Indian Philosophy v2.c27.s2.1

v2.c27.s2.1

The supreme reality is called Śiva, and is regarded as beginningless, uncaused, free from defects, the all-doer and the all-knower, who frees the individual soul from the bonds which fetter them. The formula of saccidānanda is interpreted as implying the eight attributes of self-existence: essential purity, intuitive wisdom, infinite intelligence, freedom from all bonds, infinite grace or love, omnipotence, and infinite bliss. Some proofs of the existence of God are mentioned. The world is undergoing change. Its material cause, prakṛti, is unconscious like clay, and cannot organise itself into the world. The development is not due to the elements, which are devoid of intelligence. Karma is equally unavailing. Kāla, or time, is, according to Meykaṇḍar, changeless, though it appears to the observer as changing.² It is a condition of all action, but is not by itself an active agent. But if God is directly the cause, his independence and perfection may perhaps be compromised. It is therefore said that God operates through his śakti as his instrumental cause. The principle of karma works in accordance with the spiritual ends of man. It does not frame the ends or make distinctions between good and evil. These are laid down by an infinite spirit, who also, with the aid of his śakti, sees to it that the souls get their proper rewards. As the jar has the potter for its first cause, the staff and the wheel for its instrumental cause, and clay for its material cause, even so the world has Śiva for its first cause, śakti for its instrumental cause, and māyā for its material cause. As sound fills all the notes of a tune, or flavour pervades the fruit, so God, by his śakti, pervades the whole world so fully that he does not appear to be different from it. God is the soul of which the universe of nature and man is the body. He is not identical with them, though he dwells in them and they in him. Non-dualism does not mean oneness (ekatva), but inseparability.