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The System of the Vedanta according to Badarayana's Brahma-Sutras and Cankara's Commentary c8.s7: XXVIII. Special States of the Soul

The System of the Vedânta according to Bâdarâyana's Brahma-Sûtras and Çankara's Commentary c8.s7

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XXVIII. Special States of the Soul

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THERE are three states of the individual soul which sojourns in the body; they are: Waking, dream-sleep, and deep sleep (p. 799, 14), and these three are also to be understood when the highest soul is spoken of as "changeless onlooker at the three changing states" (as *e.g.* 432, 12, above p. 276). A fourth state is dying consisting in a passing out of the body (p. 799, 15); we have further swooning, which is however not to be reckoned as a fifth state because it is only an occasional and exceptional phenomenon, which is in the sphere of the healing art (p. 802, 13).

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We shall now consider these three states on the basis of the material afforded by the appendix 3, 2, 1—10 supplementary to the *Psychology*, prefixing a brief definition of them from p. 107, 12 ff.: "the soul is awake, when, in consequence of its connection with the various *Upâdhis* [the ten *Indriyas*] which proceed from the *Manas*, it apprehends sensuous objects and examines their differences;—when, modified by the impressions¹²⁰ of these, it sees dream-pictures, it is [occasionally, *viz.* Chând. 6, 8, 2, above p. 263] described by the word *Manas* [in the dream-state the senses repose, while the *Manas* remains active, above p. 320]; in the state of deep sleep in which the two kinds of *Upâdhis* [*Indriyas* and *Manas*, or, as Govinda maintains: the coarse and fine] are in repose, and the differences conditioned by the *Upâdhis* cease to exist, the soul is as it were dissolved (*pralîna*) in its own self and therefore "it is said: it has entered into itself (Chând. 6. 8. 1, above "p. 263)."

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¹²⁰ The dream-pictures have as cause the impressions (*vâsanâ*) of the waking state; cf. p. 788, 11: *jâgarita-prabhava-vâsanâ-nimittatvât tu svapnasya*; p. 270, 8: *tad-vâsanâ-nimittâḥ ca svapnân nâḍî-caro 'nubhûya*.

1. Dream-Sleep

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Sûtras 3, 2, 1-6.

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In the principal passage, Brih. 4, 3 (a knowledge of which from Chap. XII, 4. above p. 189 we shall in what follows assume in the reader) it is said: "there are no chariots, no "teams, no roads, but he creates for himself chariots, teams. "and roads." The question is (p. 778, 7) whether a real creation is here to be understood or one depending on illusion (*mâyâ*).

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The first view might be taken, for it is said: "he creates;" and further: "for he is the creator" (p. 779, 6). Moreover another passage (Kâth. 5, 8) says of dream-sleep:

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"The spirit that in the sleeper never tires
"And gives the form he will to his desires,
"He is the Brahman, he the stainless one,
"Immortal is his name.
"And all the spheres
"Repose in him; beyond him there is none."

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It might be imagined that by wishes here as before (Kâth. 1, 23-24) real objects are to be understood, and that by the creating spirit (Kâth. 2, 14) the world-creating highest Soul (*prâjna*) is meant (p. 780, 1. 5), so that the dream-creation is to be conceived as real just as much as the actual creation (p. 780, 10).

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To this is to be replied: the dream-creation is a mere illusion, and not a reality (p. 780, 17) because it is not consistent with time, space, and causality and is refuted by them (p. 781, 3). 1) Not with space: for there is no room for chariots, etc. in the limited confines of the body (p. 781, 5). It might be imagined that the soul leaves the body in sleep because it is said (Brih. *loc. cit.*) "it soars from the nest and "hovers where it will" and because in dreaming, going and standing still are only possible on this supposition (p. 781, 6). But that is not so; for it is not possible to pass over the space of a hundred miles in a moment; besides a man who goes to sleep in the country of the *Kurus* and reaches in his dream the country of the Pañcālas, ought to be able to wake up there too; but in reality he always wakes in the country of the Kurus (p. 781, 10, 14). Moreover objects in foreign countries are in reality not at all the same as they were in the dream (p. 782, 1). The above mentioned passage is therefore to be taken figuratively, and the going and standing still in dreams are an illusion (p. 782, 5. 7). The dream is just as unreconcilable with 2) the conditions of time; for one sleeps at night and believes it to be day, and often a dream that lasts an hour seems like a number of years (p. 782, 8); and the dream is in conflict 3) with causality; for one grasps chariots without hands, sees them without eyes, builds them without wood; besides their existence is refuted by the awakening (cf. above p. 247), and not by this alone but also by the course of the dream itself, for the chariot suddenly turns into a man, and a man into a tree (p. 782, 11).

