rAjagopAla

Vedartha Sangraha
OF
Sri Ramanuja
(Author of SRI BHASHYA)
TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH
WITH
INTRODUCTION AND NOTES
By
M. R. RAJAGOPALA AYYANGAR, M. A.
(Formerly of the Madras Educational Service)
Price 3-0-01

Preface

In this English rendering of Sri Ramanuja’s Vedarthasangraha, I have tried to be as close and faithful to the original as the idiom of the English language would permit. Here and there, when I felt that the addition of words, phrases or sentences would make the author’s meaning cleaner, I have inserted them in the body of the text within brackets. In the section dealing with the doctrines of the Mimamsakas, the original is too terse to be easily understood. I have, therefore, made the translation explanatory, as I felt that a faithful and close translation might not be clear enough. When longer explanations are necessary, they are given separately as notes in small type.

I am bound to express my deep indebtedness to the late Sri Vangipuram Vasudevachariar Swami’s excellent edition of Vedarthasangraha in Grantha script with Tamil translation and notes. Sri K. S. Patrachariar, M. A., scrutinised the English rendering with the Sanskrit original by his side and drew my attention to several omissions as well as inaccuracies. To go through an original treatise and make suggestions for its improvement is comparatively easy; but to go through a translation and compare it with the original, word by word and sentence by sentence, with a view to examining its accuracy requires much greater concentration and patience. Only those who have done this kind of scrutiny can appreciate the trouble involved in it. It is, therefore, impossible for me to thank him adequately for his kindness in having undertaken this task.

My grateful thanks are due also to my guru, Sri Ubhaya-Ve. Sinnamu Srinivasa Patrachariar Swami of [iv] Kumbakonam, to whom I applied for the clarification of the meanings of certain passages. I am grateful also to Sri R. Kesava Ayyangar, B. A., B. L., Advocate, Triplicane, for elucidating a point that I referred to him. My heartfelt thanks are due to my friend, Sri K. Varadachariar, B. A., B. L., Advocate, Kumbakonam, for help readily and willingly given in connection with the reading of the proofs.

In conclusion, I should like to express my warm appreciation and gratitude to the Cauvery Colour Press for the speedy execution of their part of the work.

M. R. RAJAGOPALAN.

CONTENTS

PAGE 1-35 … 37

Introduction

1. A brief exposition of Visishtadvaita Philosophy
2. The philosophical systems of Advaita and Bhedabheda …
3. Criticism of Sankara’s Advaita … The meaning of Samanadhikaranya or grammatical equation or co-ordination …. Refutation of the doctrine of a Brahman without attributes or differentiating features (Bheda) … 40 43

56 The doctrine of Avidya or Maya is against Śruti … It is also against reason 66 75

Criticism of the doctrine of a single individual self: Eka Jiva Vada

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Criticism of Sankara’s theory of Adhyasa or illusory appearance … Refutation of the Bhedabheda

Bhaskara and Yadavaprakasa 8883 84 systems of 93

4. A detailed exposition of the Visishtadvaita system: (i) Tattva. Reality:- Brahman, the Jiva, and Prakriti and their relation to one another (ii) Hita. or Upaya the means of attaining Brahman-supreme devotion (Parabhakti) … 102

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132 [vi] …

5. The validity of pramanas or sources of knowledge. 138
6. The arguments to prove that Narayana is the Supreme Brahman
7. The argument to prove that Brahman is both the material and the instrumental cause (Upadana karana and Nimitta karana)

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(i) Criticism of the Mimamsa view that the Upanishads are not a valid source of knowledge as they do not prescribe actions of any kind… (ii) Criticism of the Mimamsa doctrine of Apurva or Karya

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9. Arguments to prove the existence of “The Region of Eternal Glory” (Nitya Vibhuti)
10. Recapitulation; The Vedas and what they 143 155 167 174 192 really teach …
11. Appendix

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211 220 12. Sanskrit words and their transliteration in English… 224 13. Errata 230

INTRODUCTION

Bhagavan Ramanuja, the great exponent of the Visishtadvaita system of philosophy, was the author of nine treatises: Vedartha Sangraha, Sri Bhashya, Vedanta Deepa, Vedanta Sara, Gita Bhashya, three prose works called Vaikunta Gadya, Saranagati Gadya and Sri Ranga Gadya and a book called Nitya which deals with the daily rites and duties that should be performed by every Sri Vaishnavite. Among these, Sri Bhashya is his famous commentary on Badarayana’s Brahma Sutras. The commentary on the first sutra is a lengthy thesis in which the author shows the untenability of rival systems of philosophy and expounds a number of disputed passages in the Śrutis and Smritis as being in favour of his own system. Vedanta Sara and Vedanta Deepa are also commentaries on the Brahma Sutras, but are briefer than Sri Bhashya and leave out lengthy controversial discussions. They were evidently intended by the author to suit the average reader who is unacquainted with the methods of logical and interpretative disputation.

Purpose

Vedartha Sangraha, which was written before Sri Bhashya and which is referred to in the later work, may be considered primarily as a dissertation on the Visishtadvaita doctrine to show that it is more in keeping with the spirit of the Vedas or srutis than Advaita or Bhedabheda. Though this seems to have been the author’s purpose, he has also appended, to this discussion, short essays on the validity of the Upanishads as a source of true knowledge which had been questioned by the Mimamsakas, the truth concerning the Supreme Deity whether it is Brahma, Vishnu or Siva and the existence of a region of eternal glory (Nitya vibhuti), a transcendental world beyond this world of matter, where Narayana, whom Ramanuja identifies with the Supreme Brahman of the Upanishads, ever dwells with His Consort and His attendants, in His mansions of wonderful beauty and grandeur and to which the souls of those that have attained release from the bondage of samsara proceed.

The other five treatises are not wholly philosophical. They are religious out-pourings and not dissertations on the doctrines of Visishtadvaita.

Style

Vedartha Sangara, being controversial in nature, is written in the usual manner of philosophical disputations in Sanskrit literature. Dialectic subtlety and ingenuity of interpretation are of the very essence of such treatises. Occasionally, however, when the author has to speak of the glory of Narayana and of His infinite compassion, he bursts into a rhapsody of devout fervour, which comes from the very depths of his soul.

Background info of advaita

Motivation

While arguing his case against the Advaitins and the exponents of other systems, Sri Ramanuja assumes that the reader is acquainted with their fundamental doctrines, as also their interpretations of well-known passages in the Upanishads. The reader who has no such acquaintance is likely to find the discussion unintelligible. In order to facilitate an easier understanding of the text, it may be necessary to present, in brief, the main doctrines of the systems of philosophy dealt with in the book.

It is not the object of this introduction to give a comprehensive study of Visishtadwaita or to summarise all the arguments employed by Ramanuja to refute rival doctrines. Its purpose is just to provide, as it were, the back-ground of the controversial forum, in order to enable the reader to follow the disputation in the text without much difficulty.

Every system of Hindu Philosophy except that of the Charvakas has a bearing on religion and holds distinctive views on tattva or the real nature of what we see around us and of what we believe to be around us and within us, on purushartha or the goal or aim of life and on hita or the kind of means or upaya which will enable us to attain the goal. A brief account of these views held by the exponents of rival systems is essential for a study of controversial treatises on these points.

