The Sarva-Darsana-Samgraha Part 10

As if then we had thrown their best wrestler, the redargution of the rest of their categories may be antic.i.p.ated from this exposition of the manner in which their treatment of the soul has been vitiated.

Their doctrine, therefore, as repugnant to the eternal, infallible revelation, cannot be adopted. The venerated Vyasa accordingly propounded the aphorism (ii. 2, 33), "Nay, because it is impossible in one;" and this same aphorism has been a.n.a.lysed by Ramanuja with the express purpose of shutting out the doctrine of the Jainas. The tenets of Ramanuja are as follows:--Three categories are established, as soul, not-soul, and Lord; or as subject, object, and supreme disposer.

Thus it has been said--

"Lord, soul, and not-soul are the triad of principles: Hari (Vish?u)

"Is Lord; individual spirits are souls; and the visible world is not-soul."

Others, again (the followers of Sa?karacharya), maintain that pure intelligence, exempt from all differences, the absolute, alone is really existent; and that this absolute whose essence is eternal, pure, intelligent, and free, the ident.i.ty of which with the individuated spirit is learnt from the "reference to the same object"

(predication), "That art thou," undergoes bondage and emanc.i.p.ation.

The universe of differences (or conditions) such as that of subject and object, is all illusorily imagined by illusion as in that (one reality), as is attested by a number of texts: Existent only, fair sir, was this in the beginning, One only without a second, and so forth. Maintaining this, and acknowledging a suppression of this beginningless illusion by knowledge of the unity (and ident.i.ty) of individuated spirits and the undifferenced absolute, in conformity with hundreds of texts from the Upanishads, such as He that knows spirit pa.s.ses beyond sorrow; rejecting also any real plurality of things, in conformity with the text condemnatory of duality, viz., Death after death he undergoes who looks upon this as manifold; and thinking themselves very wise, the Sa?karas will not tolerate this division (viz., the distribution of things into soul, not-soul, and Lord). To all this the following counterposition is laid down:--This might be all well enough if there were any proof of such illusion. But there is no such ignorance (or illusion), an unbeginning ent.i.ty, suppressible by knowledge, testified in the perceptions, I am ignorant, I know not myself and other things. Thus it has been said (to explain the views of the Sa?kara)--

"Ent.i.tative from everlasting, which is dissolved by knowledge,

"Such is illusion. This definition the wise enunciate."

This perception (they would further contend) is not conversant about the absence of knowledge. For who can maintain this, and to whom? One who leans on the arm of Prabhakara, or one to whom k.u.marila-bha??a gives his hand? Not the former, for in the words--

"By means of its own and of another's form, eternal in the existent and non-existent,

"Thing is recognised something by some at certain times.

"Non-ent.i.ty is but another ent.i.ty by some kind of relation.

Non-ent.i.ty is but another ent.i.ty, naught else, for naught else is observed."

They deny any non-ent.i.ty ulterior to ent.i.ty. Non-ent.i.ty being cognisable by the sixth instrument of knowledge (_anupalabdhi_), and knowledge being always an object of inference, the absence of knowledge cannot be an object of perception. If, again, any one who maintains non-ent.i.ty to be perceptible should employ the above argument (from the perceptions, I am ignorant, I know not myself, and other things); it may be replied: "Is there, or is there not, in the consciousness, I am ignorant, an apprehension of self as characterised by an absence, and of knowledge as the thing absent or non-existent?

If there is such apprehension, consciousness of the absence of knowledge will be impossible, as involving a contradiction. If there is not, consciousness of the absence of knowledge, which consciousness presupposes a knowledge of the subject and of the thing absent, will not readily become possible." Inasmuch (the Sa?karas continue) as the foregoing difficulties do not occur if ignorance (or illusion) be ent.i.tative, this consciousness (I am ignorant, I know not myself, and other things) must be admitted to be conversant about an ent.i.tative ignorance.

All this (the Ramanuja replies) is about as profitable as it would be for a ruminant animal to ruminate upon ether; for an ent.i.tative ignorance is not more supposable than an absence of knowledge. For (we would ask), is any self-conscious principle presented as an object and as a subject (of ignorance) as distinct from cognition? If it is presented, how, since ignorance of a thing is terminable by knowledge of its essence, can the ignorance continue? If none such is presented, how can we be conscious of an ignorance which has no subject and no object? If you say: A pure manifestation of the spiritual essence is revealed only by the cognition opposed to ignorance (or illusion), and thus there is no absurdity in the consciousness of ignorance accompanied with a consciousness of its subject and object; then we rejoin:--Unfortunately for you, this (consciousness of subject) must arise equally in the absence of knowledge (for such we define illusion to be), notwithstanding your a.s.sertion to the contrary. It must, therefore, be acknowledged that the cognition, I am ignorant, I know not myself and other things, is conversant about an absence of cognition allowed by us both.

