Closely connected with the question as to the double nature of the Brahman of the Upanishads is the question as to their teaching M&ya. — From Colebrooke downwards the majority of European writers have inclined towards the opinion that the doctrine of Maya, i. e. of the unreal illusory character of the sensible world, does not constitute a feature of the primitive philosophy of the Upanishads, but was introduced into the system at some later period, whether by Badaraya^a or vSankara or somebody else. The opposite view, viz. that the doctrine of Maya forms an integral element of the teaching of the Upanishads, is implied in them everywhere, and enunciated more or less distinctly in
Introduction. Cxvu
more than one place, has in recent times been advocated
with much force by Mr. Gough in the ninth chapter of his
Philosophy of the Upanishads.
In his Materiaux, &c. M. Paul Regnaud remarks that 'the doctrine of Maya, although implied in the teaching of the Upanishads, could hardly become clear and explicit before the system had reached a stage of development necessitating a choice between admitting two co-existent eternal principles (which became the basis of the Sankhya philosophy), and accepting the predominance of the intel- lectual principle, which in the end necessarily led to the negation of the opposite principle.' — To the two alterna- tives here referred to as possible we, however, have to add a third one, viz. that form of the Vedanta of wrhich the theory of the Bhagavatas or Ram&nu^as is the most eminent type, and according to which Brahman carries within its own nature an element from which the material universe originates; an element which indeed is not an in- dependent entity like the pradhana of the Sankhyas, but which at the same time is not an unreal Maya but quite as real as any other part of Brahman's nature. That a doctrine of this character actually developed itself on the basis of the Upa- nishads, is a circumstance which we clearly must not lose sight of, when attempting to determine what the Upanishads them- selves are teaching concerning the character of the world.
In enquiring whether the Upanishads maintain the Maya doctrine or not, we must proceed with the same caution as regards other parts of the system, i. e. we must refrain from using unhesitatingly, and without careful consideration of the merits of each individual case, the teaching — direct or inferred — of any one passage to the end of determining the drift of the teaching of other passages. We may admit that some passages, notably of the Brzhadara^yaka, contain at any rate the germ of the later developed Maya doctrine1, and thus render it quite intelligible that a system like Sankara's
1 It is well known that, with the exception of the 6veta\yvatara and Maitra- yaniya, none of the chief Upanishads exhibits the word ' mayl' The term indeed occurs in one place in the Brz'hadara/zyaka ; but that passage is a quotation from the Rik Sa/^hita in which maya means 'creative power.' Cp. P. Regnaud, La Maya, in the Revue de l'Histoire des Religions, tome xii, No. 3 (1885).
CXVlii VEDANTA-S^TRAS.
should evolve itself, among others, out of the Upanishads ; but that affords no valid reason for interpreting Maya into other texts which give a very satisfactory sense without that doctrine, or are even clearly repugnant to it. This remark applies in the very first place to all the accounts of the creation of the physical universe. There, if anywhere, the illusional character of the world should have been hinted at, at least, had that theory been held by the authors of those accounts ; but not a word to that effect is met with any- where. The most important of those accounts — the one given in the sixth chapter of the KMndogya, Upanishad — forms no exception. There is absolutely no reason to assume that the 'sending forth' of the elements from the primitive Sat, which is there described at length, was by the writer of that passage meant to represent a vivarta rather than a pari;zama, that the process of the origination of the physical universe has to be conceived as anything else but a real manifestation of real powers hidden in the primeval Self. The introductory words, addressed to 6Vetaketu by Uddalaka, which are generally appealed to as intimating the unreal character of the evolution about to be described, do not, if viewed impartially, intimate any such thing 1. For what is capable of being proved, and mani- festly meant to be proved, by the illustrative instances of the lump of clay and the nugget of gold, through which there are known all things made of clay and gold ? Merely that this whole world has Brahman for its causal substance, just as clay is the causal matter of every earthen pot, and gold of every golden ornament, but not that the process through which any causal substance becomes an effect is an unreal one. We — including Uddalaka — may surely say that all earthen pots are in reality nothing but earth — the earthen pot being merely a special modification (vikara) of clay which has a name of its own — without thereby com- mitting ourselves to the doctrine that the change of form, which a lump of clay undergoes when being fashioned into a pot, is not real but a mere baseless illusion.