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True the dream is not completely illusory, for it is prophetic of good or ill luck. For thus says the Scripture (Chând. 5, 2, 9):

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"For him who dreams of happiness in love,
"Good fortune when he wakes is near at hand;"

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while (according to Ait. ār. 3. 2, 4, 17) a black man with black teeth indicates a speedy death (p. 783, 7). Again those skilled in dream-books (*svapna-adhyāya* p. 783, 10) explain the dream, when they for example teach that riding on an elephant is a foretoken of riches, and on a donkey of poverty. Here what is presaged is true, but what presages, the dream namely, is not true (p. 783, 14; cf. above p. 270). Besides it is the purpose of dream-pictures to excite joy and fear, and that as a result of the good and evil that one has done (p. 784, 7).

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Therefore the passage as to the creation of the chariot is to be understood figuratively (p. 784, 2) and serves to elucidate how far the spirit is its own light (p. 784, 9). The individual soul is in the first place to be regarded as the creator of dream-pictures (p. 785, 3); and if the context of the Kāṭhaka-passage we have cited indicates the highest soul, this depends on the two being properly speaking identical (p. 785, 6) in the sense of the words *tat tvam asi* [it would have been more appropriate to recall the words etad vai tat which we find not far from these cited. God directs all things and therefore dreams too; but the dream-creation is not a real one in the same sense that nature is. "Further the creation of nature "is not an absolute reality (ātyantikaṃ satyatvam); for on the "basis of the words of scripture referring to its depending on "words (above p. 262) we have proved its identity with Brahman (chap. XX), as well as that the whole extension of the "world is a mere illusion (māyā); ¹²¹ its difference from the "illusion of a dream consists only in the continuance of the "extension of the world until the soul is recognised as Brahman, while the extension of the dream is refuted daily" (p. 785, 10).

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¹²¹ The theory of the extension of the world as māyā, the occurrence of which in Śaṅkara is doubted by Colebrooke, and in Bādarāyaṇa by Cowell (Colebrooke, M. E.³, p. 400) is quite clearly expressed in Śvetāśvatara-Up. 4, 9—10 which is accepted by both of them; from Śaṅkara's Commentary the following passages are applicable: pp. 120, 16. 269, 2. 342, 12. 406, 6. 432, 8—13. 472, 9. 484, 11. 785, 12; cf. above pp. 100, 187, 228, 254, 276, 277, 299.

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"But are not God and the soul related as fire and sparks; "and does not the soul therefore of necessity share in God's "omniscience and omnipotence, as sparks have their share of "light and heat; and cannot it therefore at will (saṃkalpa) "create in a dream?"

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—Reply: the homogeneity of the soul and God is a fact, but is concealed by Ignorance, and only becomes manifest to him whose eyes are opened by the grace of God.

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"But does it come about that this homogeneity is "hidden from us?"

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—It is, like fire under the ashes, hidden in consequence of the connection with the Upādhis, to wit the body etc. which are produced by the world of names and forms dependent on Ignorance.

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"But if the soul does not possess the omniscience and "omnipotence of God, it is essentially heterogeneous from "Him, and does not need to become so by the connection "with the body?"

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—By the connection with the body it comes about, that the soul's (own) omniscience and omnipotence are concealed from it, and that is why it cannot create at will in a dream. If it could do so, no one would have an unpleasant dream, for no one creates what is not pleasing to himself (pp. 786 to 788).

