The System of the Vedanta according to Badarayana's Brahma-Sutras and Cankara's Commentary c7.s6.t2.3

c7.s6.t2.3

2—3. “Existent alone, dear one, was this in the beginning, one only, and without a second. Some, it is true, say that this was non-Existent in the beginning, one only, without a second; that from this non-Existent was born the Existent. But how could this be, dear one? how could the Existent be born from non-Existent?”—Here follows the passage given above (p. 230ff.) in which Âruṇi explains to his son how the one Existent put forth from itself the three primordial elements: heat, water, and food, and entered into these with the living self (*jīva ātman*, that is, the individual soul).