Tattva or what is real

Our senses present to us a world with a wonderful variety of objects, men, beasts, birds, insects, worms, plants and the like, as also inanimate things like the sun, the moon and the stars, each with its own peculiar qualities like colour, form, flavour, fragrance and the like. There are also objects not capable of being perceived by the senses but believed to exist on the authority of the Scriptures. The question arises, “Are all these things that exist and are believed to exist real? If all of them are not real, is any of them real? If so, what are they?” Before answering this question, a preliminary definition of what is meant by ‘real’ or reality has to be given.

The Advaitins, who follow the teaching of Sri Sankaracharya, define reality as that which endures for ever, for all time, without any change or modification, whatsoever. In their view whatever exists only for a short time is unreal. It is a mere appearance or illusion similar to that which occurs when a serpent is seen by mistake in what is only a rope. There is only one ‘real’ which accords with their definition and that is Brahman. It alone lasts for ever without change. The world that we see around us, so varied and so wonderful, is a false and illusory appearance, adhyas, superimposed on the substrate or adhishtana, which alone is real and true, namely Brahman. Brahman, somehow, became associated with factor causing this illusory appearance, which is called Maya or Avidya, (ignorance or nescience), and the illusory world is seen superimposed on Brahman in the same way as the form of a serpent is super-imposed on what is really a rope.

To this illusory appearance or creation Advaitins give the name, vivarta. The creation of the world means really the origin of the illusory appearance of the world on Brahman. If you ask the Advaitins why they consider the world, which appears so real, as illusory, they reply as follows:-

“To sense-perception or pratyaksha the world seems real, but we know many instances in which pratyaksha misleads us into false knowledge or illusion (bhrama). The shell is often mistaken for silver by sense-perception; the rope, as has been stated before, is mistaken for a serpent; when in a moving railway train, the passenger sees the trees and other things as moving, while the train seems to be stationary. It is only a little later that the mistake is realised and the false knowledge replaced by the truth. So also in the case of the world’s reality”.

If you ask the Advaitin,

“If sense-preception is, as you say, deceptive and unreliable, is there any other means of knowing the truth”?,

he replies,

“Certainly there is. The Sastra(Śruti or Veda)is always reliable and can give unmistakable knowledge of the truth of things. The sastra’ or Scripture is a sure and trustworthy means of knowledge and it says that only Brahman is real and that all the rest. namely, the world, is illusory.

The sruti says “All this (namely, the world that we see) is Brahman’ (Chandogya Upanishad III-14). This means that there is nothing else than Brahman.

Again in the sixth chapter of the ‘Chandogya Upanishad, where Svetaketu is taught what is called Sad Vidya, it is stated, “This existed, my dear, as Sat at first, ‘alone and without a second”. Sat here means Brahman, which is reality or true existence. The words ‘alone and without a second’ clearly state that nothing else existed then. ‘This’ means “the world.” So the objects that we see around us are only modifications and names which have no real existence.

The point is also thus illustrated, “If you know a lump of mud, you have known all things made of mud like pots, and pitchers, because the latter are only forms and names which are unreal. Only mud is real. In the same way only Brahman is real like the mud in the illustration and the world, with all the sentient and non-sentient things in it, consists merely of illusory forms and names superimposed on Brahman. So when the one, namely, Brahman, is known, all the rest are known as well. This implies that these other things do not exist in reality”.

“Again”, continues the Advaitin,

“could there be anything more emphatic than the teaching addressed in the same sruti to Svetaketu namely, “That Thou art”? It states, in no uncertain terms, the identity between Brahman and the individual self (here, that cf Svetaketu.) In other Upanishads, too, the same truth is taught in texts like “I am Brahman” (Aham Brahma asmi.) The existence of anything other than Brahman is, in the same way, denied in many srutis which say There is no such thing as plurality here (neha nana asti kinchana.) The existence. of the manifold world is here stated to be false or illusory.’

At this stage, if the student of Vedanta asks the Advaitin,

“Well, what do you mean by Brahman about which you say that it alone exists?”,

he replies as follows:-

“I have already stated that the sruti calls it the only reality satyam. Further since the self within us, the Jivatma, is said, by the sruti, to be identical with Brahman and since the self is self- luminous and shines without any other aid, it has to be called chit (i. e., it is different from the non-sentient things like pots and cloths which require to be lighted up by something else before they become manifest to perception. So Brahman is sentience or consciousness or, as the sruti calls it, jnanam (Taittiriya Upanishad)”.

The student might here interrupt the Advaitin with this question;

“If Brahman is consciousness or knowledge, as you say, it must be conscious of something else. When we say we are conscious, we always mean that we are conscious of some object either within us or without.[[6]] If there is any such object of which Brahman, which is consciousness, is conscious, it would follow that there are other objects besides Brahman of which Brahman is conscious.”

The Advaitin is ready with his reply to this objection:

“Brahman, it is true, is consciousness, but it is not conscious of anything else, for there is no such thing of which it could be conscious. It is pure consciousness without any discriminating features, like consciousness of pot, cloth and the like. There is an instance of such consciousness experienced by every one of us almost every day.

In our waking hours, we are conscious of the external world and of the thoughts and feelings within us; when we go to sleep and dream (svapna ), we are conscious of a world of illusory shows or phantasms. But when we are in deep sleep, without dreaming of anything sushupti, there is consciousness, pure and alone, for otherwise the man would be said to have died and yet the sleeper is not conscious of anything.

That is why Taittiriya Upanishad says of Brahman:- Satyam, Jnanam, Anantam Brahma. Brahman is Reality, Consciousness, Infiniteness, You see what Anantam means. Brahman is everywhere and there is nothing else.”

The student of Vedanta is likely to put the following question now:—

“Do you mean to say that Brahman has these three attributes, reality, consciousness, and infiniteness? Is the sruti that you quoted just now a definition of the nature of Brahman?”.

The Advaitin hastens to correct the misapprehension in the following words:

“No, no. Brahman has no attributes or qualities. If it had, there would be not only Brahman but its attributes, as well. But the Śrutis clearly say “Brahman is one, without a second”. Further there are texts in the Śrutis which expressly state that Brahman is without parts (niravayava), without activity (nishkriya), and without qualities (nirguna) or differentiating features (heda). It can be described only in negative terms, It is not this, not this, [[7]] neti neti.”

“What, then, do you mean”, the student asks, “by *satyam’ ‘jnanam’, ‘anantam’, if they are not attributes?”

The Advaitin answers:

‘When the sruti says satyam jnanam anantam Brahma, it means to say what Brahman is not.+++(5)+++ Brahman is other than the unreal or non-existing (satyam); it is other than non-sentience ( jnanam), it is other than the finite (anantam). That does not mean three different attributes. The three negatives mean only a single thing, “Brahman”.

If these words mean three different attributes, it would follow that there are three objects or substantives (viseshyas) of which they are attributes (viseshana). But there is only Brahman. According to our Advaita doctrine, Brahman is knowledge or consciousness, not the knower or possessor of knowledge. It is infiniteness and not the possessor of infiniteness. Some Śrutis add also ‘ananda’ to the three words already quoted from the sruti. It means that Brahman is other than ‘dukkkham’ or pain and misery.”

From what has been said so far, it may have become clear that Advaita, in its purest and most uncompromising form, does not recognise the real existence of anything other than Brahman. Then what about the world of sentient and nonsentient things which are said to exist? Advaita recognises three orders or degrees of existence (satta). One is transient or temporary appearance or existence, pratibhasika satta like that of the serpent which appears in the rope as rope as an illusion. In a few moments the illusion disappears, or, as it is termed, is sublated by true knowledge; far higher or superior is the existence of the world with all that it contains. It is real for all practical purposes ( vyavaharika satta ). This existence persists as long as the Jivatma is in the bondage of but when the atma attains release or mukti, the world disappears like any other illusion and the pure atma shines alone and without a second. This atma which is the same as Brahman is the only true Reality (paramarthika satta).