2. Deep Sleep

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Sûtras 3, 2, 7—9.

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In deep, *i.e.* dreamless sleep, the soul becomes temporarily one with Brahman. In course of time this doctrine, which, in our opinion, only expressed the extinction of conscious in unconscious life, that is perceived in sleep by simple observation, assumed an essentially different meaning. According as the soul came to be regarded as an essentially intellectual potency a separation of it from the *Mukhya Prâna* as principle of the unconscious life and a closer connection with the organs of conscious life, *viz.* *Manas* and *Indriyas*, became necessary. In deep sleep this connection is temporarily dissolved in such a way that *Manas* and *Indriyas* enter into the *Prâna*, and the soul on the other hand is submerged in the Brahman who sojourns in the ether of the heart. Çañkara's statements on this point are concerned with special questions and rest on assumptions which are nowhere clearly developed; we must therefore by putting things together attempt to lay down what these were.

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In the waking state the soul, connected with the *Manas*, has its seat in the heart and from here by means of the *Indriyas* exercises its influence throughout the body.—In dream-sleep the functions of the *Indriyas* are extinguished, for (Praçna 4, 2) they are absorbed into the *Manas*; and the soul surrounded by the still active *Manas* and the reposing *Indriyas* (above p. 320) passes through the whole body, as a prince surrounded by his vassals makes a progress through his kingdom. This view based on Bṛih. 2, 1, 18 seems to hover before Çañkara's mind when he says p. 270, 8, the soul enjoys the dream-pictures which are dependent on waking impressions nāḍīcara, "as it passes through the veins."—In deep sleep, as is said in the same passage (p. 270, 9), the two illusions of waking and dreaming are destroyed, and the soul, freed from all Upādhis enters into Brahman in the ether of the heart. What becomes of Manas and Indriyas in this case? According to Chānd. 4, 3, 3 the Prāṇa absorbs them and this view is adopted by Śaṅkara p. 720, 1. On the other hand it is said in the statement to be given below, the Upādhis (i.e., here Manas and Indriyas) sojourned in deep sleep in "the pericardium (purītat) or the veins," which, 72 000 in number (according to Bṛh. 2, 1, 19) starting from the heart surround the Purītat and thence (Śaṅkara on Bṛh. p. 367, 8) pass to all parts of the body, 101 of them subserving the withdrawal of the dying soul from the body. This information leads us to believe that the veins were taken to be the main seat of the Mukhya Prāṇa; with this agrees the statement that the Vyāna acts in them (Praśna 3, 6) and that the Udāna leads the soul from the body at death by the 101 principal veins.

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After these preliminary remarks we turn to the statements of Śaṅkara, which we shall give in some detail on account of certain special difficulties.

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On the question of the state of the soul in deep sleep (suṣuptam, supti, suṣupti), as we read in the Commentary on 3, 2, 7, the scripture seems to contradict itself; for there are passages according to which the soul in deep sleep "has crept into the veins" (Chānd. 8, 6, 3), "lies in the pericardium" (Bṛh. 2, 1, 19), "has attained unity in the Prāṇa" (Kauṣ. 4, 19), "sojourns in the ether of the heart" (Bṛh. 4, 4, 22), "has entered into the Existent" (Chānd. 6, 8, 1), "is embraced by the Self of knowledge" (Bṛh. 4, 3, 21).—One might think that different places are to be here understood, because they all subserve the same end and therefore cannot be dependent on each other (p. 789, 12). That is also the reason why they are mostly in the locative, and where this is not the case, as in the passage about "the Existent" (p. 790, 3) the locative meaning is made certain by the connection and context (p. 790, 8). As the essence of deep sleep consists in the suspension of individual cognition (viśeṣa-vijñāna-upaśama), and all the spots mentioned subserve this purpose, it seems that the soul in deep sleep can enter one or the other at choice (p. 790, 10).—To this is to be replied: not at choice (vikalpena) into one or the other, but at the same time (samuccayena) into all the places mentioned does the soul enter in deep sleep (p. 791, 1), because otherwise we should have a partial denial (pakshe bādhaḥ) of the evidence of scripture.

