IS Brahman intelligent?

[Kalidas]

So I asked this question in an another thread and realised I do not know the answer at all(if the question can be answered at all). I don't mean Brahman is "dumb" but is there even an entity that we could recognise as being intelligent?

 

[Vinayaka]

Not sure if Brahman is intelligent, as that would imply a quality, but Brahman may well be intelligence ... of the Supreme unconditional variety.

 

[Kalidas]

Not sure if Brahman is intelligent, as that would imply a quality, but Brahman may well be intelligence ... of the Supreme unconditional variety.

It is a difficult question. Brahman IS everything that exists,existed,will exist, and never existed. So can something such as this(that something being everything) be intelligent? Intellect of itself?

 

[Jainarayan]

You mean self-aware? Good question. I think the answer is yes. But I think it's different than what we think of as self-aware. Remember, Brahman is ineffable, and we are trying to ascribe characteristics to it with our limited intellects. It's just like acintya-bhedābheda-tattva, "inconceivable one-ness and difference". We just can't grasp it.

 

[Vinayaka]

We just can't grasp it.

I certainly can't. (but someone will come along and explain it to us)

 

[Valjean]

Good points. The term "intelligent," In common parlance, implies a capacity for data collection and analysis in a discrete, self-conscious entity. It implies "thingness" and entails qualities -gunas-, as Vinayaka and Kalidas pointed out.
I suppose the definition could be expanded to a commonly understood technical understanding, (I think the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi described Brahman as intelligent), but we've seen the problems the general public has disentangling colloquial and technical usages of a term.

 

[Jainarayan]

(but someone will come along and explain it to us)

I'm not going to go there!

 

[Valjean]

You'd do better trying to explain Relativity to a flatworm.

 

[MD]

You'd do better trying to explain Relativity to a flatworm.

Lol well said

 

[Maya3]

I don´t know. It is a better question to ponder tomorrow after I have a large mug of coffee.

(Excellent question thought Kalidas, keep them coming)

Maya

 

[Vinayaka]

It is a better question to ponder tomorrow after I have a large mug of coffee.

(Excellent question thought Kalidas, keep them coming)

Maya

Does coffee help you meditate? Surely the answer, if there is an answer, lies in the depths of our beings?

 

[Kalidas]

Yeah I guess self awareness is pretty close to what I mean.

Here let me explain it using examples we already know.

Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva the Tri murti. I would say they are "intelligent". They are self aware, have a "job" of some kind (create, peserve, destroy respectivly). They know what they do, how, why,when etc etc. Gravity, I would not call gravity intelligent. But it has a "job" of sorts also. Yet it is not capable of knowing how it works, why, where, when. It just does what it does.

See what kind of what I mean by intelligence?

 

[Kalidas]

Does coffee help you meditate? Surely the answer, if there is an answer, lies in the depths of our beings?

I'm starting to think there is no answer. Or not one we can explain.

 

[Vinayaka]

Yeah I guess self awareness is pretty close to what I mean.

Here let me explain it using examples we already know.

Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva the Tri murti. I would say they are "intelligent". They are self aware, have a "job" of some kind (create, peserve, destroy respectivly). They know what they do, how, why,when etc etc. Gravity, I would not call gravity intelligent. But it has a "job" of sorts also. Yet it is not capable of knowing how it works, why, where, when. It just does what it does.

See what kind of what I mean by intelligence?

Indeed some conceptualisations of God have attributes. Brahman is not one of them.

But within certain sects, Brahman is also there. Parasiva is also Parabrahman.

 

[atanu]

So I asked this question in an another thread and realised I do not know the answer at all(if the question can be answered at all). I don't mean Brahman is "dumb" but is there even an entity that we could recognise as being intelligent?

I think either one knows and thereby abides as brahman, or one goes by the scripture. Both cases, IMO, involve 'knowledge' (jnana) in some form. The scriptural definition of brahman as having self nature of satyam, jnanam, anantam, can be understood as unbroken awareness.

 

[ShivaFan]

Read this

http://www.hinduwebsite.com/hinduism/essays/mahavakyas1.asp

 

[Kalidas]

Read this

http://www.hinduwebsite.com/hinduism/essays/mahavakyas1.asp

Thanks for that. That actually cleared everything up wonderfully.

So the answer isn't yes or no "Brahman Does or doesn't have intelligence", but rather Brahman IS intelligence. Yet Brahman is also those things that ARE intelligent.

So the big answer is Brahman is both intelligent, and also is THE intelligence. Brahman Is the knowledge that Brahman knows.

Brahman is the man who asks questions, and the man who answers them.

THANKS!

 

[Kalidas]

I don´t know. It is a better question to ponder tomorrow after I have a large mug of coffee.

(Excellent question thought Kalidas, keep them coming)

Maya

I too need coffee daily

thanks Maya I try, lol. Honestly if it wasn't for the utter seemingly uselessness of it, I would get my degree in Philosophy.

Maybe after my Child Development degree I will go back to school and get a Philosophy degree, for fun!

 

[Runewolf1973]

So I asked this question in an another thread and realised I do not know the answer at all(if the question can be answered at all). I don't mean Brahman is "dumb" but is there even an entity that we could recognise as being intelligent?

All is Brahman. Humans are intelligent creatures and even that intellect is part of Brahman. In this sense, Brahman may take on intelligent forms (illusions) and it may take on non-intelligent forms. At the most fundamental however, it is neither intelligent, nor is it non-intelligent. It just IS what it is...Brahman.

 

[atanu]

The following saying of Ramana Maharshi, i think, clarifies it.

To see God and not the Self that sees is only to see a projection of the mind.

Shri Ramana Maharshi