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The System of the Vedanta according to Badarayana's Brahma-Sutras and Cankara's Commentary c6.s4: X. The Brahman as Cosmic Principle

The System of the Vedânta according to Bâdarâyana's Brahma-Sûtras and Çankara's Commentary c6.s4

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X. The Brahman as Cosmic Principle

1. The Brahman as Creator of the World

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THE creative activity of the Brahman is one of the fundamental ideas concerning it, which recurs in most of the Vedic texts to be considered. We here discuss only a few passages, which cannot conveniently be introduced elsewhere and refer for further information to the texts as well as to our cosmological section (chaps. XVI, XVII). The passages in question teach us to know the Brahman from two sides: (a) as that which conditions the spatial extension of beings (Brahman as *Âkâça*, that is, "Ether" or "Space" of which later),—(b) as that which fills and animates the spatially extended (Brahman as *Prâna*, that is, "Breath" or "Life").

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(a) The Brahman as *Âkâça*. Sûtram 1, 1, 22 and 1, 3, 41.

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1. In the Chândogya-Up. 1, 8—9 there is a dialogue between three men, in which is investigated the point of departure (*gati*), of the Sâman (song). The Sâman, so it is said in the course of the dialogue, goes back to the Tone, the Tone to Breath, Breath to Food, Food to Water, Water to the celestial world, which has, however, as its basis the terrestrial world. But the terrestrial world also is finite, and goes back to the Ether (or space).

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"Now it is the Ether from which all these beings arise, and into which they return; the Ether is older than them all, the Ether is the highest goal. This most excellent of all is the Udgîtha [song of the Sâman], it is the endless."

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Even though, Çañkara remarks on 1, 1, 22, it would be most natural in the case of the word Ether to think of the so-called element, yet what is said here of the Ether cannot apply to the element, but only to the Brahman (p. 136, 5).

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For even if the other beings (elements) have arisen directly and immediately from the ether-element, yet it is said here that "all beings," therefore the ether also, arose from, and return to that which is here, as frequently in the scripture, symbolically called the Ether, that is the Brahman (p. 136, 9). Moreover this only could be meant by the oldest (p. 136, 11), according to the Scripture (Chând. 3, 14, 3) which calls it "older (greater) than the earth, older than the atmosphere, "older than heaven, older than all these worlds;" and only the Brahman can be the highest goal (p. 136, 14), according to the words (Bṛih. 3, 9, 28, where Śaṅkara, with the Mâdhyan-dinas, reads râter):

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"Brahman is bliss and knowledge, the highest aim of the sacrificer
"And of him who desists and knows."

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2. Towards the end of the Chândogya-Up. (8, 14) there is found a remarkable saying (perhaps a blessing for the departing pupil), which runs thus: "The Ether it is, which extends "Names and Forms; that in which these two are [or: that "which is in these two], that is the Brahman, that is the im"mortal, that is the soul. I go forth to the hall of the lord "of creation, to his house [I enter the world]; I am the glory "of Brahmans, the glory of warriors, the glory of cultivators; "to glory following after have I come; let me the glory of "glories not enter into the grey, the toothless, the toothless, "the gray, the slimy [into the womb for a re-birth; or: into "grey old age?]."

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In this passage also, according to Śaṅkara on 1, 3, 41, by the Ether is to be understood the Brahman, chiefly because it is distinguished from Names and Forms,⁷³ which embrace everything created, everything that is not Brahman itself (p. 329, 7).

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⁷³ p. 329, 5 antarâ "different," as at p. 454, 12, where it is explained by anya, while the Commentator on Chând. and according to all appearances also Bâdarâyaṇa 1, 3, 41 understand it as "inside."

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(b) The Brahman as Prâṇa. Sûtram 1, 1, 23.

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Between the two great Upanishads, Bṛihadâraṇyaka, which serves as text-book for the students of the (white) Yajurveda,

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X. The Brahman as Cosmic Principle.

