रामानुजीये विश्वासटिप्पन्यः

RAMANUJA’S VEDARTHASAMGRAHA
INTRODUCTION, CRITICAL EDITION AND ANNOTATED TRANSLATION
BY J. A. B. VAN BUITENEN
Sometime Sub-Editor, Dictionary of Sanskrit on Historical Principles, Deccan College, Poona
POONA 1956
Code No, M. 54
LAN 181-48
First Edition: 750 copies: October 1956
All Rights Reserved
Price Rs. 20/-
Published by Dr. S. M. Katre, for the Deccan College Postgraduate and Research Institute, Yervada, Poona-6 Printed at the G. S. Press, Mount Road, Madras

TO THE EDITOR-IN-CHIEF AND THE STAFF OF THE SANSKRIT DICTIONARY ON HISTORICAL PRINCIPLES POON A

RAMANUJA’S VEDARTHASAMGRAHA OFFICE OF THE GIRECTOR OF ARCHAEOLOGY 1139 2 6 AUG 1969 GOVT. OF MADRAS. M1033S-

Deccan College Monograph Series 16 RAMANUJA’S VEDÄRTHASAMGRAHA BY J. A. B. VAN BUITENEN DECCAN COLLEGE POSTGRADUATE AND RESEARCH INSTITUTE POONA

विस्तारः (द्रष्टुं नोद्यम्)

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PREFACE

RAMANUJA’S Vedarthasamgraha marks a new era in Vedanta philosophy. It is the début of a thinker who, with all the force of his remarkable talents, set out to restate the theology of the Absolute in the terms of religion and worship. It was, according to tradition, in front of the sacred image of Śrīśailapati in the temple of Tirumalai that Rāmānuja delivered this lecture on the interpretation of the Upanisads. We may suppose that it was first public appearance as a mature theologian. No doubt many years of erudite disputations with the followers of Sankara and Bhaskara, of Yadaprakasa and Prabhakara, and also with the Vaisnavas of his own milieu, preceded this function. But now his doctrine was complete, his truth definitive: in this short but extremely rich lecture he was able to choose his principal adversaries and to outline a both philosophically and theologically sound refutation of their views. That he offered it to one of the multiple forms of the one God is characteristic of this deeply religious thinker.

This Vedarthasamgraha is virtually unknown to Western scholarship; and even in India, where its usefulness as a compendious introduction to Visiṣṭādvaita has long been recognized in the pāṭhaśālās, it has not inspired to the study which it certainly deserves. I know of one old English translation, exceedingly, even excessively literal, published by the South-Indian scholar VASUDEVACHARIAR in the issues of the Brahmavādin. This translation, still more his Tamil rendering, is all but inaccessible in the West.

The present work offers a critical edition of the Sanskrit text, a liberally annotated translation into English, and an Introduction. As the work was undertaken in connexion with my post on the Staff of the Sanskrit Dictionary Department of the Deccan College at Poona, I have made it my object to study the text primarily from the philological point of view: to which I was the more inclined by the consideration that without a sound philological basis the philosophical study of Indian thought and its comparison with other patterns of thought will never achieve finality. Therefore I have made the notes to the English translation as exhaustive in dealing with terms and references as was possible to me; not exhaustive enough by far: many studies like those which HACKER devotes to advaita will have to be made in all systems before the entire context of concepts in Indian thought is rightly intelligible. I have made full use of SUDARSANASURI’s excellent commentary: Western scholars disregard these erudite studies by privileged colleagues with great disadvantage to their comprehension of the scholastic background of the studied authors. [[Pviii]]

In the Introduction I have sought to avoid all duplication and to centre the attention on relevant topics which so far have been dealt with insufficiently or not at all. Special regard has been given to Ramanuja’s place in the history of Vedanta thought. The importance of Uddalaka’s Sadvidyā for Vedanta as a whole and the variety of its interpretations led naturally to a more detailed description of Uddalaka’s teaching as a convenient starting-point. Ramanuja’s ancient predecessors have been studied anew and their fragments collected in an appendix. The relative date of the Vedarthasamgraha has then been established and Rāmānuja’s sources, in the widest sense, have been investigated: in that connexion special interest has been shown to the place of Pañcarātra and the doctrine of Yamuna. A chapter of observations on Ramanuja’s hermeneutics concludes the introduction. Several Indexes will, I hope, enhance the usefulness of the book.

This study has been made possible by my stay in Poona. The Minister of Education of the Netherlands, who granted me a travelling subsidy, the Curators of the State University of Utrecht, who arranged generously for a long study-leave, and the Council of the Deccan College Post-Graduate and Research Institute, who appointed me a Sub-Editor of the Sanskrit Dictionary, are the first to whom my gratitude is to be acknowledged. In the course of my daily routine in the Dictionary Department I have been able to benefit greatly by intimate contacts with Indian friends, colleagues and scholars; the readiness with which they have accepted me in their midst and shown me their friendship will for ever remain unforgettable to me. Professor V. A. RAMASWAMI SASTRI, whose liberal friendship I consider a privilege, has followed the work of this study with the greatest interest and sympathy; his helpfulness in matters pertaining to Karmamīmāmsā has been invaluable; I owe more to his advice and encouragement, and to our innumerable neighbourly verandah discussions, than I am able to express.

It is to Dr. S. M. KATRE, Editor-in-Chief of the Sanskrit Dictionary, who invited me to Poona, that my warmest thanks are due. I do not know a better way of expressing my gratitude to him, reputed scholar, understanding friend and most charming host, than by dedicating this volume to the Staff of the Poona Sanskrit Dictionary, his creation.

Poona, May 1955. J. A. B. VAN BUITENEN, [[Pxi]]

PREFACE … vii TABLE OF CONTENTS … xi BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTES AND ABBREVIATIONS … xii

PART ONE: INTRODUCTION CHAPTER I. The Sadvidya in Vedānta … 3 II. The Ancient Masters … 18 § 1. Bodhayana the Vṛttikära … 19 § 2. Tanka the Vakyakāra and Dramida the Bhāṣyakāra … 24 § 3. The views of the Ancient Masters … 29 III. The Vedarthasamgraha … 30

Its date … 30
Its sources … 33 A. Smrti … 33 § 1. Function of Smrti … 33 § 2. Visnupurāṇa … 34 § 3. Influence of Pañcarātra Agama … 36 B. Darśanas … 39 § 1. Mimämsä: a. Śabarasvāmin; b. Kumārila; c. Prabhakara. … 39 § 2. Vedanta: a. Advaita; b. Bhedabheda; c. Yamuna. … 40 IV. Observations on the exegetical method and principles of Rāmānuja … 48 § 1. The authority of sabda … 50 § 2. All śrutis equally authoritative … 57 § 3. Lakṣanā … 59 § 4. Context … 66

PART TWO: TEXT Editorial Note … i Sanskrit Text … 73

PART THREE: TRANSLATION Contents of the Vedarthasamgraha … 177 Annotated English translation … 183

APPENDIX § 1. Fragments of Bodhayana’s Vṛtti … 301 § 2. Vakya and Dramiḍabhāṣya … 302

INDEXES I. Notable Sanskrit terms … 313 II. Ancient Indian authors quoted … 317 Addendum et corrigenda … 318 [[Pxii]]

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTES AND ABBREVIATIONS

ABHYANKAR, Notes. - V. S. ABHYANKAR, Śribhāṣya of Ramanujācarya, II, Introduction and Notes (Sanskrit) (Bombay, 1916). Agamapramanya - see Yamuna. Annambhatta, TS. - Tarkasamgraha by Annambhatta. Apadeva, MNPr, - Mimänsänyāyaprakasa by Apadeva, edited and translated by Franklin EDGERTON (New Haven, 1929). ATHALYE, TS. - Y. ATHALYE, Tarkasamgraha, edition and notes (Bombay, 1938). Ätmasiddhi. - see Yamuna. BELVALKAR, Lectures on Vedanta. - S. K. BELVALKAR, Lectures on Vedanta I (The Shree Basu Mallik Lectures), Poona, 1929. BhG. - Bhagavadgītā. BrS. - Brahmasutras of Badarāyaṇa. BrSBh. - Brahmasútrabhāṣya.

