Liberation and Hindu Studies

The Journal of Hindu Studies 2019;12:1–11 doi:10.1093/jhs/hiz006 Liberation and Hindu Studies James Madaio In one of his many provocative arguments, the maverick philosopher Daya Krishna proposed that numerous problems engaged by Indian philosophical traditions do not ‘have any direct or indirect relation, even in the remotest way, to mokXa [liberation]’ (Krishna 1965, p.48). Krishna, of course, was right to push back against the tendency to see mokXa as the ‘focal concern’ and distinctive feature of Indian intellectual pursuits, which has inhibited the broader reception of Indian ideas, including those not necessarily related to liberation, within contemporary philosophy. When mokXa (from ˇmuc, ‘to free’, ‘to release’, ‘to unyoke’) is taken as the predominant interest of Indian traditions, one does so by backgrounding the virtuosity and reach of other fields of art and knowledge, such as logic, jurisprudence, aesthetics, language analysis, theatre, architecture, life science, eroticism, politics and statecraft, to name but a few. Nevertheless, it cannot be denied that for well over two millennia liberation has been valorised as the highest good within many Hindu traditions making it central to Hindu self-understanding, both medieval and modern. The aim of liberation, along with other facets of the ‘classical’ Indic worldview, developed dialogically within a constellation and contestation of systematic views (darśana) and paths (m@rga), including Buddhist, Jaina, and groups now called ‘Hindu’. Most of the articles in this issue of the Journal of Hindu Studies concentrate on philosophies of liberation articulated from roughly the middle of the first millennium CE to the mid-eleventh century. In doing so, they invite a ‘choral hermeneutics’ (Frazier 2017, p.13) of mokXa, providing a simultaneous sense of the range of positions on liberation, their mutual relationality, developmental trajectories, and instructive differences. Rather than approaching traditionspecific ideas of liberation as static or fixed, the articles here trace the dynamic ways in which liberation has been understood within Ny@ya, Jainism, VaiśeXika, the Mah@bh@rata, and the t@ntrika cult of the goddess Tripurasundara, popularly known as Śravidy@. Some of the papers analyse how theories of liberation operate within circumscribed parameters, such as karma theory, exploring the varied ways liberation is articulated within a tradition and also, in some cases, how it is a key point of contention in sectarian debate. The articles also demonstrate how ß The Author(s) 2019. Oxford University Press and The Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies. All rights reserved. For permissions, please email [email protected] Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jhs/article-abstract/12/1/1/5540288 by guest on 07 August 2019 The Oriental Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences *Corresponding author: [email protected] 2 Liberation and Hindu Studies The liberation paradigm In the early Vedic tradition, post-mortem rites were performed to stave off the possibility of repeated death (punarmPtyu). The avoidance of a second death, and an interest in notions of immortality, are evidenced in the early, ritual-oriented strata of Vedic literature. The ascendency of mokXa to the premier aim of human life is, however, often regarded as having arisen through interaction between Vedic-Brahmanism and extra-Vedic, ‘śrama>ic’ movements, such as Jainism, Buddhism, the ?javikas, and currents of Yoga later systematised by Patañjali. This context of philosophical negotiation is not, however, to deny a certain internal development within the Vedic tradition that extended the inner disciplines associated with ritual performance to those linked to renunciation and liberation. Putting aside the disputed nature of these changes, and related socioeconomic factors of the latter half of the first millennium BCE, there was a current of Brahmanical thought that moved toward understanding through introspection and the cultivation of ascetic qualities, such as concentration and recollecting the source of being (Flood 2004, p.98). While aspects of this shift can be detected in the ideas of pre-Buddhist and pre-Jaina UpaniXadic thinkers, such as Y@jñavalkya, Udd@laka ?ru>i, and Ś@>nilya (c. seventh to sixth centuries BCE), a broad consensus solidified, after Mah@vara Jina and the Buddha (sixth to fifth centuries BCE), that conditioned reality or sa:s@ra entails a process of repeated