Well, then (the Sa?karas may contend), let the form of cognition evidentiary of illusion, which is under disputation, be inference, as follows:--Right knowledge must have had for its antecedent another ent.i.ty (_sc._ illusion), an ent.i.ty different from mere prior non-existence of knowledge, which envelops the objects of knowledge, which is terminable by knowledge, which occupies the place of knowledge, inasmuch as it (the right knowledge) illuminates an object not before illuminated, like the light of a lamp springing up for the first time in the darkness. This argument (we reply) will not stand grinding (in the dialectic mill); for to prove the (antecedent) illusion, you will require an ulterior illusion which you do not admit, and a violation of your own tenets will ensue, while if you do not so prove it, it may or may not exist; and, moreover, the example is incompatible with the argument, for it cannot be the lamp that illumines the hitherto unillumined object, since it is knowledge only that illumines; and an illumination of objects may be effected by knowledge even without the lamp, while the light of the lamp is only ancillary to the visual organ which effectuates the cognition, ancillary mediately through the dispulsion of the obstruent darkness.

We dismiss further prolixity.

The counterposition (of the Ramanujas) is as follows:--The illusion under dispute does not reside in Brahman, who is pure knowledge, because it is an illusion, like the illusion about nacre, &c. If any one ask: Has not the self-conscious ent.i.ty that underlies the illusion about nacre, &c., knowledge only for its nature? they reply: Do not start such difficulties; for we suppose that consciousness by its bare existence has the nature of creating conformity to the usage about (_i.e._, the name and notion of) some object; and such consciousness, also called knowledge, apprehension, comprehension, intelligence, &c., const.i.tutes the soul, or knowledge, of that which acts and knows. If any one ask: How can the soul, if it consists of cognition, have cognition as a quality? they reply: This question is futile; for as a gem, the sun, and other luminous things, existing in the form of light, are substances in which light as a quality inheres--for light, as existing elsewhere than in its usual receptacle, and as being a mode of things though a substance, is still styled and accounted a quality derived from determination by that substance,--so this soul, while it exists as a self-luminous intelligence, has also intelligence as its quality. Accordingly the Vedic texts: A lump of salt is always within and without one entire ma.s.s of taste, so also this soul is within and without an entire ma.s.s of knowledge; Herein this person is itself a light; Of the knowledge of that which knows there is no suspension; He who knows, smells this; and so also, This is the soul which, consisting of knowledge, is the light within the heart; For this person is the seer, the hearer, the taster, the smeller, the thinker, the understander, the doer; The person is knowledge, and the like texts.

It is not to be supposed that the Veda also affords evidence of the existence of the cosmical illusion, in the text, Enveloped in untruth (_an?ita_); for the word untruth (_an?ita_) denotes that which is other than truth (_?ita_). The word _?ita_ has a pa.s.sive sense, as appears from the words, Drinking _?ita_. _?ita_ means works done without desire of fruit; having as its reward the attainment of the bliss of the Supreme Spirit through his propitiation. In the text in question, untruth (_an?ita_) designates the scanty fruit enjoyed during transmigratory existence as opposed to that (which results from propitiation of the Supreme Spirit), which temporal fruit is obstructive to the attainment of supreme existence (_brahman_); the entire text (when the context is supplied) being: They who find not this supreme sphere (_brahma-loka_) are enveloped in untruth. In such texts, again, as Let him know illusion (_maya_) to be the primary emanative cause (_prak?iti_), the term (_maya_) designates the emanative cause, consisting of the three "cords" (_gu?a_), and creative of the diversified universe. It does not designate the inexplicable illusion (for which the Sa?karas contend).

In such pa.s.sages as, By him the defender of the body of the child, moving rapidly, the thousand illusions (_maya_) of the barbarian were swooped upon as by a hawk, we observe that the word "illusion"