Sankara’s bhāṣya, ed. by N. R. ACARYA (Bombay, 1948).
Bhaskara’s bhāṣya, ed. by Pt. V. P. DVIVEDI, Chowkhamba Sanskrit Series 70; 185; 209 (Benares, 1915).
Ramanuja’s bhāṣya, see Śrībhasya (SBh). BrSiddhi - see Mandanamiśra. BUITENEN, J.A.B. VAN. - Ramanuja on the Bhagavadgītā (The Hague, 1953). DASGUPTA, Indian Philosophy. - S. DASGUPTA, A History of Indian Philosophy III (Cambridge, 1940); IV (ib., 1949). DE SMET - R. V. DE SMET, S.J., The Theological Method of Samkara (thesis Pontifica Universitas Gregoriana, Rome, 1953). DEUSSEN, System of Vedanta. - Paul DEUSSEN, The System of the Vedanta, authorized translation by Charles Johnston (Chicago, 1912). DEUSSEN, Upanisads - Paul DEUSSEN, Sechzig Upanisad’s des Veda3 (Leipsic, 1921). Dharmaraja, VedP. - Vedantaparibhasa by Dharmaraja Adhvarin, edited and translated by S. S. Suryanarayana SASTRI (Adyar, 1942). FALK, Namarupa. - Maryla FALK, Nama-rupa and Dharma-rupa (Calcutta, 1943). [[Pxiii]] FOUCHER, TS - A. FOUCHER, Le Compendium des Topiques (Tarkasamgraha), text and French translation (Paris, 1949). G. - Bhagavadgitä. Gautama, NS. - Nyayasutras of Gautama, with Vätsyāyana’s bhāṣya, ed. by Ganganath JHA, (Poona, 1939). GBh. - see Ramanuja. GONDA, Early Visnuism. - J. GONDA, Aspects of Early Vişnuism (Utrecht, 1955). HACKER, Untersuchungen. - Paul HACKER, Untersuchungen über Texte des frühen Advaitavada, I. Die Schüler Sankaras (Ak. Wiss. u. Lit. Mainz, Abh. G. u. Sw. Kl. 1950, 26) (Wiesbaden, 1950). HACKER, Vivarta. - Paul HACKER, Vivarta, Studien zur Geschichte der illusionistischen Kosmologie und Erkenntnisstheorie der Inder (Ak. Wiss. u. Lit. Mainz, Abh. G. u. Sw. Kl., 1953, 5) (Wiesbaden, 1953). HIRIYANNA. - see Sureśvara. Istasiddhi. - see Vimuktātman. Isvarasiddhi. - see Vimuktātman. Jayantabhaṭṭa. - Nyayamañjarī by Jayantabhaṭṭa, ed. by S.N.S. SUKLA, Chowkhamba Sanskrit Series 106 (Benares, 1992/1936). JHA, Prabhakara. - Sir Ganganath JHA, The Prabhakara School of Purva Mimämsä (D.Litt. thesis Allahabad, 1911). KUPPUSWAMI, Indian Logic. - S. KUPPUSWAMI SASTRI, A Primer of Indian Logic, according to Annambhatta’s Tarkasamgraha (Madras, 19512). KMS. - Karmamimämsäsutras of Jaimini, see Sabara. LACOMBE, ASV. - Olivier LACOMBE, L’Absolu selon le Védânta (Paris, 1937). LACOMBE, La Doctrine. - Olivier LACOMBE, La doctrine morale et métaphysique de Ramanuja (= annotated translation of Śrībhāṣya, 1, 1, 1). (Paris, 1938). LACOMBE, Notes. - Olivier LACOMBE, Notes to La Doctrine, etc. MNPr. - see Apadeva. NS. - see Gautama. Prakaraṇapañcikā. - see Śālikanātha. R. - Rāmānuja. RADHAKRISHNAN, Indian Philosophy. - S. RADHAKRISHNAN, Indian Philosophy, 2 vols. (London, 1951). RADHAKRISHNAN, Upanisads. - S. RADHAKRISHNAN, The Principal Upanishads, annotated translation (London, 1953). Rāmānuja, GBh. - the Gitābhāṣya by Ramanuja, ed. with Tätparyacandrika of Venkatanatha, by V. N. APTE (Anandăśrama Sanskrit Ser. 34, 3d ed., Bombay, 1936). [[Pxiv]] Rāmānuja, ŚBh. - Sribhāṣya by Rāmānuja, ed. by V. S. ABHYANKAR (Bombay, 1915); references to SBh. 1, 1, 1 are specified by page-numbers in this ed., and sometimes also by pagenumbers of THIBAUT’S translation. Rămānuja, VedantaD. - Vedantadipa by Ramanuja, ed. Shree Acharya BHATTANATHASWAMY (Benares Sanskrit Series 69; 70; 80; Benares, 1904). Mandanamiśra. - Brahmasiddhi of Mandanamiśra, ed. by S. KUPPUSWAMI (Madras, 1937). Rāmānuja, VedāntaS. - Vedantasära by Ramanuja, ed. and translated by Narasimha AYYANGAR (Adyar, 1953). Rāmānuja, Ved. - Vedarthasamgraha by Ramanuja with Sudarśanasuri’s Tātparya-dipikā, ed. by S. S. P. S. Rama Misra SASTRI (Reprint from the Pandit,2 Benares, 1924); the Dipika is quoted acc. to this edition. RENOU, Gramm. Sct. - Louis RENOU, Grammaire sanscrite, 2 vols. (Paris, 1930). RENOU, Terminologie. - Louis RENOU, Terminologie grammaticale du sanscrit, 3 vols. (Paris, 1942). RUBEN, Philosophen. - Walter RUBEN, Die Philosophen der Upanishaden (Bern, 1947). Ś. - Sankara. S. - Sudarsanasuri, see Ramanuja, Ved. Sabarasvamin. - Mimamsadarsana by Sabarasvamin, ed. by V. G. APTE, 6 vols. (Bombay, 1929-34). Sālikanatha. - Prakaraṇapañcikā by Sālikanätha (Chaukhamba Skt. Ser.). Sankara, BrSBh. - see BrSBh. Sankara, Upadeśas. - Upadeśasahasri by Sankara, with Ramatirtha’s Padayojanika, ed. by C. Laxman Sastri PANSIKAR (Bombay, 1930). Sankara, Upanisadbh. - Upanisadbhasya by Sankara, ed. H. R. BHAGAVAT (Poona, 1927-28). Samvitsiddhi. - see Yamuna. Sarvajñātman, Pañcaprakriyä - The Pañcaprakriya of Sarvajñātman, ed. by T. R. CHINTAMANI (Madras, 1946). Sarvajñātman, Samkṣepaśārīrakam. - The Samksepaśäriraka of Sarvajñātman, ed. by H. N. APTE (Bombay, 1918). $Bh. - see Rāmānuja. SCHRADER, Pañcarātra. - F. Otto SCHRADER, An Introduction to the Pañcarātra (Adyar, 1916). SINHA, Psychology. - Jadunath SINHA, Indian Psychology: Perception (London, 1934). Siddhitraya. - see Yamuna. Ślokavārttika, - see Kumärila. Srinivasa, YID. - Yatindramatadipika by Srinivasa, ed. by H. N. APTE (Bombay, 1906). SRINIVASACHARI, Bhedabheda. - P. N. SRINIVASACHARI, The Philosophy of Bhedabheda (Adyar, 1950). Sureśvara, Naiskarmyasiddhi. - The Naiskarmyasiddhi of Sureśvara, ed. by M. HIRIYANNA (Bombay, 1925). Sureśvara, BAUpBhVärttika. - The Bṛhadaranyakopaniṣadbhāṣyavärttika of Sureśvara. Stotraratna. - see Yamuna. Th. - George THIBAUT, Vedanta-Sutras with Rāmānuja’s Commentary, SBE XLVIII (Oxford, 1904). Tätp. - Tatparyadipika of Sudarsanasūri, see Rāmānuja, Ved. TS. - see Annambhaṭṭa, TS. V.Ved. - see Yamuna. VedP. - Vedarthasamgraha, see Ramanuja, Ved. VARADACHARI, Theory of knowledge. - Vedantaparibhāṣā, see Dharmaraja. Vimuktātman. - K. C. VARADACHARI, Sri Ramanuja’s Theory of Knowledge (Tirupati, 1943). VP. - Istasiddhi by Vimuktätman, ed. by M. HIRIYANNA (Baroda, 1933). Yamuna. - Visnupurana, ed. Gītā. Press (Gorakhpur, 2009/1951). YID. - Agamapramanya, reprint from Pandit, ed. by Pt. S. M. Rama Misra SASTRI (Benares, 1994/1937).
SIDDHITRAYA, consisting of Atmasiddhi, Isvarasiddhi and Samvitsiddhi, ed. by Pt. S. M. Rama Misra SASTRI (Chowkhambā Sanskrit Series, Benares, 1904).
Stotraratna, ed. and translated by Swami ADIDEVANANDA (Madras, 1950).
Yatindramatadipika, see Srinivāsa. [[P3]]

INTRODUCTION

I. THE SADVIDYA IN VEDANTA

The moment that the ancient Indian speculations on the creation and origin of the world passed from a mythological stage to a more or less philosophical one is often, and in my opinion correctly, fixed by the first occurrences of the term sat in cosmogonical Veda texts. This is of course not much more than a convenient landmark, the selection of which has been determined by the role of the term and conception of sat in later thought rather than by its significance in the Veda. Moreover, it would be too rash to assume a direct and complete evolution of cosmogonic speculations from a mythological to a philosophical plane: not only do mythological elements accompany the speculations on sat’s origin-elements which will persist, though later on they may conveniently be called theistic-, but also the manner in which they are introduced into some of the Vedic hymns creates the impression that the conception of sat and correlated ideas had already reached an advanced stage of elaboration before they were accepted in a Vedic context: in other words, that they derived from another milieu than that commonly represented by the Vedic poets. On the other hand, the strictly philosophical import of the notion of sat should not be exaggerated : it is anachronistic to render it as “being” in the sense of esse. It is a very concrete term with a distinct demonstrative value¹ and can perhaps best be rendered by “this which is here and now” a meaning that can be followed through the Upanisads.

The paramount importance in later Indian thought of the idea complex that is from the beginning connected with sat needs no proof. Although in other systems of philosophy its influence can be shown, it is most conspicuous in Samkhya and Vedanta. But when we survey these two darśanas as the clear-cut systems of later date, we find that sat, or corresponding terms, have assumed different, even opposite, connotations which reflect the fundamental difference between the darśanas: for Vedanta as a whole sat is the transcendent and immaterial, for Samkhya the immanent and material first cause of the world. Within the fold of Vedanta again the elaboration of the [[P4]] problems involved in the idea complex of sat as transcendent causa prima has led to extremely diverging solutions. We have therefore in the presystematic speculations about sat and its origin a convenient starting-point to seek a point of vantage from which we can survey the relation between Vedānta and Samkhya, and between the systems of Vedanta, among which especially Rāmānuja’s system will interest us most. We shall try to sketch in broad outlines the complex of notions associated with sat in its presystematic usage to see if there is anything in it that may add to our understanding of the later differences.

We may depart from the sadvidyā of Chandogya Upanisad 6, Uddālaka’s teaching of his son Svetaketu, easily the most celebrated śruti text. It plays an important part in Vedantamīmāmsā, not only for its own sake, but also indirectly because it has been dealt with in the Brahmasutras, so that all system-building commentators had to explain it precisely. Their explanations concern invariably the relation between the first cause and the effected world, and in so far as this relation is the fundamental problem of Vedanta the commentaries on the arambhanadhikarana represent the central doctrines of the systems. The general interpretation is of sat as the self-existent, transcendent and absolute Brahman as an essentially perfect entity in opposition-of varying degree to its effect, the phenomenal world. Modern scholarship, on the other hand, has long since recognized that the same sadvidyā represents an early stage of more or less ‘Samkhyan’ speculations; and whereas translators like Böhtlingk, Deussen, Senart, Hume and Radhakrishnan render their text in a spiritualist sense.⁵ other scholars like Jacobi, Betty Heimann and Ruben⁶ urge that this famous prapathaka voices a materialist tendency. We have to go beyond our text to discover its meaning in the context to which it belongs.