Schools

There are some schools of Advaitins who hold also that there is only one Jiva in samsara, namely, the speaker or thinker himself and that all other sentient beings (Jivas) which appear to exist are as unreal as the non-sentient things. This view is called Eka Jiva Vada and Sri Ramunuja makes a reference to it, while refuting Advaita in general.

nirvikalpa pratyaxa

It was stated before that Advaitins consider Sastra or Śruti as a more reliable authority or pramana than pratyaksha or sense-perception. This statement has now to be qualified and clarified. There is one form of pratyaksha which they look upon as a reliable source of knowledge. Take the case of a pot in front of us.

Even before we preceive the pot as a pot, we perceive, says the Advaitin, that there is existence or sat or what corresponds to is (asti). At the very first instant, moment or kshana, what pratyaksha reveals is is or mere existence and in the perceptions that follow in later instants, ‘pot’ appears illusorily on the is and we say “There is a pot”. This second or later perception is illusory and presents differentiating features like the quality of being a pot and others (bheda) which mark it off from, say, a cloth; when the pot is taken away, and a cloth is seen in its place, the perception of the cloth is super-imposed on bare existence, namely, the is spoken of before and later still, other things like table, chair, pen etc., are super-imposed, illusorily, on it. The one permanent feature that persists throughout and for ever is is or bare existence or sat and the other percepts, pot, cloth, table and the like supersede one another without persistence. So this bare existence or sat is alone real, being persistent; the temporary appearances, such as pot, cloth etc., are unreal.+++(5)+++ The first instant’s perception which does not present differentiating features is called nirvikalpa pratyaksha and it is a source of true knowledge and the later perceptions presenting differentiating features are called savikalpa pratyaksha and are illusory. What persists for ever is alone true or real and this is one of the fundamental doctrines of Advaita, viz., whatever is temporary or transient is unreal or illusory.

Illusory shruti?

When the Advaitin claims greater authority for Sastra or Śruti, other students of Vedanta are tempted to ask,

“According to your doctrine, everything other than Brahman is false or illusory. This would mean that the Śruti i-e Veda is illusory and false. How, then, could the Śruti, which is itself false, give true knowledge such as Brahman alone being real, the identity between the Jivatma and Brahman, and the like? Is not the knowledge given by an illusory or tainted source likely to be false also?”

To this the Advaitin replies as follows:-

“Sometimes information coming from an illusory source may be true or give a knowledge of the truth. Those who have made a special study of the science of dreams say, for example, that if one dreams of a man with black teeth, one’s death will soon follow. Such prognostications are afterwards found to be true. The dream is, however, unreal.”

A further question might be asked also,

“If Śruti or Sastra destroys all illusions and reveals the only Reality, Brahman, what about the Śruti itself? Is there anything else that destroys Śruti, which itself is also an illusion?”

The Advaitin answers thus:

“The fire in a forest burns away all trees, creepers, bushes and the like and when they are all burnt away, the fire is consumed of itself and perishes without any other agency causing its destruction.”

If, according to Advaita, the only Reality is Brahman and if Brahman has no attributes, no activities, no parts, no desires, no knowledge and no will, one might ask.

“Is there no place in the Advaitic scheme for the Personal God of religion who is omniscient, omnipotent and full of compassion for all the beings created by Him and who is worshipped with love and [[10]] devotion for the sake of His grace and fot final salvation?”

The Advaitin says in reply:

“Yes, there is. The only Reality is, of course, Brahman, but as stated before, this Brahman, which is without form, without colour, without attributes, or in other words, without differentiating features of any kind, becomes associated ‘somehow’ with a factor which obscures it or shadows it, called, maya or avidya.

When Brahman is shadowed by maya, Saguna Brahman or Iswara or the Personal God of religion with attributes like omniscience and omnipotence results and it is He that is is the cause, maintenance, and destruction of the world-appearance and that is the object of veneration and worship.

But as Saguna Brahman results from maya, He is as unreal as the Jivatma shadowed by the same principle which, in the case of the Jiva, is usually called avidya or ignorance or nescience. But maya and avidya are not essentially different. Saguna Brahman or God exists, of course, but His existence is of the second order referred to, namely, vyavaharika satyam. He is true for all practical purposes, and may be adored or worshipped as long as the Jiva is in bondage or samsara due to avidya and may even be the means of the Jiva proceeding thence to the realisation of Brahman or mukti which will be defined presently. Saguna Brahman dissociated from maya is identical with the Jiva dissociated from avidya, for such dissociation would mean pure Brahman.”

anirvachanIyA avidyA

The student of Vedanta has one more doubt which he would like to get cleared. He might ask the Advaitin:-

“You say that Brahman is the only Reality and that there is no other Reality at all, but from what you have said just now, it appears that there is another principle, tattva or reality named maya or avidya which, by its association with Brahman, causes the illusion of God and [[11]] the world of sentient and non-sentient beings. If this is so, would there not be two ‘Reals’ Brahman and this avidya?

What Advaitin says:– “No.” The Advaitin has a ready answer. “avidya has no real existence”. and is then, “is avidya not real, one might ask.

The ‘Avidya is not ‘sat’ or a really existing thing, which is Brahman alone, nor can it be said to be non-existent like the horn of a hare or the flower in the sky which does not exist at all. So avidya is not asat or a non-existing thing,”

The student may find this curious and ask himself how a thing can be neither sat nor asat neither true nor untrue. The Advaitin’s explanation is as follows:-

Avidya is a thing that exists for all practical purposes, but may, sometime or other, cease to exist. So its existence is something peculiar, it is different from both the real and true on one side and the untrue and the non-existent on the other, like the horn of a hare.

As an instance of this peculiar existence which can be defined neither as sat nor as asat and which has to be called an indefinable kind of existence (anirvachaniya) we may take the mirage that is seen by travellers in hot countries. Something like a pond appears before the weary traveller; the images of trees and other objects are seen in the water, as it seems to be, of that pond. He proceeds thither perhaps with the object of quenching his thirst, but when he is actually on the spot, there is neither pond nor water. The mirage existed and was seen for sometime. So you cannot say it did not exist; it disappeared when the man came to the spot; so it cannot be called real. So it is neither real nor non-existent. Avidya now exists for us, but when we arrive at mukti or release from bondage, it would cease to exist and only Brahman will then remain, alone and without a second”.

Two brahmans

It would be evident from what has been said that Advaita postulates two Brahmans, a higher or Para Brahman [[12]] which is Nirguna, Niravayavi, Nishkriya without attributes, without parts, without activity, which can be called only Pure Consciousness and a lower or Apara Brahman or Iswara, who is omniscient and omnipotent, who creates the manifold world of appearances and sustains it.

But this lower Brahman is unreal, being the effect of maya. He exists, it is true, for all practical purposes (vyavaharika satyam) but would cease to exist after mukti. Since Brahman alone is real, according to Advaita, it follows that the individual self or Jiva (to which class you and I and all other sentient beings belong) is also unreal. But we should clearly discriminate what is unreal in the Jiva from what is real.

Brahman, it has already been stated before, is pure consciousness or experience which is conscious of nothing and experiences nothing.

