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Indian Philosophy v2.c26.s10: XI Śaṁkara’s Relation to the Upaniṣads and the Brahma Sūtra

Indian Philosophy v2.c26.s10

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XI Śaṁkara’s Relation to the Upaniṣads and the Brahma Sūtra

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Philosophy is the self-expression of the growing spirit of mankind, and the philosophers are its voice. Great thinkers appear in all great ages, and are as much the creatures as the creators of their era. Their genius lies in the power to seize the opportunity of the hour and give voice to the inarticulate yearnings that have been for long struggling in the hearts of men for expression. A creative thinker of the first rank, Śaṃkara entered into the philosophic inheritance of his age, and reinterpreted it with special reference to its needs. Though Hindu thought had practically triumphed over Buddhism, the latter had instilled its secret strength into the people. The shadow of distrust which Buddhism threw over cherished beliefs did not completely vanish. The Mīmāṃsakas were not able to satisfy the reason of all regarding the spiritual value of Vedic ritualism. The different theistic sects were practising rites in support of which they could cite some text or other. It was a critical period in the history of the Hindu nation, when there was a general sense of weariness with the wrangling sects. The age needed a religious genius who was unwilling to break with the past and yet open to the good influences of the new creeds, one who could stretch the old moulds without breaking them and synthesise the warring sects on a broad basis of truth, which would have room for all men of all grades of intelligence and culture. Śaṁkara "set to music" the tune which had been haunting millions of ears, and announced his Advaita Vedānta as offering a common basis for religious unity.

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Śaṁkara’s modesty makes him say that the doctrine he is expounding is nothing more than what is contained in the Vedas. He thinks that he is voicing an old and weighty tradition which has been handed down to us by an unbroken series of teachers.¹ He is aware that the Vedānta Sūtra is commented on by other thinkers in a different way. He frequently refers to one other commentator from whom he differs.² It is indeed difficult to decide whether Śaṁkara’s philosophy is a continuation or reinterpretation of, or an addition to, the old teaching. We cannot distinguish the old from the new, for in the living the old is new and the new is old.

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¹ Śaṁkara refers to previous teachers of the Advaita in opposition to the Vṛttikāra. See Daharādhikaraṇa, where the expression "asmadīyāś ca" occurs. There are frequent references to "sampradāyavidbhir ācāryaiḥ." See the opening verse of S.B. Tait. Up.

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² S.B., iv. 3. 7; i. 3. 19. Liṅgeśa Mahābhagavat thinks that the Vṛttikāra refuted by Śaṁkara is not Bodhāyana, and the Draviḍa referred to by Śaṁkara as "sampradāyavid" in the commentary on the Bṛh. Up. is different from Drāmiḍa of the Viśiṣṭādvaita school. See the Indian Philosophical Review, vol. iv, p. 112. The name of Bhagavān Upavarṣa occurs twice in S.B., i. 3. 28; iii. 3. 53.

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So far as the classical Upaniṣads are concerned, it must be said that Śaṁkara’s view is representative of their main tendency. The Upaniṣads, as we have seen, do not yield any consistent view of the universe. Their authors were many, and not all of them belonged to the same period, and it is doubtful whether they all intended to set forth a single view of the universe; but Śaṁkara insists on interpreting the Upaniṣads in a single coherent manner. According to him, the knowledge of Brahman which we gain from the Upaniṣads must be uniform throughout and without contradiction.¹ Śaṃkara attempts to harmonise such of the assertions of the Upaniṣads as seem most opposed.

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¹ D.S.V., p. 95.

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There are descriptions in the Upaniṣads of the ultimate reality, as both nirguṇa (devoid of qualities) and saguṇa (possessing qualities), and Śaṃkara reconciles them by means of his distinction between parāvidyā (higher knowledge) and aparā vidyā (lower knowledge). This latter distinction can be traced to the Upaniṣads.² Though the distinction as stated in the Upaniṣads is not identical with that which Śaṃkara adopts, still, it lends itself to the latter interpretation. Only through the acceptance of the distinction between higher metaphysics and lower common sense can we reconcile the pure idealism of Yājñavalkya with the less advanced views setting forth the reality of the world and its creation by a personal God. This distinction helps Śaṃkara to get over a number of difficulties. For example, in the Īśa Upaniṣad,³ contradictory predicates are attributed to Brahman, such as, “It is motionless and yet swifter than the mind.” Śaṃkara says, “This is no contradiction.” It is possible with reference to its being thought of as unconditioned and conditioned.”⁴ Regarding the descriptions of Brahman as nirviśeṣa (non-determinate) and saviśeṣa (determinate), Śaṃkara says: “From two different standpoints Brahman may be conditioned and unconditioned at the same time. From the standpoint of the liberated soul he is unconditioned; from that of one in bondage Brahman appears to be the cause of the universe endowed with omniscience and with other attributes.” The two sets of passages describing mokṣa as identity or equality with Brahman are easily explained by Śaṃkara. Though the māyā doctrine is not found in the early Upaniṣads, still it is an intelligible development of the Upaniṣad view.⁵ The word avidyā (ignorance) occurs in the Kaṭha Upaniṣad,⁶ though it is used in the ordinary sense of ignorance of the true end of man. In Śaṃkara’s scheme, the concept of avidyā plays a great part. Other interpreters of the Upaniṣads find it extremely difficult to account for all those passages which regard Brahman as indeterminate and mokṣa as oneness with Brahman. There are of course passages which Śaṃkara passes over as unimportant.¹ Yet his interpretation of the Upaniṣad is more satisfactory than any other.²

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² See I.P., p. 149; Muṇḍaka, i. 1. 4–5; Maitrāyaṇī, vi. 22.

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³ Naiṣa doṣaḥ, nirupādyupādhimattvopapatteḥ.

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⁴ See also Chān., viii. 1. 5; Bṛh., iv. 5. 13.

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⁵ Kaṭha Up., ii. 4. 2; Chān., viii. 3. 1–3; i. 1. 10; Praśna, i. 16. The prayer of the Bṛh. Up. to “lead us from non-being to being, from darkness to light, from death to immortality,” suggests the māyā theory.