births (punar@vPtti, punarbhava, pr@durbh@va, etc.) marked by suffering. In addition to the śrama>ic traditions, most of the other ‘classical’ traditions, which were systemised through aphoristic treatises, or s+tras, from roughly 100 BCE to 450 CE,1 share a common orientation toward liberation. These traditions locate the affliction of sa:s@ra against the alterity of an ‘unborn’ ultimacy, diagnose causes of affliction, and delineate a path for its elimination. In 1927, the scholar Fyodor Stcherbatsky drew attention to this shared framework as follows: [The classical Indian systems] . . . start from the conceptualization of a whole (sarvam) which is then split into halves: Phenomenal life and the Absolute (sa:s@ra and nirv@>a). The phenomenal part is further divided into an analysis of its actual condition ([that is of suffering, or] du$kha), its [causal] driving forces (du$kha-samudaya) and their gradual extinction ([i.e., through a transformative path or] m@rga). When this extinction (nirodha) is reached, life merges Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jhs/article-abstract/12/1/1/5540288 by guest on 07 August 2019 inherited ideas are received, re-thought, and creatively developed through commentary, disputation, narrative techniques, ‘blending’ dialogues, and the internalisation of ritual. Read together, the papers provoke a prolonged analysis on the different issues pertinent to the development of varied philosophies of freedom, not as isolated accounts, but rather as articulations ‘continuous with alternative formulations that stand in relation of contrast, analogy or even creative complementarity’ (Frazier 2017, p.13). James Madaio 3 into the Absolute about whose essence a variety of constructions exist. These four topics. . .contain, in reality, no doctrine at all. It is only a scheme for philosophical constructions. . ..2 Freedom and the karmic cosmos The ‘unattested proposition’ (Dasgupta 1941, p.226) of karma theory provided, in no short measure, profound explanatory power, which accounted for not only aporetic problems of the human condition but also an ethical-causal theory, which posited that intentional action (whether mental, verbal, or physical) has a concomitant result. In VaiśeXika, an unseen force (adPXba, see Ionut Moise’s article in this issue for an extensive discussion) was understood as the medium that relates act and result, a position that had certain resonances with the subtle potency or potential, ap+rva, postulated by Mam@:sakas in the context of Vedic ritualism. In addition to causality, karma theory was also implicated in accounts of embodied conditioning; that is, when a person acts within the context of desire (r@ga) and aversion (dveXa) it produces a habitual momentum toward merit (dharma) and demerit (adharma), a process ultimately rooted in ignorance. In the Jaina tradition, this process of conditioning is understood in relation to an inflow of subtle karmic particles that ensnares the living being (java) within aimless rebirths (see Ana Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jhs/article-abstract/12/1/1/5540288 by guest on 07 August 2019 While nuance could certainly be added to the above account, it is helpful in shedding light on a certain structure of thought evident in S@:khya, Ny@ya, VaiśeXika, some Ved@ntic traditions, as well as Buddhism and Jainism. The causal and diagnostic orientation identified by Stcherbatsky, which is perhaps most readily associated with the four noble truths of the Buddha, was later called the ‘therapeutic paradigm’ by Wilhelm Halbfass (1991), who highlighted how certain Indic traditions seek the elimination of suffering, i.e. ‘disease’, and the restoration of true identity, i.e. ‘health’. As the bh@Xya on the P@tañjalayogaś@stra (c. 325–425 CE) puts it: ‘as medical science (cikits@ś@stra) has four divisions: illness, cause of illness, recovery, and therapeutics – so this teaching (i.e. Yoga) has four parts (caturvy+ha), i.e. cycle of births, sa:s@ra, its cause (hetu), liberation (mokXa), and the means of liberation. Of these, the cycle of births, sa:s@ra, is heya, to be discarded, the association of [the pure self or] puruXa and [the creative, ‘material’ source] pradh@na/prakPti is heyahetu, or the cause of what is to be discarded, perpetual stoppage of this association is h@na or liberation, and right knowledge is the means of liberation (h@nop@ya)’ (cited in Halbfass 1991, p.247). Within the context of the therapeutic paradigm, liberation, then, whether called mokXa, nirv@>a, apavarga, etc., was quintessentially liberation from suffering and transmigration.3 While the ‘classical’ systems, i.e. the śrama>ic and later s+trabased traditions, argue on behalf of different conceptions of liberation, and on varied methods of realising it, two postulates are recurring: the centrality of karma (‘action’) and the aetiology of the sa:s@ric condition in ignorance or unwisdom. 