Studies in the Epics and Puranas c8.57

c8.57

The *Chāndogya* and *Kauṣītaki* supply us with an advance over the previous theory maintaining that Prāṇa or life-force or cosmic force is the ultimate substratum of things.²⁸ The *Kauṣītaki*, however, presents Prāṇa with certain features which are not met with in the *Chāndogya* or *Praśna*.29 Prāṇa is directly identified with life, with *prajñā* (consciousness), with Ātman itself, the ultimate reality which is ageless and immortal. It thus comes about that Prāṇa is life from biological point of view, consciousness from psychological and Ātman from the metaphysical point of view.