The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v2.c41.s8.28

v2.c41.s8.28

The parallel drawn by Garbe between the doctrine of the Upaniṣads and that of Parmenides is, of course, largely discounted, if we accept the view that Parmenides was essentially not the father of idealism but of materialism, as claimed by Burnet,¹¹ who with Zeller ¹² denies to Parmenides the assertion of the identity of thought and being which is attributed to him by Garbe. Burnet ¹³ also further differentiates Parmenides from the doctrine of the Upaniṣads by denying that the second part of his poem is intended as an exposition of appearances as opposed to reality in the sense that Parmenides admitted in some degree that appearances existed. On his view, as on that of Diels, this part of the poem merely deals with opinions of others, which are necessarily false, those others being, as he thinks, Pythagoreans, not, as in Diels’s view, followers of Herakleitos. But this latter view is opposed both by Gomperz¹ and Wilamowitz,² and it must be regarded as far from satisfactorily made out,³ while the treatment by Plato of Parmenides is inconsistent with the view that he was really a mere materialist. The analogy of Spinoza cited by Gomperz is perhaps the most enlightening; the one is material but also it is spiritual; ‘It is universal matter and universal spirit at once, but the matter is sterile because capable of no expansion and the spirit powerless because capable of no action.’ Gomperz, however, is clearly erroneous in comparing the Vedānta philosophy, which in no form develops this precise doctrine.