The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v2.c40.s5.52

v2.c40.s5.52

But, despite the giving to the absolute of these three attributes or characteristics, Yājñavalkya returns constantly to the fact that they are not to be taken in the empirical sense, and that, therefore, our knowledge of the absolute is non-existent. The most drastic expression for this view is the formula⁷ *neti neti*, ‘not so, not so’, which denies to the absolute any and every attempt to define it in terms of ordinary knowledge. Its existence is a transcendental reality, which is essentially from the empirical point of view a nonentity: its consciousness involves the essential fusion of subject and object, and the transcendence of their diversity, although the phraseology of the Upaniṣads always treats the Ātman as subject,⁸ and, therefore, is not ordinary consciousness at all, and the bliss arises from this state of non-distinction. Hence we have two different conceptions which are repeated times without number: on the one hand every empirical attribute is attributed to the absolute and also denied of it: in the second place the most contradictory observations are made regarding it. The ideas thus enunciated are clear: the absolute is not in space¹ which is expressed by the assertion that it is infinitely large and infinitely small, that space is interwoven in it, and that it is all pervading. The absolute is not in time:² hence it appears as above the three times, independent of the past and the future, at its feet time rolls on its course: on the one hand it is of infinite duration, but at the same time it is of the instantaneous character of the flash of the lightning, or the swift rush of thought. The absolute is also free from causal connexion:³ it is said to be absolutely without diversity, and this point is variously developed: the Kaṭha⁴ is emphatic that the absolute is independent of becoming and not becoming, of good and evil, of past and future, the knowing seer is not born, does not die, abides from everlasting. The Īçā⁵ insists that it is unmoving, yet swifter than mind; far, yet near; within, yet without the universe; above knowledge and ignorance; that it differs essentially from coming into being and not coming into being. The final answer to the question of the nature of the Ātman is that recorded for us in a legend by Çañkara: Vāṣkali asked Bāhva as to the nature of the Brahman: the latter remained silent, and on being pressed for an answer replied, 'I teach you, indeed, but you understand not: silence is the Ātman.'⁶