4 Liberation and Hindu Studies Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jhs/article-abstract/12/1/1/5540288 by guest on 07 August 2019 Bajželj’s article in this issue). Not only formative of one’s present condition, karma is also determinative in the formation of future lives, as well as the happiness (sukha) and suffering (du$kha) undergone during each life. Indeed, it was understood that if an individual is still subject to karma, i.e. if karmic results have not yet been expunged through experience, then the sa:s@ric condition persists or ‘rolls on’, as it were. A crucial question, then, was in what way could individuals transcend karmic causality (on karma theory, see the articles by Bajželj, Kataoka, and Moise in this issue). At least two fundamental types of karma were broadly theorised: karma that is currently fructifying, or bearing results, and karma that is stored or not yet activated. Kei Kataoka’s article in this issue demonstrates how Naiy@yika theories of liberation had to account for karma theory, i.e. that there is a causal relationship between every act and its result, and, in particular, how stored karma could be extinguished given the injunctive demands of Vedic orthopraxy. These issues were critical in Bhabba Jayanta’s (c. 840–900 CE) articulation of the ‘complete release from suffering’ in his Ny@yamañjara and they played a pertinent role in Jayanta’s polemical assessment of the ‘ritualist’ (y@jñika) Kum@rila (fl. 660). While it has been argued that early Mam@:s@ ‘denied the goal of liberation’ (Ingalls 1957, p.45), carrying with it the ‘“prekarmic” past of Indian tradition’ (Halbfass 1991, p.301), later Mam@:sakas, such as Kum@rila, absorbed key facets of the therapeutic paradigm, including karma and mokXa. Jayanta differentiates his own position on the exhaustion of accumulated karma from other ‘internal’ Naiy@yika strategies, and he maintains that Kum@rila’s arguments in favour of liberation are disingenuous. Among other issues, Jayanta’s argumentation underscores how commitment to liberation was an important sectarian identity marker that was integral to the systematicity and defence of a given tradition. His critique also evidences the way in which debates between Brahmanical interlocutors were carried out in relation to certain shared presuppositions, such as adherence to ‘the law of karma’, rules of Vedic exegesis, the existence of the three debts (P>atraya), and other rituals incumbent on brahmins. It was not, of course, simply whether or not one accepted liberation that was critical in cross-sectarian debate but also the details pertaining to the nature of that liberation and the means of securing it. A critical issue, debated on numerous fronts, was whether it was through action or knowledge, or both, that one could realise the highest good. Does liberation entail bliss? Are there varying degrees of bliss? Other points of contention focused on the nature of the self (@tman, puruXa) that is apparently liberated: is there a self in liberation and is that self aware or not (and, if aware, what is the nature of that awareness)?4 While both the Ny@ya and VaiśeXika traditions discussed in this issue hold that mokXa is shorn of cognisance, i.e. liberation entails the extirpation of all qualities of the self, the Jaina tradition argues on behalf of a liberation that entails infinite bliss (sukha), energy (varya), perception (darśana), and knowledge (jñ@na), which are essential or inherent to the java. In her article on the nature of liberation and the ‘final journey’ of the java in James Madaio 5 Excluding the materialists, all crossers (tairthika), given that they accept liberation (mokXa), cannot raise objections concerning the conduct of the yogin [¼javanmukta] either, because even if in the treatises on liberation (mokXaś@stra) of Jainas (?rhatas), Buddhists, VaiśeXikas, Naiy@yikas, Śaivas, VaiX>avas, Ś@ktas, S@:khyans, Yogins, etc., there are many things to be explained, the means of liberation [in all of these treatises] is of one kind: the eightfold yoga of disciplines, observances, etc.7 Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jhs/article-abstract/12/1/1/5540288 