The earliest form-but not necessarily the most primitive one-of the question of the provenance of “this which is” is found in Rigveda 10, 72: it is asked how the gods came to be. The poet describes how Bráhmaṇaspáti forged these worlds as a blacksmith: for in the age before the gods sat originated from asat, and after it, or rather along with it, originated the worlds.⁷ The sequel shows that the poet had other, probably more congenial, cosmogonic associations in mind where Daksa and Aditi were the primeval progenitors from whom the worlds were born.

The relation between sat and the personality of Brahmanaspati, who somehow assisted at its origination, remains obscure. His personality reminds us of RV. 10, 81 where creation is described as the handiwork of the divine artisan Viśvákarman-who significantly is called Vacáspáti.⁸ In this sukta the question is posed: what is the foundation, what the foothold on which Viśvakarman created; and again: seek with your minds, O sages, for that on which he stood while supporting the worlds. This question is, it would seem, directly answered in RV. 10, 129; the sages found out that sat is fastened to asat.

This famous hymn formulates elaborately and in an already advanced form the view that sat arose from asat. The progress made in this hymn concerns not so much the relation between sat and asat as that between both and the personality behind it: Bráhmanaspáti and Viśvákarman Vacáspáti are succeeded by a vague and anonymous ádhyakṣa or superintending person whose actual assistance at, and knowledge of, sat’s origination is questioned: under whose protection did it take place? and: he knows, or does he?⁹ Henceforth the question of a personal agency behind the creation of this world will remain connected with the question of the relation between sat and asat.

The latter relation is expressed in this sūkta in the terms of conception and procreation:¹⁰ in the womb of asat, the dark hidden within the dark, in which the embryonic water was as yet ‘unaccidented’,¹¹ the one first embryo (abhú) is conceived with an excess of heat-orgasm; the procreative impulse (káma) takes shape in that germ which is the first germ of will (mánas):¹²

This tendency to do away with both the relicts of a creator person and asat as a necessary hypothesis for the origination of sat finds it conclusion in Uddālaka’s sadvidya where for the first time the originality and eternity of this which is is posed in a polemical manner: originally sat was only here, nothing else: for how could it arise from asat?¹³ Something that is of a certain kind cannot arise from something else which is not of the same kind: sat is the irreducible, it is ‘kind’ itself, like in a clay pitcher clay is the ‘kind’ beyond which the pitcher cannot be reduced.

How does Uddālaka account for this view in the terms of his age? He begins by asking his son: “What is the instruction by which the unrevealed is revealed, the not understood understood, the unknown known?¹⁴” The instruction is given in the following lessons which are summarized (4, 5) “this [[P6]] is what the ancient who knew it, those who were great in disputations¹⁵ and great experts in śruti, have said: ‘Now there is no one who could name a single thing that is not yet revealed, understood and known; for they knew it by those (three colours): that which is red, they knew it for the colour of glowing-heat; that which is resplendent, they knew it for the colour of water; that which is black, they knew it for the colour of grown food; that which is not known (for anyone of these three colours), they knew it for a combination of these three deities.”

It is clear that the instruction is primarily concerned with an inventory of the world under the three ‘aspects’ (rūpa"colour, coloured form") of tejas “glowing-heat”, apas “water”, anna “grown food”. These three aspects are described as the successive offspring of what is called sat. All the beings that in their turn went forth from the deities which are these ‘aspects’ (from tejas derives sun and all that is of sun etc.¹⁶) are described as “change proceeding from speech, or name.” What exactly is meant by this phrase becomes clear from the illustrations given by Uddalaka. His son asks what is the instruction which promises to reveal everything, and Uddālaka answers: “It is like this, my son: we can know all that is made of clay by knowing one lump of clay: the change is that which proceeds from speech or name: it is clay: that is the truth.” Similarly we know all that is made of copper by knowing a lump of copper ore,¹⁷ and all that is iron by knowing a nail-cutter. The last instance warns us that the point is not so much that we first are to know the first or rough material but that a small piece of the same kind is enough to classify the kindred; as indeed it is.

When this is made clear Uddalaka declares: “only sat was here¹⁸ ori[[P7]]ginally, nothing else; i.e., nothing that was not sat, i.e., asat. “That wished:¹⁹ ‘I will be many, I will beget,’ it begot tejas. That tejas thought: ‘I will be many, I will beget,” it begot water. That is why whenever a man is hot then he sweats; consequently from the (engendered) heat water arises.²⁰ Water wished: “I will be many, I will beget,’ it begot grown food. That is why whenever it rains, then there is plenty of food. Food and eatables consequently arise from water. All beings have three ways of being born, from an egg, a living being, or a plant. That first deity wished: “Well, now will I make separate forms and names by entering into these three deities as a living being myself: I will make each of them threefold.” So she entered and divided.

We see that in this instruction an inventory is attempted of all beings under the three aspects or ’elements’ tejas, water and food. These ’elements’ however do not sum up the entire world: they are ‘classes’. Nor do they sum up sat: as the comparisons show sat is the field on which tejas works to produce water, and both to produce food. This vision was no doubt inspired by nature: sun, rain and food work from and on earth. Later commentators invariably take these three ’elements’ to imply the classical five. But, if not more primitive,²¹ the series is of a different kind. Not only does it intend to distinguish the three spatial layers of sun, clouds and land,²² but also three [[P9]] temporal events: hot season, rainy season, harvest time.²³

The stage of Uddalaka’s speculations is yet more advanced: the three are also the three aspects under which the existent beings can be grouped according to colour. From this point of view the series shows affinities with that of the three guņas under which the world, constituted by the five elements, is classified as being bright, moving and stationary. It is interesting to note how the colours persist: Śvetāśvatara ‘puns’ on an unborn male (aja"constant self and puruşa” or “he-goat”) who copulates with an unborn female (ajā"constant matter” or “she-goat”) who is red, white and black;²⁴ red, white and black threads woven in a piece of cloth will be the Samkhya’s stock-example of the material cause persisting in the effect,

We may now ask: how does the sadvidya continue RV. 10, 129? Fundamental is Uddālaka’s polemic against those who hold a more original asat to account for sat. So did the Vedic poet hold, but his asat is by no means original: originally there was nothing at all. Uddālaka’s did away with the hypothesis of asat: sat in the beginning-the beginning as far as the world is concerned, creation was there alone. Is Rāmānuja right in explaining advitiya as denying that there was a separate adhisthätṛ who was ‘instrumental’ to the process of creation?²⁵ In any case the vague watching person has disappeared.

Yet we find traces of the original birth-process of sat as described in the sukta; but the events which in the Vedic hymn took place as successive stages in a conception are now represented as primary emanations of sat itself and the chronological sequence has become a causal chain. Nonetheless, the emanations of tejas, water and food are of a different kind from creation proper which only sets in after food has been produced and sat has entered the ’elements’.²⁶ The parallelism is unmistakable: in the sūkta the embryo which was conceived by an excess of heat (tápas)²⁷ in the formerly unaccidented water was the germ in which the primary creative impulse took shape: an order kâma-tápas-Water-conceived germ presents itself clearly. In Uddalaka’s account these succeeding events are moments in a causal series proceeding from sat’s first impulse: sat desires to multiply and tejas appears, after and through tejas water, after and through water the fruit (anna).

[[P10]] Bearing the Vedic archetype in mind we could speak of sat’s self-creation, which is completed with the origination of anna.

At this exact point we find a remark that is highly significant: there are three ways of being born, from an egg, as a living being, a plant.²⁸ So long as we do not recognize that sat is creating itself, this remark seems irrelevant, and Senart was indeed led to regard it as an interpolation. But it is a necessary observation: how does the definitive birth of the now completely conceived sat proceed? To each of its constitutive ’elements" corresponds a mode of birth: to tejas that of the brooded egg, to water that of the living being born in the embryonic liquid, to anna that of a plant. So naturally the next sentence reads: “I will now make separate names and forms (i.e. start creation proper) by entering the three deities as a living being myself.”

The three constitutive events of conception elaborated as separate moments of a causal series are now again condensed and integralized, and it is sat, not anna, which starts creation by being born in the manner of a living being itself.²⁹

It goes without saying that Uddālaka’s vision is not a mere recast of the Vedic archetype. The contents of the Vedic description are its structure rather than its contents: to use our terms, the events of a more or less symbolical creation by procreation provide the structure of a temporal-spatial coherence of the three layers of the world and three successive creative changes, which is integralized in the self-creation of sat. This self-creation is preceded by, or proceeds from, a phase of sat as ablu, a potentiality which actualizes itself by passing through a series of primary emanations, prototypes of the following creation by triplication; but these three prototypes form the triunity of the actual sat. Hence it is rightly said that in the final analysis sat is the [[P11]] anima, the irreducible stuff of which everything is made, root, meeting-place,³⁰ solidity, ätman of everything: the atomic minimum that remains after all successive products have inversely been dissolved in their causes, and “you are it, Svetaketu.”

We have but lightly passed by the meaning of the phrase vacārambhaņam vikāro nāmadheyam, describing the process by which the effect emerges from its cause.³¹ This phrase has become the bone of content of the later commentators explaining BrS. 2, 1, 14 tadananyatvam arambhanasabdadibhyah. There can be little doubt that the term arambhana is taken from, or inspired by, RV. 10, 81, 2 where it is asked: kim svid asid adhiṣṭhānam árámbhanam katamát svit kathasit/yáto bhúmim janáyan viśvákarmā ví dyám aúrnon mahima višvácakṣāḥ “what was the underlay or foothold, what the support, and how was it, out of which Viśvakarman, producing the earth, separated the sky by his power, he the all-seeing One?”³² This question is repeated and illustrated (4): “What was the forest and what the wood, out of which they fashioned heaven and earth? Seek for that with your minds, O sages, on which he stood while supporting the worlds.” One reply was given in 10, 129: sat is fastened to asat. Uddalaka replies: the effect is vācărambhanam, i.e. nämadheyam,

No doubt with this connexion of the Vedic hymn in mind Ramanuja tries to show that the sadvidya by advitiya denies a separate adhisthätṛ, and he quotes TaittBr. 2, 8, 9, 6 where the question of the Vedic poet was directly answered: brahman is the forest and the wood on which the creator stood, i.e., the materia prima out of which he created.³² Madhva, even more explicitly, refers directly to the Vedic hymn,³³ and though the use he makes of it is objectionable, GHATE is wrong in declaring that “the topic is irrelevant”.³⁴

Arambhana is synonymous with adhistāna “the stable and solid [[P12]] foundation” which in Indian thought, where the notion of cause is inseparably linked up with that of a permanent, immobile and solid substructure, is virtually synonymous with our “material cause”. As the second quoted stanza shows ārambhana is the materia prima from which things take their beginnings and in which, apart from some individual modifications, they consist. So one would translate: “Name is the effect, name which has its basis in speech”. We are reminded of the fact that Viśvakarman, who created the worlds while standing on the arambhana was called the Lord of Vāc and that Brahmanaspati, who forged the worlds when sat emerged from asat, is the Lord of Brahman, and that according to Taitt Br. that on which Viśvakarman stood was again Brahman. Sat, wishing to multiply, said: “I be many”, and it was many. Vac and Brahman, it seems, Both³⁵ stand for the powerful and powerfully creative word that creates a thing in its individuality by pointing it out and thus distinguishing it from the common stuff it is made of. He who names uses of the power of naming to create:name is what he resorts to (aуrabh) when singling out a new thing from the common undistinguished stuff. Uddālaka, doing away with the creating and naming person, still preserves the power of naming to account for the emergence of new things out of the common stuff that is sat, or of sat: satya.

