Study on the philosophy of Vaishnavism in Bengal.

Vaishnava philosophical work, in verse; critically edited.

This is a scholarly book on one of the oldest living relgions of India.

This book analyses the concepts of God in Vaisnavism, which is commonly referred to as one of the great Hindu monotheistic traditions. Addressing the question of what attributes God possesses according to particular textual sources and traditions in Vaisnavism, the book analyses Vaisnava traditions and texts in order to locate them within a global philosophical framework. The book is divided into two sections. The first one, God in Vaisnava Texts, deals with concepts of God found in the canonical Vaisnava texts: (...) the Bhavagad Gita, the Bhagavata Purana, the Pancaratras, and the Mahabharata. The second section, God in Vaisnava Traditions, addresses concepts of God found in several Vaisnava traditions and their respective key theologians. As well as the Alvars, five traditional Vaisnava schools- the Sri Vaisnava tradition, the Madhva tradition, the Nimbarka tradition, the Pustimarga tradition, and the Caitanya Vaisnava tradition- and two contemporary ones Ramakrishna's and Swami Bhaktivedanta's are considered. The book combines normative, critical and descriptive elements. Some chapters are philosophical in nature, others are more descriptive, unpacking a specific Vaiṣṇava concept of God for future philosophical analysis and critique. Written by experts who break new ground in presenting and representing a diversity of Vaiṣṇava texts and tradition, the book presents approaches that reflect the amount of philosophical and historical deliberation on the specific issues and divine attributes considered. This book will be of interest to researchers in the fields of philosophy of religion and Indian philosophy, cross-cultural and comparative philosophy, analytic philosophy of religion, Hindu studies, theology and religious studies. (shrink)

Contributed articles presented at the National Seminar "Vaisnavism as a Religio-Philosophical Movement" held on April 1999 at Institute of Orissan Culture, Bhubaneswar, India.

The Book Makes A Fascinating Study Of The Unique Philosophical Tradition Revolving Around The Concept Of The Sunya Purusa The Ineffable, Indescribable And Non-Dual Reality That Originated In Medieval Orissa. Examining A Range Of Philosophies, It Throws Light On The Theories Of This Rare School Of Vaisnavism That Was Vaisnavite In Form But Buddhistic In Essence.

The Buddhist monk Upagupta, who preached and taught meditative practices in Northwest India over two thousand years ago, is venerated today by the laity in ...

Critical study of ethics in Vaishnava-puranas; Hindu mythological text.

On Bhakti and Bhāgavata philosophy according to Chaitanya school.

On Dvaita Vedanta philosophy and doctrines of Nimbarka, sect in Vaishnavism; with Hindi interpretation.

On concept of doctrine of Bhakti according to Chaitanya sect.

Exegesis, with text, of the classical treatise expounding the philosophy of Chaitanya school in Vaishnavism.

Treatise on the doctrine of the Rāmānandīs, Vaishnava sect.

Treatise, with commentaries, on ontology; according to the Chaitanya school in Vaishnavism.

On verse work on the doctrine of the Rāmānandīs.

The International Society of Krishna Consciousness, commonly known as the Hare Krishna Movement, has disseminated a flurry of antievolutionist media since its inception in 1966. Such communications frequently co-opt arguments employed by Christian creationists and Intelligent Design theorists. At the same time, however, there are indications that a scattering of ISKCON publications have articulated relatively ambiguous, less oppositional statements about evolutionary theory. This article reconsiders ISKCON's Darwin-skepticism by appraising recent, largely unexamined Hare Krishna publications, as well as responses to evolutionary (...) theory expressed by ISKCON's founder, A. C. Bhaktivedanta, and his immediate Vaishnava forerunners. The analysis reveals that, although the majority of contemporary ISKCON materials are vehemently opposed to evolution, some leading voices demonstrate less combative, cautiously accommodating stances. These cases are suggestive of complexities in ISKCON's responses to evolution, both past and present, which are not necessarily encapsulated in the terms Vedic creationism or antievolutionism. (shrink)