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and Chândogya, which serves for the students of the Sâma-veda, are to be observed many, often verbal agreements, but, side by side with these, certain traces of a thorough-going polemic, which is shown, among other things, by the fact that teachers, who appear in the one Upanishad as the highest authorities, occupy only a subordinate position in the other. Thus, for example, Ushasta, the descendant of Cakra, whose doctrine in Bṛih. 3, 4 is subordinate to that of Yājñavalkya (cf. above p. 141), while, in Chând. 1, 10—11, under the name of Ushasti⁷⁴ it is true, he plays the leading rôle. In the legend, which is here recounted of him, he appears as completely destitute, and yet, notwithstanding his poverty, proud, since he begs food from a rich man, but refuses the drink offered with it, because he can get water to drink without begging. It is further related of him how he betakes himself to a sacrifice, and embarrasses the priests who have been engaged for it by his questions. The king, who is offering the sacrifice, notices him, and, after hearing his name, transfers to him the functions of the other priests. Now it is their turn to examine Ushasti, and the first question in this colloquy runs thus: "Which is the Godhead to which the *Prastâva* (the "introduction to the song of the Sâman) refers?"—To this Ushasti answers (Chând. 1, 11, 5):

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⁷⁴ Çankara calls him Ushasti also in quoting Bṛih. 3, 4 (p. 922, 3).

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"It is the Life (or the Breath, *prâṇa*); for all these beings "enter into Life, and to Life (*prâṇam*, probably better: *prâṇâd*, "from Life) do they arise."

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Here, according to Çankara, we must not, by Life, understand the vital force, into which, according to Çatap. 10, 3, 3, 6, the organs enter in sleep, and from which, on awaking, they are born again, but Brahman, because according to the words of the text not only the organs, but all beings arise from it and return to it again (p. 140, 10); and if it be objected that Ushasti's other two answers, as which "the Sun" and "Food" follow, cannot apply to Brahman (p. 139, 13), it may be answered that this is not at all necessary (p. 141, 5).

2. The Brahman as World-ruler

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(a) Sûtram 1, 3, 39.

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In the Kâthaka-Upanishad (6, 1) the world is likened to an inverted Açvattha (ficus religiosa) whose one root is above (Brahman), and whose manifold branches are below (the beings of the world). Thus Brahman is indicated as the Essence of the Universe, on which all worlds rest, and which penetrates and rules them as the Breath of Life (*prâṇa*):

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"The root above, the branch below,
"This fig-tree stands from ancient days:—
"This is the pure, the Brahman this,
"And this is the Immortal called.
"This is the resting-place of worlds,
"By none can this be e'er surpassed.
"This [world] is truly that [the Brahman]!

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"This is the Life in which the world,
"Which sprung from it, moves tremblingly,
"Fearful is this, a threatening flash,
"Who knows this, his is immortality.

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"From fear of this burns the Fire, from fear of this the Sun,
"From fear of this run Indra and Vâyu, and Death the fifth of them."

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In this passage, says Çankara, by Life (or Breath, *prâṇa*) we are to understand, not the fivefold Vital-breath (Chap. XXVII, 4) or the wind, but Brahman, as is clear from the context (p. 324, 7). To this alone can apply the passage about the trembling of the whole world (p. 325, 2) as also what is said of the lightning-flash; "for just as a man thinks: 'the threatening lightning-flash could strike my head if I did not fulfil his [Indra's?] bidding;' and impelled by this [and similar] fear performs the command of a king etc., so the whole world, fire, wind, sun etc., from fear⁷⁵ of Brahman necessarily perform the duties which are assigned to them" (p. 325, 11). Moreover, proceeds Çankara, it is only the knowledge of Brahman, through which immortality is ours (p. 326, 2), for thus says the Scripture (Çvet. 3, 8 = Vâj. S. 31, 18; cf. Taitt. Âr. 3, 13, 1):

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⁷⁵ Cf. Psalm 104, 7 and Heraclitus': ἥλιος οὐχ ὑπερβήσεται μέτρα, εἰ δὲ μὴ, Ἐρινύες μιν Δίκης ἐπίκουροι ἐξευρήσουσιν.