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⁶ ii. 4 and 5; Muṇḍ., ii. 1. 10.

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¹ See D.S.V., p. 95.

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² Thibaut, Gough and Jacob are also of this opinion. "The task of reducing the teaching of the whole of the Upaniṣads to a system consistent and free from contradiction is an intrinsically impossible one. But the task once given, we are quite ready to admit that Śaṃkara's system is most probably the best that can be devised" (Introduction to S. B. Thibaut). "The teaching of Śaṃkara is the natural and legitimate interpretation of the doctrines of the Upaniṣads" (Gough: Philosophy of the Upaniṣads, p. viii). Colonel Jacob says: "It may be admitted that if the impossible task of reconciling the contradictions of the Upaniṣads and reducing them to a harmonious and consistent whole is to be attempted at all, Śaṃkara's system is about the only one that could do it" (Introduction to the Vedāntasāra).

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The matter is not quite so simple when we take up the question of the Vedānta Sūtra. It is difficult to make out the intentions of the author if we leave aside the commentaries. There are six well-known tests, according to the Hindu theory of interpretation, by which we can ascertain the teaching of a work, which are: (1) upakrama (commencement) and upasaṃhāra (conclusion); (2) abhyāsa (reiteration); (3) apūrvatā (novelty); (4) phala (fruit); (5) arthavāda (explanatory statements); and (6) upapatti (illustration). In view of these tests, Śaṃkara believes that Bādarāyaṇa had in view Advaitism of the type advocated by himself.³ This is in accord with the accepted position that the Vedānta Sūtra sums up the teachings of the Upaniṣads. Many students of the Vedānta, notably Thibaut, favour the view that Rāmānuja is more faithful to the intentions of the author.⁴

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³ S.B., i. 1. 4.

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⁴ "They do not set forth the distinction of a higher and lower knowledge of Brahman; they do not acknowledge the distinction of Brahman and Īśvara in Śaṃkara's sense; they do not with Śaṃkara proclaim the absolute identity of the individual and the highest self" (Introduction to S.B.). His chief arguments may be briefly stated: (1) The last three parts of the fourth chapter refer to the successive steps by which the soul of him who knows the Lord reaches the world of Brahmā and lives there without returning to the cycle of rebirth. Besides, the concluding sūtra of the whole work, "of them there is no returning according to scripture," is the upasaṃhāra, and must be taken as describing absolute freedom from rebirth and not a mere stage on the road to it, as Śaṃkara takes it. According to Śaṃkara, iv. 2. 12-14, and iv. 4. 1-7, describe the state of him who had attained the knowledge of the highest or unconditioned Brahman. It is said in reply to this charge that the upakrama, or the introduction, is more decisive on this question than the upasaṃhāra or the conclusion. Appaya

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Every Indian commentator believes that his own view is that of the author of the Sūtra, and that every other view is different from it.¹

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¹ Cp. Bhāskarabhāṣya, 2. Suppressing the intentions of the sūtras and developing their own views, many commentaries are written and new commentaries must be written.

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Śaṃkara and Other Schools

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It is said, not without truth, that Brahmanism killed Buddhism by a fraternal embrace. We have seen already how Brahmanism silently assimilated many Buddhist practices, condemned animal sacrifices, accepted Buddha as an avatār of Viṣṇu, and thus absorbed the best elements of the

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Dīkṣita refers to the superior value of the introduction (upakramaparākramaḥ). The same reply holds against Thibaut’s view regarding iv. 3. 7-16, containing the opinions of Bādari, Jaimini and Bādarāyaṇa, where he urges that what occurs first is the pūrvapakṣa, and what comes last the siddhānta. (2) The definition of Brahman given in i. 1. 2 cannot be taken as a definition of Īśvara. “It certainly is as improbable that the sūtras should open with a definition of that inferior principle from whose cognition there can accrue no permanent benefit, as it is unlikely that they should conclude with a description of the state of those who know the lower Brahman and thus are debarred from attaining true release.” The Advaitins contend that, though Brahman in its true nature is indefinable (anirdeśya) and unknowable (agrāhya), still we have to give some provisional definitions. They mention some attributes (viśeṣaṇas) or characteristics (lakṣaṇas) to mark off from Brahman objects possessing other attributes, and thus help us to concentrate on the object in question. These characteristics are either essential (svarūpalakṣaṇas), as sat, cit and ānanda, or accidental (taṭasthalakṣaṇas), as creatorship of the universe, etc. The definition of the second sūtra helps us to a knowledge of Brahman. (3) The argument that the Sūtra does not contain the doctrine of māyā, as Śaṃkara understands it, is too complicated to be discussed in a footnote. This, at any rate, is true, that Śaṃkara’s view of the world is a legitimate development of the teaching of the Sūtra. The question of the identity of the individual soul and Brahman is a specific application of the general principle of māyā. One cannot be certain on the point whether or not Śaṃkara is a faithful interpreter of Bādarāyaṇa’s work. See Thibaut: S.B., Introduction; Jacob: Vedāntasāra, Introduction; Sundararaman: Vedāntasāra, Introduction; Apte: The Doctrine of Māyā; and Lingeśa Mahābhagavat’s article on this subject in the Indian Philosophical Review, vol. iv. Deussen admits that there are great differences between Bādarāyaṇa and Śaṃkara. See D.S.V., p. 319.

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Sūtrābhiprāyasaṃvṛtyā svābhiprāyaprakāśanāt
Vyākhyātaṃ yaīḥ idaṃ śāstraṃ vyākhyeyaṃ tan nivartaye.

