806.  Both the vernacular translators have rendered this verse wrongly.  This fact is, without clearly understanding either the text or the gloss, they have used bits of the gloss without being able to convey any intelligible idea.  The gloss sometimes requires gloss to make it intelligible.  The commentator says that the theory of rebirth mentioned in verse 34 is that Of the Sugatas or Buddhists.  That theory is refuted inverse 35.  The objection to the Buddhistic theory is that mere ignorance and karma cannot explain rebirth.  There must be an indestructible Soul.  This the Buddhists do not allow, for they believe that Nirvana or annihilation is possible.  The argument, as sketched, proceeds in this way:  the being that is the result of the rebirth is apparently a different being.  What right have we to assert its identity with the being that existed before?  Ignorance and karma cannot create a Soul though they may affect the surroundings of the Soul in its new birth.  The objections to the Buddhistic theory became clear in the verses that follow.

807.  The sense is this:  it is never seen in the world that the acts of one person affect for good or for evil another person.  If Chaitra exposes himself to the night air, Maitra never catches cold for it.  This direct evidence should settle the controversy about the unseen, viz., whether the acts of one in a previous life can affect another in a subsequent life if there be no identity between the two beings in two lives.

808.  It is needless to say that I have considerably elaborated the second line of the verse, as a literal rendering would have been entirely unintelligible.  For example’s sake I give that rendering; “That which is separate Consciousness is also different.  That from which it is, does not recommend self.”

809.  If (as has already been said) the second Consciousness be the resulting effect of the loss or destruction itself of the previous Consciousness, then destruction is not annihilation, and, necessarily, after Nirvana has been once attained, there may be a new Consciousness or new birth, and, thus, after having again attained to Nirvana the same result may follow.  The Buddhistic Nirvana, therefore, cannot lead to that final Emancipation which is indicated into the Brahmanical scriptures.

810.  The Buddhists then, according to this argument, are not at all benefited by asserting the existence of a permanent Soul unto which each repeated Consciousness may inhere.  The Soul, according to the Brahmanical scriptures, has no attributes or possessions.  It is eternal, immutable, and independent of all attributes.  The affirmance of attributes with respect to the Soul directly leads to the inference of its destructibility, and hence the assertion of its permanency or indestructibility under such conditions is a contradiction in terms, according to what is urged in this verse.