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The System of the Vedanta according to Badarayana's Brahma-Sutras and Cankara's Commentary c6.s7: XIII. The Brahman as the highest Goal

The System of the Vedânta according to Bâdarâyana's Brahma-Sûtras and Çankara's Commentary c6.s7

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XIII. The Brahman as the highest Goal

1. Brahman as Object of Meditation

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Sûtras 1, 3, 13.

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The Meditation on the Brahman can be more or less perfect and accordingly, as is known from the passages adduced in Chap. VI (above p. 102 ff.), brings different fruit, namely, in part, earthly happiness, in part, heavenly though transitory felicity, in part, eternal union with Brahman. This thought is illustrated in the fifth section of the *Praçna-Upanishad* (p. 219 ff.) by the doctrine that, in the word "om," the symbolical bearer of the meditation on the Brahman, the three metrical moments (*mâtrâ*), of which it is supposed to consist (*a-u-m*), are distinguished. The meditation is more perfect in proportion as it extends to one, two, or to all three elements of the word "om." The passage runs as follows:

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"Verily, o Satyakâma, the sound 'om' is the higher and the lower Brahman. Therefore the wise, when he relies on it, gains the one or the other."

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"If he meditates on one element, enlightened by it, he comes [after death] quickly to the state of the living. The *Rig*-hymns lead him to the world of men; there he comes to asceticism, pious life and faith and enjoys exaltation."

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"When in his thought he attains two elements, then [after death] he is borne by the *Yajus*-sentences upward into the air to the Soma-world [to the moon]. After he has enjoyed lordship in the Soma-world, he comes back again."

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"But if, through all three elements of the sound 'om,' he meditates on the highest spirit, then, after he has entered into the light, into the sun, as a serpent is freed from its

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“slough, so he is freed from evil; by the Sāman-songs he is “led upwards to the Brahman-world; then beholds he Him “who is higher than the highest complex of life, the spirit “who dwells in the city [the body] (puri-śayaṃ puruṣam).”

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It is a question, remarks Ṣaṅkara, which of the two Brahmans, mentioned in the opening passage, is to be understood in the last paragraph, the higher or the lower? The spatial reference, which lies in the leading upward to the world of Brahman, speaks for the latter, and does not suit the higher Brahman (p. 245, 7; above p. 109). Nevertheless we must think of the higher Brahman because it is said “he beholds,” which can only refer to a reality, to the highest Brahman, as it is the object of perfect knowledge (samyag-darśanam) (p. 246, 6), while by the “highest complex of life” Brahman in the form of the individual soul⁸⁸ must be understood (p. 247, 1). In conformity with this also, in what has gone before, by the highest spirit, which is to be meditated on, the highest Brahman is to be understood (p. 247, 10), for meditation on it only brings the further mentioned deliverance from evil (p. 248, 4). But as to the reference to place, which lies in the leading upwards to the Brahman-world, it must be assumed that gradual liberation (kramamukti) is here taught, and that perfect knowledge is only communicated after the introduction into the Brahman-world (p. 248, 8),—though this last view is not quite in accordance with the doctrine of the system; as here the highest Brahman is to be understood, while on the contrary as we shall see later (Chap. XXXIX, 4), gradual liberation applies only to the worshipper of the lower Brahman.

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⁸⁸ Somebody whose opinion is introduced very abruptly p. 247, 3 wishes to refer the “highest complex of life” to the Brahman-world, a view which is neither approved of nor opposed in what follows, and has probably been interpolated into the text, so that tasmāt p. 247, 7 was originally connected immediately with 247, 2 (cf. above p. 29).

2. Brahman as the Place of the Liberated

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Sûtras 1, 3, 1—7.

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In the Muṇḍaka-Upanishad 2, 2, 5 it is said:

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"The place in which the heavens, and earth, and mind,
"The sky with all the senses are entwined,
"That place as nought but Âtman shall ye know,
"All other turns of speech shall ye forego⁸⁹
"He is the bridge of immortality."

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⁸⁹ In the text the indicative stands: jânatha, vimuñcatha.