The Jiva says, “I see the pot, I know this is a pot” and so on. Here, in “I see” and “I know”, there is an element calling itself “I” and it looks upon itself as a seer or one who does the act of seeing or as a knower, who does the act of knowing. This “I” which is the knower, the doer, the one who sees and so on is superimposed illusorily on pure consciousness or Brahman which underlies the Jiva and is the substratum of the knower, the seer, the doer. This substrate is alone real and that which gives rise to the notion of ‘I’, of the knower, seer, doer etc., is illusory. Consciousness, which is pure, can have no such thing as the feeling or notion of ‘I’ or of its being a knower seer, doer, and the like. So the Atma or pure consciousness on which these illusions appear is alone real and it is identical with Brahman. It is no such thing as being a knower, seer, doer and the like. These are unreal appearances and are of the nature of jada or nonsentient things. In dreamless sleep the notion or feeling of ‘I’ and of being a knower and doer disappears and pure consciousness or Brahman alone remains. Such will be the state in mukti also.

The atman or[[13]] Brahman or pure consciousness (or anubhuti), has no qualities or relationships such as being a knower or doer. In every form of knowledge, such as “I know the pot”, there are three concepts, that of the knower I’, that of the pot which is the object of knowledge and knowing. These three are illusory, what is true ot real is mere consciousness and this is Atman or Brahman.

PURUSHARTHA or the Supreme Goal of Life in Advaita

Every system of Hindu philosophy which is religious has to answer the question, “What is the ultimate aim or supreme goal of life?” The great majority of us go on living without this thought ever rising in our minds, but the moment we begin to think and feel that we should not drift like logs on the sea without any aim or object, this question will ask for a reply.

Since Advaita considers that we, Jivas, are really Brahman but that we have, owing to beginningless avidya or ignorance, fallen into the current of births and deaths, subject to the sufferings of samsara, it would follow that the supreme goal or purushartha would be, according to Advaita, to get rid of this avidya which has been the cause of our identifying ourselves with the body and the mind and to realise that we have all along been and are really Brahman (Aham Brahma Asmi).

In the Upanishads, however, there are some passages where the soul or self is said to be led along a luminous path (Archiradi) by Amanava Purusha to Brahman, where it enjoys perfect bliss. The Advaitin explains away these passages as describing a lower form of mukti or release from bondage, where the self which has been meditating on Saguna Brahman or Brahman with attributes reaches the region of Saguna Brahman. [[14]]+++(5)+++ To such souls there is no coming back to Samsara but it is not the final state of mukti. It is what Advaitins call krama mukti.

There is yet another step to be taken by the self or soul which it will realise as the result of Jnana and that is Pure Consciousness or Brahman. This alone is real mukti.

The means of attaining Mukti or upaya or Sadhana

Since Advita teaches that the bondage of Samsara is due to avidya or ignorance, the only means by which avidya, the cause of this bondage, could disappear is Jnana or knowledge. The Sastra or Śruti teaches this knowledge by which the self understands that, in reality, it is Brahman, (‘Tat Tvam Asi: That thou art”) The knowledge of the identity of the Jiva with Brahman is the only means by which the ignorance or Avidya could be got rid of.

The Gita describes three ways or Yogas to be followed by the seeker after salvation or mukti. One of them is karma yoga, the performance of the rites and duties pertaining to the man’s station in life, his varna and his asrama, in a spirit of complete detachment, without any thought of their consequences or fruits (nishkama karma.) The rites and duties are to be performed as forms of worship to the Lord.

The Gita also teaches a second way, bhakti yoga which consists in loving devotion, adoration and meditation of the Lord (upasana.)

The third way is jnana yoga or the way of knowledge or jnana and the Jnani is praised highly in several passages. The Advaitin holds that, the direct means or sadhana which leads directly and at once to moksha or liberation is only jnana. In support of his view, he cites the authority of such passages in the Śrutis as the following:

“He who [[15]] knows Brahman becomes Brahman,”

“Having ‘known’ Him (Brahman) he attains immortality and there is no other way.”

The performance of karma in the spirit of utter detachment is, of course ordained, but it can, at best, create only a desire for attaining true knowledge of Brahman by causing mental purity (chitta suddhi). Devotion adoration and meditation (upasana) or what is called bhakti yoga is concerned only with Saguna Brahman and its fruition will result only in krama mukti or sojourn in the world of Saguna Brahman.+++(5)+++ Thereafter attaining true knowledge of the identity of the self with Brahman, the self will realise that it has all along been and is in reality Brahman.

Thus in the Advaitic system, only jnana is the means of mukti. The jnani might give up the performance of the rites and duties ordained in the Sastra as he no longer needs these needs these props.

Sri Ramanuja’s Visishtadvaita

I. On Tattva

After this preliminary study of Sri Sankaracharya’s views on Tattva, Purushartha and Upaya in the system of Advaita philosophy, we may proceed to the study of Sri Ramanuja’s views on these points as set forth in his Vedartha Sangraha. The reader would have noticed that the Advaitin approaches the inquiry into these points in two ways; first, through the Śrutis or revelation, which he considers as superior even to sense-perception, inference and reason and afterwards through reason, inference or yukti.

Sri Ramanuja adopts the same method in his approach. Taking the evidence of the srutis first, what do we find ?

Divergences in shrutis

There are some srutis or passages in the Upanishads which describe Brahman as being without imperfections, without qualities or attributes, without change or modification, without activity and as being of the nature of pure consciousness or jnana and bliss ananda. [[16]] In the Katopanishad and Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, it is said that there is no such thing here as the many, or as plurality. These and other such texts deny the existence of the many.

There are other Śrutis, however, which say of Brahman; “He is omniscient” (Mundaka Upanishad:) “By his mere will, He creates the Universe” “He gives forms and names to all things”. “He is free from faults, from old age, from death, from sorrow, from hunger and thirst and is all-perfect and omnipotent” (Chandogya Upanishad). These Śrutis deny the existence of faults and imperfections and affirm the existence in Him of positive qualities and attributes like omniscience and omnipotence.

A third set of passages in the Śrutis declares:

“All this is Brahman, because all things are created by Him, sustained by Him and are merged in Him”.

“All this has Brahman for its Atma.”

These affirm the world with all its varied contents as the creation of Brahman and also their oneness with Him.

There are, however, other Śrutis which say,

“Man can attain immortality by realising that the individual self is different from the Supreme Self which inspires and directs it.”

“Having understood the difference between the self that enjoys or experiences, the object that is enjoyed or experienced, and also the Supreme Self that directs everything etc”. (Svetasavatara Upanishad)

“He has all things under His control and rules over all”. (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad)

and again,

“He is the Lord of the world,”

“He is the Supreme Ruler among all rulers and is the Supreme Deity over all deities.”

These Śrutis state that Brahman is different from all else and that He rules over all. Other Śrutis again declare as follows:

“He has entered into all beings and rules them from within as their self or soul. This Atma is the Inner Ruler, Immortal.”

“The earth is His body, the waters are His body, Light is His body, the soul (or the jiva) is His body. He is [[17]] the inner self that controls all from within” (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad).

These passages state that the relationship that exists between Brahman and the world consisting of sentient and non-sentient beings is that which exists between the soul and the body.

When there are such apparent inconsistencies in the Śrutis regarding the essential nature of Brahman, how are we to explain them? One explanation might suggest itself at first sight, namely, that the Śrutis were composed by different seers at different times and that these seers held divergent views about the nature of Brahman; but none of the orthodox commentators of the Upanishads or Brahma Sutras, would subscribe to this view, neither Sankara, nor Ramanuja, nor Bhaskara, nor Madhvacharya nor any others.+++(5)+++ They all agree in thinking that the Śrutis are not divided among themselves and that all of them declare the same truth without any inconsistency or contradiction. The Śrutis, they say, are not the work of any human or divine being and are eternal revelations of Tattva, Purushartha and Hita or Upaya. Their authority is unquestioned. If inconsistencies or contradictions are noticed, they are only apparent and due to wrong interpretations of the meaning of the passages.