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Buddhist faith. Though the accidents of its first immediate form disappeared, Buddhism became, partly through Śaṁkara’s influence, a vital force in the life of the country. Buddhism created in the region of thought a certain atmosphere from which no mind could escape, and it undoubtedly exercised a far-reaching influence on Śaṁkara’s mind. An Indian tradition opposed to Śaṁkara holds that he is a Buddhist in disguise and his māyāvāda but crypto-Buddhism. In the Padma Purāṇa, Īśvara is said to have declared to Pārvatī: “ The theory of māyā is a false doctrine, a disguised form of Buddhism; I, myself, O goddess, propounded this theory in the Kaliyuga in the form of a Brahmin.”¹ Yāmunācārya, the spiritual grandfather of Rāmānuja, is of the same opinion, which Rāmānuja repeats.² Vijñānabhikṣu, commenting on the Sāṁkhya system, observes: “ There is not a single Brahmasūtra in which our bondage is declared to be due to mere ignorance. As to the novel theory of māyā propounded by persons calling themselves Vedāntists, it is only a species of the subjective idealism (of the Buddhists). That theory is not a tenet of the Vedānta.”³ Apparently, shortly after Śaṁkara had established the orthodoxy of the māyāvāda, opponents of the view maintained that it was nothing more than a réchauffé of Buddhism, and so not in conformity with the Vedas. The concluding words of Śiva in the Padma Purāṇa are to the effect that “ that great system, the māyā theory, is not supported by the Veda, though it contains the truths of the Veda.”⁴ All these estimates imply that Śaṁkara incorporated certain Buddhistic elements such as the doctrine of māyā and monasticism into the Vedānta philosophy. It is held that, in an endeavour to preserve the continuity of thought, he attempted to combine logically incompatible ideas. However creditable this may be to the elasticity of Śaṁkara’s mind or his spirit of genuine toleration, it cannot but affect the logical rigour of his thought; and the theory of māyā serves as a cloak to cover the inner rifts of his system. However that be, there is no doubt that Śaṁkara develops his whole system from the Upaniṣads and the Vedānta Sūtra without reference to Buddhism.¹ A persistent misreading of India’s religious history is responsible for the prevalent view that Buddha’s faith is an alien one opposed to the Vedas. In our discussion of Buddhism we have repeatedly urged that Buddha developed certain views of the Upaniṣads. The inclusion of Buddha among the avatārs of Viṣṇu means that he appeared for the establishment of the Vedic dharma, and not for the undermining of it. There are no doubt similarities between the views of Buddhism and Advaita Vedānta, and this is not surprising in view of the fact that both these systems had for their background the Upaniṣads.

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¹ Māyāvādam asac chāstram pracchannam bauddham eva ca Mayaiva kathitaṁ devi, kalau brāhmaṇarūpiṇā (i. 14). See also S.D.S.

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² In his Siddhitraya, Yāmunācārya remarks that, for both the Buddhists and the Advaitins, the distinctions of knower, known and knowledge are unreal. The Advaita traces them to māyā, while Buddhist subjectivism traces them to buddhi (J.R.A.S., 1910, p. 132).

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³ S.P.B., i. 22.

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⁴ Vedārthavan mahāśāstram māyāvādam avaidikam.

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¹ Many followers of the Advaita adopt the dialectical method of the Mādhyamikas so far as the refutation of opposed views is concerned. Śrī Harṣa believes that for criticising other systems we need not assume any views, but simply adopt the Mādhyamika logic. Vitāṇḍākathām ālambya khaṇḍanānāṁ vaktavyatvāt. Madhusūdana Sarasvatī adopts vāda, jalpa and vitaṇḍā in his criticism of the other theories.

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Śaṁkara was clearly conscious of this fact, while Buddha did not seem to be so. While Śaṁkara had the Buddhist’s love of free thought, he had much respect for tradition. Philosophically, he became convinced that no movement could thrive on a spirit of negation, and so asserted the reality of Brahman on the basis of śruti. The phenomenalism of the Buddhists is akin to the doctrine of māyā. Śaṁkara declares that the world of experience neither is nor is not. It has an intermediate existence which both is and is not. Buddha repudiates the two extreme views that everything is and everything is not, and holds that there exists only a becoming.² Śaṁkara admits the distinction between absolute truth (paramārtha) and empirical truth (vyavahāra), which answers to the Buddhistic distinction between paramārtha and saṁvṛti.³ Early Buddhism was positivist in its outlook and confined its attention to what we perceive. Some of the early Buddhists even went the length of saying that there was nothing behind appearances, not only nothing for us but nothing at all. Śaṁkara, as a Hindu, claims that, beyond the unsatisfactoriness of its phenomena, in its deepest depths, there is the real spirit which embodies all values. Yet Śaṁkara’s conception of mokṣa (freedom) is not much different from the Buddhist view of nirvāṇa.¹ If we introduce the reality of an absolute Brahman into early Buddhism, we find the Advaita Vedānta again. Śaṁkara had a firm grasp of the real significance as well as the limitations of Buddhist thought, and if at times we are tempted to quarrel with his treatment of the Buddhist schools, we must remember that he wrote in reply to the prevalent views of Buddhism and not the teachings of Buddha.

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² See I.P., p. 369; Saṁyutta Nikāya, xxii. 90. 16.

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³ Dve satye samupāśritya buddhānāṁ dharmadeśanā Loke saṁvṛtisatyaṁ ca, satyaṁ ca paramārthataḥ. See Nyāyaratnākara on S.V., Niralambanavāda.

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¹ Vāsanātyantavirāmaḥ. The realisation of the identity of the individual soul with Brahman (so’ham or aham brahmāsmi) answers to the ‘I am nullity’ (śūnyataivāham) of the Mādhyamikas, though the emphasis is on the different aspects of the one fact.

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Every system of thought is determined not only by the positive content which it attempts to express, but also by the views which it wishes to oppose. The controversy with Maṇḍana Miśra shows that Śaṁkara was opposed to the exclusive supremacy of Vedic ritualism. He emphasised jñāna, or knowledge of the supreme spirit, as the chief end of man’s endeavour. He had the fear that a ceremonial cult led to mere pharisaism. As Jesus denounced the Pharisees and Paul protested against the law, Śaṁkara declared that ceremonial piety by itself was not the end of religion and was often its deadly enemy. He did not, however, dismiss the Vedic code as useless. While only true philosophers can get beyond the Vedic rule of life, others were called upon to conform to the Vedic regulations, not in the expectation of good things here or hereafter, but out of a sense of duty and as a help for the development of the moral competency for the study of the Vedānta. Vedic piety helps us by turning our minds towards the inner soul, and thus leads us to the realisation of the eternal goal of mankind.