In Indian philosophy and theology, the ideology of Vedanta occupies an important position. Hindu religious sects accept the Vedantic soteriology, which believes that there is only one conscious reality, Brahman from which the entire creation, both conscious and non-conscious, emanated. Madhusudana Sarasvati, who lived in sixteenth century Bengal and wrote in Sanskrit, was the last great thinker among the Indian philosophers of Vedanta. During his time, Hindu sectarians, rejected monistic Vedanta. Although a strict monist, Madhusudana tried to make a synthesis (...) between his monistic philosophy and his theology of emotional love for God. This book provides the religious context of his extensive and difficult works. This is the only comprehensive study of Madhusudana Sarasvati's thought. (shrink)

Nammalvar, a Tamil poet who lived in IX-X centuries, is revered as one of the great mystics of India. His four poetic works are equated with the sacred hymns and are part of the ritual worship in the temples of South India. Artistic images of Nammalvar formed the basis of the philosophy of Vishishta-Advaita several centuries later. The poem “Thiruviruttam” is considered as his early work, where he combines the canons of ancient Tamil poetry and his devoted love for Vishnu-Tirumal. (...) The study presents a religious and philosophical interpretation of the poem. The secret of the poem is its dualism: external beauty and sacred meaning. There is a spiritual meaning in symbols of Tamil poetry. Nammalvar takes canons of his predecessors, poets of the Sangam era. However, he fills one with new content. The author compares ancient Tamil poetry and the work of Nammalvar. The plot describes the love between God and the soul. The poet reveals several types of bhakti or devoted love. The description of bhakti subsequently formed the basis for the classification of souls in the philosophy of vishishta-advaita. Bhakti leads to the transition to Vaikuntha or the heaven city. Sri Vaishnavism teachers turned the description of relationship soul-Vishnu into a spiritual practice. The artistic images of Nammalvar are compared with Hindu concepts such as transcendence, darshan, divine grace and moksha. In South India “Thiruviruttam” is considered the Tamil Rig Veda. Poem is performed at home, in the temple, during festive processes. It helps to find the roots of Vaishnavism and understand its poetic origin. (shrink)

Judgment aggregation theory, or rather, as we conceive of it here, logical aggregation theory generalizes social choice theory by having the aggregation rule bear on judgments of all kinds instead of merely preference judgments. It derives from Kornhauser and Sager’s doctrinal paradox and List and Pettit’s discursive dilemma, two problems that we distinguish emphatically here. The current theory has developed from the discursive dilemma, rather than the doctrinal paradox, and the final objective of the paper is to give the latter (...) its own theoretical development along the line of recent work by Dietrich and Mongin. However, the paper also aims at reviewing logical aggregation theory as such, and it covers impossibility theorems by Dietrich, Dietrich and List, Dokow and Holzman, List and Pettit, Mongin, Nehring and Puppe, Pauly and van Hees, providing a uniform logical framework in which they can be compared with each other. The review goes through three historical stages: the initial paradox and dilemma, the scattered early results on the independence axiom, and the so-called canonical theorem, a collective achievement that provided the theory with its specific method of analysis. The paper goes some way towards philosophical logic, first by briefly connecting the aggregative framework of judgment with the modern philosophy of judgment, and second by thoroughly discussing and axiomatizing the ‘general logic’ built in this framework. (shrink)

This article proposes an analysis of the doctrine of sufficiency. According to my reading, the doctrine's basic positive claim is ‘prioritarian’: benefiting x is of special moral importance where (and only where) x is badly off. Its negative claim is anti-egalitarian: most comparative facts expressed by statements of the type ‘x is worse off than y’ have no moral significance at all. This contradicts the ‘classical’ priority view according to which, although equality per se does not matter, whenever x is (...) worse off than y, at least some priority should be assigned to helping x. Section I elaborates and defends this reconstruction of the doctrine of sufficiency, and section II shows that the privileged utility level presumed within the sufficiency framework exists. (shrink)

