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.
the seer, is the kshetraj/n/a; the two are therefore the internal organ and the individual soul.’  Nor does the mantra under discussion fall under the purvapaksha propounded above.  For it does not aim at setting forth the embodied individual soul, in so far as it is characterised by the attributes connected with the transmigratory state, such as acting and enjoying; but in so far rather as it transcends all attributes connected with the sa/m/sara and is of the nature of Brahman, i.e. is pure intelligence; as is evident from the clause, ’The other looks on without eating.’  That agrees, moreover, with sruti and sm/ri/ti passages, such as, ‘That art thou,’ and ’Know me also to be the individual soul’ (Bha.  Gita XIII, 2).  Only on such an explanation of the passage as the preceding one there is room for the declaration made in the concluding passage of the section, ’These two are the sattva and the kshetraj/n/a; to him indeed who knows this no impurity attaches[142].’—­But how can, on the above interpretation, the non-intelligent sattva (i.e. the internal organ) be spoken of as an enjoyer, as is actually done in the clause, ’One of them eats the sweet fruit?’—­The whole passage, we reply, does not aim at setting forth the fact that the sattva is an enjoyer, but rather the fact that the intelligent individual soul is not an enjoyer, but is of the nature of Brahman.  To that end[143] the passage under discussion metaphorically ascribes the attribute of being an enjoyer to the internal organ, in so far as it is modified by pleasure, pain, and the like.  For all acting and enjoying is at the bottom based on the non-discrimination (by the soul) of the respective nature of internal organ and soul:  while in reality neither the internal organ nor the soul either act or enjoy; not the former, because it is non-intelligent; not the latter, because it is not capable of any modification.  And the internal organ can be considered as acting and enjoying, all the less as it is a mere presentment of Nescience.  In agreement with what we have here maintained, Scripture (’For where there is as it were duality there one sees the other,’ &c.; B/ri/.  Up.  IV, 5, 15) declares that the practical assumption of agents, and so on—­comparable to the assumption of the existence of elephants, and the like, seen in a dream—­holds good in the sphere of Nescience only; while the passage, ’But when the Self only is all this, how should he see another?’ declares that all that practically postulated existence vanishes for him who has arrived at discriminative knowledge.

13.  The person within (the eye) (is Brahman) on account of the agreement (of the attributes of that person with the nature of Brahman).

Scripture says, ’He spoke:  The person that is seen in the eye that is the Self.  This is the immortal, the fearless, this is Brahman.  Even though they drop melted butter or water on it (the eye) it runs away on both sides,’ &c. (Ch.  Up.  IV, 15, 1).

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