And a closer investigation of the contents of the Upani- shads amply confirms this preliminary impression. If we avail ourselves, for instance, of M. Paul Regnaud's Materiaux pour servir a l'Histoire de la Philosophic de l'lnde, in which the philosophical lucubrations of the different Upanishads are arranged systematically according to topics, we can see with ease how, together with a certain uniformity of general leading conceptions, there runs throughout divergence in details, and very often not unimportant details. A look, for instance, at the collection of passages relative to the origination of the world from the primitive being, suffices to show that the task of demonstrating that whatever the Upanishads teach on that point can be made to fit into a homogeneous system is an altogether hopeless one. The accounts there given of the creation belong, beyond all doubt, to different stages of philosophic and theological development or else to different sections of priestly society. None but an Indian commentator would, I suppose, be inclined and sufficiently courageous to attempt the proof that, for in- stance, the legend of the atman purushavidha, the Self in the shape of a person which is as large as man and woman together, and then splits itself into two halves from which cows, horses, asses, goats, &c. are produced in succession (Bri. Up. I, i, 4), can be reconciled with the account given of the creation in the KMndogya. Upanishad, where it is said that in the beginning there existed nothing but the sat,
cvl vedAnta-s6tras.
i that which is,5 and that feeling a desire of being many it emitted out of itself ether, and then all the other elements in due succession. The former is a primitive cosmogonic myth, which in its details shows striking analogies with the cosmogonic myths of other nations ; the latter account is fairly developed Vedanta (although not Vedanta implying the Maya doctrine). We may admit that both accounts show a certain fundamental similarity in so far as they derive the manifold world from one original being ; but to go beyond this and to maintain, as vSankara does, that the atman purushavidha of the Br/hadara^yaka is the so-called Virct^ of the latter Vedanta — implying thereby that that section consciously aims at describing only the activity of one special form of tjvara, and not simply the whole pro- cess of creation — -is the ingenious shift of an orthodox commentator in difficulties, but nothing more.
How all those more or less conflicting texts came to be preserved and handed down to posterity, is not difficult to understand. As mentioned above, each of the great sections of Brahminical priesthood had its own sacred texts, and again in each of those sections there existed more ancient texts which it was impossible to dis- card when deeper and more advanced speculations began in their turn to be embodied in literary compositions, which in the course of time likewise came to be looked upon as sacred. When the creative period had reached its termina- tion, and the task of collecting and arranging was taken in hand, older and newer pieces were combined into wholes, and thus there arose collections of such heterogeneous character as the KMndogya. and Br/hadara^yaka Upani- shads. On later generations, to which the whole body of texts came down as revealed truth, there consequently devolved the inevitable task of establishing systems on which no exception could be taken to any of the texts ; but that the task was, strictly speaking, an impossible one, i. e. one which it was impossible to accomplish fairly and honestly, there really is no reason to deny.
For a comprehensive criticism of the methods which the different commentators employ in systematising the contents
Introduction. Cv11
of the Upanishads there is no room in this place. In order, however, to illustrate what is meant by the ' impossibility,' above alluded to, of combining the various doctrines of the Upanishads into a whole without doing violence to a certain number of texts, it will be as well to analyse in detail some few at least of 5ankara's interpretations, and to render clear the considerations by which he is guided.
We begin with a case which has already engaged our attention when discussing the meaning of the Sutras, viz. the question concerning the ultimate fate of those who have attained the knowledge of Brahman. As we have seen, vSankara teaches that the soul of him who has risen to an insight into the nature of the higher Brahman does not, at the moment of death, pass out of the body, but is directly merged in Brahman by a process from which all. departing and moving, in fact all considerations of space, are altogether excluded. The soul of him, on the other hand, who has not risen above the knowledge of the lower qualified Brahman departs from the body by means of the artery called sushum^a, and following the so-called devayana, the path of the gods, mounts up to the world of Brahman. A review of the chief Upanishad texts on which 5ankara founds this distinction will show how far it is justified.
In a considerable number of passages the Upanishads contrast the fate of two classes of men, viz. of those who perform sacrifices and meritorious works only, and of those who in addition possess a certain kind of knowledge. Men of the former kind ascend after death to the moon, where they live for a certain time, and then return to the earth into new forms of embodiment ; persons of the latter kind proceed on the path of the gods — on which the sun forms one stage — up to the world of Brahman, from which there is no return. The chief passages to that effect are Kh. Up. V, 10 ; Kaush. Up. I, 2 ff. ; Mund. Up. I, 3, 9 ff. ; Bri. Up. VI, 2, 15 ff. ; Pra^na Up. I, 9 ff. — In other passages only the latter of the two paths is referred to, cp.K/z. Up. IV,i5;VIII,6,5;Taitt.Up.I,6; Bri. Up. IV, 4, 8, 9 ;V, 10 ; Maitr.Up.VI, 30, to mention only the more important ones.
Now an impartial consideration of those passages shows
CVlii VEDANTA-sftTRAS.