Is this stuff, this sat that is the atman of everything, a material or or immaterial entity for Uddalaka? In an interesting śruti³⁶ Uddālaka himself replies to a similar question of king Asvapati: “Gautama, how do you conceive of the atman?” “As the earth.” Asvapati paraphrases this answer: Uddālaka’s ātman is the solid basis,³⁷ on which he stands solid himself, solid in children and cattle, and eats and enjoys life: but his ātman is the ātman’s feet. Important are other descriptions of sat: BAU. 1, 3, 28, ChUp. 8, 3, 5 it is deathless (amṛta), so BhG. 9, 12; BAUp. 2, 3, 1 it is Brahman’s embodied form, corresponding to that which is stationary and transient, this embodied form being distinguished from a disembodied one that is described as being wind and sky: sat is clearly the earth here. Later on, Prašn. Up. 2, 5; 4, 5; BhG. 4, 5 sat and asat simply sum up the entire world.

[[P13]] It is clear that Uddālaka’s teaching is not ‘spiritualist’ in the sense that the irreducible stuff at the bottom or root of all things is conceived as an entity different in kind from the matter of the phenomenal world and transcending it as an immaterial spirit that happens to be also immanent to some extent. Yet, no more can it be urged that the teaching is materialist. Matter and spiritthe term nearest to spirit is neither atman nor manas, but vāc in vācārambhaṇam — are not treated as different or distinct. Actually the question of matter and spirit does not arise. Nor is the diversity emerging from the stuff sat disparaged as being merely effects: there is nothing discreditable in things being created by naming out of their common substratum: rather is the discovery of name as a principle of individuality a precious one. One might go further and suggest that Uddālaka’s main purpose was not to set forth the rather obvious unity of things in general, but just the manner of deriving diversity from it: his is after all a creation myth.

Another point is worth interest: Uddālaka manages to elaborate a cosmic vision without once borrowing terms from ritual terminology. The majority of Upanisad thinkers cannot conceive of wide perspectives in both macrocosmos and microcosmos except in ritual terms: small wonder, for it was in these terms that the Brāhmaṇas had described a coherent sacrocentric universe. Uddālaka, one may gather, did not care to depart from the ritually sacred, and his brahman was vāc.

We may read an essentially ‘Samkhyan’ tendency in his discourse: Samkhya not in the sense of a coherent system with a psychology and eschatology of its own, but rather of an attiude, an approach of study, an interest in classifying the world, a summing-up and inventorizing, indifferent to a distinction between matter and spirit, or even sacred and non-sacred, but primarily concerned with this which is, or sat.

Does this long analysis justify itself in helping us to understand the latter differences in interpreting the relation between the first cause and the effected world? I think it does. Though necessarily we must study the history of thought by the texts that have come down to us, we should while doing so never lose sight of the fact that the actual history moved on another plane, stages of which happened in passing to be fixed and perpetuated in texts while thought moved on. Indian culture was incomparably less livresque than the Western. The continuity of thought was at first served unconsciously by the thinkers, but when gradually the spirit changed, the time came when they began to return consciously to former thought as preserved in ancient texts to receive inspiration from it and so to be better able to serve its continuity. Trends that had been partly or incidentally or not at all voiced in those texts had then been developed, and original visions of a more primitive, and hence often more comprehensive, character [[P14]] been elaborated and distinguished. So texts came to be vehicles of views which, if expressed in them at all, had been part of a different context; and gradually the Word became really transcendent.

When the inspiration of the Upanisad fragments, with their sudden aperçus, cosmic imagery and criss-cross flashes of penetration, had given way to a spirit of systematization, and, after the example of Purvamīmāmsā, brahmajñāna was succeeded by brahmajijñāsā or Vedāntamīmāmsā, order was imposed on the kaleidoscopic teachings of the ancient. Later darśanas or outlooks distinguished themselves. Samkhya, from a more or less independent attitude, became a more independent inquiry. Among those principally interested in the sacred, distinction began to be made-though not yet contradistinction-between the study of the rites proper and the study of that comprehensive power hovering over the rites, their language, their function and their fruits, that more or less objective but mysterious and enigmatic object of speculations about the cosmic constancy correlated to the not less cosmic dynamics of the all-comprising ritualthe brahman. With this brahman dealt the upasanas of the upanisads and now this in its vastness unalterable constancy was sought to be grasped, described and defined on the basis of these texts - mainly, if not exclusively at first, on the basis of the Chandogya Upanisad.³⁸

Though we saw that Uddālaka did not conceive of his sat as an immaterial entity, yet he must have been surrounded by thinkers who tended. to do so. A vedic poet already declared that ekam sat viprā “bahudhā vadanti³⁹ What he called sat was elsewhere named brahman or atman or Nārāyana⁴⁰ It was conceived as the one principle existing par excellence as the stable foundation of cosmic ritual,⁴¹ which to recognize and command would secure release from the retributory effects of ritual, from world itself. In this respect the brahman, too, was satya “true, real” with the peculiarly Indian connotation of “permanently and underivably real”. Macrocosmically that vast, hidden power that supports the world, microcosmically the solid soul of the body, its character of basic constancy attracted the function of cause, which was inseparably connected with the notion of permanent, underlying solidity.

Side by side, a brahma-centric and a more tellurian approach developed out of the sacrocentric cosmology of former ages, but in constant interaction. Sat was conceived of differently as cause. Simultaneously a mythology of the creator god, of a strictly personal character [[P15]] which forbade microcosmic identifications, persisted and gained new importance with the rise of the religions. Though more allied to the Samkhyan spirit of lucid distinctions by names and forms, this personalism influenced the monistically tending brahmanical spirit profoundly and persistently. Such is the composite picture which the Gita shows, and in this picture belong historically the activities of the Brahmasūtrakāras.⁴² They conceived synthetically of the mystic relation between this effected word of transitory phenomena and Brahman, the hypostatized constancy, as a relation of immanent causality. Brahman-never exclusively regarded as an undifferentiated abstract entity emanated the world; the effect grew upon it: while remaining essentially its constant and undisturbed self it passed by a process of parināma into the condition of effect. That in Badarayana’s collection this view is summarized under the ‘Samkhyan’ sadvidyā is not surprising: Uddālaka’s indifference did not preclude a dichotomy of matter and spirit, still less such a vague and pantheistic relation as envisioned by the sūtras; and early Samkhya formed part and parcel of early Vedanta where it would remain its substructure.

It took long before the logical difficulties of maintaining the immanence of a transcendent Absolute in an imperfect, relative and transitory world were recognized, and the parināma doctrine was challenged. The doctrine of vivarta was formulated, at first it seems by sabdadvaita, and later elaborated in Sankara’s school.⁴³ HACKER has shown that the vivarta doctrine was not yet fully accepted by Sankara who tended towards modifying pariņāma in an illusionist sense.⁴⁴ A more oldfashioned position was taken up by Bhaskara who maintained pariņāma in its full force, allowing upādhis or limiting conditions to render the absolute and perfect partly relative and imperfect. Yamuna, and more systematically Rāmānuja, represented a very different view in which pariņāma took place not in the Absolute but in the phenomenal world of matter and souls which were eternally and really related to the Absolute as its natural modes. Madhva, at last, went one step further and rejected this relationship: he professed a radical dualism.⁴⁵

However divergent these solutions, they show one basic agreement: all agree upon the primacy of the transcendence of the Absolute that is sat. We have reached the end of the development. [[P16]]

SRINIVASACHAR⁴⁶ in his useful study of bhedäbhedavāda says that Bhaskara’s philosophy marks a transition from Sankara to Ramanuja, but it is doubtful if such an evolution Sankara-Bhaskara - Rāmānuja, suggested by the relative chronology of their works, can be maintained historically. One would hesitate even to speak of an evolution within Vedanta exclusively: for Sankara and Ramanuja at least one would rather assume influence, or inspiration, from without Vedanta. That Sankara was influenced by Buddhist thought is now generally recognized, and the inspirations of the popular Samkhya of the Puranas are manifest in Rāmānuja’s philosophy. Bhaskara would seem to represent a more traditional view of Vedanta which admitted parināma within the absolute and perfect Brahman, a view which both Sankara and Rāmānuja declined to accept without profound modification. Sankara’s modification towards illusionism was perhaps the simplest and, on the given premisses, the most logical procedure: given the unique reality of Brahman as the eternal spirit, the reality of the phenomenal world with its plurality and variety of transitory material and conscient entities could not be of the same degree of ultimate reality. The world, obviously imperfect and relative effect of the perfect and absolute sat, could not be described as wholly sat; but somehow deriving its relative reality from its perfect cause, it could neither be described as wholly asat, but, for merely practical purposes, it could be taken at least provisionally as real. This view is, in the final analysis, a development of a more ancient Vedānta view -as represented later on by Bhaskara-in that it accepts some effected change of and in Brahman, yet questions the ultimate validity of the conditions of this change and consequently of the change itself.