How Advaitins explain away these apparent inconsistencies and contradictions has already been indicated. According to them, the Śrutis describe two Brahmans, a higher Para or Supreme Brahman without attributes and without activity, change or modification and a lower or Apara Brahman, who has the attributes, and activites mentioned in some passages, This lower Brahman is Iswara who is called the Ruler of the world, its director and so on. But He is unreal in the ultimate reckoning. Only pure, attributeless Brahman is real.

Another explanation of theirs is that the passages which assign attributes and activities to Brahman express the prima-facie [[18]] view which is rejected by the passages which deny attributes and activities. The passages which deny attributes are later than the passages which affirm and therefore sublate or supersede them.

Sri Ramanuja is a realist. To him, Brahman, Iswara or God is real, so also the Jivatma or the individual self or soul. These souls are infinite in number and not one. Further matter or prakriti with all its modifications or evolutes is real. So there are three ‘Reals’ or Tattvas, Brahman or Iswara, the Soul or self (Jiva), (speaking of it as a class) and Prakriti or matter (inclusive of its evolutes).

One brahman

Speaking of the first Tattva, namely, Brahman or Iswara, Ramanuja is emphatic in declaring that the Śrutis do not speak of the existence of two Brahmans, a higher and a lower, and that the one Brahman, the Supreme Being which is described in the Śrutis has infinite auspicious qualities.

Those passages which seemingly deny attributes in Brahman and call it Nirguna deny the existence in Brahman only of the three qualities ascribed to Prakriti, namely, sattvam, rajas and tamas. What is denied is only the existence in Brahman of faults and imperfections. How else could we explain such attributes as omniscience and omnipotence which are ascribed to Brahman in the very passages which deny a number of attributes? Nirguna means “without blemishes, faults or imperfections”.

Attributes

In reply to the Advaitin who states that the passages in which Brahman is said to possess attributes express the prima facie view and that they are superseded or sublated by the passages which deny attributes, Sri Ramanuja says:-

“All the knowledge concerning the nature of Brahman has to come to us only from Scripture or Śruti. We can have no valid knowledge of it from any other source. It would indeed be funny if the Śrutis first said that Brahman had qualities and activities only to deny it afterwards. Why should the Śrutis state at first something that is not true and then deny its truth?’’+++(5)+++ [[19]]

neti neti

The Advaitin may ask: “But how do you explain those passages which state that Brahman can be described only in negative terms (Neti-Neti)? Do they not mean that Brahman is without attributes and that it is not this, not this, not that and so on?”

Ramanuja answers the question as follows;,-

The Śruti which says Neti-Neti “not this”, “not this” really means that Brahman’s nature or Svarupa and qualities are incapable of adequate and complete description and that what is at all possible is only a partial or fragmentary description. What the Śruti states by saying “not this” “not this” is that Brahman is not to be considered as being limited to this or that, but that it is these and an infinity of others as well, which defy adequate enumeration.

The passage in question is in Brihadaranyaka Upanishad IV. iii. 6. It is said there that Brahman is two-fold, that it has a tangible form and is also formless. Then follows the statement neti neti, which means Iti na, Iti na, not this only, not this only’.

The author of the Brahma Sutras has explained the meaning of this text or Śruti in III, ii, 21 as follows:-

" What is denied is, of course, that Brahman is only this much. Therefore the Śruti proceeds further to describe Brahman. What is said in the Śruti after Neti-Neti, is that there is nothing superior to Brahman and that it is the real (Satyam) of all reals (satyasya); for the individual souls (pranas) are real and Brahman is the Real among all reals”.

The individual self is called Real because, in its essential nature, it does not undergo any change or modification like matter or prakriti.

Non-plurality

The Advaitin will now ask,

But what do you say to the passage: “There is no such thing here (ie) in Brahman as the many or plurality (nana)?” Does it not clearly say that only Brahman exists and that there is nothing else, no other real and not even any attributes within itself?” [[20]]

Sri Ramanuja’s answer is to this effect:

“This idea that there is no such thing in Brahman as the many (nana) is found in the Kata Upanishad II, and in the ‘Brihadaranyaka Upanishad VI. Immediately after this statement, the Śruti declares that Brahman has all things under His control (sarvasya vasi) and that He rules over all (sarvasya isanah). In the face of these later passages, how can it be maintained that Brahman has no attributes at all, while rulership and control are ascribed to Him ?”

It may be said by the Advaitin that the passage in question denies the existence of anything other than Brahman. To this Ramanuja would reply as follows:-

That is certainly not the meaning.

To decide what the true interpretation of the text is, we should go back to a consideration of the apparently divergent Śrutis quoted before,

• some seemingly denying the existence of anything other than Brahman,
• some stating that all this is Brahman, because it is created and sustained by Brahman and is merged in it, which seem to recognise the reality of the world with its sentient and non-sentient beings and
• others stating that Brahman is different from the individual self which enjoys or experiences, and from matter which is the object of such enjoyment or experience.

What are we to make of these apparently inconsistent statements?

The Advaitin flatly declares that the Śrutis which speak of the reality of the world and of the differences between Brahman and the jivas on the one hand and Brahman and matter on the other, are not valid and that only those passages like “This existed, my dear, as Sat without a second” are authoritative.
This would imply rejection of all the passages in the Upanishads which speak of the Jiva and of Prakriti or matter and of the attributes of Brahman as real.

Similarly if we take the Svetasvatara passage cited before, which says that Brahman, the Jiva and Prakriti are real and different from one another as valid and authoritative,
we shall have to reject the authority any of those texts which declare that Brahman is the only reality and that there is no such thing as the many.

Is there any interpretation or view which would enable us to explain and reconcile these apparently divergent Śrutis without rejecting of them as invalid? Ramanuja says,

“Yes, there is and this key which would reconcile all the texts is found in the Brihadaranyaka text usually called Antaryami Brahmanam. It says that the world of matter or non-sentient things is the body of Brahman and that Brahman is its soul. Likewise, it says that all sentient beings or Jivas are Brahman’s body, Brahman being their soul. This relationship between body and soul existing between the world and Brahman is the key- doctrine of Sri Ramanuja’s Visishtadvaita system.

According to it, Brahman has chit and achit, which are as real as Brahman itself, as His body.
He is their soul, their Inner Self, controlling and directing them from within.
If this central doctrine of Sri Ramanuja’s system which is explicitly stated in the Antaryami Brahmanam is accepted, it would enable us to reconcile all the divergent texts referred to before, without rejecting the validity of any of them.
Since Brahman is the soul or inner self of all,
Brahman with chit and achit, the sentient and non-sentient things, as His body, forms a unity or a Single Real and there is indeed nothing else, for the world with all its variety is included in Brahman as its body.
This body is really an attribute or prakara of the soul;
and we often speak of the soul of a man with its prakara or body as a single thing or unity.
In the same way Brahman is, according to the Śrutis, a single Real and there is nothing else, for all else form the body of Brahman which is inseparable from it and may therefore be included as one with the Svarupa or the substantive part of Brahman which has, for its attributive amśa or part, the world of chit and achit. Thus the texts that, in the opinion of the Advaitin, teach unity, [[22]] find an easy explanation without denying the reality of the world and calling it an illusion.