On-line English translation of these 40 short statements of doctrine, mostly concerning ethics.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 39.1 (2001) 23-47 [Access article in PDF] Suárez' Doctrine of Eternal Truths Amy D. Karofsky 1. Introduction The primary aim of this paper is to offer an interpretation of Suárez' doctrine of eternal truths as found in Metaphysical Disputation XXXI, chapter XII, sections 38-47. There, following the typical scholastic style, Suárez considers and rejects several theories before developing his own. Because it is (...) somewhat difficult to determine what view Suárez ultimately adopts, interpretations of this passage tend to vary. For example, Norman Wells suggests that the necessity and eternality of essential propositions is grounded in the intellect of the divine being. 1 Armand Maurer and John P. Doyle maintain that eternal truths are not grounded in the being of God, but rather in the real being of the essences themselves. 2 I will argue that none of these interpretations adequately expresses Suárez' project, for Suárez wants a solution to the problem of eternal truths that does not depend upon the will of the divine being and one that avoids any ontological commitment to unactualized, possible essences. 3 2. Explanation of the Problem of Eternal Truths Suárez begins the thirty-first disputation with a proof of the identity of essence and existence in finite creatures. The key premise in his argument is the claim that, lacking existence, an unactualized essence is not a being, but absolutely [End Page 23] nothing. 4 By 'being' Suárez means existing being, or a being that is created by God. 5 Unlike the essence of God, the essence of a creature is dependent for its being on the efficient causality of God. Prior to the creative act of God, then, the essence of a creature is not an existing being, hence not a being at all; the unactualized, possible essence is a non-being or nothing.From the claim that a nonexistent essence is absolutely nothing, the following problem arises:... si, ablata existentia, perit essentia, ergo propositiones illae in quibus praedicata essentialia de re praedicantur, non sunt necessariae, neque perpetuae veritatis... 6An essential proposition of the form "X is f" is a proposition in which an essential property f is attributed to an object X. If there are no X's in existence, then there is nothing of which f can be predicated. It would seem, then, that the proposition, "X is f" must be false. One might maintain, however, that even though there are no X's in existence, there is an essence (of) X that has the property f. And in this way, "X is f" remains true, even if there are no X's in existence.However, if one holds, as Suárez does, that the unactualized essence is absolutely nothing, then this solution will not work. For if there are no X's in existence, and if a nonexistent essence is absolutely nothing, then there is nothing of which the essential attribute can be predicated. Thus it appears that any proposition that purports to attribute a property to a nonexistent object must be false and so clearly it can be neither necessarily nor eternally true. Therefore, because Suárez believes that an unactualized essence is absolutely nothing, he seems to be committed to the claim that essential propositions are neither necessarily, nor eternally, true. I will refer to this problem as the Problem of Eternal Truths.Another way to illustrate the Problem of Eternal Truths is to see that there are two seemingly inconsistent propositions: AN: An unactualized, possible essence is absolutely nothing, and NE: True essential propositions are necessarily and eternally true. [End Page 24]Given that a proposition in which a property is attributed to an unactualized essence is false, if Suárez wants to assert the truth of AN, it would appear that he must deny the truth of NE, and, in so doing, reject the possibility of any science of creatures that deals only with necessary truths.Suárez considers three different solutions to this problem: (What I will call) the Aristotelian Solution, the Divine... (shrink)

This research article uses the theoretical framework of doctrine as believer's security to critique the theological framework behind the controversial activities reported amongst some South African neo-Pentecostal prophets, which include feeding congregants with grass, spraying them with insecticides and sexual violation of women congregants. The framework of the article falls within the discipline of systematic theology by raising the importance for South African Christians to develop a critical doctrinal framework for protecting themselves from controversial NPPs. The following main question is (...) answered by the article: from a systematic theological perspective, how can we evaluate the theological framework, which leads to the recent controversial activities reported amongst some NPPs in South Africa? Consequently, the article, firstly, describes the critical theological framework of the protective role of Christian doctrine. Secondly, it describes the South African NPPs and their controversial practices. Thirdly, this article analyses some of the theological problems in the current operative framework of NPPs. Fourthly, it argues for the need for doctrinally informed critical thinking as a safety measure against controversial NPPs. Finally, some steps that must be taken by NPPs to develop critical theological thinking in order to overcome doctrinally vacuous experientialism that promotes controversial religious activities are provided.CONTRIBUTION: From a systematic theological approach, this article attempts to demonstrate the importance of critical doctrinal thinking as a defence mechanism for protecting Christians from falling prey to harmful religious practices, such as those recently reported amongst some NPPs in South Africa. (shrink)