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According to Śaṁkara, the contents and aims of the Pūrva and the Uttara Mīmāṁsās are independent. The former investigates the question of man’s duty and holds before our vision a future world dependent on our conduct here on earth. The highest happiness it presents is but transitory. The Vedānta, on the other hand, helps us to the realisation of the truth. Its goal is not happiness on earth or heaven (abhyudaya), but freedom from rebirth (niḥśreyasa). This cannot be had so long as we pin our faith to the future. The investigation of Brahman relates to a reality which has always existed and is not dependent on our actions.¹

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¹ Normally, however, inquiry into dharma prepares the mind for the inquiry into Brahman. Those who take straight away to Brahma knowledge must have performed the necessary duties in the previous life.

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As a rule, Śaṁkara attacks the philosophical views of the rival schools and not their religious tenets. Regarding the Bhāgavata system, Śaṁkara agrees that its religious conception is based on the authority of śruti and smṛti, but he objects to the view that the individual souls are born from God.² He admits the supremacy of a personal Īśvara, who is the cause of the freedom and the bondage of the individual. In the difficulty as to how the knowledge of Brahman arises in the mind of man, which cannot be due to logical investigations, which belong to the realm of avidyā, Śaṁkara brings in the will of God.³

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² The Bhāgavatas say that the Lord Vāsudeva divides himself into soul, mind and self-sense. Śaṁkara argues that if the soul is produced from the Lord, then it can be destroyed, and there can be no final release for it. The Bhāgavatas also hold that just as the soul is produced from the Lord, so also mind is produced from the soul and the self-sense from the mind. This, says Śaṁkara, is inconceivable, since it is not a matter of experience. The soul cannot produce out of itself its instruments any more than the farm labourer can produce from himself the spade he works with. If it is said that all the four have the same powers and status and are equally real, then they are all one. If each of these forms results from the preceding, in the order Lord, soul, mind, self-sense, then the effects suffer from the defect of impermanency. If all four are permanent, then there is no reason why the Lord should produce the soul and not the soul the Lord. If all the four are forms in which the one reality manifests itself, the Advaitin retorts that Brahman is present in forms too numerous to mention and not merely in four forms (S.B., ii. 2. 42-44).

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³ "For the individual soul, which is impotent, in the condition of ignorance, to distinguish the Ātman from the aggregate of the organs of activity (appearing as the body), and is blind through the darkness of avidyā, from the highest soul, the overseer of the work, the onlooker dwelling in all being, the Lord who is the cause of spirit, from him, by his permission, comes the saṁsāra, consisting in the states of doing and enjoying, and through his grace is caused knowledge and, through this, liberation." Again, although the truth of the identity of God and the soul is hidden,

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Śaṁkara, as we have seen, criticised the loose and hasty speculations of the Sāṁkhya thinkers, as well as the empirical tendencies of the Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika. He broke away from the common-sense method of the Naiyāyikas, and substituted for it a logical criticism quite as subtle and penetrating as that of the Buddhist thinkers.

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THE ĀTMAN

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Metaphysics is a consideration of what is implied in the fact of experience. Its problem is not one of observing and tabulating the facts of consciousness; it is concerned with what the existence of facts implies regarding the nature of reality. Śaṁkara does not question the facts of psychology any more than the facts of physical science, but raises the further question of the presupposition of these facts, and he approaches the problem from the subjective and the objective sides, which do not ultimately diverge. In the Introduction to his commentary on the Vedānta Sūtra, he asks whether there is anything in experience which may be regarded as foundational, and discusses the claims of all the factors of experience to such a title. Our senses may deceive us and our memory may be an illusion. The past and the future may be abstractions. The forms of the world may be pure fancy, and all our life may be a tragic illusion. Nothing prevents us from regarding the waking tracts of experience as analogous to dream-worlds, where also we visit places, handle shadows and do battle with ghosts, and remember, too, all our adventures in the fairy land. If dreams are facts, facts may well be dreams. Though all objects of knowledge may be matters of belief and so open to doubt, there seems to be still something in experience transcending it. If one finds within oneself something not made by one's

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"yet, when a creature thinks and strives towards the highest God, just as the faculty of sight in one who has become blind, after the darkness is shaken off by the power of remedies, in him in whom the grace of God perfects it, does it become manifest, but not naturally in any being whatsoever. Why? Because through him, through God as cause, the binding and the loosing of the soul are accomplished, binding when it does not recognise the essence of God, and loosing when it does" (D.S.V., pp. 86-87).

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environment but making it and moulding it, if in the very possibility of one’s knowledge and evaluation of the sense-world there is implied that which cannot be derived from the sense-world, then logic requires that one should affirm the reality of that transcendent presence within oneself. The note of scepticism finds its limit in regard to the self, of which we are immediately conscious. Everyone is conscious of the existence of his own self, and no one thinks “I am not.”¹ Like Descartes, Śaṃkara finds the basis of truth in the immediate self certainty which is untouched by any of the doubts cast on other things.² If the existence of self were not known, then everyone would think “I am not,” which, however, is not true. The self is prior to the stream of consciousness, prior to truth and falsehood, prior to reality and illusion, good and evil. “All means of knowledge (pramāṇas) exist only as dependent on self-experience, and since such experience is its own proof, there is no necessity for proving the existence of self.” “The very existence of understanding and its functions presupposes an intelligence known as the self, which is different from them, which is self-established, and which they subserve.”³ Each function and faculty, the gross body and the vital breath, the senses and the internal organ, the empirical “me,” appear only on the basis of and in relation to the Ātman. They all serve an end beyond themselves, and depend on some deeper ground of existence. Ātman cannot be doubted, “for it is the essential nature of him who denies it.”⁴

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¹ Sarvo hy ātmāstitvam pratyeti na nāham asmīti (S.B., i. 1. 1).

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² Cp. Descartes : Discourse on Method.

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³ Sureśvara’s Vārttika, pp. 189 and 542, 791-795. See also S.B., ii. 3. 7; i. 3. 22.

