The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya: Sacred Books of the East, Volume 1
Religion
The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya: Sacred Books of the East, Volume 1
Vedanta
In the conspectus I have given it as my opinion that the Sutras in which
the size of the individual soul is discussed can hardly be understood in
/S/a@nkara's sense, and rather seem to favour the opinion, held among
others by Ramanuja, that the soul is of minute size. We have further
seen that Sutra 18 of the third pada of the second adhyaya, which
describes the soul as 'j/n/a,' is more appropriately understood in the
sense assigned to it by Ramanuja; and, again, that the Sutras which
treat of the soul being an agent, can be reconciled with /S/a@nkara's
views only if supplemented in a way which their text does not appear to
authorise.--We next have the important Sutra II, 3, 43 in which the soul
is distinctly said to be a part (a/ms/a) of Brahman, and which, as we
have already noticed, can be made to fall in with /S/a@nkara's views
only if a/ms/a is explained, altogether arbitrarily, by 'a/ms/a iva,'
while Ramanuja is able to take the Sutra as it stands.--We also have
already referred to Sutra 50, 'abhasa eva /k/a,' which /S/a@nkara
interprets as setting forth the so-called pratibimbavada according to
which the individual Self is merely a reflection of the highest Self.
But almost every Sutra--and Sutra 50 forms no exception--being so
obscurely expressed, that viewed by itself it admits of various, often
totally opposed, interpretations, the only safe method is to keep in
view, in the case of each ambiguous aphorism, the general drift and
spirit of the whole work, and that, as we have seen hitherto, is by no
means favourable to the pratibimba doctrine. How indeed could Sutra 50,
if setting forth that latter doctrine, be reconciled with Sutra 43,
which says distinctly that the soul is a part of Brahman? For that 43
contains, as /S/a@nkara and his commentators aver, a statement of the
ava/kkh/edavada, can itself be accepted only if we interpret a/ms/a by
a/ms/a iva, and to do so there is really no valid reason whatever. I
confess that Ramanuja's interpretation of the Sutra (which however is
accepted by several other commentators also) does not appear to me
particularly convincing; and the Sutras unfortunately offer us no other
passages on the ground of which we might settle the meaning to be
ascribed to the term abhasa, which may mean 'reflection,' but may mean
hetvabhasa, i.e. fallacious argument, as well. But as things stand, this
one Sutra cannot, at any rate, be appealed to as proving that the
pratibimbavada which, in its turn, presupposes the mayavada, is the
teaching of the Sutras.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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