana . Among the above , the Uttara Mimaamsa of Baadaraayana attained prominence as that gives an insight into the Vedanta. Because of the differences in interpretation of the above Maharshis, though the Vedas are one , the creeds became six .All of them accepted the authorities of the Vedas , but as stated by Sir S Radhakrishnan in his book "Indian Philosophy" the differences in the approach of the different creeds were only because of the sages and authors themselves . It is from the Uttara Mimaamsa of Baadaraayana , the Advaita , the Visishtaadvaita and the Dvaita arose as principles enunciating different approaches to religion . The other creeds like Nyaaya, Vaiseshika and others remained only as wings of these three religions.All the religions arising from the Vedas became parts of these three religious approaches . The Principal enunciators of the three religious approaches, Sri Sankara Bhagavatpada, Sri Ramanuja charya, and Sri Madhva charya accepted the Vedas , theUpanishads ,the Ithihasas and the Puraanas as the authorities and thereafter established their respective religions. Though their principles were different , they all accepted the supremacy of Narayana and accepted that He alone can give all fruits , He alone is Worthy of worship by all persons and He alone can confer Liberation (Moksha) .Even a very staunch Advaitin like Madhusudana Saraswati accepted this.
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