by guest on 07 August 2019 Um@sv@ti’s Tattv@rthas+tra (c. 350 CE) and later commentaries, Ana Bajželj notes that the kevalin, or the one who has realised perfect knowledge, operates with the aforementioned infinite qualities. However, it is only after all karma naturally runs its course, that the enlightened being or self (java) ascends, bodiless, to the ‘wished for place’ at the height of the cosmos.5 Within the context of the Jaina view that motion is inherent to javas and matter, Bajželj explains how karma is understood to have a ‘heavy’ downward pull on the java, which has an innate or inherent vertical motion or upward gravitation (+rdhvagaurava). Further, she analyses the different ways in which Jaina philosophers explain the perplexing propulsion of disembodied javas to the ‘eternal stability’ at the height of the cosmos. While the vertical ascent of the java is understood literally here, verticality, as a theme, can be profitably extended to the soteriological impulse ‘upward’, albeit by going ‘inward’ through askesis (i.e., toward one’s immaterial self by shedding karmic layers), to an ultimate good that is inherent to one’s own nature. As a root metaphor of soteriology, verticality is also suggestive of the notion of ‘crossing over’, a ubiquitous way in which classical Indic traditions refer to the path from the turbulent waters of sa:s@ra to the fearlessness of the ‘other shore’. In both Vedic and Buddhist literature, ‘crossing’, mainly connoted through terms derived from ˇt r (‘to cross over’, ‘to escape’, ‘to accomplish’), is often employed in _ from one state of being to another, whether in terms of a relation to passing heavenly realm or liberation. In the Jaina tradition the notion is evident in the title bestowed on the twenty-four enlightened teachers of this cosmic cycle, the tarthaṅk@ras, who build ‘fords’ for safely crossing the treacherous ocean of sa:[email protected] The ‘crosser’ traditions in India, many of which depict themselves as paths, ways, or vehicles toward an ultimate transformation, can be broadly distinguished from the so-called materialist tradition, the C@rv@ka or ‘Lok@yata’, associated with BPhaspati, C@rv@ka, Purandara, among others. The views of the C@rv@kas come down to us in distorted, straw-man representations. It is nonetheless generally accepted that C@rv@kas denied crucial presuppositions of the liberation paradigm, such as karma theory, transmigration, and a higher good beyond the sensual-physical domain. In a fourteenth century Advaita Ved@ntin work on liberation-whileliving, or javanmukti (see below), Vidy@ra>ya uses the term tairthika, which might be rendered as ‘crosser’, to distinguish the ‘materialists’ from adherents of traditions he considers as postulating a soteriological agenda: 6 Liberation and Hindu Studies Liberation and synthesis The C@rv@kas certainly pose an interesting case for a compelling tradition of Indian philosophy unconcerned with mokXa. The aim of liberation, however, has not been taken for granted across Hindu traditions. For example, scholars generally hold that early Mam@:s@ was uninterested in liberation since it did not posit a highest good beyond this realm or heaven (although certainly a heavenly attainment entails some sense of ‘crossing over’).9 More speculatively, certain scholarly reconstructions of a naturalistic proto-VaiśeXika have argued that the tradition originally lacked a soteriological agenda.10 What is clear, however, is that the system attested to in the s+tras of Ka>@da (c. 0–250 CE), and in subsequent commentaries, position liberation as critical to the analysis typified in the VaiśeXika enterprise, which is not dissimilar to the kind of ontological categorisation evident in the soteric traditions of the Jainas and Sarv@stiv@da Buddhists.11 The VaiśeXikas+tra, notably, commences by indicating the tradition’s concern with dharma, i.e. the means of flourishing (abhyudaya), in this world or in heaven, as well as achieving a ‘meta-gnostic’ liberation, i.e. ni$śreyasa, the unexcelled or highest good. Ionut Moise’s article in this issue situates the genealogy of abhyudaya in the desire and action, or pravPtti, orientation of Vedic ritualism, which he contrasts with the disinterested detachment of the nivPtti, or ‘inaction’, path closely associated with renunciation and, ultimately, ni$śreyasa.12 Principally examining the work of Candr@nanda (c. 900 CE), Moise tracks the way in which both of these approaches, and their respective aims of abhyudaya and ni$śreyasa, are