Ramanuja’s thesis is essentially different from both Sankara’s and Bhaskara’s in that it attributes an ultimately valid, distinct and definable reality to the phenomenal world, and within the phenomenal world to the component orders of non-spiritual matter and individual spirits or souls. The souls are not real (or practically real) and conditioned projections of the absolute spirit, but fundamentally uniform spiritual monads, which in a beginningless process of causation (karman) happen to suffer degrees of change in their essential attribute knowledge.

This thesis is basically Samkhyan, but not dualistic for that. Even with regard to Samkhya itself one hesitates to subscribe to the qualification of dualism. Eternally soul and matter are interrelated in interaction; however different both may be, soul is accessible to matter in its essential quality of knowledge. Though soul may be free from matter, still in potentiality it is vulnerable to it. The union of soul and body is no doubt [[P17]] brought about by a deception: the soul mistakes itself for a material ego. From the soul’s point of view the union is a deficiency, but from the ego’s point of view a harmony: the body obeys the orders of the captive soul to fulfil its purposes: it is completely dependent on the soul for its very existence, it is the mode and the particularization of the egotized soul, without which it is purposeless; and through the body the soul may ultimately rediscover itself in its essential difference.

It is this microcosmic harmony of the soul, as the consciously directing agent and the body as its perfect instrument,⁴⁷ which Rāmānuja has elaborated into an analogy for a macrocosmic harmony. It is remarkable that the conception of the body as the defect of the soul has hardly any significance for Rāmānuja: the marvellous utility of the body is for him its most significant function. This attitude is the consequence of his positive interpretation of Release: it is not an escape from the evils of embodied life but a supreme hankering after a higher fulfilment in the loving adoration of God. So Rāmānuja could conceive of a harmonious Universe, in which the harmony of body and soul was repeated in the harmony of matter and souls which form the body of God who himself is the directing spirit within it. This harmony is eternal; soul and matter exist, and have existed, eternally as modes of God, essentially dependent and subserving the single but supreme purpose of glorifying his Majesty.

Sat at the beginning of creation is God Nārāyaṇa as modified by soul and matter which both constitute His body. The vikara or parināma described by Uddālaka takes place only in God’s modes. God is His perfect self, with the modifying body that at the beginning of creation abides in the subtle or causal phase. Thus God is the material cause, though only his mode of matter undergoes transformation in its essence and his mode of soul in its attribute of knowledge. God is also the operative cause inasmuch as He is the inner Ruler, setting in motion and allowing to operate the causality of karman which brings about the diversity of the finished products, or the gross, effectual phase of God’s body.

We are not concerned here with the question how far Rāmānuja’s exegesis of the sadvidya is the ‘correct’ one, but only with the developments of the idea-complex for which Uddalaka in the terms of his age had found a suggestive expression in the famous sixth prapathaka. The regularity with which the Indian thinkers have ever since returned to the sadvidya to interpret into it their own theses is proof of the fundamental significance for [[P18]] Indian thought of the concept which it expresses. Sat, originally determined neither as an impersonal law nor as a personal demiurge, took in the course of history either form without excluding the other completely. The divergencies between the different schools concern the degree in which the immanence of the transcendent is admitted. But basically they all agree that the transcendent is somehow present and accessible. Even the more radical advaitins, restating the satkāryavāda as satkāraṇavāda, allow that the Absolute be cause. The perfect is never completely unattainable to the imperfect, the absolutely real never wholly inaccessible to the relatively real. The instinct urge to Release of the soul implicated in samsara is a bridge between world and godhead. And sat preserves its ancient meaning throughout the fluctuations between an eminently transcendent ??

Uddalaka expressed sat’s immanence in creation to some extent as the soul’s presence within it, from which presence all this derives its satya: similarly Ramanuja formulated God’s immanence in the world as His inner presence as the soul of the Universe, His body. For Uddālaka sat was the anima, the subtlest possible reduction, for Rāmānuja it is God whose body abides in the subtle phase of cause. Though in other respects their views are far apart, yet both thinkers have a common approach in dealing with the most ancient and most vital problem of Indian thought: the cause is approached from the effect, not the effect from the cause. The formula in which their common approach is summed up is, not team tad asti “it is you”, but tat tvam asi “you are it”.

It is not for merely polemical reasons that Rāmānuja begins his exposition of his views in his philosophical début the Vedarthasamgraha by a fresh interpretation of the sadvidya, but because he recognized the basic significance of this text, which for him, not less than for Sankara, expresses the profoundest truth that man is able to grasp.

II. THE ANCIENT MASTERS

Among the names which Rāmānuja mentions in his list of ancient commentators,⁴⁸ Bodhayana, Tanka, Dramida, Guhadeva, Kapardi and Bharuci, only the three first mentioned are known as authors of specific commentarial texts, whereas of the others nothing but the names has been [[P19]] saved from oblivion. Nonetheless, the identities of the first three are hardly less obscure and they have been obscured further by several attempts to clarify them. It would seem to be necessary, after KUPPUSWAMI’S interesting but unconvincing identifications⁴⁹ and DASGUPTA’s critical but incomplete account,⁵⁰ to restate the problems and rearrange the available evidence.

§1. Bodhayana the Vṛttikāra :

Rāmānuja declares in the first line of his Śrībhāṣya⁵¹ that he will follow the interpretation that Bodhāyana has given of the Brahmasūtras in his extensive vṛtti, which has been abbreviated by the ancient Masters. He quotes this Vrtti-to conform to the custom and use the class-name as its title some seven times in his Śribhāṣya and nowhere else.⁵² These seven fragments, it would seem, are all that is known of a vṛtti by a Bodhāyana. Sankara, however, according to his commentators Rāmānanda and Anandagiri refers implicitly to a Vṛttikāra in several places of his Brahmasutrabhāṣya.⁵³ They identify this author with an Upavarșa, possibly⁵⁴ on the strength of a remark by Sankara ad BrS. 3, 3, 53: ata eva bhagavatopavarṣena prathame tantre ätmästitvābhidhānaprasaktau ‘sarirake vakṣyama ity’ uddhara uktah “therefore the venerable Upavarșa declared at a point in the First Tantra where there was occasion to discuss the existence of the Soul: “We shall explain this in the Sariraka”. This remark is, according to KUPPUSWAMI, a clear indication that Upavarșa was the author of [[P20]] vṛttis in both karma. and brahmasutras and he proceeds to identify him with Rāmānuja’s vṛttikāra Bodhāyana.

The question is, however, appreciably more complicated than at a first glance it would appear to be. An Upavarṣa is mentioned by Sabarasvamin ad Karmasutra 1, 1, 5 in a discussion on the topic of what constitutes a word.⁵⁵ So, on the basis of Sankara’s and Sabara’s references and citations and of Rämänanda’s identification, we may conclude that Upavarṣa did indeed write a vṛtti on both Karmaand Brahmasutras. Venkatanatha, writing in the 14th Century, suggests the identity of this Upavarṣa with our Bodhāyaṇa, but it is noteworthy that he refers to him by quoting Sabara’s quotation.⁵⁶ One wonders whether he knew much more of him than just that analysis of the word gauḥ, and whether, for that matter, Sankara’s commentators did.

The citation from Upavarṣa by Sankara is in itself most interesting. It is remarkably worded. Tantra may indeed mean “system, doctrine” but much more frequent is the sense of “chapter, part of a larger treatise”. If we accept this sense we shall be led to conclude that Upavarṣa’s text contained both the Karma and Śārīrakasutras as one context.⁵⁷ KUPPUSWAMI just stops before this conclusion: “Upavarṣa was decisively in favour of treating the Karma-Mimämsä and Brahma-Mimāmsā as forming the former and the latter parts of an integral whole”. Left at this the statement vakṣyāmaḥ means simply that Upavarșa contemplated writing a vṛtti on the Säriraka part. Yet, to express such an intention of commenting on another work some time in the future is most uncommon with Indian commentators; but very frequent indeed are references to, and anticipations of, what is to follow later on in the same text.

Reading the citation naturally we under[[P21]] stand that Upavarṣa postponed the discussion of a certain topic to a later chapter of the treatise on which he was commenting. But all our evidence points to the fact that Jaimini’s and Badarayana’s Sutras are not only different treatises by different authors but belong to two altogether different śāstras; and any evidence extracted from one stray sentence crumbles before this firm fact.

Sureśvara, however, in his Naiskarmyasiddhi sambandhokti ad 1, 91 makes incidentally a surprising statement: yato na Jaiminer ayam abhipraya ‘amnayasya sarva eva kriyartha’ iti: yadi hy ayam abhiprāyo ‘bhavisyad ‘athāto brahmajijñāsā janmādy asya yata’ityevamādi sarvavedāntamīmāmsanam śrīmacchārīrakam nāsūtrayiṣyat; asutrayac ca Jaimini cannot have meant that ‘all scripture bears on acts’: if he had he would not have composed his Śārīrakasutras athāto brahmajijñāsā etc. in which he interprets the sense of all Upanisads: but the fact is that he did!” In the light of this remark⁵⁸ our explanation of Upavarṣa’s statement as referring to one treatise of both corpora of Sutras becomes more plausible.

Let us also consider the testimony of one of Bodhāyana’s fragments: samhitam etac chārīrakam Jaiminiyena ṣoḍaśalakṣaṇeneti sastraikatvasiddhiḥ “that Karmaand Brahmasutras constitute one śästra is proved by the fact that this Šārīraka is incorporated in one treatise with Jaimini’s Sutras in 16 Chapters”: the wording again is significant: etat must mean that Bodhāyana refers to the work on which he is commenting, whereas the pregnancy of the word-order Jaiminiyena ṣoḍaśalakṣanena can only be brought out in rendering it “Jaimini’s work, i.e. the one in 16 chapters”: in other words at least two forms of the Jaiminiya were already known to Bodhayana, one in 16 and one not in 16 chapters.

