The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v2.c39.s2.79

v2.c39.s2.79

The real history of Ātman seems then to be that from the meaning ‘wind’ sprang early up that of ‘the breath’: thence came the meaning ‘self’, as when it is said of Sūrya that he is the self of that which stands and moves.³ Then we have the use of the self as a reflexive pronoun, and the use as meaning the body,⁴ an idea which is clearly intended when it is contrasted with Prāṇa, ‘the breath’: the meaning ‘trunk’,⁵ as opposed to limbs, is an easy development from this sense. But the sense ‘breath’ or ‘self’ is also capable of being understood in more abstract ways, and we, therefore, find Ātman used to denote the essential nature of a thing: this use is already found in the Rigveda⁶ where the nature of the breath, the blood, the self of the earth, is put as a question, and similarly we hear of the self of the disease Yakṣma,⁷ of all beings, and the adjective *ātmanvant*, ‘possessing existence’.⁸ But of much more importance is the development of the use of the word to denote the self of man in direct distinction from the members of his body and his body itself: it must be admitted that the use is far from common in the Vedic literature, but twice in the Atharvaveda⁹ the contrast of Ātman with breath and body seems clearly intended, and the same thing must be admitted for two passages in the Çatapatha,¹⁰ in which either one or ten breaths are set over against the self. Further, it seems that efforts were being made to define the self either as mind or as consciousness, Vijñāna.¹