Toujours, dans toute proposition affirmative veritable, necessaire ou contingente, universelle ou singuliere, la notion du predicat est comprise en quelque facon dans celle du sujet, praedicatum inest subjecto, ou bien je ne sais ce que c'est que la vetite. Parce qu'elles mettaient principalement l'accent sur les liaisons conceptuelles, les precisions de ce genre ont ete interpretees comme autant d'indices permettant de reconstituer le contenu du predicat de verite a partir de presupposes coherentistes. Dans le concensus qui s'est etabli sur ce (...) point, le role hermeneutique tres excessif accorde a la notion de systeme a eu une portee aussi considerable que le contenu des quelques textes generalement allegues. Si on admet, au contraire, qu'il y a bien une doctrine leibnizienne de la verite, alors on est amene a inscrire la position de Leibniz dans le contexte du debat relatif a l'adaequatio rei et a souligner davantage ce qui l'apparente a une theorie de la verite-correspondance. Cet argument principal est soutenu par des analyses de detail dans la logique. Un attention particuliere est apportee aux valeurs des variables du nouveau calcul, a la fonction du predicat de possibilite, au probleme relatif a la constantia subjecti et au statut des entites intensionnelles. L'image de l'ontologie leibnizienne s'en trouve modifiee et precisee: a la fois possibiliste et factualiste, elle est traversee de tensions importantes et occupe une place tout a fait singuliere dans cette partie de la philosophie qui connait aujourd'hui un si profond renouveau. (shrink)

The doctrine (or principle) of double effect is often invoked to explain the permissibility of an action that causes a serious harm, such as the death of a human being, as a side effect of promoting some good end. According to the principle of double effect, sometimes it is permissible to cause a harm as a side effect (or “double effect”) of bringing about a good result even though it would not be permissible to cause such a harm as a (...) means to bringing about the same good end. Does the principle of double effect play the important explanatory role that has been claimed for it? To consider this question, one must be careful to clarify just what the principle is supposed to explain. Three misinterpretations of the principle’s force or range of application are common. 1. To ensure that Double Effect is not misunderstood as principle issuing a blanket permission on causing any unintended harm that yields a benefit, applications must require that the agent seek to minimize the harm involved. 2. Since it is widely accepted that it is wrong to aim to produce harm to someone as an end, to rule this out is not part of double effect’s distinctive content. 3. Harms that were produced regretfully and only for the sake of producing a good end may be prohibited by double effect because they were brought about as part of the agent’s means to realizing the good end. (shrink)

The doctrine of double effect has a firm, respected position within Roman Catholic medical ethics. Neil M. Gorsuch, a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit, believes that this doctrine also enjoys a central place within U.S. law. This essay examines and assesses Gorsuch’s thesis. National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly 11.1 (Spring 2011): 31–40.

There are two seemingly unrelated paradoxes of democracy. The older one is the doctrinal paradox or the discursive dilemma. or a comprehensive bibliography, see List 1995. The younger one is the mixed motivation problem introduced by Jonathan Wolff (1994) in this journal. In the mixed motivation problem, we have voters with mixed Benthamite and Rousseauian motivations who reach a majority on an issue that is neither in the self-interest of a majority of the voters, nor considered to be conducive to (...) the common good by a majority of the voters. What has gone unnoticed so far is that both of these paradoxes share a common structure. (shrink)

The standard version of the doctrine of double effect, a significant doctrine in applied ethics particularly medical ethics, not only fails to capture some morally significant components of Aquinas’ view, but it does not resort to proper complementary features in order to accommodate the doctrine to our moral intuitions. We attempt to offer a new formulation of the doctrine incorporating the main components of Aquinas’ view and also to extend the view using some complementary features. We will examine the strength (...) of the formulation applying it into some ethically controversial situations, mainly in medical ethics. (shrink)

