The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 748 pages of information about The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya.

The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 748 pages of information about The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya.
also, i.e. in the passage itself there is ‘connexion’ with characteristic marks of Brahman, as, for instance, the reference to what is most beneficial for man.  The assertion that the passage, ‘Having laid hold of this body it makes it rise up,’ contains a characteristic mark of the chief vital air, is untrue; for as the function of the vital air also ultimately rests on Brahman it can figuratively be ascribed to the latter.  So Scripture also declares, ’No mortal lives by the breath that goes up and by the breath that goes down.  We live by another in whom these two repose’ (Ka.  Up.  II, 5, 5).  Nor does the indication of the individual soul which you allege to occur in the passage, ’Let no man try to find out what speech is, let him know the speaker,’ preclude the view of pra/n/a denoting Brahman.  For, as the passages, ‘I am Brahman,’ ‘That art thou,’ and others, prove, there is in reality no such thing as an individual soul absolutely different from Brahman, but Brahman, in so far as it differentiates itself through the mind (buddhi) and other limiting conditions, is called individual soul, agent, enjoyer.  Such passages therefore as the one alluded to, (viz. ‘let no man try to find out what speech is, let him know the speaker,’) which, by setting aside all the differences due to limiting conditions, aim at directing the mind on the internal Self and thus showing that the individual soul is one with Brahman, are by no means out of place.  That the Self which is active in speaking and the like is Brahman appears from another scriptural passage also, viz.  Ke.  Up.  I, 5, ’That which is not expressed by speech and by which speech is expressed that alone know as Brahman, not that which people here adore.’  The remark that the statement about the difference of pra/n/a and praj/n/a (contained in the passage, ‘Together they dwell in this body, together they depart’) does not agree with that interpretation according to which pra/n/a is Brahman, is without force; for the mind and the vital air which are the respective abodes of the two powers of cognition and action, and constitute the limiting conditions of the internal Self may be spoken of as different.  The internal Self, on the other hand, which is limited by those two adjuncts, is in itself non-differentiated, so that the two may be identified, as is done in the passage ‘pra/n/a is praj/n/a.’

The second part of the Sutra is explained in a different manner also[134], as follows:  Characteristic marks of the individual soul as well as of the chief vital air are not out of place even in a chapter whose topic is Brahman.  How so?  ’On account of the threefoldness of devout meditation.’  The chapter aims at enjoining three kinds of devout meditation on Brahman, according as Brahman is viewed under the aspect of pra/n/a, under the aspect of praj/n/a, and in itself.  The passages, ‘Meditate (on me) as life, as immortality.  Life is pra/n/a,’ and ’Having laid hold of this body it makes

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The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.