At the same time, the body of man is different from his soul. So also the world of chit and achit, which is the body of Brahman, is different from the Inner Soul or self of all, namely, the Svarupa of Brahman
and the Svetasvatara and other texts which speak of the differences between Iswara, the individual self, and matter or prakriti are easily explained as being consistent with this Śruti called Antaryami Brahmana.
Thus Brahman with chit and achit as its prakaras or attributes is the only Reality and Ramanuja’s system is therefore Visishta Advaita.

Body and karma

The student of Vedanta is likely to raise an objection to what has been said about the world being the body of Brahman, Iswara, or God.

The body of the Jiva is usually said to be due to past karma and to be the cause of all the ills of samsara If Brahman has a body like ourselves, does is not follow that He, too, is subject to karma and the consequent sufferings of samsara!

Ramanuja would answer this question as follows;-

“Brahman’s body is not the result of any past karma of His.
In order to understand this aright, we should first define what is meant by the term ‘body’. The body is sometimes defined as composed of matter and as being the seat of the senses and of pleasures and pains. But this is not a proper definition.

The body of a sentient being is something that is supported and controlled by its soul or self and that exists solely for the fulfilment of the purposes of the soul or self.
If this definition is a true definition (and its truth cannot be denied), the question of Brahman suffering from samsara owing to the possession of a body will not asise”.

nirvikāratā

The Śruti-s which say that Brahman is without change or modification (nirvikara) are easily explained in Visishtadvaita, because
the Svarupa or substantive part or Viseshya amśa of Brahman never undergoes any change and remainsever Satyam, Jnanam, Anantam, (“Reality, Consciousness and Infiniteness.)
In the attributive part or amśa of Brahman which is its body, there are two reals, chit and achit. These alone undergo changes.

sthUla and sUxma

The achit portion or prakriti,
which is in such a subtle state or sukshma dasa, in pralaya (ie) before creation, that it can hardly be said to exist at all,
becomes modified in creation or Srishti into Sthula or gross matter
and evolves into various forms like earth, water, fire, air, ether (akasa), the senses, etc., and we see them in the pot, cloth, wood, metal, the bodies of animals and so on.
The chit or sentient part, which also lies in Brahman during pralaya as indistinguishable and insignificant,
so much so that it may be said not to exist at all,
becomes associated with prakriti in the gross or sthula state in accordance with its past karma
and is seen as the self in gods, men, animals, plants and so on.

And let us remember that Brahman is the Inner Self of chit and achit, both in their subtle and in their gross state;
the sentient being chit thus enclosed in the body, enjoys or experiences pleasures and pains due to samsara,
while the Svarupa of Brahman, the substantive, which has the chit as its body, remains changeless and unaffected by the sorrows of the latter.

We are now in a position to understand Ramanuja’s interpretation of what is stated in Sadvidya
which Advaitins consider as strongly supporting their doctrine.

“This, my dear, existed before as sat, alone and without a second.”

This is the text in question.
“Before” says Ramanuja, means “during pralaya”.
“This” means, of course, the world of chit and achit.
Sat, which, Advaitins say, means pure existence (satyam) or Brahman,
means, according to Ramanuja, Brahman with chit and achit in their subtle state.+++(5)+++
Sat does not mean “pure and mere existence”; for, in other Upanishads, the same sentence occurs with substitutes like Atma or the Self, Brahman and even Narayana; so it refers [[24]] to the Supreme Being with attributes;
for, immediately after, the Śruti, says:
‘It willed to become the many’.
Then follows a description of srishti or creation.
So will is ascribed by the Śruti itself to Sat in this very passage
which is considered to support the Advaita doctrine of a Brahman without attributes.+++(5)+++

Only thing to be known

This naturally leads us to another passage in the Chandogya Upanishad:
Chapter VI, where Sadvidya is taught by his father to Svetaketu,
The father asks, at the beginning of the chapter,
whether Svetaketu asked his teachers about that,
by knowing which everything else becomes known.
Svetaketu does not know how, by knowing one thing,
all things could become known
and the father afterwards explains his meaning to Svetaketu.

The Advaitins explain the meaning of this passage thus:
“Brahman being the only Reality, when it is known, all other things become known, because they are only illusory appearances which have no reality. Since no other ‘reals’ exist, by knowing Brahman all become known.”

Svetaketu finds it difficult to understand this.
So the father, says the Advaitin, gives illustrations to explain the statement as follows:-

“When you know a single lump of mud,
all things made of mud are known (such as pots and pitchers),
for all changes and modifications are mere forms and names which have no reality. Only mud is real”.

The passage in the Śruti, says the Advaitin,
means that Brahman alone is real like the mud in the illustration
and that other things which are super-imposed on it are mere forms and names having no reality.

Ramanuja denies that the original statement and the mud illustration which follows it are a statement of the Advaitic doctrine of Brahman being the only “real”. His explanation of the passage is to this effect:- [[25]]

Svetaketu is here taught the truth
that Brahman with chit and achit as His body in the subtle state in pralaya, (ie) before creation,
gives rise to Brahman with chit and achit in their gross state (namely the world that we see).
The former is the material cause (upadana karana)
from which arises the effect (karya) namely the world
with Brahman as its Inner Self.

What the father teaches his son is this:
When Brahman, the cause, is known,
the effect, namely, the world of chit and achit with Brahman as its soul is also known,
for the effect, karya, is only the cause, karana, with new states, forms and names;
which enable it to serve certain practical purposes.
This does not deny the reality of the world.
Pots and pitchers are modifications or new states of mud with new forms and names and serving certain new purposes,
but as substance,
they are only mud and are not essentially different from mud
which has only entered a new state or condition.

Tat Tvam Asi

Towards the end of this same sixth chapter of Chandogya Upanishad,the well-known sentence, Tat Tvam Asi, is repeated several times, as it were, to enforce the teaching in Svetaketu’s mind. To the Advaitin this is a Maha Vakya teaching the identity of the Jiva with Brahman. Tat is Brahman, the ultimate and only Real, on which the illusory world appears. Tvam (thou) is Svetaketu, who is addressed by his father. The two are said to be the same.

The Advaitin asks,

“Can there be a more emphatic declaration of the unity or identity of Brahman and the Jiva than these words which are repeated ever so many times in that context?
This Mahavakya declares that there is only one ‘real’, namely, Brahman,
which is the cause or substrate of the origin, maintenance and dissolution of the world
and it is declared to be the individual self of Svetaketu in “That Thou Art”;
but on the face of it, the sentence would appear to convey no coherent meaning,
for how can the individual self of Svetaketu with its limited powers be the same as Brahman which is infinite?
So the direct or primary meaning of the word “Thou” will have to be given up as being incongruous [[26]] and a secondary or indirect meaning (lakshana) will have to be taken.
The result of this would be:
That would mean pure Brahman without attributes, activity, change or relations of any kind
and ’thou’ should be taken to mean not the individual self of Svetaketu, which is the direct meaning, but Brahman without the limitations, attributes, [[68]] activities etc., of the individual,
a meaning arrived at by having recourse to the indirect meaning (or lakshana).
There would then be no equation of two different things but an identity or unity, namely - Brahman”.

The Advaitin, who gives this explanation of the Mahavakya “That thou art” illustrates it with an example from ordinary life.

Having seen a person, called, say, Devadatta, in the past, in a certain place,
we now see him, say, in some other place and say,
‘This is that Devadatta’.
Since the Devadatta seen formerly in one place cannot be the same as the Devadatta seen now in a different place,
we have to resort to lakshana and give up the qualifications and relationships such as ‘formerly in one place’ and ’now in a different place’.
What results in thus giving up the direct meanings which would not convey a coherent meaning, is the bare identity, namely, Devadatta.
So also, ‘Brahman in That Thou Art’.

