A group blog of scholars exploring Indian philosophy
The Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta is a philosophical and theological school active chiefly in South India, from the last centuries of the first millennium until today and holding that the Ultimate is a personal God who is the only existing entity and Continue reading Why studying Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta through Veṅkaṭanātha: An introduction for lay readers
As promised, this (a bit belated) post summarizes some talks from the October 2015 Society for Asian and Comparative Philosophy in Monterey, CA. To keep the post brief, I’m choosing to discuss only those SACP talks which I attended, have Continue reading Society for Asian and Comparative Philosophy 2015
Christopher G. Framarin. Hinduism and Environmental Ethics: Law, literature, and philosophy. 192 pp. London and New York: Routledge. 2014. 140 USD. Hardcover [Book Review Editor’s Note: This book has previously been reviewed on this blog by Stephen Harris. See Harris’s Continue reading Book Review of Hinduism and Environmental Ethics by Christopher G. Framarin (Reviewed by Elisa Freschi)
A reader of the blog, Satyanarayana, sent in the following question. Could any of our learned śāstrīs provide any insight? * * * The asatī : Strīsvabhāva, Kāvya, Śāstra A dominant theme of Brahminical patriarchy as reflected in the Sanskrit Continue reading A reader’s query
Several distinct component are constitutive of what we now know to be Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta and are not present at the time of Rāmānuja: 1. The inclusion of the Āḻvār’s theology in Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta 2. The Pāñcarātra orientation of both subschools Continue reading What happened at the beginnings of Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta?—Part 2
The starting point of the present investigation is the fact that between Rāmānuja and Veṅkaṭanātha a significant change appears to have occurred in the scenario of what was later known as Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta (the term is only found after Sudarśana Continue reading What happened at the beginnings of Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta?—Part 1
Is Īśvara in the Yogasūtra/Pātañjalayogaśāstra just the model of a puruṣa who has realised its being separated from nature? Or is He an omnipotent (and perhaps compassionate) God?
Was Rāmānuja the first author of the Vedāntisation of the current(s) which later became well-known as Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta? Possibly yes. But, one might suggest that there are many Upaniṣadic quotations also in Yāmuna’s Ātmasiddhi and that Rāmānuja’s Śrībhāṣya seems to Continue reading How Vedāntic was Yāmuna?
The following is an expanded version of the introduction to my paper, “Renunciation, Pleasure, and the Good Life in the Saṃnyāsa Upaniṣads,” forthcoming in Philosophy East and West (July 2017). The Saṃnyāsa Upaniṣads characterize the life of the saṃnyāsin (renunciate) Continue reading Renunciation and the Good Life
A reader (Robert Gressis) asked me to give him some advice for a class on philosophy of religion in which he would (admirably) like to insert something more than “the typical western philosophy of religion”. He would be interested in Continue reading Ultimate reality in Hinduism, Buddhism (etc.): Some suggestions for a possible syllabus