synthesised over time in the VaiśeXika tradition so that they come to imply one another in a sequence. Moise’s attention to philosophical synthesis is paralleled by Paloma Muñoz Gomez’s examination of the Mah@bh@rata’s ‘blending’ of the ideal of mokXa into the pravPtti-oriented aims of human life (puruX@rtha). Historically, the early iterations of the puruX@rthas were limited to the trivarga or three-fold group of virtue (dharma), wealth (artha), and pleasure (k@ma), which have been understood as functioning both diachronically and synchronically. Some scholars argue that the eventual expansion of the trivarga to include mokXa is a result of the interplay between Vedic traditions, rooted in ‘householder’ norms and ritual performance, and non-Vedic traditions, which aim at the ‘cessation’ (nirodha, nivPtti, nirv@>a, etc.) Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jhs/article-abstract/12/1/1/5540288 by guest on 07 August 2019 The above account is atypical in the sense that Vedic and extra-Vedic traditions, such as Jainism and Buddhism, are grouped together albeit in contradistinction to the Lok@yatas, who deny the possibility of mokXa.8 Vidy@ra>ya also sees a unity across this broad list of ‘crosser’ traditions by way of yoga, the means (s@dhana) to liberation, no doubt subsuming tradition-specific forms of yoga under what had, by the fourteenth century, become the normative, pan-Brahmanical tradition of Patañjali, but perhaps also, in doing so, intimating a shared, śrama>ic ‘eightfold’ heritage. James Madaio 7 Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jhs/article-abstract/12/1/1/5540288 by guest on 07 August 2019 of sa:s@ra through techniques and attitudes associated with renunciation (sa:ny@sa). Muñoz Gomez analyses the way in which this broader dialogic interaction plays out literally through the dialogue of the Sangat@, a verbal exchange between Vidura and the five P@>nava brothers, in_ the Ś@ntiparvan of the Mah@bh@rata. In particular, she examines the mechanics of this ‘blending’ process by paying close attention to the views voiced by the different interlocutors in the Sangat@ and how these positions are creatively harmonised through the character _ YudhiXbhira. This integration is not only reflective of a compromise, between of renunciatory and householder norms, but also expands the meaning and accessibility of mokXa by positioning it within the framework of the puruX@rthas. The accounts of liberation articulated in Ny@ya, VaiśeXika, and the Mah@bh@rata all partake in a shared multivocalic discourse of what is often considered as polycentric Hinduism, which developed in conversation with the Buddhist and Jaina traditions, forming a broader context within which ideas about the structure of the cosmos and mokXa emerged. The views on liberation discussed in this issue are not, of course, exhaustive of the Hindu or, more broadly, Indic fold. Numerous Hindu devotional movements, for example, do not seek the extirpation of qualities or self-abidance whether in terms of a formal but attributeless self or pure consciousness but rather what we might term the aim of remaining so as to adore – that is, remaining as a transformed individual so as to worship God.13 Many such approaches hinge on theological principles such as surrender (prapatti) and grace (anugraha), and involve the cultivation of a ‘vertical’ disposition through advancing stages of devotion (bhakti) toward greater proximity or intimacy with God. In this sense, one is ‘crossing’ a sa:s@ra that is constituted by ignorance and delusive traits, a view that does not position individuality, association, contact, or involvement as constituting bondage. Other programmes of self-fashioning, such as those linked with certain habha-yogic, N@tha, and Ras@yana traditions, evidence a striving toward divine abilities, bodily immortality, or agelessness. One of the terms used in relation to both an immortal body and a perfected awareness is javanmukti or liberation-while-living. As a technical term, but not as a new conceptual notion, ‘javanmukti’ appears to have emerged within the early medieval Śaiva context, and is later employed within Advaita Ved@nta, as well as in other advaitic, ved@ntic, and yogic traditions.14 The YoginahPdaya, a mideleventh century Ś@kta Śaiva work of the Tripurasundara cult (more popularly known as Śravidy@), explicitly aims at the realisation of javanmukti, or the establishment of a permanent non-dual awareness here and now. Anya Golovkova’s article in this issue situates