/lit/ - Literature

>>15019427
I'm considering being initiated into Veerashaivism, also known as Lingayatism, they are the final philosophical development of Shaivism and draw from both the Tantric Agamas and the Upanishads. Their metaphysics is sort of between Advaita and Vishishtadvaita. You have to become a vegetarian for life and forever stop smoking and drinking alcohol though but I wouldn't have a problem with that if the spiritual instructions and initiation etc are what I am looking for. They offer initiation to foreigners and non-Indians as long as you promise to follow the expected rules. Nisargadatta Maharaj was initiated into the Veerashaivism in addition to the Nath lineage.

http://www.virashaiva.com/shaivism/

Here is an interview with the head of a Veerashaiva temple in Varanasi where he confirms that they offer the same initiation to foreigners that they offer to Indians

http://wildyogi.info/en/initiation-veera-shaiva-sampradaya-gokarna-karnataka-india-24-25-march-2019

I would just need to get in contact with some Veerashaiva temples in India and find one with a Jagatguru who speaks English so I don't have to spend 4 years learning fluent Hindi or Kannada just so I can be initiated.

>>14914054
Guénon (pbuh) is correct, as always

Reincarnation as normally understood is the idea that the personified soul-essence of Bob was actually Napoleon or Cleopatra etc in their past lives and that this soul essence which is you continues from life to life while remaining the same "you" with the same values, tendencies etc. What is actually taught in the Upanishads according to the Hindu school of Advaita Vedanta that Guénon (pbuh) mostly writes from the perspective of is transmigration i.e. the Supreme Godhead remains as immutable and unborn and never actually reincarnates but is the inner Self and Awareness animating all living beings and that the only things that transmigrate are unreal illusory creations of God's magician-like power. The subtle body, in which the mind inheres is the object that transmigrates from body to body, but the Godhead who is the inner Self animating that subtle body and mind observing them as their inner awareness never actually transmigrates. All the things which make up "you" as a person such as your emotions, values, memories, proclivities are based on the conditions of your current life and karmic influences from past lives but are not any sort of stable or permanent identity/soul whatsoever.

The actual "soul" which is always there at all times in all the lives and which is eternal and which is the true "you" is the Self, which is the Supreme Godhead, whose essential nature is immutable bliss and which is completely free from all such attributes that we might consider to the components of our personalities or identities. In enlightenment and spiritual liberation the subtle body and our personas as individual beings with such and such traits are revealed to be unreal illusions (created by the Supreme Godhead's power of maya) and vanish, leaving God alone as the thing that was always really existing all along and as the only thing that will ever exist. The major difference with the regular conception of reincarnation in the west is that the soul in the Hindu conception bears little resemblance to what people regularly imagine to be the soul to be which reincarnates in the standard western conception of reincarnation.

>>14663549
>if Perennialism is Advaita Vedanta, why not just practice Advaita Vedanta?
Because according to how it is traditionally practiced, one is supposed to give up all of one's possessions and live the rest of one's life as a monk in order to attain liberation, as is described in the Upanishads; some Hindus wait until old age until after having a family to do so. If you travel to India at any point you are free to do this though, the actual monastic orders like the Dashnami Sampradaya which trace their founding to Shankara admit anyone willing to become a monk regardless of nationality, caste etc.

For people who don't want to become a monk, very similar metaphysical teachings that point to the same truth are found in wide range of other traditions according to the Traditionalists such as certain other Hindu schools, Sufism, Taoism, some Mahayana, Neoplatonism, and certain Christian esoterism. Not all of these have actual traditions with long histories going back which you can personally join and be instructed in though. The actual orders going back many hundreds of years which a westerner can join and be instructed in the esoteric metaphysical teachings are mostly Sufism, Mahayana (some Mahayana is kinda garbage though watch out!), and the non-Advaita but still nevertheless non-dual Hindu schools like Vishishtadvaita and Shaivite schools like Lingayatism. With Christianity there is the teaching of Heychasm in Eastern Orthodox hermitages etc but to get deep into that you would probably have to become a sort of monk anyway.

>>14663660
>All these Traditionalists on /lit/ are actually followers of Neo-Advaita which is not even 100 years old. So much for tradition.
Lol have you even read Guenon ? He carefully distinguishes his ideas from NeoVedanta/NeoAdvaita and btfos the latter.

>>14622263
>What texts are the most essential and core, as there are so many (4 vedas, upanishads etc. etc.)
The primary Upanishads and the Bhagavad-Gita, the Vedas are mostly of interest to academics only, with the possible exception of the Rig-Veda which has some nice poetry. If you want a translation of those texts by academics then Olivelle's edition of the Upanishads are good as is Flood's edition of the Bhagavad-Gita. If you want to read the classical commentaries of Hindu philosophers on those texts, Adi Shankara wrote some great commentaries on the Upanishads which have been translated, and the Bhagavad-Gita has had numerous wonderful commentaries written on it by Hindu philosophers such as those by Shankara, Ramanuja, Abhinavagupta and Jnanadeva.

>I was planning on picking up the mahabharata and ramayana. Abridged or unabridged?
Reading the entirety of both unabridged could take you possibly a whole year or so, the former especially is quite long. Doing that would allow you to fully appreciate the glory and significance of those texts but people also find the abridged verisons to be enjoyable. It comes down to how much time you want to spend reading them. There is some philosophical content in the Mahabharata but those two text are literary epics and not primarily philosophical or metaphysical works like the Upanishads.