(_maya_) designates the really existent weapon of a t.i.tan, capable of projective diversified creation. The Veda, then, never sets out an inexplicable illusion. Nor (is the cosmical illusion to be inferred from the "grand text," That art thou), inasmuch as the words, That art thou, being incompetent to teach unity, and indicating a conditionate Supreme Spirit, we cannot understand by them the essential unity of the mutually exclusive supreme and individual spirits; for such a supposition (as that they are identical) would violate the law of excluded middle. To explain this. The term That denotes the Supreme Spirit exempt from all imperfections, of illimitable excellence, a repository of innumerable auspicious attributes, to whom the emanation, sustentation, retractation of the universe is a pastime;[108] such being the Supreme Spirit, spoken of in such texts as, That desired, let me be many, let me bring forth. Perhaps the word Thou, referring to the same object (as the word That), denotes the Supreme Spirit characterised by consciousness, having all individual spirits as his body; for a "reference to the same object" designates one thing determined by two modes. Here, perhaps, an Advaita-vadin may reply: Why may not the purport of the reference to the same object in the words, That art thou, be undifferenced essence, the unity of souls, these words (That and thou) having a (reciprocally) implicate power by abandonment of opposite portions of their meaning; as is the case in the phrase, This is that Devadatta. In the words, This is that Devadatta, we understand by the word That, a person in relation to a different time and place, and by the word This, a person in relation to the present time and place. That both are one and the same is understood by the form of predication ("reference to the same object"). Now as one and the same thing cannot at the same time be known as in different times and places, the two words (This and That) must refer to the essence (and not to the accidents of time and place), and unity of essence can be understood. Similarly in the text, That art thou, there is implicated an indivisible essence by abandonment of the contradictory portions (of the denotation), viz., finite cognition (which belongs to the individual soul or Thou), and infinite cognition (which belongs to the real or unindividual soul).

This suggestion (the Ramanujas reply) is unsatisfactory, for there is no opposition (between This and That) in the example (This is that Devadatta), and consequently not the smallest particle of "implication" (_laksha?a_, both This and That being used in their denotative capacity). The connection of one object with two times past and present involves no contradiction. And any contradiction supposed to arise from relation to different places may be avoided by a supposed difference of time, the existence in the distant place being past, and the existence in the near being present. Even if we concede to you the "implication," the (supposed) contradiction being avoidable by supposing one term (either That or Thou) to be implicative, it is unnecessary to admit that both words are implicative. Otherwise (if we admit that both words are implicative), if it be granted that the one thing may be recognised, with the concomitant a.s.surance that it differs as this and as that, permanence in things will be inadmissible, and the Buddhist a.s.sertor of a momentary flux of things will be triumphant.

We have, therefore (the Ramanujas continue), laid it down in this question that there is no contradiction in the ident.i.ty of the individual and the Supreme Spirit, the individual spirits being the body and the Supreme Spirit the soul. For the individual spirit as the body, and therefore a form, of the Supreme Spirit, is identical with the Supreme Spirit, according to another text, Who abiding in the soul, is the controller of the soul, who knows the soul, of whom soul is the body.

Your statement of the matter, therefore, is too narrow. ALL words are designatory of the Supreme Spirit. They are not all synonymous, a variety of media being possible; thus as all organised bodies, divine, human, &c., are forms of individual spirits, so all things (are the body of Supreme Spirit), all things are identical with Supreme Spirit.

Hence--

G.o.d, Man, Yaksha, Pisacha, serpent, Rakshasa, bird, tree, creeper, wood, stone, gra.s.s, jar, cloth,--these and all other words, be they what they may, which are current among mankind as denotative by means of their base and its suffixes, as denoting those things, in denoting things of this or that apparent const.i.tution, really denote the individual souls which a.s.sumed to them such body, and the whole complexus of things terminating in the Supreme Spirit ruling within.

That G.o.d and all other words whatsoever ultimately denote the Supreme Spirit is stated in the Tattva-muktavali and in the Chaturantara--

"G.o.d, and all other words, designate the soul, none else than That, called the established ent.i.ty,

"Of this there is much significant and undoubted exemplification in common speech and in the Veda;

"Existence when dissociated from spirit is unknown; in the form of G.o.ds, mortals, and the rest

"When pervading the individual spirit, the infinite has made a diversity of names and forms in the world."

In these words the author, setting forth that all words, G.o.d, and the rest, designate the body, and showing in the words, "No unity in systems," &c., the characteristic of body, and showing in the words, "By words which are subst.i.tutes for the essence of things," &c., that it is established that nothing is different from the universal Lord, lays down in the verses, Significant of the essence, &c., that all words ultimately designate the Supreme Spirit. All this may be ascertained from that work. The same matter has been enforced by Ramanuja in the Vedartha-sa?graha, when a.n.a.lysing the Vedic text about names and forms.

Moreover, every form of evidence having some determinate object, there can be no evidence of an undetermined (unconditionate) reality. Even in non-discriminative perception it is a determinate (or conditioned) thing that is cognised. Else in discriminative perception there could not be shown to be a cognition characterised by an already presented form. Again, that text, That art thou, is not sublative of the universe as rooted in illusion, like a sentence declaratory that what was illusorily presented, as a snake is a piece of rope; nor does knowledge of the unity of the absolute and the soul bring (this illusory universe) to an end; for we have already demonstrated that there is no proof of these positions.

