Indian Philosophy v2.c26.s17.12

Language: English

v2.c26.s17.12.1

To say that Brahman is reality is to say that it is different from the phenomenal, the spatial, the temporal and the sensible.⁶ Brahman is what is assumed as foundational, though it is in no sense substance.¹ It is not in any point of space, though it may be said to be everywhere, since all things imply and depend on it. Since it is not a thing, it cannot have spatial relations to anything else, and is therefore nowhere. It is not a cause, for that would be to introduce time relations.² Its nature is inexpressible, for when we say anything of it we make it into a particular thing. We may speak about it, though we cannot describe it adequately or have any logical knowledge of it.³ If the finite man can comprehend Brahman, then either our understanding must be infinite or Brahman finite. “Every word employed to denote a thing denotes that thing as associated with a certain genus, or act, or quality, or mode of relation.”⁴ Brahman has no genus, possesses no qualities, does not act, and is related to nothing else. It is devoid of anything of a like kind or of a different kind, and has no internal variety.⁵ A tree, for example, has the internal variety of leaves, flowers and fruits, has the relation of likeness to other trees and of unlikeness to objects of a different kind like stones.⁶ Brahman has nothing similar to it, nothing different from it, and no internal differentiation, since all these are empirical distinctions.

v2.c26.s17.12.2

As it is opposed to all empirical existence, it is given to us as the negative of everything that is positively known. Śaṁkara declines to characterise it even as one, but calls it non-dual, advaitam. It is the “wholly other,” but not non-being.⁷ Though the words used are negative, what is meant is intensely positive. A negation is only an affirmation of absence. It is non-being, since it is not the being which we attribute to the world of experience. It does not follow that it is pure nothing, since the negative has its meaning only in relation to the positive. The Upaniṣads as well as Śaṃkara,¹ deny of Brahman both being and non-being of the type with which we are familiar in the world of experience. We can at best say what Brahman is not, and not what it is. It transcends the opposition of permanence and change, whole and part, relative and absolute, finite and infinite, which are all based on the oppositions of experience. The finite is always passing beyond itself, but there is nothing which the infinite can pass into. If it did so, it would no longer be the infinite. If we call it infinite, it is not to be equated with a mere negation of the finite. We cannot understand the nature of Brahman until we let go the formal and the finite. Since personality cannot be realised except under the limiting condition of a non-ego, the absolute is not a person.

v2.c26.s17.12.3

If we use the term personality in a different sense, in which it does not demand any dependence on another, then it is an illegitimate use. When the Absolute is said to be nirguṇa, this only means that it is trans-empirical, since guṇas are products of prakṛti and the Absolute is superior to it. The guṇas qualify the objective as such, and God is not an object. The objects come and go, but the real persists as the permanent in the midst of all changes. So it transcends the guṇas or phenomenal being. The Absolute is not on that account to be regarded as a mere blank. So the Upaniṣad says “nirguṇo guṇī.” Brahman is of the nature of ultimate consciousness and yet knows nothing, since empirical cognition is a modification of the internal organ.² Knowledge, again, is its essence and not its property.³ It is not eternal in the sense of persisting changelessly through time like the motionless being of Parmenides, the "mindless, unmoving fixture," which Plato derides in the *Sophist*,¹ but in the sense of absolute timelessness and incorruptibility. It is eternal because its completeness and perfection are unrelated to time.² The sequence which binds things and events in the time order has no meaning for it. It is eternal perdurance, to which all time relations are irrelevant. It can only be negatively described as the other of its own otherness. It is sat (real), meaning that it is not asat (unreal).

v2.c26.s17.12.4

It is cit (consciousness), meaning that it is not acit (unconsciousness).³ It is ānanda (bliss), meaning that it is not of the nature of pain (duḥkhasvarūpa). It is real, having authentic being. It never fails to be, since it depends on nothing to preserve it in being. It does not take in anything from outside itself, for then being would include non-being. There is no first or last in it. It does not unfold, express, develop, manifest, grow and change, for it is self-identical throughout. It cannot be regarded as a whole including parts, for it is uniform in nature (ekarasa).⁴ It is real and yet devoid of the nature of the world.⁵ Such a being cannot of course be physical and quantitative and fragmentary. The everlasting being devoid of any deficiency is of the nature of consciousness, cit. Such a fulness of authentic being and ideality perforce is free delight, ananda.⁶ All human bliss is a phase of the bliss of Brahman.⁷ It is highest truth, perfect being and fullest freedom.