A Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy c8.s4.9

c8.s4.9

18. We may arrange the different stages of spiritual experience, as developed in the Upanishads, philosophically interpreted, in a series of five developing propositions. We may regard them as constituting the ladder of spiritual experience with a series of five ascending steps. The first stage of spiritual experience would consist, according to Bṛihadāraṇyaka Upanishad, in realising the Self, in mystically apprehending the glory of the Self within us, as though we were distinct from him (S. 14. a). Now comes the second stage. Another passage from the Bṛihadāraṇyaka Upanishad tells us that the Being, which calls itself the "I" within us, must be identified with the Self that is hitherto realised. We must experience that we are really the very Self, and that we are neither the bodily, or the sensuous, or the intellectual, or the emotional vestures; that we are in our essential nature entirely identical with the pure Self. This is the second stage (S.14.b). In the third stage of spiritual experience, we must come to realise, according to Bṛihadāraṇyaka Upanishad, that the Self that we have realised is identical with the Absolute. This same identification of the Ātman and the Brahman, of the Individual Spirit and the Universal Spirit, of the Self and the Absolute, is also proclaimed by the epistolary stanza of the Īśa and its cognate Upanishads, where we are told that the Ātman must be regarded as verily the Brahman, that the Ātman is infinite in its nature as also the Brahman, that the Ātman derives its being from Brahman, that subtracting the infinity of the Ātman from the infinity of the Brahman, the residuum is even infinite. Thus does that epistolary stanza pile infinities over infinities, and, taking the mathematical lead, speak as if when the infinity of the Ātman is deducted from the infinity of the Brahman, the remainder itself is infinite. The inner meaning of this assertion is that we should see that there is no difference between the Self and the Absolute. This constitutes the third stage (S.14.c). Now comes the fourth. If the Being that calls itself the "I" within us is the Ātman according to our second proposition, and if it is to be entirely identified with the Brahman according to our third proposition; that is, in other words, if I am the Self, and the Self is the Absolute; then, it follows syllogistically that I am the Absolute. This is unmistakably inculcated by a passage of Bṛihadāraṇyaka Upanishad, where we are told that we must identify the " I " with the Absolute. Another aspect of the same doctrine is proclaimed in the Chhāndogya Upanishad, where the " Thou " comes also to be " projectively " identified with the Absolute. This constitutes the fourth stage (S. 14. d. ). If now the " I " is the Absolute, and if also the " Thou " is equally the Absolute, if, in other words, both the subject and object are the Absolute, then it follows that everything that we see in this world, Mind and Nature, the Self and the not-Self, equally constitute the Absolute. Whatever falls within the ken of apprehension, equally with whatever we are, goes to make up the fulness of the Absolute. The Brahman according to the Chhāndogya Upanishad is verily the " ALL " (S. 14. e ). To such a giddy height does the philosophic ladder take us on the rising steps of philosophic thought. This is verily the position of Absolute Monism. Whether this state of Absolute Monism is to be merely intellectually apprehended, or mystically realised, depends upon whether we are by nature destined to be merely torch-bearers or mystics in the spiritual pilgrimage. That we should prefer the second alternative will be evident in our last Chapter on the " Intimations of Self-Realisation."