Please tell us (Idealists) what benefit you derive by holding that knowledge depends on other things. If it is contended that dependence (of knowledge) on the knower is desirable (we reply that) the knower also, according to us, is nothing but Knowledge.
The intellect itself, though indivisible, is looked upon by deluded people as consisting of the division of the knower, knowing, and the known.
Action, agents etc. consist, according to us, (Idealists) of knowledge only.
(Reply from advaitin). You must accept an agent of this knowledge, if you admit its existence and destruction (every moment). (#141, #142, #143 Chap. XVIII Upadesa Sahasri)
The locus classicus for a thoroughgoing refutation of Buddhist Idealism (Vijnanavada) is of course Bsb.Bh. II.ii.28. It is ironic that what is called British Empiricism shares the same view that what we are in contact with is a state of consciousness and anything further is an inference of some kind or native faith. In other words we perceive perceptions.
Sankara in this comment on Vijnanavada impugns the annica/annata (no-self/momentariness) aspect since the topic of the chapter is the Self. Holding that there in no knower only knowing implies that the agent of knowing is created and destroyed in every moment. Thereby they (Buddhist Idealists) contradict themselves.
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