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⁴ Ya eva hi nirākartā tad eva tasya svarūpam (S.B., ii. 3. 7).

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Śaṃkara argues that it is impossible for us to know the self by means of thought, since thought itself is a part of the flux belonging to the region of the not-self. If we grasp it by inducing a sort of sleep on all our critical and interpretative powers, then we do fail to have knowledge of the type we desire. Yet we cannot think away the self, for there is no consciousness or experience possible apart from it. Though it escapes our knowledge, it does not entirely escape us. It is the object of the notion of self,¹ and is known to exist on account of its immediate presentation.² It cannot be proved, since it is the basis of all proof and is established prior to all proof.³ Logically it is a postulate. We have to take it for granted.⁴

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¹ Asmatpratyayaviṣaya. Cp. Kena., ii. Pratibodhaviditam.

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² Aparokṣatvāc ca pratyagātmā prasiddheḥ (S.B., i. 1. 1).

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³ Ātmā tu pramāṇādivyavahārāśrayatvāt prāg eva pramāṇādi vyavahārāt siddhyati (S.B., ii. 3. 7; S.B.G., xviii. 50).

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⁴ Śaṁkara says: "The eternal spirit different from the agent, which is the object of the presentation of I (ahaṁpratyayaviṣaya) dwelling as witness (sākṣin) in all being, uniform (sama), one, the highest is not apprehended by anyone from the Veda (vidhikāṇḍa) or any book based on reflection (tarka). He is the soul of all (sarvasyātmā) . . . and therefore none can deny him, for he is even the self of him who denies" (i. 1. 4).

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Śaṁkara tries to distinguish the true self from the object, and declares that subject and object are opposed like light and darkness, so that what is truly subject can never become an object. Metaphysically, the conception of self-existence involves the ideas of eternity, immutability and completeness. What is truly real is what has being in itself and for itself,⁵ so that to affirm the reality of Ātman or the permanent self is to affirm the reality of an eternal Brahman. Ātma ca Brahma.⁶ The proof of the reality of Brahman is that it is the ground of the self of everyone.⁷

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⁵ See Hegel: Æsthetics, E.T., chap. i.

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⁶ S.B., i. 1. 1.

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⁷ Sarvasyātmatvāc ca brahmāstitvaprasiddhiḥ.

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Though we know that the self is, we do not know what it is, whether finite or infinite, knowledge or bliss, one only or one among others like itself, a mere witness or an enjoyer, or neither. As there are conflicting opinions about the nature of the self, Śaṁkara says that it is both known and unknown. The "I" must be distinguished from the "not I," which includes not only the outer world, the body and its organs, but also the whole apparatus of understanding and the senses. In ordinary usage we regard mental states as subjective, and physical states as objective. But from the metaphysical point of view both orders of phenomena, material and mental, are equally objective.⁸ The materialists identify the self with the body or the senses. But consciousness and matter represent different kinds of reality, and one cannot be reduced to the other. Nor can we identify the self with the senses. For then there would be as many selves as there are senses, and this would make the recognition of personal identity a problem. Besides, if the different senses constitute the self, there should be the simultaneous enjoyment of sight, sound, taste, etc. According to the Yogācāra theory, the self is nothing more than a series of impermanent mental states.¹ But we cannot, on this theory, account for the facts of memory and recognition. The Śūnyavāda, which declares that there is no permanent self at all, comes into conflict with the first principle of Śaṃkara’s philosophy, that the existence of the self cannot be doubted. Even if we declare the whole world to be a mere void, this void presupposes a cogniser of itself.² Even in dreamless sleep there is the self, for when one rises from it one is aware that one had good sleep undisturbed by dreams. This he knows from memory. Since memory is only of presentations, the bliss of sleep and the consciousness of nothing must have been presented during the sleeping state. If it is said that the absence during sleep of disquiet and knowledge is only inferred from the memory of the state before sleep and the perception of the state after it, then it

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⁸ "As one is accustomed when it goes ill or well with his son or wife and the like to say, 'It goes ill or well with me,' and thus transfers the qualities of outer things to the self, in just the same way he transfers the qualities of the body when he says, 'I am fat, I am thin, I am white, I stand, I go, I leap,' and similarly the qualities of the sense-organs when he says,

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¹ Kṣaṇikavijñānadhārā.

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² Śūnyasyāpi svasākṣitvāt.

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‘I am dumb, impotent, deaf, one-eyed, blind,’ and similarly the qualities of the internal organ (antaḥkaraṇa), desire, wish, doubt, resolution, and the like. Thus also he transfers the subject presenting the ‘I’ (ahaṃpratyayin) to the inner self present solely as witness (sākṣin) of the personal tendencies, and, conversely, the witness of all, the inner self to the internal organ and the rest” (S.B., i. 1. 1). See D.S.V., p. 54, n. ; Ātmabodha, p. 18; S.S.S., xii. 49-62, 72-77. Cp. Descartes: “I am not the assemblage of members called the human body; I am not a thin and penetrating air diffused through all these members, or wind, or flame, or vapour, or breath, or any of all the things I can imagine, for I supposed that all these were not, and without changing the supposition I find that I still feel assured of my existence” (Meditations, p. ii). See also Chān. Up., viii. 7-12; Tait. Up., ii. 1. 7; Māṇḍūkya Up. Felt-masses and content-complexes do not explain but demand explanation. Kant made an effective contribution to logical theory when he asked us to shift our attention from the contents of consciousness to the consciousness which apperceives or is aware of the contents. But he was not fully aware of the implications of his theory that there could be only one universal consciousness. He knew that the distinction of objects into inanimate and animate, sentient and conscious, were distinctions in the world of contents. But he illegitimately inferred from the plurality of the content world the plurality of things in themselves.

