A Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy c7.5.3

c7.5.3

e), we have here enunciated for us the root-principle of the metaphysics and the epistemology of the Vijñānavādins, when we remember that there is only an easy passage from the word “prajñāna” which is actually used in the quotation, to the word “vijñāna,” which the Vijñānavādins use. Finally, when in the conversation between Jaratkārava and Yājñavalkya in the Bṛihadāraṇyaka, Jaratkārava pressed Yājñavalkya to the deepest issue, Yājñavalkya said that it behoved them to retire to a private place and discuss the merits of the question he had asked only in private, and we are told that what passed between Jaratkārava and Yājñavalkya was only a conversation about the nature of Karman, and that they together came to the conclusion that a man becomes holy by holy actions and sinful by sinful actions (S. 1. f)—a thought which was probably later reiterated in the Kaṭhopanishad where we are told that the souls take on a new body in inorganic or live matter according to their works and wisdom (S. 1. g)—a passage where we have once for all laid down for us the principle of Karman which became the inspiration of Buddhistic as well as other systems of philosophy in India, but which appears with a peculiar moral force in Buddhistic as in no other system of philosophy.