Ishwa helper Reged: 03/03/02 Posts: 553

Re: The so called difference between Shivaism and Vishnuism [Re: jayasri] #19885 - 09/10/02 05:35 AM Edit Reply Quote

Of course Shaivism and Vaishnavism aren't antagonistic, but still there outlook is in some points differently as any Shaiva and Vaishnava knows, but within the Hindu mainframe, which is actually no big deal. Hinduism has the power to (re)create different points of views and then to absorb and adjust and assimilate and develop without changing the universal laws so beatifully understood by the Hindu seers. That's why any Hindu has Shaiva-Sh�kta as well as Vaishnava, etc. devotion and rituals. We can already see how the BrahmaS�tras of B�dar�yana Vy�sa V�sishtha (being a Raudra Shaiva) was adopted in the Vaishnava Bhagavatism, leading to the systems of Yamun�charya, R�m�nuja, M�dhav�ch�rya and R�m�nanda, etc. But at the same time Krshna Dvaip�yana, another earlier Vy�sa V�sishtha, did write the Bh�ratam including the BhagavadGiit�, which is Bh�gavata (though N�r�yanistic, not yet completely Vaishnavistic). In the same way Jainism and Buddhism are ancient currents of Hindu thought very close to the end of the Vedic period, but belonging to the more eastern Upanishadic Vedic culture. In the same sense Sikkhism and Sant Bhaktism is the logical outcome of the fusion of aspects of Saguna Vaishnavism (Bhed�bheda and Bhakti Yoga) and Nirguna Shaivism (Jnana Yoga and Natha tradition etc.) There are more agreements than differences, as Jayashri rightly points out, and all belong to the same platform of creational thinking within Hinduism. Many indologists and communist researchers have only stressed the (minor) differences, in order to cut every part of Hindu currents from the mainstream religion.