In reply to this Advaitic explanation of identity as contained in ‘That thou art’,
Ramanuja submits the whole question of appositional or coordinative use of words,
as in “That thou art”, “Janaka is a king”, “This is that Devadatta ”, ‘Ayodhya was the capital of the Raghus’ and so on, to a careful investigation.
It is really a question for grammarians to decide. What do we really mean when we say ‘Janaka is a king’? Is it simply the identity of Janaka or something more? So also in " Ayodhya was the capital of the Raghus “, is the purport merely ‘… city Ayodhya’ apposition or something more?
This kind of grammatical [[27]] co-ordination of two substantive words is called samanadhikaranya in Sanskrit
and as ‘That thou art’, the Advaitin’s Mahavakya, is an instance of samanadhikaranya,
Ramanuja considers it necessary to determine the meaning and purpose of this appositional use more than once in Vedarthasangraha.

The purpose of samanadhikaranya is to show that two or more different attributes, qualities or relationships refer to a single object. For example in ‘Janaka is a king’, the word Janaka, signifies a person with a specific form and with that name. The word ‘king’ means something different, namely, his being the ruler of a kingdom. The sentence having the co-ordination or samanadhikaranya aims at showing that these two sets of different attributes meet in the same person and not the bare identity of Janaka.
In the example cited by the Advaitin, ‘This is that Devadatta’, Ramanuja says that there is no incoherence or absurdity in taking the direct meaning of the words just as they are (ie) the Devadatta seen formerly in the place A is the same as the Devadatta seen now in the place B. The same person could have been in one place in the past and in a diffent place at present. Where is the absurdity in it? So we may take the direct meaning of the words ’the Devadatta seen in the past in the place A, is the Devadatta seen at present in the place B.’
In fact the aim of the samanadhikaranya is just to show that ‘being present in A at a former time’ and ‘being present now in B’ are both in Devadatta. There is absolutely no reason why we should give up the direct and primary meaning.

It may be asked what is the relevancy of all this discussion of the meaning of samanadhikaranya to the interpretation of the Mahavakya “That thou art”? Ramanuja replies as follows:- When the direct and primary meanings of That’ and ’thou’ may be taken just as they are and a sound, coherent and valid meaning can be had for the sentence, where is the need for resorting to lakshana or the indirect [[28]] and secondary meaning’?

He then proceeds to explain what he considers to be the real meaning of ‘Tat Tvam Asi’, That thou art ‘;
‘That’ of course signifies the Supreme Brahman who is the cause of the origin, maintenance and dissolution of the world.

‘Thou’, at first sight, would seem to mean Svetaketu or Svetaketu’s self but it really means here the soul or the Inner Self within the soul of Svetaketu.
When we use the word or name ‘Devadatta’, it refers to the bodily configuration of Devadatta, but does not stop there.
It is not merely his body that is meant by the word ‘Devadatta’ but his Atma soul or self as well.
The denotation or meaning of the word does not stop there; it refers also to the soul or Inner Self or Antaryami who has the soul of Devadatta for His body, as set forth in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad.

So That thou art means Brahman who is the cause, the support etc., of the world,
is also the inner Self or Antaryami who dwells within the soul of Svetaketu.

Here two different attributes, that of being the cause etc., of the world and that of being the inner self of Svetaketu are ascribed to the same object, namely, Brahman,
and this is the real purport or significance of samanadhikaranya as understood by grammarians, whose authority in a matter like this should be unquestioned.

But it may be asked:

“Is not Ramanuja also giving up the primary and direct meaning of ’thou’ namely, Svetaketu’s self and taking up lakshana or an indirect and secondary meaning viz.. the inner self within the self of Svetaketu?”

Ramanuja’s answer is as follows,

Take any word, say, cow. It has three meanings, all primary and direct, namely, the bodily configuration of the cow, the self or soul of the cow and likewise, the Inner Self within the soul of the cow, which is Brahman or God or Iswara.
Laymen who are not acquainted with Vedanta are not aware of this third significance or meaning which is as direct and as primary as the other two. [[29]]
So my interpretation is sound and in accordance with the Antaryami Brahmanam and the science of grammar.

saguNa-brahman

To sum up: In Visishtadvaita as expounded by Ramanuja,
the Upanishads impart to us knowledge of only one Brahman and that is Saguna Brahman or Brahman with infinite auspicious qualities. He has chat and achit as His body.
The words Nirguna, Niranjana, etc., mean only that Brahman has none of the faults and the imperfections found in the Jiva.

dharmabhuta jnana

Visishtadvaita agrees with Advaita
in holding that the essential nature or Svarupa of Brahman is Jnana or consciousness,
but maintains, in addition,
that Brahman, who is consciousness,
has for its attribute, jnana.
Brahman is thus the knower
as well as knowledge or consciousness.
Without a knower, there can be no such thing as bare consciousness.
The knowledge or jnana which is an attribute of Brahman is called dharmabhuta jnana or attributive knowledge,
to distinguish it from the Svarupa (or substance) of Brahman which is also called Jnana.

As has been pointed out,
the Brahman of the Upanishads
is also the God of religion who creates, maintains and sustains the world.
It is He who rewards the Jiva with mukti, when he strives for it.

Jiva

The Jiva in Visishtadvaita is as real as Brahman itself.
Its essential nature svarupa, is also jnana
but it differs from Brahman in being atomic (anu),
whereas Brahman is all-pervasive or omnipresent (vibhu).

The Jivatma, has knowledge for one of its attributes
and this knowledge is called dharma bhuta jnana, or attributive knowledge.
Though the individual self or Jivatma is anu,
its attributive knowledge is capable of infinite reach.

Owing, however, to beginningless avidya or karma,
this attibutive knowledge has undergone contraction,
but in the state of mukti or release from samsara,
it will become infinite in its reach and will be capable of [[30]] understanding all things at the same time.

Nityas

Sri Ramanuja states also
that there is another class of individual souls called Nityas
in the region of eternal glory, which he calls Nitya Vibhuti.
Their attributive knowledge has always been infinite in its range
as they have never been in the bondage of samsara.
The arguments by which he establishes this will be seen in chapter-9.

Prakriti

Prakriti or matter is also real in Ramanuja’s system.
It undergoes modifications into various tattvas (24 in number)
which are the same as the 24 reals in the Sankhya system.
Prakriti and its evolutes exist for the enjoyment or experience of the individual souls
in accordance with their past karma.

PURUSHARTHA in VISISHTADVAITA

The ultimate or supreme goal of life
is to attain release from samsara,
and enjoy the bliss of Brahman
and not, as in Advaita, to become Brahman.+++(5)+++

The avidya which is the same as karma
belongs to the jiva and not to Brahman.
Ramanuja accepts the view
that the released soul will enjoy infinite bliss in Nitya Vibhuti or God’s Region of Eternal Glory.

THE MEANS or UPAYA

Of the three Yogas, taught in the Gita,
bhakti or devotion with its highest development,
which Ramanuja calls parama bhakti,
is the direct and only means of attaining mukti.

Karma and jnana are essential
but are only accessories to bhakti;
karma or the rites and duties prescribed for each varna and each asrama,
have to be performed as long as life lasts
and are, on no account, to be given up.