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is replied that we cannot infer anything the like of which was not presented. If it is said that a negative concept cannot have any percept answering to it, and therefore the absence of knowledge and disquiet is only inferred, it is said in reply that absence of knowledge, etc., to be inferred must be conceivable, *i.e.* must have been directly perceived during their absence. So we have during dreamless sleep direct consciousness of the absence of knowledge and disquiet. In that state the empirical mind is inactive, and pure consciousness alone is present.¹ The self is not to be identified with the inner feeling which accompanies the continual changes of our mental attitudes or the empirical "me," consisting of a number of mental contents developing in time.² It is true that self-consciousness (ahaṁkāra) precedes activity, but it is not the self, since it is not antecedent to knowledge, as it is itself an object of knowledge.³ To equate the self with a flux of states, a presentation continuum, or a stream of consciousness, would be to confuse the principle of consciousness with portions of its contents. The felt-masses and conscious streams rise and fall, appear and vanish. If all these varying contents are to be connected, we require a universal consciousness which ever accompanies them. "When it is said, It is I who now know what at present exists, it is I who knew the past and what was before the past, it is I who shall know the future and what is after the future, it is implied in these words that, even when the object of knowledge alters, the knower does not alter, for he is in the past, present and the future, as his essence is eternally present."¹ We can know a temporal series of events as a series only if the facts are held together through something present alike to each of them and itself therefore out of time.² The self is not a creature of the natural world, for the simple reason that there would not be any natural world were not the principle of self presupposed. Śaṃkara holds that we get the notion of the Ātman if we divest it of all that surrounds it, discriminate it from the bodily frame with which it is encompassed, strip it of all contents of experience.³ To our logical minds it may appear that we have reduced it to a bare potentiality of thought, if not mere nothing, but it is better to regard it this way than as a whole of parts or a thing with qualities or a substance with attributes. It is undifferenced consciousness alone (nirviśeṣacinmātram) which is unaffected even when the body is reduced to ashes and the mind perishes.⁴

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¹ The inner organ is inactive and the pure consciousness is only in relation to avidyā. Any activity in suṣupti is traced to avidyā by the author of Vivaraṇa, while Sureśvara contends that there is no activity at all in suṣupti.

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² M. Bergson has made us familiar with the conception of a growing self which goes on gathering its past experience through memory and pressing forward to its future ends (*Creative Evolution*, p. 210). If the basis of personality is only the consciousness of the past, as some Buddhists believe, then there can never be the same self at two different moments of time. While the connecting-link of memory may give some force and significance to the notion of selfhood, the sense of timelessness inherent in the consciousness of self remains unexplained. Bergson is aware of the unsatisfactory nature of an endlessly growing self, and so tells us that the true self is to be defined by a reference to pure duration which is unconscious of a forward movement or a past history. It is the undivided present where all the temporal categories are absent. Bergson thus tries to satisfy the instinct for eternity by making short work of time and developing a theory of duration or non-temporal growth. But the self that endures does so in dependence on external factors. It is not self-dependent. When Bergson admits the reality of memory, whole and complete, even in deep dreamless sleep, he comes very near Śaṁkara. He admits that the spiritual in memory persists even when every form is extinguished in the universal flux of things. While it serves as a binding link of the successive experiences, it can exist even when all experiences vanish.

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³ Ahaṁkārapūrvakam api kartṛtvaṁ nopalabdhir bhavitum arhati, ahaṁkārasyāpy upalabhyamānatvāt (S.B., ii. 3. 40).

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¹ Sarvadā vartamānasvabhāvatvāt (S.B., ii. 3. 7, and S.B.G., ii. 18). See Advaitamakaranda, pp. 11 and 13.

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² Śaṃkara would endorse Lotze's argument that the simplest comparison of two ideas and the recognition of them as like or unlike presupposes "the indivisible unity of that which compares them," an Ātman external to the content with which it deals (Metaphysics, p. 241).

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³ Understanding, senses, etc., are unconscious and objects of a subject. Cp. Bhāmatī: "Citsvabhāvātmā viṣayī, jaḍasvabhāva buddhīndriyadehaviṣayā viṣayaḥ."

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⁴ S.S.S.S., xii. 8. Cp. Augustine: "Step by step was I led upwards from bodies to the soul which perceives by means of the bodily senses; and thence to the soul's inward faculty, to which the bodily senses report external things, which is the limit of the intelligence of animals; and thence again to the reasoning faculty, to whose judgment is referred the knowledge received by the bodily senses. And when this power also within me found itself changeable, it lifted itself up to its own intelligence and withdrew its thoughts from experience, abstracting itself from the contradictory throng of sense-images, that it might find what that light was wherein it was bathed, when it cried out that beyond all doubt the unchangeable is

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The crux of all philosophy is this, that the sense-organs and the neural processes of the body, which is in space and time, seem to produce consciousness. Surely the non-conscious cannot be the cause of the conscious. If anything, the conscious must be the cause of the non-conscious. The senses, the mind and the understanding are not self-sufficient. "The activity of these organs demands in addition upalabdhi, which belongs to the Ātman . . . whose very nature is eternal knowledge."¹ But this consciousness, which is the cause of the non-conscious, is not the finite consciousness but the ultimate one, for ever so many objects and events that do not exist in this or that finite consciousness still exist in reality. So we must assume an ultimate consciousness of which the finite is only a fragment. The fundamental consciousness, which is the basis of all reality, is not to be confused with the human consciousness, which appears rather late in the cosmic evolution. Presentations are subject to origin and decay, and are not self-luminous, and they are known only through the light of Ātman,² whose essential nature is self-luminosity.³ It is pure consciousness (caitanyam) or mere awareness, "the supreme principle in which there is no differentiation of knower, knowledge and known, infinite, transcendent, the essence of absolute knowledge."⁴ It is of

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¹ Nityopalabdhi svarūpatvāt (S.B., ii. 3. 40). Cp. Citsukhī, i. 7. Cid rūpatvād akarmatvāt svayaṁjyotir ity śruteḥ Ātmanaḥ svaprakāśatvaṁ ko nivārayituṁ kṣamaḥ.

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² S.B., ii. 2. 28. Cp. with this Aristotle's Nous, which helps understanding, etc., which are potentially intelligent, to realise their potencies.

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³ Svayaṁjyotis svarūpatvāt (S.B., i. 3. 22). See also S.B. on Praśna Up., vi. 3.

