4.2 METAPHYSICAL ANALYSIS  OF BODHAM :

ONTOLOGICAL AND COSMOLOGICAL EXPLANATION OF     SIVAGNANA   BODHAM.

ONTOLOGY[i]:

1.How many substances are there?(monism vs. pluralism)

There are two forms.

2. What are they?

1.siva (pati) 2. body(pasu).

3.How are they composed?

Pati is supreme. Pasu was created and exists independently.

It is bonded by desires(pasa).  

4.How do they interact?

Pati stays and pasu moves steadfast towards it by removing bonds(pasa). Thus pati, pasu and pasa becomes three basic entities .   (the god, the human conscious and the world  according to some authors as three entities). The three are real and not an ideal one( as in the vedic advaida schools). When the three together form as a whole the ontology in saivism is realist one. Hence it is called the “ontogenic triadism”.

The verse-1: describes the basics of the saivite ontology and cosmology,

The ontology of the soul is in three states

They are :Father, mother and child

They have three functions

They are: appearance, sustenance and disappearance.

This is done by sivam

This ontogeny is part of the cosmogony(sivam)

The soul leave the sivam in order to get rid of the malam

The sivam is the primordial force of the cosmogony.

The saivite ontology defines the soul as three dimensions. They are father, mother and the child. The father and mother unite to create the child and the child grows under the guidance of them till the end of adolescence. The child when becomes an adult mates with another of the opposite gender to create another generation of child. This is an infinite process. The triangle of father mother and child is the basic unit of the existential and phenomenological analysis. All the other phenomena therefore come after this basic experience.

The purpose of this creation is to get rid of the three basic contaminations (malam).  The malam are anavam(affective), kanmam(psychomotor) and maya(cognitive) defects in the soul(child).The child successfully gets rid of its malam and unites with the sivam. Thus with each generation the malam gets less and lesser.

In Freudian psycho-analysis the child is in autistic state in the womb. After it is delivered it goes into a series of relationship stages with the parents. The first stage is oral stage(0-1years)
The corresponding  stage in saiva siddhantham would be the attanga-yogas.

The next stage is the cleaning of malam when the soul has problem in eliminating its malams. This corresponding to the Freudian anal stage(1-3years). Here the child learns to retain some thing and eliminate something from the mother. The anal function in Freudian vocabulary does not mean feces but an analogue in the mind. Similarly the saiva doctrines denote malam as an object to be cleansed  from the soul.

Later theories like Margaret Mahler ‘s separation individuation process also liken the saiva schools in its core philosophy in psychological development. The initial autistic stage progress in to a separation individuation states akin to the saiva siddhantham stages.

COSMOLOGY[ii]:

1.How did universe come into being?

The universe is the creation of Siva.

2. Are there space and time?

The Siva creates the space and time and  he is beyond that.

The body is the creation, sustenance and destruction of Siva

and hence within space  and time.

 

EPISTEMOLOGY[iii]:

            Siva is the ultimate knowledge.

            The life knowledge is acquired and not a-priori.

            It is by the contact with Siva life acquires knowledge.

            Life gets knowledge by meditating on Siva.

            The knowledge is concealed by the contamination of the dirts(mala) .

Siddhantha epistemology in short[iv]:

            Siva is the ultimate knowledge.

            The life knowledge is acquired and not a-priori.

            It is by the contact with Siva life acquires knowledge.

            Life gets knowledge by meditating on Siva.

            The knowledge is concealed by the contamination of the dirts(mala) .

The soul cannot realize the absolute through the mind, knowledge, thought, or by its self love. The sivagnana bodham verse  four says that the thoughts and the mental functioning cannot be sufficient to understand the almighty. In this verse it refutes the Cartesian rationalism . the dualism of the Cartesian theory is likened to the mind and the soul relationship to a relationship between the king and the ministers. The soul joins the mind to produce only the five avathais. This state is called the SAGASAMALAM(சகசமலம்). In this state the soul  will only be illusioned.

In the verse five the SGB  points to the empiricism of knowledge and its inability know the absolute through the senses either. These sense experiences even though helpful to know the world they cannot know the soul or the almighty. This is like the magnet and the steel even though are attracted to each other would not mix with them even as they approximate-they only separate later. The power of god is like the power of magnet.

