A Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy c4.s3.5.3

c4.s3.5.3

The philosophy of Pippalāda emerges in the answers that he gives to these seers. Pippalāda is a great psycho-metaphysician of antiquity, advocating the doctrine of Rayi and Prāṇa, which is equivalent to the Aristotelian doctrine of Matter and Form, as well as the doctrines of the supremacy of the vital breath above the senses and the primary emergence of the vital breath from the Ātman. He regards the state of dream as one in which the mind of man has free play, bodying forth the forms of things inexperienced as well as experienced, and the state of deep sleep as one in which the light of the man is overpowered by the light of the Self. Pippalāda also teaches that by meditation on Om till the time of death, one goes to the celestial regions where one learns from Hiraṇyagarbha to see the all-pervading Person, while in regard to the doctrine of the Person with Sixteen Parts, he prepares the way for the later Sāṃkhya and Vedāntic doctrine of the Liṅga-śarīra. Bhujyu and Uddālaka, who are mentioned in the Bṛhadāraṇyaka are both of them interested in psychical research. The curious personality of Vāmadeva which appears for the first time in Ṛgveda IV. 26, 27, is introduced again in the Bṛhadāraṇyaka I. 4. 10, where he declares himself as having been Manu and the Sun in a previous birth, as well as in the Aitareya II. 4, where the philosophy of "Three Births" is declared to have been in consonance with his teaching.