A Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy c6.s3.t2.58

c6.s3.t2.58

36. It is not difficult to understand that these so-called paths are merely imaginary ways in which the primeval mind tried to express itself in regard to the eschatological idea; but they were not so understood for a great length of time, and dogmatic systematisers tried to justify them in one way or another, the most reasonable of these justifications being that the Sun and the Moon and the Smoke and the Night were regarded as presiding deities, and therefore the soul was understood as being given over in the charge of these deities who sent him whither he deserved. It is not difficult to see that the two paths which are spoken of in the above passage are merely mythological explanations of an insoluble problem. The great Rāmadāsa, the patron saint of the Deccan, said in his Dāsabodha that one does not need to believe in the two paths.¹ What becomes of the soul after death it is not given to man to understand; and if any credit is to be given to the author of the Upanishadic passage, it is not for having solved the problem but for having attempted the solution. Philosophically speaking, we are not much concerned with the actual stages of the ascent or descent of the soul, but only with the idea of ascent and descent. And looking at the problem in this way, one is filled with a great deal of surprise and admiration when one sees that the ideas of ascent or descent were placed on no less than a moral founda-