>Any other texts, like the yoga sutras of patanjali?
The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali is a classic worth checking out, I'd also recommend 'The Yoga Vasistha', in particular the longer ~700 page translation of it by Venkatesananada which was published by SUNY

>What about the rig veda? They dont seem to publish the other three.
The Jamison and Brereton translation is the latest critical edition of it published by academics specializing in that area, i'd recommend getting that one if you desire to read it

>Also, is english fine, or preferably english and sanskrit?
Unless you are planning to learn Sanskrit, it's unnecessary to get editions that contain the Sanskrit characters, but most English translations of Hindu writings do so anyway.

>>13738726
Only Advaita does, the later Vedanta schools like Vishishadvaita and later Vedantic-Yogic-Tantric syncretic schools say you can live a householders live and still attain union with God through constant devotion, egolessness, meditational practices etc

just ordered some powdered Peruvian torch powder lads, I'm looking forward to having a nice mescaline trip

>>11639085
It sounds like you've already intuitively grasped the gist of Advaita Vedanta, aka the cream of the crop top-shelf Indo-European primordial metaphysical wisdom. There are many thousands of pages of Advaita texts which have been translated into English but the Ashtavakra Gita is a particularly good one and is easy to understand for people new to it. You can read the whole thing online here in an hour or so.

https://realization.org/p/ashtavakra-gita/richards.ashtavakra-gita/richards.ashtavakra-gita.html

There are several ideas you stated which are more or less expressed in the text (as demonstrated by the below quotes from it)

>My true self is the thing that watches the thoughts, not the thoughts themselves

You do not consist of any of the elements — earth, water, fire, air, or even ether. To be liberated, know yourself as consisting of consciousness, the witness of these. 1.3
If only you will remain resting in consciousness, seeing yourself as distinct from the body, then even now you will become happy, peaceful and free from bonds. 1.4
Your real nature is as the one perfect, free, and actionless consciousness, the all-pervading witness — unattached to anything, desireless and at peace. It is from illusion that you seem to be involved in samsara. 1.12

>Why should I attach myself to any thought? Why not just ignore them and stay still, doing nothing?

In the infinite ocean of myself the world boat drifts here and there, moved by its own inner wind. I am not put out by that. 7.1
Whether the world wave of its own nature rises or disappears in the infinite ocean of myself, I neither gain nor lose anything by that. 7.2
It is in the infinite ocean of myself that the mind-creation called the world takes place. I am supremely peaceful and formless, and I remain as such. 7.3
My true nature is not contained in objects, nor does any object exist in it, for it is infinite and spotless. So it is unattached, desireless and at peace, and I remain as such. 7.4

>Another possibility is to explore an higher consciousness, a state above the Ego. Using discourse reason and phenomenology, seeking metaphysical knowledge.

Unmoved and undistressed, realising that being, non-being and change are of the very nature of things, one easily finds peace. 11.1
At peace, having shed all desires within, and realising that nothing exists here but the Lord, the Creator of all things, one is no longer attached to anything. 11.2
Realising that suffering arises from nothing other than thought, dropping all desires one rids oneself of it, and is happy and at peace everywhere. 11.5
Realising, “I am not the body, nor is the body mine. I am awareness,” one attains the supreme state and no longer remembers things done or undone. 11.6
Realising, “I alone exist, from Brahma down to the last clump of grass,” one becomes free from uncertainty, pure, at peace, and unconcerned about what has been attained or not. 11.7

>>11343043
>But of what could possibly eternity be aware of?

itself (everything)

from the Ashtavakra Gita

>In my unblemished nature there are no elements, no body, no faculties, no mind. There is no void and no despair. 20.1
>For me, free from the sense of dualism, there are no scriptures, no self-knowledge, no mind free from an object, no satisfaction and no freedom from desire. 20.2
>There is no knowledge or ignorance, no “me,” “this,” or “mine,” no bondage, no liberation, and no property of self-nature. 20.3
>For him who is always free from individual characteristics there is no antecedent causal action, no liberation during life, and no fulfilment at death. 20.4
>For me, free from individuality, there is no doer and no reaper of the consequences, no cessation of action, no arising of thought, no immediate object, and no idea of results. 20.5
>There is no world, no seeker for liberation, no yogi, no seer, no one bound and no one liberated. I remain in my own nondual nature. 20.6
>There is no emanation or return, no goal, means, seeker or achievement. I remain in my own nondual nature. 20.7
>For me who am forever unblemished, there is no assessor, no standard, nothing to assess, and no assessment. 20.8
>For me who am forever actionless, there is no distraction or one-pointedness of mind, no lack of understanding, no stupidity, no joy and no sorrow. 20.9
>For me who am always free from deliberations there is neither conventional truth nor absolute truth, no happiness and no suffering. 20.10
>For me who am forever pure there is no illusion, no samsara, no attachment or detachment, no living organism, and no God. 20.11
>For me who am forever unmovable and indivisible, established in myself, there is no activity or inactivity, no liberation and no bondage. 20.12
>For me who am blessed and without limitation, there is no initiation or scripture, no disciple or teacher, and no goal of human life. 20.13
>There is no being or non-being, no unity or dualism. What more is there to say? There is nothing outside of me. 20.14