There is little doubt that the 16 Chapters refer to KMSutras I-XII with Samkarṣakanda XIII-XVI.⁵⁹ It follows that we have three corpora of [[P22]] sutras known to Bodhāyana: one in 12, one in 16, and one in 20 chapters including the 4 adhyayas of the sariraka. Did he comment on the preceding 16 Chapters of the Jaiminiya also? I doubt it. The quoted fragment II must have been connected with fragment I in some discussion like this: “Atha has the sense of immediate succession.[Objection: No; for Karmamimāmsā and Brahmamimämsä being different sastras immediate succession is excluded. Reply: No;] that both constitute one śastra is proved by the fact etc.” It is possible to explain ṣoḍaśa as 12 KMS. + 4 BrS., as Rāmānuja clearly does.⁶⁰ In that case we are to conclude that Jaimini wrote a Sārīraka, which as we saw is quite possible, and that Bodhayana did not comment on that one but a different one, since otherwise the specific mention of Jaiminiya would be pointless; moreover Rāmānuja, had he known about such a Śārīrakam, would no doubt have made the most of it because the continuity of the śastras is the corner-stone of his system: that he does not think of it although it is implied by his own interpretation of ṣoḍaśa proves that he did not know of the existence of a continuous treatise of Sutras that was commented on in its entirety by Bodhāyana. As Ramanuja is the only author of whom we know that he consulted this vṛtti, we have to accept his evidence whether he was right or wrong–and leave it at that.

There is other confusing evidence which contradicts this. The Prapañcahrdaya states that Bodhayana did write vṛttis on both Sutras, even a complete extensive commentary called Krtakoți “Disputation on Karman”⁶¹; this bulky commentary was abbreviated by Upavarșa, but slightly (kimcit), and further abbreviated for the slow-witted by Devasvamin.⁶² Then Bhavadāsa was the first to comment the 16 Chapters of the Jaiminiya only; finally Sabarasvamin was the first to comment on the 12 Chapters only, leaving out the Samkarsakända.

How reliable is this account? We know nothing about the author and its age, but we gather that he was a Vaisnava bhakta following Samkhya and a tantric kind of Yoga, which would render his date rather late. Of the Vedanta systems he describes only an advaita [[P23]] school, which seems to be post-Sankara and he mentions the names of Sankara, Brahmadatta and Bhaskara.⁶³ He is right about Sabara, at least partly right about Devasvamin of whom we have a commentary on the Samkarṣakanda left.⁶⁴ His other data conflict with what little evidence we have.

Rāmānuja did not know about a Sutra collection in 20 Chapters. Besides, the convincing name of the Commentary is more probably that of Upavarṣa’s, whom the Vaijayanti calls Kṛtakotikavi “author of the Kṛtakoti”,⁶⁵ His history of the Sutras and its commentaries sounds plausible, but some of the earlier names may have been filled in to make it stick. Withal its authority is dubious.

To sum up. On our evidence the probabilities are that Upavarṣa, author of a vṛtti on both Sūtras, probably entitled Krtakoti, is different from Bodhāyana known from Rāmānuja’s quotations; that Bodhāyana did not compose a vṛtti on the KMSūtras; that therefore he was later than Upavarsa, recognised the schism between the two sastras but did not accept it.

Further we may consider the possibility that Upavarṣa’s śārīrakam not only formed part of, but also went under the name of, Jaiminiyasūtras; and finally that— abstracting from the dubious Devasvamin-since Śabarasvamin was the first commentator to explain the Purvamimämsäsutras only and therefore also recognised the schism, Bodhayana’s date will not be far removed from Sabara’s.

Again we may ask: what is Ramanuja’s evidence worth? In other words, how much did he know of Bodhayana himself? Tradition relates⁶⁶ that Rāmānuja had his pupil Kureśa procure a copy of the vṛtti from a Sārada Math in Kasmir: ⁶⁷ possibly it was purloined, for as soon as it was missing Rāmānuja and Kureśa were chased by the temple-keepers and the manuscript was recovered; meanwhile Kureśa had learnt it by heart.+++(5)+++ The circumstances of the story may be fictitious, but they would hardly have been invented unless Bodhayana MSS. were known to have been extremely scarce. And is it a coincidence that all the quotations are from the first adhyaya?+++(5)+++

Arguments ex silentio are seldom conclusive; but that neither Sudarśanasüri nor Venkatanatha quote once from the vṛtti in their commentaries[[P24]] on a treatise that professes to have been inspired by it-whereas they do quote both the Vakya and the Bhasya, which are far less fundamental to the Śribhāṣya-renders the conclusion that neither one ever saw a copy of it virtually unavoidable.

Significant is also Ramanuja’s statement that Bodhāyana’s supposedly extensive vṛtti has been abbreviated by ancient Masters; he does not actually say that he is following the vṛtti, but the vṛtti as abbreviated. It is quite possible that Rämänuja, too, knew it only by fragments from quotations. This possibility is further increased by the comparative insignificance of the fragments quoted; except for I and II they hardly contribute anything to the argumentation and sometimes they are added as an after-thought. But they may conceivably have been found cited in early treatises which continued ancient traditions of interpretation.

Against this background no special authority can be attributed to Venkatanatha’s identification Bodhāyana = Upavarṣa on which Kuppuswami’s case rests but which Venkaṭanatha himself offers as a guess.

Of interest also is another point. Yamuna, at the beginning of his Atmasiddhi,⁶⁸ gives a list of ancient Vedantins. Strangely enough he does not mention the Vrtti by which Ramanuja set great store and which must have enjoyed great authority-if only by report-in their common milieu. But he mentions a bhāṣyakṛt who had explained Badarāyaṇa’s Sūtras “briefly and profoundly”: bhagavatā Bādarāyaṇenedamarthany eva sūtrāņi pranītāni vivṛtāni ca tāni parimitagambhirabhāṣinā bhāṣyakṛtā. This bhāṣyakṛt is always identified with Dramida the Bhāṣyakāra, for which, as we shall see, there are no arguments.

Ramanuja declares that the vṛtti was an extensive one, Yamuna that the bhāṣya was a brief one. Vṛtti “gloss, scholion” is mainly distinguished from a bhāṣya “commentary” by its size:⁶⁹ a long vṛtti will be very similar to a short bhāṣya. As Bodhāyana’s omission cannot be accounted for in this context-where also a sub-commentary by a Śrīvatsānkamiśra, another ancient Master, is mentioned-I am inclined to think that Yamuna and Rāmānuja both referred to the same work by different descriptions; Ramanuja may have preferred the term vṛtti to avoid confusion with Dramida’s bhāṣya.

§2. Tanka the Vakyakara and Dramida the Bhāṣyakara :

Apart from the Vṛttikara and rarely if ever in the same context Rāmānuja quotes regularly from the Vakya of an anonymous vākyakāra and [[P25]] from a bhāṣya thereof by Dramida. Both are also known elsewhere. The Vākyakāra is generally named Tanka, and he is identified by Sudarsanasüri and others with Brahmanandin. Tanka’s name, which has the second place. in Rāmānuja’s list, does also occur in a list of Yamuna, but here he has the distinction of being mentioned the first of a series of adversaries and is put on a par with Advaitins like Bhartṛhari and Sankara and with Dvaitadvaitins like Bhartṛprapañca and Bhaskara.⁷⁰ Whatever his persuasion, we have no reason to doubt that Yamuna’s Tanka is identical with Rāmānuja’s. That Rāmānuja, who never introduces him as such, also regarded Tanka as the Vākyakära is indicated by the place which his name holds between Bodhayana the Vṛttikara and Dramiḍa the Bhāṣyakāra. Dramida, this is evident from the citations themselves, followed Tanka’s vakya scrupulously. This is another argument against identifying Yamuna’s bhāṣyakṛt with Ramanuja’s bhāṣyakāra.

Besides, we can understand why Tanka was excluded by Yamuna and included by Rāmānuja. Sarvajñātman, the author of the Samkṣepaśārīraka, quotes in 1,218 ff. a Vakyakāra by name of Atreya who was commented upon by a Bhāṣyakāra: beyond any doubt the latter is Dramida, for the quotation corresponds literally to one by Ramanuja ⁷¹ Nrsimhasramin⁷² commenting on the Samkṣepaśārīraka identifies this Atreya with Brahmanandin to remove the last doubt of his identity. Sarvajñātman’s reference reads:

“Atreya’s Vakya tells us also that all effect is merely phenomenal, not of ultimate reality (samvyavahāramātram). The many defects inherent in the satkaryavāda cannot affect the māyāvāda because it is contradictory: thus, if the effect is merely phenomenal, the defects inherent in the Samkhya view are [[P26]] completely avoided. Hence the sage of Atri’s clan, who is well conversant with the stages of Vedanta, declares that the effect is merely phenomenal. The statement tat satyam in ChUp. 6, 8, 7 is based on the effect’s dependence on satya. His example of the sea and the foam should be understood on the basis of phenomenality (i.e. the effect foam is phenomenal, Brahman sea is ultimately real). After the Vakyakāra has described the effect (vikara-) he adopts immediately afterwards, and develops gradually, the view that all effect is merely phenomenal, and therefore he maintains non-duality (advaita-). The venerable Bhāṣyakāra declares likewise that “the Venerable Lord the Supreme Deity is antarguna, ie. pratyagguna “intrinsically real”.⁷³ And this agrees with our view of a Brahman without qualities, not with the view of a Brahman with qualities”.

We understand that Sarvajñātman refers to the Vakya on ChUp. 6, 2 ff. and especially 6, 8, 7 aitadātmyam idam sarvam tat satyam sa ātmā, where Atreya illustrates the relation between idam sarvam “this Universe” and its underlying principle by the example of the foam and the sea and explains it as satyasamāśrayatva: the Universe has its ontological basis in the ‘Real’ that is its cause (ChUp. 6, 2, 1). Sarvajñātman applies his doctrine, or exegetical method, of the “didactic stages” (bhumi-),⁷⁴ pretending that Atreya was “well-conversant with the stages of teaching of the Upanisads”, and interprets the drstanta as the first stage or pariņāmavāda (satkāryavāda) and the comment corresponding to satyasamasrayatva as the second stage or vivartavada (māyāvāda), and so claims him a true-blue Advaitin. The Bhāṣyakāra’s quotation is most probably taken from the commentary on Daharavidyā ChUp. 8, 1, 1 (tasmin yad antas tad anvestavyam) and antarguna"in whom qualities inhere” explained as “who is essentially interior”.