One of the texts in the Mundaka Upanishad says that
Brahman reveals Himself only to him
with whom He is pleased.
Brahman would be pleased only with him,
who has deserved well of Him by supreme devotion
in accordance with the Sastras.
Bhakti is, therefore, the only means or upaya [[31]] for attaining the bliss of Brahman.

At the same time, Ramanuja states that bhakti and jnana are not essentially different.
Bhakti, too, is knowledge or jnana.
When jnana deepens sufficiently, it attains the form of bhakti.+++(5)+++
It is this deep jnana
which has developed into bhakti
that is the upaya or means to mukti.

dharma-bhUta-jNAna as dravya

It was said above that
the Svarupa or essential nature of Brahman
and of the individual self in its purity
is jnana
and that Brahman and the Jiva have jnana or knowledge as an attribute.

It may be asked how jnana which is a substance or dravya
could be an attribute of jnana (svarupa-jnana).
Attributes are usually of the nature of gunas or qualities
and not substances or dravya.

Ramanuja replies to this objection by stating that there is no such invariable rule.
Even a substance may be an attribute of another substance
as when we speak of a dandi or a man with a stick or danda.+++(5)+++
Here danda or stick, which is a substance, is an attribute of the dandi.
The only difference is that
the stick is not inseparable from the man,
whereas attributive knowledge is inseparable
from the knowledge which is the svarupa or substance of the Jiva or Brahman.
So also the Jiva and Prakriti, or matter, though substances (dravya),
are inseparable attributes of Brahman, being His body.+++(5)+++

avidya

It was pointed out before that the Advaitin postulates a factor called maya or avidya,
which, by some kind of shadowing or association with Brahman,
causes the illusory appearance of the world.
Ramanuja submits this theory to an elaborate and critical examination
and shows that maya, cannot be defined in any manner
to the satisfaction of others
and that it lands Advaita in inconsistencies and contradictions.

These arguments may be studied in the text itself of Vedarthasangraha. [[32]]

What is real?

So far the evidence of the Śrutis.
Approaching the question from the point of view of reason,
Ramanuja does not accept the Advaitin’s contention
that only what persists for ever is real.+++(5)+++

Temporary things

It may be remembered that in pratyaksha,
according to the Advaitin,
there is only one aspect that persists right through,
namely, mere existence or what corresponds to asti oris and that this existence or asti alone is real
and that pot, cloth, table, etc.,
as in the perceptions ’this is a pot, this is a cloth, this is a table’, and so on,
do not persist,
as they replace one another and are therefore unreal.

Ramanuja states in reply
that if an object like pot is seen to exist in a certain place, at a certain time
and another object, say, cloth, is seen there at the next instant or afterwards,
it does not follow that the thing which does not persist is unreal.

To put it in other words,
the Advaitin holds that only what exists for ever and is not superseded or sublated by anything else, is real.
Ramanuja, on the other hand, maintains that the reality or unreality of a certain thing has nothing to do with the duration of its existence.
A thing may exist only for a short time and yet be real.

Dream

The Advaitin might ask thereon,

The objects that we dreams are seen only for a very short time and are replaced or superseded by others.
Do you think that these objects or experiences in dreams are real?
Is it not agreed on all hands that dreams are unreal?

Ramanuja would reply to this effect:

I do not admit for a moment that
because a thing exists only for a short time, it is unreal.
Dreams, too, are real in our system.
They are created by Iswara to reward or punish the Jivatma for his karma.
The fact of their transience cannot be considered as a reason to deny their reality.
So it would come to this
that in Visishtadvaita,
there is no experience or object that is unreal. "

Silver in shell

The Advaitin may ask,

“What about the shell that is mistaken for silver owing to a defect in the vision or in the [[33]] light?”

Ramanuja’s answer is that,

in the shell there is an element or aspect of real silver
which accounts for the mistake or illusion.
It is this fraction of real silver
that is taken to be all silver.

brahman is both cause and effect

In Visishtadvaita, Brahman, Iswara or God, for all these mean the same,
is both the cause and the effect. As has been indicated before, Brahman with chit and achit in their subtle state is the upadana karana or material cause and Brahman with chit and achit in their sthula state as the world is the effect.

No nirvikalpa pratyaxa

In reply to the Advaitin’s contention that first perception (pratyaksha) or perception at the first instant or kshana presents only bare existence
without any differentiating features (bheda)
and that this nirvikalpaka pratyaksha is alone true and valid,
presenting as it does, pure Brahman without any differentiating features,

Ramanuja denies that, even in the first instant, there is any such thing as nirvikalpaka pratyaksha
and that even in that instant,
the perception presents not bare existence
but the configuration or physical structure of the object which has differentiating features.

All perceptions, whether of the first instant or of the later,
are only savikalpaka or sakara pratyaksha.

bhAskara’s jIva-brahmaikya

Besides the criticism of Advaita which occupies the greater part of Vedarthasangraha,
brief references are made also to the Bhedabheda systems of Bhaskara, and Yadavaprakasa.

In Bhaskara’s system,
mayavada or the theory of the world being an illusory appearance due to the shadowing of Brahman by maya,
is strongly condemned.
The reality of the world is affirmed as strongly as in Visishtadvaita;
but the identity of the Jiva with [[34]] Brahman,
which is the apparent purport of such texts as ‘That thou art’ is sought to be explained
in a manner different from that adopted by Advaitins and Visishtadvaitins.

Brahman is considered to be full of infinite auspicious qualities,
as in Ramanuja’s system.
But owing to some limiting adjuncts or upadhis
Brahman becomes the Jivas
subject to samsara and its ills.+++(4)+++

Unlike maya in Advaita, which is postulated to account for the Jivas,
these adjuncts or upadhis are real in Bhaskara’s system.
Brahman, in a sense, is different from the Jiva,
as it has been conditioned by the upadhi.
At the same time, in mukti when the adjuncts will be got rid of,
the jiva or individual self becomes one with Brahman
by knowing its unity with Brahman as taught in such passages as
“He who knows Brahman becomes Brahman”.

Thus in another sense,
there is no difference between Brahman and the individual self.
This system is therefore called Bhedabheda.

In holding that in mukti, the individual self becomes Brahman,
from which its difference is only adventitious,
Bhaskara’s system has affinities with Advaita.

The adjuncts or upadhis, are the body, the senses and the mind.
The means of attaining mukti or becoming Brahman
are both karma and jnana,
neither of them being merely accessory.

Yadhavaprakasa

In Yadhavaprakasa’s system,
Brahman has, within itself,
a certain power or energy
by which it evolves (parinama) into Iswara, chit and achit.

The means of attaining mukti,
which is the as becoming Brahman,
are karma and jnana, both being equally important as in Bhaskara’s system.

The jiva, which is a modification or parinama of Brahman, becomes Brahman again
and this explains the purport of the Mahavakya
‘That thou art ‘.
This system is also called Bhedabheda,
as the Jiva, in one sense, is different from Brahman
and, in another, the same as Brahman.

[[35]]

Sri Ramanuja’s criticism of these two systems may be studied in the text itself.

NOTE :-In Yadavaprakasa’s system, the Jiva in mukti becomes one with Brahman by remaining within it as its sakti with a separate consciousness of its own. (See Srutaprakasika; 4-4-4) '

Conclusion

The short essays on ‘The Supreme Deity,’ ‘Nitya Vibhuti,’ and Brahman’s being both the ‘Upadana Karana’, and the ‘Nimitta Karana of the world’ are easy
and do not require any explanatory notes.

A separate introduction is, however, given at the beginning of the essay on the views of Mimamsakas.