the javanmukti posited in the YoginahPdaya within the textual development of the Tripurasundara cult. Although liberation (mukti, mokXa) is briefly mentioned in works of the antecedent Nity@ cult, as well as in the V@makeśvaramata, the earliest extant tantra of the Tripurasundara cult, Golovkova argues that these works exhibit a palpable ‘this-worldly’ orientation, which is predominantly concerned with the attainment of worldly skills, powers, and enjoyments rather than transcendence. Golovkova demonstrates that the redactors 8 Liberation and Hindu Studies References Dasgupta, S. 1941. Philosophical essays. Calcutta: University of Calcutta. Eck, D. 1981. ‘India’s Tarthas: “Crossings” in sacred geography’. History of Religions, 20, 323–44. Flood, G. 2004. The ascetic self: subjectivity, memory and tradition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Fort, A. O., and Mumme, P. Y. (eds). 1996. Living liberation in Hindu thought. Albany: State University of New York Press. Frazier, J. 2017. Hindu worldviews: theories of self, ritual and reality. London: Bloomsbury. Ganeri, J. 2017. ‘Introduction: Why Indian philosophy? Why now?’. In J. Ganeri (ed.) The Oxford handbook of Indian philosophy. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 1–12. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jhs/article-abstract/12/1/1/5540288 by guest on 07 August 2019 of the YoginahPdaya maintained and built upon the complex ritual structure of the earlier V@makeśvaramata while developing meditative techniques that harness the subtle physiology of the yogic body. Integrated within a Trika-informed metaphysics, which holds that the supreme consciousness qua Goddess manifests the universe ‘on herself as the screen’, these interiorising disciplines result in the recognition of the non-duality of the cogniser and the supreme consciousness. Javanmukti, in this context, entails a ‘synthesising awareness’ that maintains the non-difference of the deity, guru, mantra, ritual diagram (or Śracakra), and self. The orientation identified by Golovkova in the Nity@ cult and early phase of Tripurasundara cult might be characterised as a ‘freedom to’ approach; that is, an aim toward securing the freedom to act with skill, mastery, and power, rather than seeking ‘freedom from’ limitation or hindrances as such.15 While the innovativeness of the YoginahPdaya is in its articulation of javanmukti and liberating practices, it seeks, not unlike earlier t@ntrika texts, not only ‘freedom from’ obstacles that impede non-dual awareness but attainment of supernatural enjoyments (bhukti), which are concomitant with liberation (mukti). In other words, one could say that the goal is not only freedom from worldly obstacles but sovereignty over a ‘world’ no longer considered as separate from oneself. Collectively, such distinctions are instructive for drawing attention to the many nuanced ways in which it is possible to map the ‘movement of self-surpassing’, which, as J.L. Mehta put it, ‘is as much constitutive of the human state as defining and setting up boundaries’ (Mehta 1985, p.203). The varieties of crossing, or selfsurpassing, are, of course, reflective of the different comprehensive ontologies within which they serve as life-orienting goals. Articulations of liberation, while setting forth the furthest horizons of self and reality, occur within situated traditions (samprad@yas) that do indeed define and demarcate boundaries. In this sense, liberation is one among a host of issues that are part of the practices of boundarymaking, as much as they also articulate soteric methods for crossing boundaries. The five papers of this issue offer a chorus of voices that open up a broader space for understanding the interconnected and dynamic ways pre-modern Indic textual practices argued, developed, and synthesised seminal accounts of freedom. James Madaio 9  Notes 1 On the ‘The Age of S+tra’, see Ganeri (2017). 2 Fyodor Stcherbatsky, The conception of Buddhist Nirv@>a (Leningrad: Academy of Sciences of the USSR, 1927), 55 (italics not in original). Stcherbatsky continues: ‘[The Naiy@yika philosopher] Uddyotakara [c. 540–600 CE] says “these are the four topics which are investigated by every philosopher in every system of metaphysics”’. Accordingly every philosophical system must contain an analysis of the elements of life, a doctrine about its driving forces, a doctrine of the Absolute and a doctrine about the method to be followed in order to escape out of phenomenal life. . .’. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jhs/article-abstract/12/1/1/5540288 by guest on 07 August 2019 Gelblum, T. 1965. ‘India’s philosophies—whose presuppositions?’ Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, 28, 308–18. Halbfass, W. 1991. Tradition and reflection: explorations in Indian thought. Albany: State University of New York. Houben, J. 1994. ‘Liberation and natural philosophy in early VaiśeXika: some methodological problems’. In: J. Bronkhorst (ed.) Asiatische studien études asiatiques XLVIII(2) 1994, proceedings of the panel on early VaiśeXika, Hong Kong, August 1993. Bern: Peter Lang. Ingalls, D. H. H. 1957. ‘Dharma and Moksa’. Philosophy East and West, 7, 41–8. Jha, G. (trans.) 1986 (1937). The Tattvasaṅgraha of Sh@ntarakXita with the commentary of Kamalashala (vol. 1). Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass. Krishna, D. 1965. ‘Three conceptions of Indian philosophy’. Philosophy East and West, 15, 37–51. Lutjeharms, R. 2018. ‘“Why do we still sift the husk-like UpaniXads?” Revisiting ved@nta in early Chaitanya Vaishnava.’ In: T. Williams, A. Malhotra, and J. S. Hawley (eds) Text and tradition in early modern north India. Delhi: Oxford University Press, pp. 382–412. Madaio, J. 2018. ‘The instability of non-dual knowing: post-gnosis S@dhana in Vidy@ra>ya’s Advaita Ved@nta’. Journal of Dharma Studies, 1, 11–30. Mehta, J. L. 1985. India and the West: the problem of understanding. Chicago: Scholars Press. Olivelle, P. 2005. Manu’s code of law: a critical edition and translation of the M@navaDharmaś@stra. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Pa>aśakara, V. L. Ś. (ed.). 1978 (1890). Javanmuktiviveka$ (?nand@śramasa:skrtagranth@vali$, granth@ṅka$ 20). Pune: ?nand@śrama. Slaje, W. 2000a. ‘Liberation from intentionality and involvement: on the concept of Javanmukti according to the MokXop@ya’. Journal of Indian Philosophy, 28, 171–94. Slaje, W. 2000b. ‘Towards a history of the javanmukti concept: the MokXadharma in the Mah@bh@rata.’ In: R. Tsuchida and A. Wezler (eds) Har@nandalahara: volume in honour of Professor Minoru Hara on his seventieth birthday. Reinbek: Verlag für Orientalistische Fachpublikationen, pp. 325–48. Stcherbatsky, F. 1927. The conception of Buddhist Nirv@>a. Leningrad: Academy of Sciences of the USSR. Uskokov, A. 2018. Deciphering the hidden meaning: scripture and the hermeneutics of liberation in early Advaita Ved@nta. PhD dissertation, University of Chicago. Watson, A., Goodall, D., and Anjaneya Sarma, S. L. P. 2013. An enquiry into the nature of liberation: Bhatta R@maka>tha’s ParamokXanir@sak@rik@vrtti, a commentary on Sadyojyotih$’s __ _ of the liberated state (mokXa). _ refutation of twenty conceptions Pondicherry: Institut français de Pondichéry, Ecole française d’Extrême-Orient. 10 Liberation and Hindu Studies Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jhs/article-abstract/12/1/1/5540288 by guest on 07 August 2019 3 With that being said, a ‘positive’ terminology also emerged in relation to ultimate reality (and this is certainly the case within Hindu theistic traditions). Within the Ved@ntic context, which entails numerous theological perspectives, many such terms were exegetically derived from the UpaniXads, such as being (sat), self-existent (svayambhu), plenum (bh+m@), bliss (@nanda), sovereignty (aiśvarya), consciousness (cit), imperishable (akXara), light (joytis), essence (rasa), unborn (aja), eternal (nitya), fullness (p+r>a), etc. 4 In this regard, Bhabba R@maka>bha’s tenth century commentary (vPtti) on Sadyojyoti$’s ParamokXanir@sak@rik@ provides an invaluable interrogation and systematisation of twenty different views on liberation (Watson et al. 2013). Polemically situated within the Śaiva Siddh@nta tradition, R@maka>bha pays particular attention to issues such as cognition, agency, enjoyment, omnipotence, etc., drawing attention to the finer points of philosophical discussion that distinguish scholastic deliberations on liberation in the Indic context. 