SATHU, ASATHU& SADHASATHU;சத்து,அசத்து, சதசத்து

The sathu is sivam. The asathu is the world. The sadhasathu is the soul . it is capable of knowing both the sivam and the world by systematic process.  The process of the sadhasathu is important in saivasiddhantham. The verse seven describes the sadhasathu state in which the soul with the help of both perception and rationalizing tries to know the absolute. This is called sadha-sathu state. This is similar to Kantian transcendental idealism.

Here saiva doctrine puts its soul in the Kantian perspective. Kant in his transcendental idealism emphasized the empirical knowledge and the rational knowledge both by them self cannot know the reality. But when the brain uses the both, it results in the knowledge which is transcendental idealism.

Kant gave the man a new level of importance from the earlier dichotomy of empiricism which puts man in a passive state  and the rationalism which make the man completely deluded. This brain and its power of acquiring both perceptual information and the rationalizing process culminate in the new level of understanding knowledge.

Sivagnana bodham epistemology has brought in the Copernican revolution well in the 13^th century. Epistemology of  sivagnanabodham is  an important early hindu doctrine.

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[i] As a first approximation, ontology is the study of what there is. Some contest this formulation of what ontology is, so it's only a first approximation. Many classical philosophical problems are problems in ontology: the question whether or not there is a god, or the problem of the existence of universals, etc.. These are all problems in ontology in the sense that they deal with whether or not a certain thing, or more broadly entity, exists. But ontology is usually also taken to encompass problems about the most general features and relations of the entities which do exist. There are also a number of classic philosophical problems that are problems in ontology understood this way. For example, the problem of how a universal relates to a particular that has it (assuming there are universals and particulars), or the problem of how an event like John eating a cookie relates to the particulars John and the cookie, and the relation of eating, assuming there are events, particulars and relations. These kinds of problems quickly turn into metaphysics more generally, which is the philosophical discipline that encompasses ontology as one of its parts. The borders here are a little fuzzy. But we have at least two parts to the overall philosophical project of ontology: first, say what there is, what exists, what the stuff is reality is made out off, secondly, say what the most general features and relations of these things are. http://www.iep.utm.edu/category/m-and-e/metaphysics/

[ii] As long as humans have been trying to make sense of the universe, they have been proposing cosmological theories. Furthermore, the notion of a deity often plays a central role in these cosmological theories. According to most monotheistic religions, God is the sole creator and sustainer of the universe.

But the last one hundred years have seen a different sort of cosmology: a scientific cosmology. Without running afoul of the demarcation problem, the notable characteristics of scientific cosmology are that it uses the tools of mathematical physics (it is formalizable) and that it makes precise and testable predictions. What has this new scientific cosmology to do with traditional (often theistic) cosmologies? Has the new cosmology replaced the older cosmologies? Does the new cosmology inform or interpret the older cosmologies? http://www.iep.utm.edu/category/m-and-e/metaphysics/

[iii] Epistemology is the study of knowledge. Epistemologists concern themselves with a number of tasks, which we might sort into two categories.
First, we must determine the nature of knowledge; that is, what does it mean to say that someone knows, or fails to know, something? This is a matter of understanding what knowledge is, and how to distinguish between cases in which someone knows something and cases in which someone does not know something. While there is some general agreement about some aspects of this issue, we shall see that this question is much more difficult than one might imagine.
Second, we must determine the extent of human knowledge; that is, how much do we, or can we, know? How can we use our reason, our senses, the testimony of others, and other resources to acquire knowledge? Are there limits to what we can know? For instance, are some things unknowable? Is it possible that we do not know nearly as much as we think we do? Should we have a legitimate worry about skepticism, the view that we do not or cannot know anything at all? http://www.iep.utm.edu/epistemo/

[iv] SAIVA SIDDHANTHA THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE,V. PONNIAH PhD, MAHARAGAMA GOVT TRAINING COLLEGE, COLOMBO. PUBLISHED BY ANNAMALAI UNIVERSITY1952, PHILOSOPHY SERIES VII.