Sarvajñātman seems aware of diverging explications and emphasizes that it agrees with the nirgunavāda. Foam-and-sea is a favourite example of the bhedabbedavādins, and I think it extremely probable that Yamuna excluded Ţanka by name and Dramida by implication because they tended toward dvaitādvaita. For compare now a quotation by Bhaskara ad BrS. 1, 4, 25 (S. 26; R. 27) atmakṛteḥ parināmāt, where parinäma is that of Brahman’s creative power: Bhaskara proceeds to say that this is the traditional view taken by the authors of the Vakya and the Vrtti on the Chandogya, and quotes the Vakya: “There is an inner causal change (pariņāma)” [[P27]] “as in the case of curds etc.”⁷⁵ We may trust this statement which goes unchallenged by Ramanuja and fits in remarkably well with Sarvajñātman’s exposition.⁷⁶

Rāmānuja, now, who addressed a larger audience of Vedantins than Yamuna, was no less a dialectician than Sarvajñātman and a far superior exegete. Though the expression nirbhugnadaivatam is difficult,⁷⁷ it is clear that Rāmānuja’s interpretation of the common citation is the more natural one. Moreover, in his zeal to show that his system of Vedanta was the one favoured by the ancient Masters, Rāmānuja was at pains to include both ancient commentators Tanka and Dramida, who enjoyed great esteem. This is also proved by Sankara’s references to Dramida in his Bhasyas⁷⁸ and by Sureśvara’s adoption of a story of his,⁷⁹ the well-known one of the prince who, suffering from amnesia, lived with hunters until his memory returned and he recognized himself for what he was. We may conclude that both commentators were ancient Vedantins whose names were hallowed by tradition. Certainly Tanka was not identical with the Tankācārya profusely quoted by Hamsayogin in his Gitābhāṣya: ⁸⁰ one glance at the style of both will prove this immediately.

[[P28]] It cannot be doubted that both Vakya and Bhasya explained the Chandogya Upanisad.[^28_78a] This is not only borne out by the testimonies of Bhaskara, of Sarvajñātman’s commentators and of Anandagiri, but also by the internal evidence of the quotations themselves. All except three of the fragments can somehow be connected with Chandogya texts and have been so connected by Rāmānuja. Apart from Yamuna’s dubious bhāṣyakṛt, there is no evidence at all to connect them with the Sutras. I have collected all fragments known so far and shown against the corresponding ChUp. texts in Appendix I, § 2.[^28_78a]: 78a. There is also a tradition that Dramida commented on the BAUP.

A final question might be asked. Is Tanka, who must have been a very ancient Master, known in the older literature? The language of his very concise Vakya displays an antique sutra-like style; old-fashioned words and constructions are the rule. Tanka appears as the first in Yamuna’s list, of which the chronological arrangement is borne out by the other names mentioned. Although the date of the Sutras is far from fixed, one would assign a date to the Vakya not too far removed from Badarāyaṇa’s. Of course we enter here the realm of speculation, but it may be pointed out that Badarayana mentions an Atreya by name as advocating a view to which an Auḍulomi is opposed. It would seem that the occasion of the cryptic difference is the interpretation of a Chandogya passage.⁸¹ Incidentally we have good reasons to believe that the Sūtrakāra, whoever he was or whoever they were, tended himself toward dvaitadvaita of a kind.⁸² We may also remark that the Sūtrakāra’s main concern was with the Chandogya Upaniṣad. BELVALKAR on plausible grounds goes so far as to contend that the original Sūtras were Chandogya Sutras.⁸³ Though all this is not much evidence, yet it is not entirely out of the question that one of the several unknown sages⁸⁴ mentioned in the Sūtras may have left some vestiges in literature: and we would hardly expect these vestiges to be other than incidental and ambiguous citations by later successors on the same road.

It is impossible to fix a date for Brahmanandin Tanka Atreya. Does it signify anything that in Yamuna’s list he precedes Bhartṛmitra, who accord[[P29]]ing to the Prapancahṛdaya would not seem far removed from Sabara? In any case it is significant that all Vākya quotations, not only Rāmānuja’s but also Sarvajñātman’s, Sudarsana’s and Venkatanatha’s, are accompanied by citations from Dramida’s bhāṣya, and Bhaskara refers to both simultaneously. We may take it that the Bhāṣya, which seems to have been the most authoritative commentary on the Chandogya Upanisad before Sankara’s eclipsed it, has preserved the Vakya. Dramida’s language is not only so much more archaic than Sankara’s but also than Bhartṛprapañca’s that a lapse of at least three centuries may reasonably be presumed. Besides, whereas Sankara attacks Bhartṛprapañca, he pays Dramiḍa the compliment, due to venerable age, of accepting his interpretation where he can safely do so and passing without comment the many passages which he must have found objectionable.

§3. The views of the ancient Masters:

The few fragments of Bodhāyana’s vṛtti are not very informative of his views. We may conclude from the way in which he stresses the continuity of Karma and Brahmamimämsä that he accepted the great importance of ritual acts as preparatory to the liberating intuition of the Absolute however he may have conceived of it-and adhered somehow to the jñanakarmasamuccaya view with its corollaries of the reality of the phenomenal world and the validity of the criteria of perception and reason in theology. To derive from the fact that Rāmānuja professes to follow himor rather the ancient masters as commenting himthe probability that Bodhayana anticipated in all points his late successor, would seem speculative. The most we can say is that the manner in which he was interpreted by his early commentators possibly the mysterious Guhadeva, Kapardi and Bharuci was generally favourable to Ramanuja’s system of unity in difference.

On Tanka and Dramiḍa we are better informed. Though their antiquity made them venerable alike to such opposites as Sarvajñātman, Bhāskara and Rāmānuja, the last two certainly had better claims on them. Ţanka rejects explicitly the doctrine that God’s body is a mere pedagogic fiction and must therefore have affirmed to some extent the reality of the world. The relation between God and worldincluding the empirical soul-is expressed in terms reminiscent of dvaitadvaita: it is like that between sea. and foam: the changing phenomena of the world are no more, but not less, than odd and useless products of an accidental commotion on the surface of a Being which, remaining undisturbed in its infinite profundity, reabsorbs them when calm returns. He adhered to the pariņāmavāda according to which Brahman as cause changes into effect like curds change into butter. We may conveniently call this dvaitadvaita as long as we are aware of the falsification that is implied: the term belongs to a later period and a different universe of discourse. [[P30]]

The personal Deity, possessed of a suprasensible body to his soul, is the object of our knowledge. Interesting are Tanka’s views on upasana, those upaniṣadic meditations which, originally the mental accompaniments of the bodily ritual acts, in the end would supersede the acts themselves. For him they are propaedeutic to the beatific vision: upasana is their constant rememorization or anusmrti, not once and for all but repeatedly and habitually, until, fortified by the observance of cumulative restrictions-ranging from proper nourishment to the suppression of the last relicts of animal life-satisfaction and dissatisfaction, the completely expurgated mind has penetrated the sense of tat tvam asi and attains God in identity.

Dramida appears to have advanced beyond Tanka’s pantheism to a more anthropomorphic theism. Aksara and Brahman are for him Bhagavān. He quotes the Bhagavadgita, He considers the maya doctrine unscriptural. He is a realist and is fond of graphic comparisonsoceans jumping the shores like rutting rams, parables and stories. His God is a merciful sovereign who, waving the fan of his omnipotence, rules all the worlds as a paramount king.

As they stand the Vakya and Bhāṣya quotations are the oldest instances of commentarial Vedanta texts; and it is important to note that on the whole however much may escape usthey are more favourable to Ramanuja’s than to Sankara’s system of Vedanta.

III. THE VEDARTHASAMGRAHA

1. Its date :

There can, in my opinion, be no doubt that the Vedarthasamgraha was Ramanuja’s philosophical début. It was written prior to the Śrībhāṣya which refers to it twice,⁸⁵ not to speak now of innumerable tacit references. Elsewhere I have tried to demonstrate that the Gītābhāṣya presupposes the Śrībhāṣya and no evidence has so far come up to correct this opinion.⁸⁶ Another work ascribed to Rāmānuja, the Vedantadīpa, is also later than the Śrībhāṣya to which it refers explicitly,⁸⁷

[[P31]] There is, however, a curious problem created by still another abridgement of the Śrībhāṣya, known as Vedantasära ’essentials of Vedanta’, not to be confused with Sadananda’s well-known advaita manual. SUDARSANACHARYA maintains that the Vedāntasära is prior to the Vedarthasamgraha,⁸⁸ on grounds whose cogency I fail to see. In itself the very existence of a second and rather thorough-going abridgement of Ramanuja’s magnum opus, side by side with the useful Vedantadīpa, is curious enough. That it was Rāmānuja’s début, as SUDARSANACHARYA Suggests, is extremely unlikely. To me it is unconceivable that Rāmānuja would have put forward his system of Visiṣṭādvaita for the first time to a highly critical audience of contemporary vedāntins by merely indicating its barest outlines as it is done in the Vedantasāra, which is nearer to being a vakya than a bhāṣya. In the most detailed explication to be found in the booklet, that of BrS. 1, 1, 2 janmady asya yataḥ, to which the basic scriptural evidence of SBh. 1, 1, 1 is delegated as a more convenient place to deal with it, the bare essentials of Visistadvaita are enumerated without the slightest attempt at convincing presentation and plausible argumentation. Read, for instance, toward the end: “all vedāntins agree that at the time of resorption there persists a subtle [[differentiation|difference]] between, on the one hand, spirit and matter, and the Supreme Being on the other hand, a differentiation so subtle that it does not admit of phenomenality:⁸⁹ for they, too, (i.e., advaitavadins and aupadhikavādins) assume that the differentiation (between the three ontological orders), being brought about either by nescience or by limiting conditions, has no beginning. But our view differs peculiarly in this: whereas the others contradict all scripture and reason by maintaining either a brahman that is nescient or a brahman that is limited by conditions, we are guilty of no such contradictions on account of the absence (of such doctrines).” This is an extremely tendentious presentation of the rival views, which can only be understood when we have seen Ramanuja’s arguments either in Vedärthasamgraha or in Sribhāṣya. We may also note that Ramanuja nowhere uses the term vedantin, nor indeed vedanta in the sense of Vedantamīmāmsā; nor is vyavahāra in the sense of “phenomenality” common with Rāmānuja; finally, the last sentence is clearly a recast of the second sanza of the Vedarthasargraha.