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From the uniformity of case it does not follow that all (each for itself) fulfil the same purpose; they may fulfil different ends which require to be combined (p. 791, 7) and as a man can be at home and in bed at the same time, the soul too can be simultaneously in the veins, the pericardium, and the Brahman (p. 791, 8). Where (as in Chānd. 8, 6, 3) the veins alone are mentioned, without excluding Brahman who dwells, as we know, in another spot [in the ether of the heart], an entrance into Brahman by means of the veins (nāḍī-dvāreṇa) is to be understood (p. 791, 16); this is not in contradiction with the locative; for he who by means of the Ganges (Gaṅgayā) journeys to the ocean, has journeyed on the Ganges (Gaṅgāyām) (p. 792, 1). Moreover the passage in question is concerned with another matter, viz. the way through the veins and sunbeams into the Brahman-world [in heaven]; and in treating of this it is, to exalt the veins, mentioned that no evil touches him who has entered by them [into the heart], and that because, as Chānd. 6, 8, 3 says, "he has thus become one with heat" (p. 792, 5). By heat (tejas) is here to be understood either the juice (pittam) in the veins that surrounds the organs of cognition (p. 792, 6) or Brahman; for (p. 792, 11) that it cannot be touched by evil agrees with the facts of the Brahman-world [in the heart, cf. above p. 164] while the complex of veins issues (anugata) in Brahman, as the place of deep sleep.

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So too the pericardium is in close relationship (anuguṇa p. 793, 4) with the place of deep sleep. For the envelope of the heart is termed pericardium, purītat; what is in the heart is also in the purītat, just as what is in a town is surrounded by the walls of the town (p. 793, 8). Of the three places of deep sleep, veins, pericardium and Brahman, the two first are therefore only to be regarded as entrances (p. 793, 13). "The “veins too, or the Puritat are only the receptacle of the Upâdhis “of the soul; in them its organs sojourn [probably only the “Indriyas, and if a removal from its natural position be “assumed, the Manas]. For apart from the connection with “the Upâdhis, the soul in itself (svatas) needs no receptacle “but in its non-difference from Brahman reposes in its own “majesty” (Chând. 7, 24, 1), and thus identity (tâdâtmyam), not a relation of receptacle and contents, exists, between it and Brahman (p. 794, 2); “true the entrance of the soul into Brahman is never unrealised; it cannot give up its own nature; “but in dream and waking by virtue of its mingling with the “Upâdhis it is as though the soul had passed into a different “nature; therefore the release from the Upâdhis in deep sleep “is regarded as an entrance of the soul into its own nature” (p. 794, 7). The aim of deep sleep, the suspension of individual cognition, would not be attained by a mere entrance into veins and Puritat, for (p. 794, 14) they involve plurality (bheda-vishaya);

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and “where a plurality as it were exists, one sees “the other,” as the scripture (Brih. 4, 5, 15) says. True suspension of cognition can be effected by the great distance of the objects but only where the subject is limited, which is not the case with the soul, if the Upâdhis are left out of account (p. 795, 2); if however a removal of the Upâdhis is meant it is just this release from them of which we are speaking (p. 795, 5). We do not maintain either that veins, pericardium and Brahman are to be regarded as possessed of equal rights; for the two first do not come in question at all (p. 795, 8); the important thing is that Brahman is unchangeably the place of deep sleep, and that the Brahmanhood of the soul is adhered to, and a release in deep sleep from the activity of the waking and dream states (p. 795, 12).

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Just as deep sleep is an entrance into Brahman, so awaking out of it is a withdrawal from him (p. 795, 15).

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But how is it possible, if deep sleep is a complete union with Brahman, that each soul on awaking finds its way back to its individuality? If a drop of water is poured into a body of water and a drop taken from it again, it can hardly be assumed that you get the same drop again!122 Just so, as it seems, must we assume that after its union with God in deep sleep the same soul cannot return to its individuality; that on the contrary it is another soul or even God himself who awakes in its place (p. 796, 8—797, 1).