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Here, says Śaṅkara, we might think of something other than Brahman, perhaps primordial matter, or the wind, or the individual soul, which in a certain sense could be called the place of things (p. 225), for the bridge mentioned seems to presuppose another shore (something outside it), which is not true of Brahman (p. 224, 8). But the place, in which the whole world is woven, can only be Brahman (p. 225, 10), as is shewn by the word Âtman, which in its full sense is only valid for Brahman (p. 226, 1). The world is, of course, not related to it as the roots, trunk and branches to the tree (p. 226, 7), but is only a product of Ignorance (p. 226, 11); for the scripture warns us against accepting unreal plurality (p. 227, 3), when it is said (Kâṭh. 4, 10. Bṛih. 4, 4, 19):

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"Their never ending death they weave,
"Who here a manifold perceive."

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What is said of the bridge, only means that Brahman keeps things asunder (cf. above p. 133. 162), not that He has another shore (p. 227, 10). But that Brahman alone can be the place, follows from the fact that He is afterwards indicated as the place to which the liberated go. For just this illusion that the I consists in the bodily nature, is Ignorance; the esteem of this body is Passion (râga), the despising of it is Hate, thoughts of injury to it are Fear, and so on according to the names of the host of the unreal (p. 228, 10). Liberation from all these defects is a going to the place which is here spoken of; it is further said concerning it (Muṇḍ. 2, 2, 8):

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“He who this highest, deepest views, “For him the heart's knots are untied, “For him his doubts are all resolved, “His works all pass to nothingness;” and again (Muṇḍ. 3, 2, 8): “As rivers run, and in the deep, “Lose name and form, are lost to sight, “The sage released, from name and form, “Enters the highest spirit of light.”

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Here neither primordial matter nor the wind can be spoken of (p. 230), nor yet the individual soul (p. 231, 1), which, by the words: “This place alone you know the Âtman is,” is distinguished as subject from the highest soul as object (p. 231, 8).

3. Brahman as Attainment of absolute Unity

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Sûtras 1, 3, 8–9.

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All knowledge, which is different from its object, is limited and not free; that knowledge only is unlimited and free, which knows itself as identical with the known.—This is the fundamental thought of the Bhûma-vidyâ, the seventh section of the Chândogya-Upanishad (p. 473–527), whose chief contents are as follows.

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Nârada prays Sanatkumâra to teach him; and, in answer to the question: what he already knows, enumerates the four Vedas and a long series of other sciences. In the consciousness of their insufficiency, he adds: “I know, O venerable one, “the Mantras [here the whole practical theology], not the “Âtman [metaphysics]; for I have heard from those who are “like thee, that he who knows the Âtman is above sorrow; “but I, O Master, am sorrowful; lead thou me away from “sorrow!”

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Sanatkumâra, in his teaching, takes the following course. All, he says, that thou hast learnt, is name, greater (bhûyas) than name is speech, than speech, understanding, than this, resolve, than this, thought, than this, knowledge, than this, force, than this, food, than this, water, than this, fire, than this, space, than this, memory, than this, hope, than this the life (or the breath, *prâṇa*). "As the spokes are fastened in the nave, so all this is fastened in the life. The life prospers through the life (breath), the life (breath) gives life, gives it to life. The life is father and mother, the life is brother and sister, the life is teacher and Brahman. Therefore, when anyone roughly uses a father or mother or brother or sister or teacher or Brahman, it is said: Fie on thee! thou art a parricide, matricide, fratricide, slayer of thy sister, slayer of thy teacher, slayer of a Brahman [cf. I John III, 15 πᾶς ὁ μισῶν τὸν ἀδελφὸν αὑτοῦ ἀνθρωποκτόνος ἐστίν]; but if, after the life has fled, he pokes the same persons with the pike [on the funeral pile] and burns them up, it is not said: thou art a parricide, matricide, fratricide, slayer of thy sister, slayer of thy teacher, slayer of a Brahman: for the life only is this all.--Verily, he who thus sees and thinks and knows, he is a conqueror in speech (*ativâdin*); and if anyone should say to him: thou art a conqueror in speech! he shall avow, and not deny it."