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⁴ Vivecacūḍāmaṇi, p. 239.

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to be preferred to the changeable; whence also it knew that Unchangeable; and thus with the flash of one trembling glance it arrived at That which is" (Confessions, vii. 23).

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The Naiyāyika objects to this theory on the following grounds: Nobody has experienced pure consciousness, since our empirical consciousness is always conditioned by the mind and the senses. To say that it is known by intuitive consciousness (aparokṣajñāna) is self-contradictory. If it is argued that the self as self-luminous is known immediately, it may be said that a shining lamp is manifested to a blind man though unperceived by him. If the lamp manifests itself only to one who apprehends it, then even the self is known only when it is apprehended, i.e. when it becomes an object of consciousness, and then it ceases to be pure and undefiled. Kumārila asks, if the self as being of the nature of consciousness is selfthe nature of non-objective consciousness.¹ “The Ātman is throughout nothing but intelligence; intelligence is its exclusive nature, as the salt taste is of the lump of salt.”² Spirit cannot have an unspiritual nature. By the law of its being, it is ever shining. As the sun shines when there is nothing for it to shine on, so the Ātman has consciousness even when there is no object.³ It is pure light, clear radiance, not merely the foundation of all our knowledge, but the light of all our seeing.

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¹ Nirviṣayajñānamayam. Cp. Śaṃkara’s *Hymn to Hari*, p. 4.

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² S.B., iii. 2. 16. See also S.B., i. 3. 19, 22.

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³ S.B., ii. 3. 18.

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Śaṃkara sets aside the view of Nyāya and the Viśiṣṭādvaita that the self is an intelligent substance and the relation of self to consciousness is one of substance and attribute (dharmi and dharma).⁴ The relation between intelligence and self must be one of identity or difference, or identity and difference. If intelligence be different in nature from the self, then there can be no relation of substance and attribute between them.⁵ Besides, in the case of different objects, the relation may be either external conjunction (saṃyoga) or internal relation (samavāya). The former holds between two corporeal things, but self and intelligence are not corporeal. If there be the internal relation of samavāya between self and intelligence, then this relation must itself be related to the self, and the second relation must also be related to the self, and so on *ad infinitum*. So if self and intelligence are different from each other, it is impossible to conceive of the relation of substance and attribute between them. If the two are identical, then there is no meaning in saying that the one is an attribute of the other. It would be contradictory to hold that one thing is both identical with and different from another. So the self must be regarded as identical with intelligence.⁶

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⁴ Ciddharma ātmā na tu citsvabhāvaḥ. Cp. Jñānabhinno nityātmā ity siddham (Viśvanātha’s *Muktāvalī*, p. 49).

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⁵ Ātmaghaṭādivad dharmadharmitvānupapatteḥ.

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⁶ See *Hastāmalaka*. See Haldane: *Reign of Relativity*, p. 196.

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The caitanya or Ātman is not to be confused with logical apprehension, where it ceases to be the ultimate real that luminous, are pleasure and pain to be regarded as self-luminous? On this view we cannot account for its suspension in sleep. If it is said that the self alone is manifested in dreamless sleep, but not the body or the senses or the objects, which are all manifested in waking life, Kumārila denies it on the ground that we have a consciousness that we apprehended nothing during deep sleep when we awake from it. He contends that the self is an object of internal perception (mānasapratyakṣagamyam). See also *Śāstradīpikā*, pp. 487-490.

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can be rendered in its own terms, but becomes an effect of, the interaction of subject and object. If knowledge is conceived as at a level where it is creative of its object, there is yet implicit in it a distinction between subject and object, and this limitation is not the less a limitation simply because knowledge itself has produced it. True existence and intelligence go together. Ātman cannot be existence without intelligence or intelligence without existence.¹ It is also of the nature of bliss (ānanda).² Ānanda is freedom from all suffering.³ Ātman has nothing to cast off and nothing to acquire, nothing dark or disorderly. Śaṁkara denies activity to Ātman, since activity by its nature is non-eternal.⁴ "The self cannot be the abode of any action, since an action cannot exist without modifying that in which it abides."⁵ All activity presupposes the self-sense, and, so far as we are aware, it is of the form of pain⁶ and motived by desire.⁷ Activity and enjoyment are dependent on a dualistic vision, which is not the highest truth.⁸ There can be no agency without the limitation of the Ātman by a body, etc., and every limitation is unreal.⁹ The Ātman by itself has no agency.¹⁰ Śaṁkara attributes to the Ātman truth, dependence on its own greatness, omnipresence, and the character of being the self of all.¹¹ He regards the Ātman as one, universal and infinite, for the same reason for which Hegel calls his idea infinite. It is at no point limited by its antitheses or opposites, by something else which it is not but which yet sets bounds to it. It is always in his own sphere. Consciousness has no limit, since the consciousness of limits shows that the consciousness is greater than the limit. If there were a limit to it, then consciousness as limited by other things cannot be conscious of limits. Consciousness and limit are opposed in nature. Limit is the nature of a thing and consciousness is no thing.

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¹ Sattā eva bodha bodha eva ca sattā.

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² Tait. Up., ii. Ātman is (asti), shines (bhāti), and pleases (priṇāti).

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³ Cp. Bṛh. Up., iii. 5.

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⁴ Adhruva.

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⁵ S.B., i. I. 4.

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⁶ Kartṛtvasya duḥkharūpatvāt (S.B., ii. 3. 48).

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⁷ Karmahetuḥ kāmaḥ syāt, pravartakatvāt (Śaṁkara's Introduction to the Tait. Up).

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⁸ Avidyāpratyupasthāpitatvāt kartṛbhoktṛtvayoḥ. Cp. also Bṛh. Up., iv. 5. 15.

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⁹ Cp. Sureśvara: "The existence of the Ātman in its natural state (svarūpa) is spoken of by the wise as liberation (niḥśreyasa), and the contact of the Ātman with any other condition is the result of ajñāna" (Vārttika, p. 109).

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¹⁰ Svataḥ anadhikāriṇaḥ. See Sureśvara's Vārttikas, pp. 110-113.

