The small ether within cannot denote anything but the highest Lord for this reason also, that the word 'ether' has (among other meanings) the settled meaning of ' highest Lord.' Compare, for instance, the sense in which the word ' ether ' is used in Kk. Up. VIII, 14, 'He who is called ether is the revealer of all forms and names ;' and Kk. Up. I, 9, 1, 'All these beings take their rise from the ether,' &c. On the other hand, we do not meet with any passage in which the word ' ether ' is used in the sense of ' individual soul.' — We have already shown that the word cannot, in our passage, denote the elemental ether; for, although the word certainly has that settled meaning, it cannot have it here, because the elemental ether cannot possibly be com- pared to itself, &c. &c.
18. If it be said that the other one (i.e. the indi-
vidual soul) (is meant) on account of a reference to
it (made in a complementary passage), (we say) no,
on account of the impossibility.
If the small (ether) is to be explained as the highest Lord on account of a complementary passage, then, the purvapakshin resumes, we point out that another complementary passage contains a reference to the other one, i. e. to the individual soul : ' Now that serene being (literally : serenity, complete satisfaction), which after having risen out from this earthly body and having reached the highest light, appears in its true form, that is, the Self; thus he spoke' {Kk. Up. VIII, 3,4). For there the word ' serenity,' which is known to denote, in another scriptural passage, the state of deep sleep, can convey the idea of the individual soul only when it is in
I Adhyaya, 3 Pada, 1 9. 1 83
that state, not of anything else. The ' rising from the body' also can be predicated of the individual soul only whose abode the body is ; just as air, &c, whose abode is the ether, are said to arise from the ether. And just as the word 'ether,' although in ordinary language not denoting the highest Lord, yet is admitted to denote him in such passages as, ' The ether is the revealer of forms and names/ because it there occurs in conjunction with qualities of the highest Lord, so it may likewise denote the individual soul. Hence the term * the small ether ' denotes in the passage under discussion the individual soul, * on account of the reference to the other.'
Not so, we reply, ' on account of the impossibility.' In the first place, the individual soul, which imagines itself to be limited by the internal organ and its other adjuncts, can- not be compared with the ether. And, in the second place, attributes such as freedom from evil, and the like, cannot be ascribed to a being which erroneously transfers to itself the attributes of its limiting adjuncts. This has already been set forth in the first Sutra of the present adhikara^a, and is again mentioned here in order to remove all doubt as to the soul being different from the highest Self. That the reference pointed out by the purvapakshin is not to the individual soul will, moreover, be shown in one of the next Sutras (I, 3, 31).
19. If it be said that from the subsequent (chapter
it appears that the individual soul is meant), (we
point out that what is there referred to is) rather
(the individual soul in so far) as its true nature has
become manifest (i. e. as it is non-different from
Brahman).
The doubt whether, ' on account of the reference to the other,' the individual soul might not possibly be meant, has been discarded on the ground of * impossibility.' But, like a dead man on whom amrz'ta has been sprinkled, that doubt rises again, drawing new strength from the subsequent chapter which treats of Pra^&pati. For there he (Pra^pati)
1 84 VEDANTA-stjTRAS.