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But this is not so, as Çankara shows p. 797, 2 ff.; he who awakes can neither be another soul nor God but must be the same who went to sleep and that for the following reasons which the words of the Sûtram also set forth:

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1) On account of works; it cannot be assumed that a religious work begun in the evening and completed in the morning is divided between two different souls; and that ati-prasangât "because too much would follow from it;" to wit that then to every one could be apportioned the works of another and be imputed to him at the retribution.

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2) On account of remembrance; for one remembers when one wakes: "I saw this and this yesterday" and "I am so and so." This continuity of the consciousness of external objects and the Self proves that the same soul awakes as went to sleep.

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3) On account of the text of scripture; "then it hurries back according to the entrance, according to the place, into the waking state" (Bṛih. 4, 3, 34);—"all these creatures go day by day into the Brahman-world and yet do not discover it" (Chând. 8, 3, 2);—"therefore of a truth, dear one, when all these “creatures proceed out of the Existent again, do they not “know that they proceed out of the Existent again; whether “they are tigers here, or lions, or wolves, or boars, or worms, “or birds, or midges, or gnats, whatever they may be, that “they become again” (Chând. 6, 10, 2).

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¹²² The question raised above is explicable from the view that the soul as such is a completely indifferent principle, i. e. like God himself (chap. XIV, 3) nirviçeṣha without any difference, and that therefore all its individuality is to be sought in its empirical existential form. But wherein is this individuality to be found?—Not in the Upâdhis for they are only a mechanical apparatus, in themselves dead, which are alike an attribute of all. Therefore if the individual character can neither be found in the soul as such, nor in its Upâdhis, it must be discoverable in some tertium quid, and this is moral determination, which we here characterise by three expressions from Bṛih. 4, 4, 2: vidyâ, karman, pûrva-prajñâ (or as we preferred to say above p. 193 apûrvaprajñâ), knowledge, works, and previous (or newly acquired) experience. We return later (p. 374 ff.) to this question; here we had to anticipate it to make what follows intelligible.

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4) On account of the precepts as to knowledge and works, which in the absence of personal identity would become invalid; for otherwise deep sleep would mean complete liberation, and what would become then of the works that still remain and have to be atoned for, and of the (lower) knowledge? So too in the case of the other in whose person the soul would have to wake, the continuity of his actions would be destroyed. How can one even assume that any one goes to sleep in the person of A and wakes up in the person of B?— Finally the really liberated might also awake again in that case [for nothing distinguishes him from the others] and liberation would not be definitive. But this is, after Ignorance has once been destroyed, impossible; and from this it follows that God (îçvara), for whom Ignorance is eternally annihilated, cannot awake in the place of the soul.—That is; for the reason that otherwise man would suffer for what he has not committed, and not atone for what he has committed (p. 798, 12), it is impossible to assume that a different person from him who went to sleep wakes up. The comparison with the drop, which cannot be recovered from the body of water, does not agree with the facts; for the distinguishing cause is wanting in this case, but in the case of the soul it is present, namely in the shape of works and knowledge [in which therefore consists the individuality of the individual]. Moreover things which are hard to distinguish for such as we are, are still distinguishable; thus the goose (hansa, for a domestic animal must be meant here) is able to distinguish water and milk when they are mixed (p. 799, 3). “There does not exist an individual “soul different from Brahman, distinguishable from the Existent “like a drop of water from a body of water; but the Existent “itself is, in consequence of the connection with the Upâdhis, “termed individual soul in a metaphorical sense, as we have “often set forth; and therefore the matter stands thus: the “action of a given individual soul extends so far as the connection with a given Upādhi-complex exists, and where another Upādhi is present, we have the action of another individual soul; but one and the same Upādhi is in deep sleep and the waking state in the position of the seed and the plant; therefore it is the same soul which wakes up again.”

