Sacred Books of the East, Vol. 38 — The Vedanta-Sutras, Part II (Sankara/Thibaut, page scans)

objection we rebut by the remark that it involves an aban- donment of the direct meaning of the sacred text. For from the text, as it stands, we understand that the quality of being an ativadin depends on speaking the truth ; the sense being : An ativadin is he who is an ativadin by means of the True. The passage does not in anyway contain a eulogisation of the knowledge of the vital air. It could be connected with the latter only on the ground of general subject-matter (prakara^a) 1; which would involve an abandonment of the di- rect meaning of the text in favour of prakara^a2. — Moreover, the particle but (' But in reality he is,' &c), whose purport is to separate (what follows) from the subject-matter of what precedes, would not agree (with the pra^a explanation). The following passage also, c But we must desire to know the True' (VII, 16), which presupposes a new effort, shows that a new topic is going to be entered upon. — For these reasons we have to consider the statement about the ati- vadin in the same light as we should consider the remark — made in a conversation which previously had turned on the praise of those who study one Veda — that he who studies the four Vedas is a great Brahma^a ; a remark which we should understand to be laudatory of persons different from those who study one Veda, i.e. of those who study all the four Vedas. Nor is there any reason to assume that a new topic can be introduced in the form of question and answer only ; for that the matter propounded forms a new topic is sufficiently clear from the circumstance that no connexion can be established between it and the preceding topic. The succession of topics in the chapter under discussion is as follows: Narada at first listens to the instruction which Sanatkumara gives him about various matters, the last of which is Pra^a, and then becomes silent. Thereupon Sanatkumara explains to him spontaneously (without being

1 It being maintained that the passage referred to is to be viewed in connexion with the general subject-matter of the preceding part of the chapter.

2 And would thus involve a violation of a fundamental principle of the Mima^sl

I Adhyaya, 3 Pada, 8. 1 67

asked) that the quality of being an ativadin, if merely based on the knowledge of the vital air — which knowledge has for its object an unreal product, — is devoid of substance, and that he only is an ativadin who is such by means of the True. By the term 'the True' there is meant the highest Brahman ; for Brahman is the Real, and it is called the ' True ' in another scriptural passage also, viz. Taitt. Up. II, 1, ' The True, knowledge, infinite is Brahman.' Narada, thus enlightened, starts a new line of enquiry ('Might I, Sir, become an ativadin by the True?') and Sanatkumara then leads him, by a series of instrumental steps, beginning with understanding, up to the knowledge of bhuman. We therefrom conclude that the bhuman is that very True whose explanation had been promised in addition to the (knowledge of the) vital air. We thus see that the instruction about the bhuman is additional to the instruction about the vital air, and bhuman must therefore mean the highest Self, which is different from the vital air. With this interpretation the initial statement, according to which the enquiry into the Self forms the general subject- matter, agrees perfectly well. The assumption, on the other hand (made by the purvapakshin), that by the Self we have here to understand the vital air is indefensible. For, in the first place, Self-hood does not belong to the vital air in any non-figurative sense. In the second place, cessation of grief cannot take place apart from the knowledge of the highest Self; for, as another scriptural passage declares, 'There is no other path to go' (vSVet. Up. VI, 15). Moreover, after we have read at the outset, ' Do, Sir, lead me over to the other side of grief ' (Kh. Up. VII, 1, 3), we meet with the following concluding words (VII, 26, 2), ' To him, after his faults had been rubbed out, the venerable Sanatkumara showed the other side of darkness/ The term ' darkness ' here denotes Nescience, the cause of grief, and so on. — Moreover, if the instruction terminated with the vital air, it would not be said of the latter that it rests on something else. But the brahma^a (Kk. Up. VII, 26, 1) does say, ' The vital air springs from the Self.' Nor can it be objected against this last argument that the concluding

1 68 VEDANTA-S^TRAS.

part of the chapter may refer to the highest Self, while, all the same, the bhuman (mentioned in an earlier part of the chapter) may be the vital air. For, from the passage (VII, 24, i), (' Sir, in what does the bhuman rest? In its own greatness,' Sec), it appears that the bhuman forms the con- tinuous topic up to the end of the chapter. — The quality of being the bhuman — which quality is plenitude — agrees, moreover, best with the highest Self, which is the cause of everything.

9. And on account of the agreement of the attributes (mentioned in the text).

The attributes, moreover, which the sacred text ascribes to the bhuman agree well with the highest Self. The passage, ' Where one sees nothing else, hears nothing else, understands nothing else, that is the bhuman/ gives us to understand that in the bhuman the ordinary activities of seeing and so on are absent ; and that this is characteristic of the highest Self, we know from another scriptural passage, viz. ' But when the Self only is all this, how should he see another ? ' Sec. (Br/. Up. IV, 5, 15). What is said about the absence of the activities of seeing and so on in the state of deep sleep (Pra. Up. IV, 2) is said with the intention of declaring the non-attachedness of the Self, not of describing the nature of the pra/za ; for the highest Self (not the vital air) is the topic of that passage. The bliss also of which Scripture speaks as connected with that state is mentioned only in order to show that bliss constitutes the nature of the Self. For Scripture says (Br/. Up. IV, 3, 32), ' This is his highest bliss. All other creatures live on a small por- tion of that bliss.' — The passage under discussion also (' The bhuman is bliss. There is no bliss in that which is little (limited). The bhuman only is bliss') by denying the reality of bliss on the part of whatever is perishable shows that Brahman only is bliss as bhuman, i. e. in its plenitude. — Again, the passage, 'The bhuman is immor- tality/ shows that the highest cause is meant ; for the immortality of all effected things is a merely relative one,