Nor is there an absurdity (as the Sa?karas would say), on the hypothesis enunciatory of the reality of the universe, in affirming that by a cognition of one there is a cognition of all things: for it is easily evinced that the mundane egg, consisting of the primary cause (_prak?iti_), intellect, self-position, the rudimentary elements, the gross elements, the organs (of sense and of action), and the fourteen worlds, and the G.o.ds, animals, men, immovable things, and so forth, that exist within it, const.i.tuting a complex of all forms, is all an effect, and that from the single cognition of absolute spirit as its (emanative) cause, when we recognise that all this is absolute spirit (there being a tautology between cause and effect), there arises cognition of all things, and thus by cognition of one cognition of all. Besides, if all else than absolute spirit were unreal, then all being non-existent, it would follow that by one cognition all cognition would be sublated.

It is laid down (by the Ramanujas) that retractation into the universe (_pralaya_) is when the universe, the body whereof consists of souls and the originant (_prak?iti_), returns to its imperceptible state, unsusceptible of division by names and forms, existing as absolute spirit the emanative cause; and that creation (or emanation) is the gross or perceptible condition of absolute spirit, the body whereof is soul and not soul divided by diversity of names and forms, in the condition of the (emanative) effect of absolute spirit. In this way the ident.i.ty of cause and effect laid down in the aphorism (of Vyasa) treating of origination, is easily explicable. The statements that the Supreme Spirit is void of attributes, are intended (it is shown) to deny thereof phenomenal qualities which are to be escaped from by those that desire emanc.i.p.ation. The texts which deny plurality are explained as allowed to be employed for the denial of the real existence of things apart from the Supreme Spirit, which is identical with all things, it being Supreme Spirit which subsists under all forms as the soul of all, all things sentient and unsentient being forms as being the body of absolute Spirit.[109]

What is the principle here involved, pluralism or monism, or a universe both one and more than one? Of these alternatives monism is admitted in saying that Supreme Spirit alone subsists in all forms as all is its body; both unity and plurality are admitted in saying that one only Supreme Spirit subsists under a plurality of forms diverse as soul and not-soul; and plurality is admitted in saying that the essential natures of soul, not-soul, and the Lord, are different, and not to be confounded.

Of these (soul, not-soul, and the Lord), individual spirits, or souls, consisting of uncontracted and unlimited pure knowledge, but enveloped in illusion, that is, in works from all eternity, undergo contraction and expansion of knowledge according to the degrees of their merits.

Soul experiences fruition, and after reaping pleasures and pains proportionate to merits and demerits, there ensues knowledge of the Lord, or attainment of the sphere of the Lord. Of things which are not-soul, and which are objects of fruition (or experience of pleasure and pain), unconsciousness, unconduciveness to the end of man, susceptibility of modification, and the like, are the properties. Of the Supreme Lord the attributes are subsistence, as the internal controller (or animator) of both the subjects and the objects of fruition; the boundless glory of illimitable knowledge, dominion, majesty, power, brightness, and the like, the countless mult.i.tude of auspicious qualities; the generation at will of all things other than himself, whether spiritual or non-spiritual; various and infinite adornment with unsurpa.s.sable excellence, singular, uniform, and divine.

Ve?ka?a-natha has given the following distribution of things:--

"Those who know it have declared the principle to be twofold, substance and non-substance;

"Substance is dichotomised as unsentient and sentient; the former being the unevolved (_avyakta_), and time.

"The latter is the 'near' (_pratyak_) and the 'distant'

(_parak_); the 'near' being twofold, as either soul or the Lord;

"The 'distant' is eternal glory and intelligence; the other principle some have called the unsentient primary."

Of these--

"Substance undergoes a plurality of conditions; the originant is possessed of goodness and the other cords;

"Time has the form of years, &c.; soul is atomic and cognisant; the other spirit is the Lord;

"Eternal bliss has been declared as transcending the three cords (or modes of phenomenal existence), and also as characterised by goodness;

"The cognisable manifestation of the cognisant is intelligence; thus are the characteristics of substance summarily recounted."

Of these (soul, not-soul, and the Lord), individual spirits, called souls, are different from the Supreme Spirit and eternal. Thus the text: Two birds, companions, friends, &c. (Rig-Veda, i. 164, 20).

Accordingly it is stated (in the aphorisms of Ka?ada, iii. 2, 20), Souls are diverse by reason of diversity of conditions. The eternity of souls is often spoken of in revelation--

"The soul is neither born, nor dies, nor having been shall it again cease to be;

"Unborn, unchanging, eternal, this ancient of days is not killed when the body is killed" (Bhagavad-gita, ii. 20).