Sankaracarya's Vivekachudamani 580

हितमिदमुपदेशमाद्रियन्तां

विहितनिरस्तसमस्तचित्तदोषाः ।

भवसुखविरताः प्रशान्तचित्ताः

श्रुतिरसिका यतयो मुमुक्षवो ये ॥

hitamidamupadeśamādriyantāṃ

vihitanirastasamastacittadoṣāḥ |

bhavasukhaviratāḥ praśāntacittāḥ

śrutirasikā yatayo mumukṣavo ye ||

(Sankaracarya's Vivekachudamani 580)

May the seekers after liberation appreciate this salutary teaching, those who have cleansed themselves of the taints of the mind by observing the prescribed methods, who are indifferent to worldly enjoyments, who have serene minds and take delight in the scriptures.

He can do this simply by discharging devotional service, just as the sun can immediately dissipate fog by its rays.” The real purpose of human life is to attain liberation from material entanglement. Such liberation may be achieved by many methods (tapasā brahmacaryeṇa śamena ca damena ca [SB 6.1.13]), but all of them more or less depending on Tapasya, austerity, which begins with celibacy. Veda means knowledge. Any knowledge you accept is veda, for the teachings of the Vedas are the original knowledge. In the conditioned state, our knowledge is subjected to many deficiencies. The difference between a conditioned soul and a liberated soul is that the conditioned soul has four kinds of defects. The first defect is that he must commit mistakes.

Another defect: to be illusioned. Illusion means to accept something which is not: māyā. Māyā means "what is not." Everyone is accepting the body as the self. If I ask you what you are, you will say, "I am Mr. John; I am a rich man; I am this; I am that." All these are bodily identifications. But you are not this body. This is an illusion.

The third defect is the cheating propensity.

Everyone has the propensity to cheat others. Although a person is fool number one, he poses himself as very intelligent. Although it is already pointed out that he is in illusion and makes mistakes, he will theorize: "I think this is this, this is this." But he does not even know his own position. He writes books of philosophy, although he is defective. That is his disease. That is cheating.

Lastly, our senses are imperfect. We are very proud of our eyes. Often, someone will challenge, "Can you show me, God?" But do you have the eyes to see God? You will never see if you haven't the eyes. If immediately the room becomes dark, you cannot even see your hands. So what power do you have to see? We cannot, therefore, expect knowledge (Veda) with these imperfect senses. With all these deficiencies, in conditioned life, we cannot give perfect knowledge to anyone. Nor are we ourselves perfect. Therefore we accept the Vedas as they are.

You may call the Vedas Hindu, but "Hindu" is a foreign name. We are not Hindus. Our real identification is varṇāśrama.

The Vedas are not compilations of human knowledge. Vedic knowledge comes from the spiritual world, from Lord Kṛṣṇa. Another name for the Vedas is śruti. Śruti refers to that knowledge that is acquired by hearing. It is not experimental knowledge. Śruti is considered to be like a mother. We take so much knowledge from our mother. For example, if you want to know who your father is, who can answer you? Your mother. If the mother says, "Here is your father," you have to accept it. It is not possible to experiment to find out whether he is your father. Similarly, if you want to know something beyond your experience, beyond your experimental knowledge, beyond the activities of the senses, then you have to accept the Vedas. There is no question of experimenting. It has already experimented with. It is already settled. The version of the mother, for instance, has to be accepted as truth. There is no other way.

The Vedas are considered to be the mother, and Brahmā is called the grandfather, the forefather because he was the first to be instructed in the Vedic knowledge. In the beginning, the first living creature was Brahmā. He received this Vedic knowledge and imparted it to Nārada and other disciples and sons, and they also distributed it to their disciples. In this way, the Vedic knowledge comes down by disciplic succession. It is also confirmed in the Bhagavad-gītā that Vedic knowledge is understood in this way. If you make an experimental endeavor, you come to the same conclusion, but just to save time you should accept. If you want to know who your father is and if you accept your mother as the authority, then whatever she says can be accepted without argument. There are three kinds of evidence: pratyakṣa, anumāna, and śabda. Pratyakṣa means "direct evidence." Direct evidence is not very good because our senses are not perfect. We are seeing the sun daily, and it appears to us just like a small disc, but it is actually far, far larger than many planets. Of what value is this seeing? Therefore we have to read books; then we can understand about the sun. So direct experience is not perfect. Then there is anumāna, inductive knowledge: "It may be like this"-hypothesis. For instance, Darwin's theory says it may be like this, it may be like that. But that is not science. That is a suggestion, and it is also not perfect. But if you receive the knowledge from authoritative sources, that is perfect. If you receive a program guide from the radio station authorities, you accept it. You don't deny it; you don't have to make an experiment, because it is received from authoritative sources.

Therefore those who seek unalloyed knowledge from Vedas and guru then follow it without doubting will attain liberation.