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—If in the course of these discussions it appears occasionally as if the exoteric theory could not be maintained throughout in the doctrine of deep sleep, the last remark shows that it is not so. The union with Brahman in deep sleep and death and at the destruction of the world is in every case merely apparent, for the individualities continue to exist potentially and arise again from their seed unchanged; and this is at the bottom synonymous with a real continued existence of the soul.

3. Swooning

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Sūtram 3, 2, 10.

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Besides the states of waking, dreaming, deep sleep, and death there is a special state, which is different from all, an intermediate condition between several of them, namely swooning (p. 799, 12). It is in the first place not the waking state; for in it the senses no longer perceive the objects. True the arrow maker perceives nothing beyond his work when he is buried in it; but he has all the same consciousness and control over his body, both of which are absent in the fainting person (p. 800, 7. 11). Further swooning is not dream-sleep on account of the accompanying unconsciousness, and not death because it is distinguished from it by bodily warmth and breath. That is why people look for warmth in the region of the heart, and breath in the nostrils to find out whether anyone is dead or only fainting; if both are absent people say he is dead and fetch wood to burn the body; if on the other hand warmth and breath are still present, he is cared for in order to restore him to consciousness (p. 800, 13). By his coming to himself again we see that he was not dead: for from Yama’s realm no return is possible [though Naciketas in the Kâthaka-Upanishad, like Er, the Armenian, in Plato Rep. 10, 13 p. 614 B, gains information as to the Beyond by sojourning in the kingdom of the dead]. Finally swooning is not deep sleep either; for while fainting is characterised by interrupted breathing, trembling of the body, a frightful expression on his face, and widely opened eyes, a person in deep sleep has a peaceful expression; he draws his breath regularly, and has his eyes closed, and his body does not tremble; moreover he is waked by merely stroking him with the hand, while not even blows with a hammer can rouse a fainting person. [Perhaps from observations during torture]. The causes of the two phenomena are different also; in the one case the blows of a club and the like produce it, in the other simple weariness (p. 801, 10). Therefore swooning is half deep sleep, not in the sense that it is a half union with Brahman, but in so far as it is intermediate between deep sleep and death. It is a gate of death (p. 802, 9): "if there remain works [that still have to be atoned "for] speech and consciousness return; if nothing remains "breath and warmth depart."

4. Metaphysical Significance of Death

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This last assertion is of importance because it shows how the strict predestination that governs life also controls its termination. The whole empirical reality is, as we know, nothing more than *kriyâ-kâraka-phalam* "the requital of works on the doer," and the whole bodily existence is *kârya-karana-sanghâta* "a complex of the organs of work" intended to produce that requital in the form of action and suffering. True the possibility is not excluded, that the works of a single existence have to be atoned for in several succeeding existences (cf. p. 1129, 11 translated above p. 112); and in souls born as plants such an assumption is unavoidable; for the rest however the view is that life both in quality and quantity is in respect of the works of the previous existence an atonement exactly measured and completely fulfilling its aim. The atonement is brought about by *bhoktritvam* and *kartritvam* (the states of enjoyer and agent); the latter condition has as its unavoidable result works which have to be atoned for again in a following existence, so that the clockwork of atonement in running down always winds itself up again; and this goes on for ever,--unless perfect knowledge is gained which, as will be seen, does not depend on merit; it makes its appearance independently to dissolve the existence in its innermost essence, to consume the seed of works and thus for all time make a continuation of transmigration impossible. On the other hand, knowledge cannot put an end to the present existence because this is conditioned by the works of an earlier birth, whose seed has already germinated and cannot therefore be consumed but demands its full retribution. So long as a balance of works remains from a previous existence, death cannot occur; if they are however exhausted, life must go out, like a lamp when the oil is burnt up,--and lead the Ignorant on fancifully elaborated ways to a retribution in the Beyond, and then back to new forms of existence; while the sages who possess the higher knowledge are immediately swallowed up in identity with Brahman, and those who possess the lower knowledge indirectly by the Devayâna or way of the Gods.

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It only remains for us to examine the Eschatology of our system, to follow the soul on its wanderings after death and to consider the two possible ways of its entrance into Brahman.

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