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“Who knoweth him, hath triumphed over death, “And he who seeks this goal, this path must tread.”

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As the last words show, by immortality (*amṛtatvam*), in the case of the Indians, we are not so much to understand the western idea of an indestructibility by death, but rather a liberation from the necessity of dying again and again.

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(b) Sûtram 1, 2, 18—20.

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In the Bṛihadāraṇyaka-Upanishad Yājñavalkya is asked by Uddālaka the son of Aruṇa (the father and teacher of Çvetaketu in Chând. VI, cf. Chap. XX, 2) concerning “the “inner ruler (*antaryâmin*), which inwardly rules this world, “and the other world, and all beings,” and thereupon answers (Bṛih. 3, 7, 3):

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“He who, dwelling in the earth, is different from the earth, “whom the earth knows not, whose body is the earth, who “inwardly rules the earth, this is thy soul, thine inner ruler, “the immortal.”

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What is said here of the earth, is further, by a stereotyped repetition of the same formula, transferred to water, fire, the atmosphere, the wind, sky, the sun, the cardinal points, moon and stars, the ether, darkness, light; then to all beings; then to breath, speech, the eye, the ear, the mind, the skin, knowledge [*according to the Kāṇva-, “the self” according to the Mādhyandina-Recension*] and seed.—In conclusion it is said (3, 7, 23):

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“He is seeing, not seen, hearing, not heard, understanding, “not understood, knowing, not known; outside him there is none “that sees, that hears, that understands, that knows; he is thy “soul, thy inner ruler, thy immortal;—what is different from “him, is afflicted.”

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Here, as Çaṅkara shows, by the “inner ruler” the highest Âtman is to be understood; for it is his quality to rule all that exists from within; he has the power to do this, because he is the cause of all that exists (p. 195, 13); and in this he makes use of the organs of the beings in question (p. 196, 7). That he is different from beings, is evident from the fact that these beings do not know him; for the said beings know themselves, as, for example the deity earth knows: "I am the earth" (p. 196, 4).--We must not think of the primordial matter of the Sânkhyas, because although it is true of this, that it is said to be "not seen" etc., it is not true that it is "seeing" etc. (p. 197, 5).--Just as little can the individual soul be meant, because this is enumerated among the things ruled by it, in the passage, where the Kânvas read "knowledge," and the Mâdhyandinas "the self." Both mean the individual soul (p. 198, 7). Besides the difference between the Brahman and the individual soul is not, in the highest sense, real, but only the work of Avidyâ, which perceives the highest soul by means of the ascribed limitation (upâdhi) as individual soul (p. 199, 5), and on which the separation of subject and object, the empirical means of knowledge, Samsâra and the Vedic Canon rest (p. 199, 9). In truth there is only one inner soul, and not two (p. 199, 7).

3. Brahman as Destroyer of the World

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Sûtram 1, 2, 9-10.

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In the Kâthaka-Upanishad it is said (2, 24-25):

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"Not he who ceases not from deeds of violence,
"Nor he who has a restless, wandering mind,
"Nor he who has not peace within his heart,
"By knowledge can that highest Spirit gain.
"To whom the priest and warrior are bread
"Which he besprinkles with the sauce of death-
"Who that hath done these deeds can find him out."

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Of the three objects, says Çankara, of which the Kâthaka-Upanishad treats, fire, the individual and the highest soul, only the last can be understood here under that which consumes food. It is true that fire also consumes; it is also true that it is said of the individual soul (Mund. 3, 1, 1): "The one eats the sweet berry," and the following words "the other looks on, not eating," refer to the highest soul (cf. on this below p. 171); but this is to be understood of the enjoyment of the fruit of works, which comes only to the individual, not to the highest soul (p. 178, 13). In our passage, on the contrary, it is a question of the devouring of all things movable [men and beasts] and immovable [plants], for which priest and warrior, as the noblest, are quoted as examples (p. 178, 11). This devouring of all that lives, after it has been sprinkled with the condiment of death, belongs only to the Brahman in its character of Destroyer of the World (p. 178, 7).

Cites (9)