I Adhyaya, 3 Pada, Io. 1 69

and another scriptural passage says that 'whatever is different from that (Brahman) is perishable' (Br/. Up. Ill, 4, 2). — Similarly, the qualities of being the True, and of resting in its own greatness, and of being omnipresent, and of being the Self of everything which the text mentions (as belonging to the bhuman) can belong to the highest Self only, not to anything else. — By all this it is proved that the bhuman is the highest Self.

10. The Imperishable (is Brahman) on account of (its) supporting (all things) up to ether.

We read (Br/. Up. Ill, 8, 7 ; 8), ' In what then is the ether woven, like warp and woof? — He said: O G&rgi, the Br&hma^as call this the akshara (the Imperishable). It is neither coarse nor fine,' and so on. — Here the doubt arises whether the word ' akshara ' means ' syllable ' or 'the highest Lord.'

The purvapakshin maintains that the word 'akshara' means ' syllable ' merely, because it has, in such terms as akshara-samamnaya, the meaning of ' syllable ; ' because we have no right to disregard the settled meaning of a word ; and because another scriptural passage also (' The syllable Om is all this,' Kk. Up. II, 23,4) declares a syllable, repre- sented as the object of devotion, to be the Self of all.

To this we reply that the highest Self only is denoted by the word 'akshara.' — Why? — Because it (the akshara) is said to support the entire aggregate of effects, from earth up to ether. For the sacred text declares at first that the entire aggregate of effects beginning with earth and differ- entiated by threefold time is based on ether, in which it is 'woven like warp and woof; ' leads then (by means of the question, ' In what then is the ether woven, like warp and woof? ') over to the akshara, and, finally, concludes with the words, ' In that akshara then, O G&rgi, the ether is woven, like warp and woof.' — Now the attribute of supporting everything up to ether cannot be ascribed to any being but Brahman. The text (quoted from the Kk. Up.) says indeed that the syllable Om is all this, but that statement

1 70 VEDANTA-SUTRAS.

is to be understood as a mere glorification of the syllable Om considered as a means to obtain Brahman. — Therefore we take akshara to mean either ' the Imperishable' or 'that which pervades ; ' on the ground of either of which explana- tions it must be identified with the highest Brahman.

But — our opponent resumes— while we must admit that the above reasoning holds good so far that the circum- stance of the akshara supporting all things up to ether is to be accepted as a proof of all effects depending on a cause, we point out that it may be employed by those also who declare the pradhana to be the general cause. How then does the previous argumentation specially establish Brah- man (to the exclusion of the pradhana) ? — The reply to this is given in the next Sutra.

11. This (supporting can), on account of the
command (attributed to the Imperishable, be the
work of the highest Lord only).

The supporting of all things up to ether is the work of the highest Lord only. — Why? — On account of the command. — For the sacred text speaks of a command (; By the command of that akshara, O Gargi,sunand moon stand apart!' 111,8,9), and command can be the work of the highest Lord only, not of the non-intelligent pradhana. For non-intelligent causes such as clay and the like are not capable of command, with reference to their effects, such as jars and the like.

12. And on account of (Scripture) separating (the
akshara) from that whose nature is different (from
Brahman).

Also on account of the reason stated in this Sutra Brahman only is to be considered as the Imperishable, and the supporting of all things up to ether is to be looked upon as the work of Brahman only, not of anything else. The meaning of the Sutra is as follows. Whatever things other than Brahman might possibly be thought to be denoted by the term ' akshara,5 from the nature of all those things Scripture separates the akshara spoken of as the

I Adhyaya, 3 Pada, 1 3. 171

support of all things up to ether. The scriptural passage alluded to is III, 8, 11, 'That akshara, 0 Gargi, is unseen but seeing, unheard but hearing, unperceived but perceiving, unknown but knowing.' Here the designation of being unseen, &c. agrees indeed with the pradhana also, but not so the designation of seeing, &c, as the pradhana is non- intelligent. — Nor can the word akshara denote the embodied soul with its limiting conditions, for the passage following on the one quoted declares that there is nothing different from the Self ('there is nothing that sees but it, nothing that hears but it, nothing that perceives but it, nothing that knows but it ') ; and, moreover, limiting conditions are expressly denied (of the akshara) in the passage, ' It is without eyes, without ears, without speech, without mind,' &c. (Ill, 8, 8). An embodied soul without limiting con- ditions does not exist1. — It is therefore certain beyond doubt that the Imperishable is nothing else but the highest Brahman.

13. On account of his being designated as the
object of sight (the highest Self is meant, and) the
same (is meant in the passage speaking of the medi-
tation on the highest person by means of the syllable
Om).