5 The Jaina distinction between the enlightened, but still embodied, kevalin and liberation after separation from the body (dehaviyoga) parallels similar distinctions posited in other traditions. In this issue, Kataoka, for example, explicates Jayanta’s argument for the ‘deactivation’ of karma upon realising the essential nature of reality (tattvajñ@na). Certain medieval Advaita Ved@ntins, on the other hand, distinguish between (i) a ‘knower of brahman’ who is susceptible to currently manifesting or activated (pr@rabdha)karma, (ii) a javanmukta° who retains a body, but is impervious to fructifying karma, and (iii) videhamukti or liberation after the exhaustion of all karma and thus the ‘fall of the body’ (Madaio 2018). As evidenced in Bajželj’s discussion, the Jainas employ the illustrative example of the potter’s wheel, among a host of other rich metaphors and illustrations, while explaining the continued upward motion of the java after the exhaustion of all karma. Although used in a different way, the potter’s wheel is also employed in the S@:khyak@rik@ (c. 400 CE), verse 67, to explain the continued presence of the body after awakening due to the power (vaśa) of the momentum (vega) of past impressions (sa:sk@ra). Advaita Ved@ntins similarly use the example of the potter’s wheel, along with the shot arrow that continues in motion until its momentum dissipates, in order to defend their position that even after awakening the body continues for some time due to operative karma. 6 Rivers across the landscape of India are dotted with pilgrimage sites known as tarthas, or sacred points of crossing, that are associated with lives of various avat@ras, gods and goddesses. On tarthas, and related notions of crossing, see Eck (1981). 7 n@pi lok@yatikavyatirikta$ sarvo ‘pi tairthiko mokXam aṅgakurvan yogicarite ’pi visa:vaditum arhati. @rhatabauddhavaiśeXikanaiy@yikaśaivavaiX>avaś@ktas@:khyayog@dimokXaś@streXu pratip@dyaprameyasya n@n@vidhatve ’pi, mokXas@dhanasya yamaniyam@dyaXb@ṅgayogasyaikavidhatv@t. For the Sanskrit, see Pa>aśakara (1978 [1890], p.98). 8 In his prose commentary on Ś@ntarakXita’s (725–788 CE) Tattvasa:graha, the Indian Buddhist philosopher Kamalaśala (c. 740–795 CE) asserts that liberation is regarded by all educated people as the highest aim, and that it is ‘well known among all @stikas that knowledge of truth brings about prosperity [abhyudaya] and the highest James Madaio 9 11 12 13 14 15 good [ni$śreyasa]. . . . When prosperity and the highest good have been attained, all that is desired by man is accomplished, and all his longings cease; and beyond this there is no other purpose [prayojana] to be sought after’. Tattvasa:grahapañjik@ adapted from Jha (1986 [1937]: pp.13–14). Uskokov (2018) argues that the Mam@:s@ notion of heaven (svarga) shared largely the same semantic and axiological space as mokXa. In that way, philosophers such as the sixth century Bhavya (Bh@viveka) and the eighth century Śa:kara understood the complex of svarga and ritual as a competing doctrine of liberation. The definition of svarga, as a state of unexcelled happiness (niratiśaya-sukha/prati/@nanda), became one of the standard definitions of liberation in Advaita Ved@nta. Houben (1994), drawing, in part, on the work of M. Biardeau, has critiqued the somewhat pervasive developmental interpretation of VaiśeXika, stemming largely from the work of E. Frauwallner, that envisions an early or proto-VaiśeXika as a pure philosophy of nature that later, uneasily, appropriated the notion of liberation. Sradhara (fl. 990 CE), for example, felt compelled to defend the VaiśeXika tradition against the charge that it was soteriologically ineffective, arguing that the ‘comprehensive classification of the constituents of the world are. . .motivated by and committed to a puruX@rtha, i.e. final liberation’ (Halbfass 1991, p.116). Manus:Pti (c. 100–300 CE) articulates the variance between pravPtti (‘advancing’) and nivPtti (‘arresting’) as follows: ‘Acts prescribed by the Veda are of two kinds: advancing, which procures the enhancement of happiness; and arresting, which procures the supreme good. An action performed to obtain a desire here or in the hereafter is called an “advancing act”, whereas an action performed without desire and prompted by knowledge is said to be an “arresting act”. By engaging in advancing acts, a man attains equality with the gods; by engaging in arresting acts, on the other hand, he transcends the five elements’. Manus:Pti 12.88-90 in Olivelle (2005, p.234). As Y@davendra Pura has put it: ‘We drown in an ambrosial sea of Nandanandana’s [i.e., KPX>a’s] youthful play. What are the salty waters of liberation to us?’ Pady@vala 42 in Lutjeharms (2018, p.395). On javanmukti, see Fort and Mumme (1996) and Slaje (2000a, 2000b). For further references related to the Śaiva context, see Golovkova’s article in this issue. On the distinction between ‘freedom to’ and ‘freedom from’ in the Indic context, see Gelblum (1965). Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jhs/article-abstract/12/1/1/5540288 by guest on 07 August 2019 10 11