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¹¹ Satyatvam, svamahimapratiṣṭhitatvam, sarvagatatvam, sarvātmakatvam (S.B., i. 3. 9).

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It is urged against Descartes that he tried to abstract the self totally from the not-self and established the reality of the former independently in its own right. We must be clear that Śaṁkara’s self is not the individual knowing subject. If Śaṁkara tried to establish the reality of the individual knowing subject in abstraction from or as opposed to the not-self, he would get a plurality of finite contentless selves or an abstract universal self. The Ātman of Śaṁkara is neither the individual self nor a collection of such selves. These latter are dependent on the universal self. Śaṁkara says that it is “ not a thing in the empirical sense which we may indicate by words; nor is it an object like a cow which can be known by the ordinary means of knowledge. It cannot even be described by its generic properties or specific marks; we cannot say that it acts in this or that manner, since it is always known to be actionless. It cannot, therefore, be positively described.” Śaṁkara’s self is different from the transcendental ego of Kant, which is purely a form which attaches to all objects of experience. Though it is said to transcend empirical consciousness, it is still individualised, since it becomes the practical will. Kant’s account of its difference from the empirical ego, which is a product of conditions, applies to Śaṁkara’s Ātman. Only Śaṁkara would say that the ever-present light of consciousness is something perfect and not in process of growth.¹ The practical will of Kant is the empirical self, for which there is always the indefinable sense of the beyond. Fichte’s absolute ego is not different in essence from the empirical self, since the activity by which it becomes actually what it is potentially is determined by the non-ego. It is because Śaṁkara finds the essence of personality in its distinction from other existences that he contends that the Ātman which has no other existences independent of it is not a person. It is true, however, that the empirical self is the only reality from the logical point of view and the pure self but a shadow. But when we rise to intuition, where the subject and the object coincide, we realise the truth of the ultimate consciousness.¹ It is the absolute vision that is its own visibility. It is the essence of everyone who, having thought "I am who I am," thus knows himself. It is the absolutely real which no experience will ever alter. It has no dimensions. We cannot think of it as extended or capable of division. It is always and everywhere the same. There is in it no plurality. It is as much in one as in another. It is incapable of particularisation. We live because we share the universal life; we think because we share the universal thought. Our experience is possible because of the universal Ātman in us.²

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¹ Cp. Gentile’s theory of the pure subject which cannot be made an object (Theory of Mind as Pure Act, pp. 6-7).

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¹ Cp. Caird: "If knowledge is the relation of an object to a conscious subject, it is the more complete the more intimate the relation, and it becomes perfect when the duality becomes transparent, when subject and object are identified, and when the duality is seen to be simply the necessary expression of the unity—in short, when consciousness passes into self-consciousness" (*Critical Philosophy of Kant*, p. 46).

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² S.B. on Māṇḍūkya Up., ii. 7. Cp. Eckhart: "There is something in the soul which is above the soul, divine, simple, an absolute nothing; rather unnamed than named; unknown than known. . . . It is higher than knowledge, higher than love, higher than grace, for in all these there is still distinction. This light is satisfied only with the supra-essential essence. It is bent on entering into the simple ground, the still waste wherein is no distinction, neither Father nor Son nor Holy Ghost; into the unity where no man dwelleth. Then is it satisfied in the light, then it is one; then it is one in itself—as this ground is a simple stillness, in itself immovable, and yet by this immovability are all things moved" (quoted in Hunt's Essay on Pantheism, p. 180).

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THE MECHANISM OF KNOWLEDGE

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Scepticism about the preconceptions of common sense and the first principles of thought is what Śaṁkara inherited from the Buddhist thinkers. It became clear to him that no attempt at philosophical construction can take for granted a system of first principles. So he undertook a critical analysis of knowledge and man's cognitive mechanism. Deep within us our self lives a life of which it does not speak. The ultimate reality is the non-dual spirit. But all determinate knowledge presupposes the modification of the ultimate consciousness into (1) a subject who knows (pramātṛcaitanya), the cognising consciousness which is determined by the internal organ; (2) the process of knowledge (pramāṇacaitanya), the cognitive consciousness determined by the vṛtti, or the modification of the internal organ; and (3) the object known (viṣayacaitanya), the consciousness determined by the object cognised. The ultimate consciousness is one only (ekam eva), pervading all things (sarvavyāpi), enlightening all, the internal organ, its modification and the object.¹ The arguments for the existence of antaḥkaraṇa (internal organ),² besides the senses, are already familiar to us.³ The internal organ is so called because it is the seat of the functions of the sense as distinct from their outer organs. It receives and arranges what is conveyed to it through the senses. It is not itself regarded as a sense, since, if it were a sense, it could not have a direct perception of itself or its modifications. It is said to consist of parts and to be of medium size, neither atomic nor infinite in magnitude. It has transparency, by which it reflects objects, even as the mirror has the lustre to reflect our faces. The power to reflect objects, i.e. to become conscious of them, is not innate in the internal organ, but is acquired by it from its relation to the Ātman. Though the internal organ is said to shed its lustre on the objects and reflect them, it is still the Ātman that reflects in it.⁴ Ātman is the illuminator, and by means of it the internal organ perceives.⁵ The internal organ undergoes changes or modifications of form. The modification which reveals objects (viṣaya) is called the vṛtti.¹ The vṛttis or modes of the internal organ are of four different kinds : indetermination (saṁśaya) ; determination (niścaya) ; self-consciousness (garva) ; and remembrance (smaraṇa). The one internal organ (antaḥkaraṇa) is called mind (manas) when it has the mode of indetermination ; buddhi, or understanding, when it has the mode of determination ; self-sense (ahaṁkāra) when it has the mode of self-consciousness ; and attention (citta) when it has the mode of concentration and remembrance.² The cause of cognition is not the ultimate consciousness alone, but this consciousness as qualified by the internal organ. This internal organ differs with each individual, and so the cognition by one man does not mean cognition by all. As the internal organ is a limited entity, it cannot apply itself to all things in the world. It functions within varying limits, which are defined by the past conduct of the individual to whom it belongs.³

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