Les religions sont-elles condamnées à s'opposer et à être source de conflits en raison de la diversité et du caractère souvent contradictoire de leurs doctrines? Lorsqu'elles sont missionnaires et prétendent détenir la vérité sur Dieu, le monde et l'homme, le caractère systématique de leurs énoncés théologiques et juridiques qui excluent les autres systèmes ne redouble-t-il pas ces conflits? Comment dans ces conditions le dialogue interreligieux pourrait-il aller au-delà des rencontres et du dialogue de vie? Peut-on penser du point de vue (...) théologique une ouverture à l'autre qui assoie l'unité entre les religions, leur communion et leur réconciliation au niveau de la doctrine sans obliger chacune à renoncer aux énoncés de sa foi?0Pour envisager ces questions fondamentales qui concernent tous les acteurs impliqués dans le dialogue interreligieux ou la théologie du pluralisme religieux, plusieurs théologiens ont interrogé George Lindbeck afin d'évaluer si les principes qu'il avance pour repenser l'oecuménisme sont transposables au niveau de l'interreligieux. En effet, conscient de l'enjeu des différences doctrinales entre les Églises chrétiennes, Lindbeck a questionné la nature d'une doctrine et a proposé un modèle post-libéral privilégiant la praxis, l'articulation entre l'action et le langage, la réactivation et la réadaptation constante des identités. Ces recherches montrent qu'en dépit de bien des limites de son modèle, on trouve chez le théologien luthérien une approche originale et féconde pour répondre à bien des défis contemporains. (shrink)

Abstract: This essay consists of some clarifying remarks on the doctrine of double effect (DDE). After providing a contemporary formulation of the doctrine we put special emphasis on the distinction between those aspects of an action plan that are intended and those that are merely foreseen (the I/F distinction). Making use of this distinction is often made difficult in practice because salient aspects of the action plan exhibit a felt “closeness” to one another that is difficult if not impossible to (...) articulate with the precision we might like. The essay goes on to examine an especially adroit criticism of DDE best articulated by J.J. Thomson. We conclude with a brand new double effect case (new to the philosophical literature anyway) taken from medicine and Roman Catholic pastoral ministry. (shrink)

The doctrine of theosis is receiving increased attention from contemporary evangelicals. In this paper, I explore theosis and its importance for our understanding and practice of the Christian moral and spiritual life. I discuss the connection between theosis and how we understand the work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer, and conclude with some practical applications related to this doctrine.

The Doctrine of Double Effect (DDE) is an influential non-consequentialist principle positing a role for intention in affecting the moral permissibility of some actions. In particular, the DDE focuses on the intend/foresee distinction, the core claim being that it is sometimes permissible to bring about as a foreseen but unintended side-effect of one’s action some harm it would have been impermissible to aim at as a means or as an end, all else being equal. This article explores the meaning and (...) application of the DDE along with current debates over the nature of the intend/foresee distinction and its moral significance. How is the line between intended effects and merely foreseen but unintended side-effects to be drawn, and how are problem cases best handled? What is an appropriate methodology for debating the tenability of the DDE? How might the DDE interact with other non-consequentialist principles, and how might it be modified to capture other related factors (resulting perhaps in a Doctrine of Triple Effect) or to avoid certain problem cases? Does the DDE make permissibility turn on the actual intentions of particular agents, as critics such as Thomson and Scanlon assume, or is the role of intention more abstract? (shrink)

When the U.S. conducts warfare, elements of a force are drawn from different services and work together as a single team to accomplish an assigned mission. To achieve such unified action, it is necessary that the doctrines governing the actions of members of specific services be both consistent with and subservient to joint Doctrine. Because warfighting today increasingly involves not only live forces but also automated systems, unified action requires that information technology that is used in joint warfare must be (...) aligned with joint doctrine. It requires also that the separate information systems used by the different elements of a joint force must be interoperable, in the sense that data and information that is generated by each element must be usable (understandable, processable) by all the other elements that need them. Currently, such interoperability is impeded by multiple inconsistencies among the different data and software standards used by warfighters. We describe here the on-going project of creating a Joint Doctrine Ontology (JDO), which uses joint doctrine to provide shared computer-accessible content valid for any field of military endeavor, organization, and information system. JDO addresses the two previously mentioned requirements of unified action by providing a widely applicable benchmark for use by developers of information systems that will both guarantee alignment with joint doctrine and support interoperability. (shrink)