Dr. S.

Lourdunathan

It is therefore, obvious that any label that we fix on the Advaitin (TMP) will not give a correct picture of him. He values reason, but he is not a rationalist. He seeks guidance from scripture, but he is not a dogmatic. He relies on experience as the Ultimate court of appeal, but he is not a positivist Prof. R. B on TMP Mahadeven
Indescribability as a way of describability - itself needs to hermeneuticized.

Discussion
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What is the sense of TMPs hermeneutical engagement of Indian Philosophy in general, and Advaita in particular? Is TMP a traditionalist in interpreting the scripture in the sense that his interpretative engagement is a sort of tradition-rule-bounded, within the parameters required for anyinterpretation as stipulated by any dogmatic textual authority? Is TMPs interpretative engagement of scripture is sort of logical positivists claim that interpretation should be a matter of representation of the world of facts? Is TMPs interpretative engagement falls within a horizon of a given fore-structure and afore structure of a given hermeneutical circle? Is TMPs interpretative engagement open to consider a plurality of interpretations of the scriptural texts? If so,

6. Is TMPs interpretative engagement intentional? 7. Is TMPs interpretative engagement specifically culture-specific? 8. Is TMPs interpretative engagement posits a space for concordance or discordance, discontent or content? 9. Is TMPs interpretative engagement rationally justifiable? If so how? 10. Is TMPs interpretative engagement ethical if so, is that ethical engagement ethical? 11. Is TMPs interpretative engagement though situated in a specified cultural context, does it contain the possibility to be directed by a Movement of

hermeneutical conversion and fusion of horizons through which understanding or Communion (Covenantal life) becomes a possibility. 12. in fine, What is the validity of the validity of TMPs
Textual hermeneutics?

What is the sense of hermeneutics that Prof. TMP Mahadevan employs in engaging Indian Philosophical Traditions ?

Two broader dimensions of Hermeneutics

(i) As a Methodology (epistemological)

of

interpretation

(ii) As a full-fledged science (constitutive of the way of being-in-the-world)

Note: The former treated as the traditional understanding of hermeneutics and the later as the Modern & Recent developments in the science of hermeneutics.

(i) Refer to the rules by which we interpret or exegete ("exegesis). hermeneutics is a process of "bringing out" the meaning of a scriptural text i.e., pre-given through linguistic ability (2) As a methodology or normative basis for interpreting any scriptural traditions the interpreter is required of a. an understanding and proficiency of a language b. an understanding the cultural context in which interpretation takes recourse to c. and sufficient self-understanding of the message to be interpreted and d. logical ability to interpret the scriptures within the rational ground (Aristotelian)

Unlike the catholic church tradition insisted a strong sense of AUTHORITY and TRADTION as the AUTHOR of interpretation, (the monopoly of interpreting) the Council of Trent in 1546 (Reformation Church) brought about a sea of change in the very mode of interpreting scriptures. It proposed two important guidelines to the task of interpretation: (i) The principle of Self-Sufficiency (ii) The principle of Perspicuity (self-expression), which broadly speaking came to be termed as the modern intervention or modern understanding of hermeneutics.

While the Greek, and the Catholic tradition deemed hermeneutics as priority of an authoritative interpreter within a specified rules of interpretation, the reformist came to consider interpretations as a possibility of anyone who engages the scriptures. Thus Understanding is not the priority of a few rather understanding is the possibility of anyone who encounters the scriptures. the idea of hermeneutics shifts from the private realm to the public realm; from the monopoly to a plurality of interpretations; from methodology to a science in-itself. From methodology to actuality of human sciences.

The interpreter must set himself free from any normative or authoritative mode of reading/interpreting the scriptures in so doing s/he needs to let not only (a) the scripture to speak to the listener but also let the (b) the cultural context to speak to the scripture, thereby, if there is any discontent or incoherency or conflict then such problematic be addressed as to render any interpretation intelligible.

Such a shift can be termed as an epistemological break, a break from ontological normative basis towards open-ended possibilities of interpretations as to treat hermeneutics as a way of being-in-theworld and as a pre-condition to our understanding of our worlds.

These streams include 1. The naive hermeneutics of early modern Europe 2. Dilthey's historically conscious hermeneutic, 3. Nineteenth centurys methodological hermeneutics, which sought to produce systematic and scientific interpretations by situating a text in the context of its production. 4. In the twentieth century, Heidegger's and Gadamer's philosophical hermeneutics shifted the focus from interpretation (epistemological) to existential understanding, which was treated more as a direct, non-mediated, authentic way of being in the world than as a way of knowing. 5. Ricoeur in his phenomenological hermeneutics attempted to synthesize the various hermeneutic currents with structuralism and phenomenology. 6. Postmodernist render hermeneutics to a sense of relativity

To be hermeneutical is to belong to a tradition the Text-Context Being hermeneutical is an ontological priority as it is fundamental to our very own being. (understanding is rooted in the historical cultural social context (Dilthey,
Saussure)

Is To be Human; to be Hermeneutical is to be Human:

Martin Heidegger critiquing the modernist cognition of human being as self thinking self, a subject that engages in cognitive acts, asserts that humans above all else are beings-in-the world, enmeshed in social networks To Hermeneutical is to be Situated and Directed Socially

The The The The

ontologically epistemological Extensional Intentional contextual

To Be Hermeneutical is to be Human and to be Hermeneutical is to be human To be human in hermeneutical engagement is to be to be Socially Situated and Directed by a Movement of hermeneutical conversion and fusion of horizons through which understanding or Communion (Covenantal life) becomes a possibility among other possibilities but without losing sight of the primacy of ethics as metaphysics.

Is TMPs interpretative engagement though situated in a specified cultural context, does it contain the possibility to be directed by a Movement of hermeneutical conversion and fusion of horizons through which understanding or Communion (Covenantal life) becomes a possibility.

What is the validity of the validity of TMPs Textual hermeneutics?

Indescribability as a way of describability - itself needs to hermeneuticized.