The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja: Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48
Religion
The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja: Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48
Vedanta
The whole matter may be summarily stated as follows. Some texts declare
a distinction of nature between non-intelligent matter, intelligent
beings, and Brahman, in so far as matter is the object of enjoyment, the
souls the enjoying subjects, and Brahman the ruling principle. 'From
that the Lord of Mâyâ creates all this; in that the other one is bound
up through that Mâyâ' (Svet. Up. IV, 9); 'Know Prakriti to be Mâyâ, and
the great Lord the ruler of Mâyâ' (10); 'What is perishable is the
Pradhâna, the immortal and imperishable is Hara: the one God rules the
Perishable and the Self' (Svet Up. I, 10)--In this last passage the
clause 'the immortal and imperishable is Hara,' refers to the enjoying
individual soul, which is called 'Hara,' because it draws (harati)
towards itself the pradhâna as the object of its enjoyment.--' He is the
cause, the lord of the lords of the organs, and there is of him neither
parent nor lord' (Svet. Up. VI, 9); 'The master of the pradhâna and of
the individual souls' (Svet. Up. VI, 16); 'The ruler of all, the lord of
the Selfs, the eternal, blessed, undecaying one' (Mahânâr. Up. XI, 3);
'There are two unborn ones, one knowing, the other not knowing, one a
ruler, the other not a ruler' (Svet. Up. 1, 9); 'The eternal among the
non-eternal, the intelligent one among the intelligent, who though one
fulfils the desires of many' (Svet. Up. VI, 13); 'Knowing the enjoyer,
the object of enjoyment and the Mover' (Svet. Up. I, 12); 'One of them
eats the sweet fruit, the other looks on without eating' (Svet. Up. IV,
6); 'Thinking that the Self is different from the Mover, blessed by him
he reaches Immortality' (Svet. Up. I, 6); 'There is one unborn female
being, red, white, and black, uniform but producing manifold offspring.
There is one unborn male being who loves her and lies by her; there is
another who leaves her after he has enjoyed her' (Svet. Up. IV, 5). 'On
the same tree man, immersed, bewildered, grieves on account of his
impotence; but when he sees the other Lord contented and knows his glory,
then his grief passes away' (Svet. Up. IV, 9).--Smriti expresses itself
similarly.--'Thus eightfold is my nature divided. Lower is this Nature;
other than this and higher know that Nature of mine which constitutes
the individual soul, by which this world is supported' (Bha. Gì. VII, 4,
5). 'All beings at the end of a Kalpa return into my Nature, and again
at the beginning of a Kalpa do I send them forth. Resting on my own
Nature again and again do I send forth this entire body of beings, which
has no power of its own, being subject to the power of nature' (Bha. Gî.
IX, 7, 8); 'With me as supervisor Nature brings forth the movable and
the immovable, and for this reason the world ever moves round' (Bha. Gî.
IX, 10); 'Know thou both Nature and the Soul to be without beginning'
(XIII, 19); 'The great Brahman is my womb, in which I place the embryo,
and thence there is the origin of all beings' (XIV, 3). This last
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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