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
We read in the Chândogya. (III, 13, 7), 'Now that light which shines
above this heaven, higher than everything, in the highest worlds beyond
which there are no other worlds, that is the same light which is within
man.'--Here a doubt arises, viz. whether the brightly shining thing here
called 'light' is the well-known light of the sun and so on, viewed as a
causal universal principle (Brahman); or the all-knowing, &c., highest
Person of infinite splendour, who is different in nature from all
sentient and non-sentient beings, and is the highest cause.--The
Pûrvapakshin maintains that the reference is to ordinary light. For, he
says, the passage does not mention a particular characteristic attribute
which can belong to the highest Self only--while such attributes _were_
met with in the texts referring to Ether and Breath--, and as thus there
is no opening for a recognition of the highest Self, and as at the same
time the text identifies 'light' with the intestinal heat of living
beings, we conclude that the text represents the well-known ordinary
light as Brahman, the cause of the world--which is possible as causal
agency is connected with extreme light and heat.--This primâ facie view
the Sûtra sets aside. The light which the text states to be connected
with heaven and possessing supreme splendour can be the highest Person
only, since a preceding passage in the same section--' All the beings
are one foot of it, three feet are the Immortal in heaven'--refers to
all beings as being a foot of that same being which is connected with
heaven. Although the passage, 'That light which shines above,' &c., does
not mention a special attribute of the highest Person, yet the passage
previously quoted refers to the highest Person as connected with heaven,
and we therefore recognise that Person as the light connected with
heaven, mentioned in the subsequent passage.
Nor does the identification, made in a clause of the text, of light with
the intestinal heat give rise to any difficulty; for that clause is
meant to enjoin meditation on the highest Brahman in the form of
intestinal heat, such meditation having a special result of its own.
Moreover, the Lord himself declares that he constitutes the Self of the
intestinal fire, 'Becoming the Vaisvânara-fire I abide in the body of
living creatures' (Bha. Gî. XV, 14).
26. If it be objected that (Brahman is) not (denoted) on account of the
metre being denoted; (we reply) not so, because thus the direction of
the mind (on Brahman) is declared; for thus it is seen.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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