at the outset declares that the Self, which is free from sin and the like, is that which is to be searched out, that which we must try to understand (Kk. Up. VIII, 7, 1) ; after that he points out that the seer within the eye, i. e. the individual soul, is the Self (' that person that is seen in the eye is the Self,' VIII, 7, 3) ; refers again and again to the same entity (in the clauses ' I shall explain him further to you/ VIII, 9, 3 ; VIII, 10, 4) ; and (in the explanations fulfilling the given promises) again explains the (nature of the) same individual soul in its different states ('He who moves about happy in dreams is the Self/ VIII, 10, 1 ; 'When a man being asleep, reposing, and at perfect rest sees no dreams, that is the Self/ VIII, 11, 1). The clause attached to both these explanations (viz. ' That is the immortal, the fearless ; that is Brahman ') shows, at the same time, the individual soul to be free from sin, and the like. After that Pra^apati, having discovered a shortcoming in the condition of deep sleep (in consequence of the expostulation of Indra, ' In that way he does not know himself that he is I, nor does he know these beings/ VIII, 11, 3), enters on a further expla- nation (' I shall explain him further to you, and nothing more than this '), begins by blaming the (soul's) connexion with the body, and finally declares the individual soul, when it has risen from the body, to be the highest person. (' Thus does that serene being, arising from this body, appear in its own form as soon as it has approached the highest light. That is the highest person.') — From this it appears that there is a possibility of the qualities of the highest Lord belonging to the individual soul also, and on that account we maintain that the term, 'the small ether within it/ refers to the individual soul. This position we counter-argue as follows. ' But in so far as its nature has become manifest.5 The particle ' but ' (in the Sutra) is meant to set aside the view of the purvapakshin, so that the sense of the Sutra is, ' Not even on account of the subsequent chapter a doubt as to the small ether being the individual soul is possible, because there also that which is meant to be intimated is the individual soul, in so far only as its (true) nature has become manifest.' The Sutra uses the expression ' he whose nature has become manifest/
I Adhyaya, 3 Pada, 1 9. 1 85
which qualifies £*iva, the individual soul, with reference to its previous condition \ — The meaning is as follows. Pra^pati speaks at first of the seer characterised by the eye (' That person which is within the eye/ &c.) ; shows thereupon, in the passage treating of (the reflection in) the waterpan, that he (viz. the seer) has not his true Self in the body; refers to him repeatedly as the subject to be explained (in the clauses 'I shall explain him further to you ') ; and having then spoken of him as subject to the states of dreaming and deep sleep, finally explains the individual soul in its real nature, i. e. in so far as it is the highest Brahman, not in so far as it is indi- vidual soul ('As soon as it has approached the highest light it appears in its own form '). The highest light mentioned, in the passage last quoted, as what is to be approached, is nothing else but the highest Brahman, which is distinguished by such attributes as freeness from sin, and the like. That same highest Brahman constitutes — as we know from passages such as ' that art thou ' — the real nature of the individual soul, while its second nature, i. e. that aspect of it which depends on fictitious limiting conditions, is not its real nature. For as long as the indi- vidual soul does not free itself from Nescience in the form of duality — which Nescience may be compared to the mistake of him who in the twilight mistakes a post for a man — and does not rise to the knowledge of the Self, whose nature is unchangeable, eternal Cognition — which expresses itself in the form ' I am Brahman' — so long it remains the individual soul. But when, discarding the aggregate of body, sense- organs and mind, it arrives, by means of Scripture, at the knowledge that it is not itself that aggregate, that it does not form part of transmigratory existence, but is the True, the Real, the Self, whose nature is pure intelligence ; then
1 The masculine ' avirbhutasvarupa^ ' qualifies the substantive givak which has to be supplied. Properly speaking the giva, whose true nature has become manifest, i. e. which has become Brahman, is no longer giva ; hence the explanatory statement that the term g-iva is used with reference to what the £"iva was before it became Brahman,
1 86 VEDANTA-SljTRAS,
knowing itself to be of the nature of unchangeable, eternal Cognition, it lifts itself above the vain conceit of being one with this body, and itself becomes the Self, whose nature is unchanging, eternal Cognition. As is declared in such scriptural passages as ' He who knows the highest Brahman becomes even Brahman ' (Mu. Up. Ill, 2, 9). And this is the real nature of the individual soul by means of which it arises from the body and appears in its own form.
Here an objection may be raised. How, it is asked, can we speak of the true nature (svarupa) of that which is unchanging and eternal, and then say that ' it appears in its own form (true nature) ?' Of gold and similar substances, whose true nature becomes hidden, and whose specific qualities are rendered non-apparent by their contact with some other substance, it may be said that their true nature is rendered manifest when they are cleaned by the application of some acid substance ; so it may be said, likewise, that the stars, whose light is during daytime overpowered (by the superior brilliancy of the sun), become manifest in their true nature at night when the overpowering (sun) has departed. But it is impossible to speak of an analogous overpowering of the eternal light of intelligence by whatever agency, since, like ether, it is free from all contact, and since, moreover, such an assumption would be contradicted by what we actually observe. For the (energies of) seeing, hearing, noticing, cognising constitute the character of the individual soul, and that character is observed to exist in full perfection, even in the case of that individual soul which has not yet risen beyond the body. Every individual soul carries on the course of its practical existence by means of the activities of seeing, hearing, cognising ; otherwise no practical existence at all would be possible. If, on the other hand, that character would realise itself in the case of that soul only which has risen above the body, the entire aggregate of practical exis- tence, as it actually presents itself prior to the soul's rising, would thereby be contradicted. We therefore ask : Wherein consists that (alleged) rising from the body ? Wherein con- sists that appearing (of the soul) in its own form ?
To this we make the following reply. — Before the rise of