In the same light we have to view numerous other passages
1 As is demonstrated very satisfactorily by Ramanu^a.
Introduction. Cx1x
which set forth the successive emanations proceeding from the first principle. When, for instance, we meet in the Ka/k Up. I, 3, 10, in the serial enumeration of the forms of exist- ence intervening between the gross material world and the highest Self (the Person), with the ' avyakrzta,' the Unde- veloped, immediately below the purusha ; and when again the Mundaka, Up. II, i, 2, speaks of the ' high Imperishable' higher than which is the heavenly Person ; there is no reason whatever to see in that ' Undeveloped ' and that 'high Imperishable' anything but that real element in Brahman from which, as in the Ramanu^a system, the material universe springs by a process of real development. We must of course render it quite clear to ourselves in what sense the terms ' real ' and ' unreal ' have to be understood. The Upanishads no doubt teach emphatically that the material world does not owe its existence to any principle independent from the Lord like the pradhana of the Sankhyas ; the world is nothing but a manifestation of the Lord's wonderful power, and hence is unsubstantial, if we take the term ' substance' in its strict sense. And, again, everything material is immeasurably inferior in nature to the highest spiritual principle from which it has emanated, and which it now hides from the individual soul. But neither unsubstantiality nor inferiority of the kind mentioned constitutes unreality in the sense in which the Maya of 5ankara is unreal. According to the latter the whole world is nothing but an erroneous appearance, as unreal as the snake, for which a piece of rope is mistaken by the belated traveller, and disappearing just as the imagined snake does as soon as the light of true knowledge has risen. But this is certainly not the impression left on the mind by a comprehensive review of the Upanishads which dwells on their general scope, and does not confine itself to the undue urging of what may be implied in some detached passages. The Upanishads do not call upon us to look upon the whole world as a baseless illusion to be destroyed by knowledge ; the great error which they admonish us to relinquish is rather that things have a separate individual existence, and are not tied together by the bond of being all of them effects
CXX VEDANTA-SUTRAS.
of Brahman, or Brahman itself. They do not say that true knowledge sublates this false world, as vSankara says, but that it enables the sage to extricate himself from the world — the inferior murta rupa of Brahman, to use an expression of the Brzhadara/jyaka — and to become one with Brahman in its highest form. ' We are to see everything in Brahman, and Brahman in everything ;' the natural meaning of this is, ; we are to look upon this whole world as a true manifesta- tion of Brahman, as sprung from it and animated by it.' The mayavadin has indeed appropriated the above saying also, and interpreted it so as to fall in with his theory ; but he is able to do so only by perverting its manifest sense. For him it would be appropriate to say, not that every- thing we see is in Brahman, but rather that everything we see is out of Brahman, viz. as a false appearance spread over it and hiding it from us.
Stress has been laid1 upon certain passages of the Br/hadara^yaka which seem to hint at the unreality of this world by qualifying terms, indicative of duality or plur- ality of existence, by means of an added * iva,' i. e. ' as it were' (yatranyad iva syat ; yatra dvaitam iva bhavati ; atma dhyayativa lelayativa). Those passages no doubt readily lend themselves to Maya interpretations, and it is by no means impossible that in their author's mind there was something like an undeveloped Maya doctrine. I must, how- ever, remark that they, on the other hand, also admit of easy interpretations not in any way presupposing the theory of the unreality of the world. If Ya^avalkya refers to the latter as that * where there is something else as it were, where there is duality as it were,' he may simply mean to indicate that the ordinary opinion, according to which the individual forms of existence of the world are opposed to each other as altogether separate, is a mistaken one, all things being one in so far as they spring from — and are parts of — Brahman. This would in no way involve duality or plurality being unreal in Ankara's sense, not any more than, for instance, the modes of Spinoza are unreal because, according to that philosopher, there is only one universal
1 Gough, Philosophy of the Upanishads, pp. 243 fF.
Introduction. Cxx1
substance. And with regard to the clause * the Self thinks as it were ' it has to be noted that according to the com- mentators the * as it were ' is meant to indicate that truly not the Self is thinking, but the upadhis, i. e. especially the manas with which the Self is connected. But whether these upadhis are the mere offspring of Maya, as 5ankara thinks, or real forms of existence, as Ramanu^a teaches, is an altogether different question.
I do not wish, however, to urge these last observations, and am ready to admit that not impossibly those iva's indicate that the thought of the writer who employed them was darkly labouring with a conception akin to — although much less explicit than — the May& of Sankara. But what I object to is, that conclusions drawn from a few passages of, after all, doubtful import should be employed for introducing the Maya doctrine into other passages which do not even hint at it, and are fully intelligible without it 1.
The last important point in the teaching of the Upanishads we have to touch upon is the relation of the ^ivas, the in- dividual souls to the highest Self. The special views regarding that point held by Sankara and Ramanu^a have been stated before. Confronting their theories with the texts of the Upanishads we must, I think, admit with- out hesitation, that Sankara's doctrine faithfully represents the prevailing teaching of the Upanishads in one important point at least, viz. therein that the soul or Self of the sage — whatever its original relation to Brahman may be — is in the end completely merged and indistinguishably lost in the universal Self. A distinction, repeatedly alluded to before, has indeed to be kept in view here also. Certain texts of the Upanishads describe the soul's going upwards, on the path of the gods, to the world of Brahman, where it dwells for unnumbered years, i. e. for ever. Those texts, as a type of which we may take the passage Kaushit. Up. I — the fundamental text of the R^manu^as concerning the soul's
1 I cannot discuss in this place the Maya passages of the *SVet£rvatara and the Maitrayaniya Upanishads. Reasons which want of space prevents me from setting forth in detail induce me to believe that neither of those two treatises deserves to be considered by us when wishing to ascertain the true unmixed doctrine of the Upanishads.
CXX11 VEDANTA-SUTRAS.