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By life (*prâṇa*) in this passage is to be understood, not as elsewhere frequently and also in the Chândogya-Upanishad itself (cf. above p. 147, 164, 177, 182) the highest Brahman, but (perhaps in intentional polemic against this view) empirically "the life-principle (*prâṇa*) shaped to the complex of the subtle body, the *Prajñâtman* [Brahman, note 82] as the central principle of the body, in which the highest godhead [*Brahman*] enters to the end of evolution in name and form as the living self (as the individual soul, *jîva âtman*), like the image in the mirror."⁹⁰ The result up to this is therefore only the highest point of the empirical view of the world, from which Sanatkumâra seeks to lift his pupil to the metaphysical view, proceeding as follows:

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⁹⁰ Çank. on Chând. p. 505, 15. Here should be distinguished 1. that which is imaged (*brahman, âtman*), 2. the image of the mirror (*jîva*), 3. the mirror (*prâṇa*), which however are all three at bottom one in Brahman. However the sense of the above scholion is in part obscure and the translation uncertain.

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But he only is the true conqueror in speech, who conquers through the truth. The truth, therefore, must be investigated.

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Now the truth is based on knowledge, knowledge on thought, thought on faith, faith on certainty, certainty on action, action on pleasure [the inclination to do something, as determining the will].

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Now pleasure, [thus the speaker continues, the idea of a single satisfaction, such as is felt after an action, leading him on to that of an absolute, final satisfaction] consists only in illimitation (*bhûman*), not in the limited (*alpam*). Now what is illimitation?

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“When one sees no other [outside himself], hears no other, knows no other, that is illimitation; when he sees, hears, knows another, that is the limited. Illimitation is the immortal, the limited is mortal.” “But on what is it based then, Master?”—“It is based on its own greatness, or, if you will, not on greatness. For by greatness in this world one understands many cows and horses, elephants and gold, slaves and women, fields and lands. But this I mean not, for here one is always based on the other.”

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“But it [the illimitation] is below and above, in the west and in the east, the south and the north; it is this whole world.”

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“Hence follows for the consciousness of ‘I’ (*ahaṃkâra*): ‘I (*aham*) am below and above, in the west and the east, the south and the north; I am this whole world.’”

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“Hence follows for the soul (*âtman*): the soul is below and above, in the west and the east, the north and the south, the soul is this whole world.”

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“He who sees and thinks and knows thus, rejoicing in the soul, playing with it, uniting and delighting with it, he is autonomous (*svarâj*), and freedom (*kâmacâra*) is his in all worlds; but they who regard it otherwise than thus, they are heteronomous (*anyarâjan*), of transitory felicity, and unfreedom (*akâmacâra*) is theirs in all worlds.”—

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“Thus,” it is said in conclusion, “he shewed him, whose darkness was worn away, the shore beyond the darkness, he, the holy Sanatkumâra.”

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Śaṅkara’s efforts, in connection with this passage, are directed to proving that, by illimitation Brahman is to be understood, and not the previously mentioned life. For although nothing higher follows after life in the series (p. 235, 4), and who knows it is called a conqueror in speech (p. 235, 8), although the description, also, that one "sees no other outside himself," suits the life in the condition of deep sleep (p. 235, 14), as also the terms as pleasure, immortal, Âtman, could be understood of the life (p. 236), yet it is not the life; but only the highest Brahman which is to be understood by illimitation; for it is termed higher than deep sleep, that is, than the life in deep sleep (p. 237, 1) by the fact that from him who knows the life, we are directed to him "who through the truth conquers in speech" (p. 238, 10), while the first mentioned conquest is unjustified (p. 239, 8). And as the truth appears further illimitation, that is, the highest soul different from the life (p. 240, 3); for to Him alone can apply the passage concerning the destruction of sorrow (p. 240, 6), as also the phrase "the shore beyond the darkness," that is, Ignorance (p. 240, 10), and the immense greatness, which lies in the idea of illimitation, and is only applicable to the highest God as the cause of all (p. 240, 14). To it applies also the unity of subject and object, since the unity which arises in deep sleep is also to be reduced to it (p. 241, 6). Lastly, to it refers also the term pleasure, since by it no pleasure enduring for a time only (sâmaya) is to be understood (p. 241, 12); as also the expressions such as immortality, truth, being based on its own greatness, omnipresent, and all-animating (p. 241, 16).

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