I think, beyond any doubt, that what is meant there by the knowledge which leads through the sun to the world of Brahman is the highest knowledge of which the devotee is capable, and that the world of Brahman to which his know- ledge enables him to proceed denotes the highest state which he can ever reach, the state of final release, if we choose to call it by that name. — Kh. Up. V, 10 says, c Those who know this (viz. the doctrine of the five fires), and those who in the forest follow faith and austerities go to light/ &c. — Kh. Up. IV, 15 is manifestly intended to convey the true knowledge of Brahman ; Upako,?ala's teacher himself represents the instruction given by him as superior to the teaching of the sacred fires. — Kh. Up. VIII, 6, 5 quotes the old i*loka which says that the man moving upwards by the artery penetrating the crown of the head reaches the Im- mortal.— Kaush. Up. I, % — which gives the most detailed account of the ascent of the soul — contains no intimation whatever of the knowledge of Brahman, which leads up to the Brahman world, being of an inferior nature. — Mund. Up. I, 2, 9 agrees with the ATMndogya in saying that ' Those who practise penance and faith in the forest, tranquil, wise, and living on alms, depart free from passion, through the sun, to where that immortal Person dwells whose nature is imperishable,' and nothing whatever in the context coun- tenances the assumption that not the highest knowledge and the highest Person are there referred to. — Bri. Up. IV, 4, 8 quotes old jlokas clearly referring to the road of the gods (' the small old path '), on which ' sages who know Brahman move on to the svargaloka and thence higher on as entirely free. — That path was found by Brah- man, and on it goes whoever knows Brahman/ — Bri Up. VI, 2, 15 is another version of the Pa^agnividya, with the variation, * Those who know this, and those who in the forest worship faith and the True, go to light,' &c. — Pra^na Up. 1, 10 says, ' Those who have sought the Self by penance, abstinence, faith, and knowledge gain by the northern path Aditya, the sun. There is the home of the spirits, the im- mortal free from danger, the highest. From thence they do not return, for it is the end.' — Maitr. Up. VI, 30 quotes
Introduction. C1x
jlokas, ' One of them (the arteries) leads upwards, piercing the solar orb : by it, having stepped beyond the world of Brahman, they go to the highest path/
All these passages are as clear as can be desired. The soul of the sage who knows Brahman passes out by the sushum?z&, and ascends by the path of the gods to the world of Brahman, there to remain for ever in some bliss- ful state. But, according to Sankara, all these texts are meant to set forth the result of a certain inferior knowledge only, of the knowledge of the conditioned Brahman. Even in a passage apparently so entirely incapable of more than one interpretation as Br/. Up. VI, 2, 15, the 'True/ which the holy hermits in the forest are said to worship, is not to be the highest Brahman, but only Hira/zyagarbha ! — And why ? — Only because the system so demands it, the system which teaches that those who know the highest Brahman become on their death one with it, without having to resort to any other place. The passage on which this latter tenet is chiefly based is Bri. Up. IV, 4, 6, 7, where, with the fate of him who at his death has desires, and whose soul therefore enters a new body after having departed from the old one, accompanied by all the pra//as, there is contrasted the fate of the sage free from all desires. ' But as to the man who does not desire, who not desiring, freed from desires is satisfied in his desires, or desires the Self only, the vital spirits of him (tasya) do not depart — being Brahman he goes to Brahman/
We have seen above (p. lxxx) that this passage is referred to in the important Sutras on whose right interpretation it, in the first place, depends whether or not we must admit the Sutrakara to have acknowledged the distinction of a para and an apari vidya\ Here the passage interests us as throwing light on the way in which Sankara systematises. He looks on the preceding part of the chapter as describing what happens to the souls of all those who do not know the highest Brahman, inclusive of those who know the lower Brahman only. They pass out of the old bodies followed by all pra^as and enter new bodies. He, on the other hand, section 6 continues, who knows the true Brahman, does not pass out of the body, but becomes one with Brahman then
CX VEDANTA-S^TRAS.
8. < The subtle old path (i. e. the path of knowledge on which final release is reached ; which path is subtle, i. e. difficult to know, and old, i. e. to be known from the eternal Veda) has been obtained and fully reached by me. On it the sages who know Brahman reach final release (svarga- loka^abda^ samnihitaprakara/zat mokshabhidhayaka/^).
9. * On that path they say that there is white or blue or yellow or green or red (i. e. others maintain that the path to final release is, in accordance with the colour of the arteries, either white or blue, &c. ; but that is false, for the
Introduction. Cxi
paths through the arteries lead at the best to the world of Brahman, which itself forms part of the sa^sara); that path (i. e. the only path to release, viz. the path of true knowledge) is found by Brahman, i. e. by such Brahma^as as through true knowledge have become like Brahman,5 &c.
A significant instance in truth of the straits to which
thorough-going systematisers of the Upanishads see them-
selves reduced occasionally!