Stress has been laid[27] upon certain passages of the B/ri/hadara/n/yaka which seem to hint at the unreality of this world by qualifying terms, indicative of duality or plurality 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, however, 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 Yaj/n/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 Sa@nkara’s sense, not any more than, for instance, the modes of Spinoza are unreal because, according to that philosopher, there is only one universal substance.  And with regard to the clause ’the Self thinks as it were’ it has to be noted that according to the commentators 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 Sa@nkara thinks, or real forms of existence, as Ramanuja 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 Maya of Sa@nkara.  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.[28]

The last important point in the teaching of the Upanishads we have to touch upon is the relation of the jivas, the individual souls to the highest Self.  The special views regarding that point held by Sa@nkara and Ramanuja, as have been stated before.  Confronting their theories with the texts of the Upanishads we must, I think, admit without hesitation, that Sa@nkara’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