The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v2.c41.55

v2.c41.55

² The view that this is meant in BAU. i. 4. 10; AU. ii. 4 (Deussen, *Phil. of Up.*, pp. 317, 318), is clearly speculative; it is not stated in either text and is a bad guess of the commentators who read their own views into the Upaniṣads wholesale, which unfortunately has misled Deussen. According to Deussen in the former passage Vāmadeva is stated to have recognized his identity with the Brahman, ‘and as a proof of his knowledge of Brahman alleged his acquaintance with his former births as Manu and Sūrya’. But the Upaniṣad has nothing whatever as to former births, and the argument is quite different. By knowledge of the Brahman one becomes the Brahman, as it did itself, and as may the gods and seers; in substantiation of this doctrine is cited the fact that Vāmadeva became (not ‘once was’) Manu and Sūrya by recognizing his identity with them (a complete misunderstanding, of course, of the hymn which is not spoken by Vāmadeva: cf., last, Charpentier, *Die Suparṇasage*, pp. 135 ff.). In AU., on the other hand, the citation is merely to establish the fact that Vāmadeva knew the three forms of birth; not a word is said of his having passed through any series of births at all.