Similar observations can be made on the majority of the comments in the Vedantasāra by anyone well-read in Rāmānuja; and I think it extremely improbable that Rāmānuja presented his system to the thinkers of his age in such a poor form. If the text was at all composed during Ramanuja’s life-time, it will at most have been an authorized epitome by one of his [[P32]] pupils. The Vedantadipa seems to be more authentic and its existence has indeed some justification in the length and difficulty of the Śrībhāṣya. Yet also in this case I find it hard to believe that Rāmānuja, who, after a traditional life of six score, left but few works in comparison with Sankara, would have preferred the clerical and thankless task of abridging his own chefd’oeuvre to the more congenial composition of, for example, commentaries on the Upanisads.

Among the more lyrical works ascribed to Rāmānuja, the Gadyatraya and Nityagrantha, only the former is found referred to sufficiently often by Indian authors to touch lightly upon it here. It may be described loosely as a prose-poem, consisting of three unequal parts, Šaraṇāgatigadya, Śrīrangagadya and Vaikunthagadya. The text has been commented on by the Vedantadesika who ascribes it to bhāṣyakāra Rāmānuja, and tradition has it that Rāmānuja wrote it in his old age. The gadyas may be described more precisely as exercises in bhakti as taught by Rāmānuja, an endless and repetitious pondering over and rememorizing of God’s infinite perfections. Large portions are repeated over and over again and many passages are practically identical with such evocations as the introduction to the Gītābhāṣya and comments ad Gītā 9, 34; and they are also strongly reminiscent of Yamuna’s hymns. Remarkable is the oft-recurring expression ekantikātyantikaparabhaktiparajñānaparamabhakti in which the Vedantadesika reads an ascension from the desire of having an immediate intuition of a supreme kind to the actual attaining to such an intuition and finally the uninterrupted retaining of it.⁹⁰ The expression is not known to me from Rāmānuja’s other works; possibly it is a restatement of the ascension karman→ jñāna bhakti, where karman, which is essentially aradhana “propitiation” of God, combined with the knowledge of the natures of God, spirit and matter, gradually culminates in the conscious and loving adoration of God.⁹¹ The later distinction between a lower bakti of works and a higher bhakti of complete abandon (prapatti) does not seem to be known to, or at least accepted by, Rāmānuja, as we have tried to show elsewhere,⁹² and it is significant that Vedantadesika does not explain it in these terms. Though formerly I hesitated, there is no valid reason to doubt the authenticity of this little devotional work: perhaps modern scholars are too apt to suspect lyrics that are ascribed to

[[P33]] philosophers and to forget that these philosophers were theologians and officiating priests. The songs of St. Thomas Aquinas, whom nobody would suspect of lyrical aspirations on the basis of his philosophical works, furnish an interesting parallel.

2. Its Sources

A. SMRTI

§1. Function of Smrti:

The scope and authority of smrti texts have been fixed ever since Jaimini ruled: “Smrti is to be disregarded whenever it militates against śruti.”⁹³

A propos of this sutra Rāmānuja, commenting on Brahmasūtra 2, 1, 1, defines the function of smrti in the following terms: “The Vedanta texts aim at establishing complete objects on the basis of apodictical assumption, which is beyond the scope of all other pramānas, from perception onwards; therefore, those people whose knowledge of scriptural revelation falls short stand in need of corroboration of these objects; many smrtis, promulgated by perfectly trustworthy personalities in harmony with the contents of the śruti, serve to corroborate them. This corroboration being equal to the elucidation of the truths set forth by the scriptures is impossible whenever smrti militates against śruti in its primary meaning.” In this connexion, where the authority of the traditional doctrine of Samkhya is condemned, he mentions a number of smrti texts which do fulfil this corroborative function: Mahabharata, Bhagavadgītā, Manu, Visnupurana, Apastambiyadharmasutra, Dakṣasmrti, etc., and which fail to do so, Kapilasmrti and Brhaspatismrti.

The same view is stated in the Vedarthasamgraha⁹⁴ with reference to the Rāmāyana text: “Seeing that Kuśa and Lava were wise and firmly established in the Vedas, the Lord made them apprehend in order to corroborate the Vedas:” for this exactly is the function of epics and puranas.

Distinction is always made between the Mahabharata and its celebrated episode the Bhagavadgītā. On the place of the latter text in Rāmānuja’s system the present writer has commented elsewhere in great detail, and little need be added here. Noteworthy is that in our text the quotations from the Visnupurana outnumber those from the Bhagavadgītā, while in the Śrībhāṣya the latter text appears to play a far more important rôle. There is an ancient Vaisnava tradition that Ramanuja wrote his Gītābhāṣya [[P34]] in extreme old age, which may signify that the Gita grew in importance for Rāmānuja in the course of his career.

Strictly epical citations are mainly from the Mahabharata, especially from the Mokşadharma which Rāmānuja once styles the jñānakāṇḍa of the great epic, and rarely from the Rāmāyaṇa. Quotations from the smrtis in the stricter sense of the word are chiefly from the cosmological and philosophical portions of Manusmrti.

Generally, with the possible exception of the Gītā citations, the quoted stanzas from other smrtis are incidental, supplementary rather than decisive, current quotations of a certain milieu rather than the significant fruits of a dedicated study. The references to the Visnupurana, however, play a more important rôle : it is to this text that Rāmānuja turns to enlarge upon topics most dear to his heart.

§2. Viṣṇupurāṇa:

In comparison with the smrtis that were generally accepted as authoritative, the epics among which the Bhagavadgītā has a privileged position, and Manu, the smarta authority of the Puranas was not so widely and completely recognized before Rāmānuja’s age. Sankara, for instance, only makes sparingly use of corroborative evidence from the Purāṇas.⁹⁵

Ramanuja, however, quotes profusely from the Puranas, or rather from one of them, the Vaisnavite Sri-Visnupurana.⁹⁶ But even he does not do so without an attempt at justification. He introduces a typically purāṇic classification of the purānas into four groups, those promulgated by Brahmā on a ‘day that is one day of Brahma’s life when his sattva constituent preponderated, those promulgated when rajas preponderated and when tamas preponderated,⁹⁷ and those promulgated on a day when the gunas were mixed. In accordance with the classification only the sattvika purānas are fully authoritative, and in case there happen to be conflicts between different purānas, the teaching of the better qualified one is decisive,⁹⁸ The multiple authorship of the Puranas exists only in appearance: Brahmā himself is the auctor intellectualis, on his dictation the sages have compiled their Purānas.

By far the greater majority of the smrti quotations in the Vedarthasamgraha have been taken from the Visnupurana. It is worth noting how [[P35]] Rāmānuja defines the scope of its authority: “The Vaisnava Purana is accepted without dissension by all scholars from the East, North, South and West of India as being adequate (paryāpta-) in so far as it establishes all the dharmas and all the tattvas”.⁹⁹ We may assume that in Ramanuja’s age the Visnupurana had gained wide currency and popularity. —not necessarily only in Vaisnavite circles as a religious and edifying book in all the Indian senses of the words. Interesting is the restriction to “all dharmas and all tattvas”: the basic doctrines do not stand in need of corroboration by the Viṣṇupurana, they are not smärta but śrauta. The description of this Purāņas as a dharma-book is possibly with reference to the huge appendix Visnudharmottara - which, incidentally, is quoted only once in the Śrībhāṣya¹⁰⁰ and not at all in the Vedarthasamgraha-, whereas the tattvas refer either to the three ontological orders of Supreme Being, soul and matter, or to the categories of Samkhya, the influence of which on this popular Purana has been very great.

The strictly metaphysical object of the Visnupurana is described in the following terms: ¹⁰¹ it serves the special and exclusive purpose of setting forth a certain aspect of Brahman’s essence, that is not a phenomenal projection of the Supreme Being, but a particular manifestation of Its essence, This aspect of Brahman or, personally, of Narayana who is the Supreme Brahman, is Visņu who represents Nārāyaṇa’s character of omnipresent pervader and saviour-god of incarnations.

A propos of Rāmānuja’s introduction of the Visnupurana a few general remarks may be made. Not infrequently Rāmānuja is opposed to Sankara as the ‘first sectarian commentator’, by which is meant that he was the first to introduce into Vedantamimāmsā, so far kept pure, external and deteriorating elements which made his system a parochial manifesto rather than a universally valid system of thought; or it is said that he fabricated scriptural evidence, that is to say, made room within Vedanta for a great many śrutis and smṛtis that Sankara either ignored or delegated to the rank of relative truth. It is clear that those who pass these criticisms take Sankara’s selection and treatment of scriptures as normative, in other words, believe on speculative grounds that Sankara is more right than Rāmānuja.

Ramanuja’s citations of the Visnupurana are only illustrative and corroborative. His justification of these citations shows clearly that he was anxious not to introduce any evidence that would be unacceptable to his fellow [[P36]] Vedantins.¹⁰² It is for all Vedanta that he claims to speak. I doubt whether his contemporary Vedantins would have disputed the relevancy of any quotation he gives, though they might debate his interpretation. No doubt the results of his scriptural exegesis are at times picturesque. Yet remarks such as Radhakrishnan-a sympathetic describer of Rāmānuja’s thoughtpasses: “Rāmānuja’s beautiful stories of the other world, which he narrates with the confidence of one who had personally assisted at the origination of the world, carry no conviction,”¹⁰³ are not quite fair in many respects. Other-worldly stories never sound convincing to unbelieving ears; neither do Sankara’s. Besides, the example is ill chosen: Ramanuja is not particularly interested in the circumstances of world origination beyond the fact that it is a causal process by which the qualified, subtly embodied God as the material cause evolves into the phenomenal world of soul and matter constituting a modus of God as the immanent guiding spirit. Finally, if ever he indulges in wondrous stories, he is forced to do so by his texts. This is exactly the point: he takes his texts seriously. A more comprehensive collection of śrutis and smrtis could hardly be made. And he takes his texts literally. If these texts, the authority of which is the very foundation of orthodox metaphysical thought, happen to speak about the golden splendour of God, about the supreme immaterial heaven, about angelic beings eternally absorbed in the contemplation of God’s essence, he accepts them in their literal sense. Only then he proceeds to illustrate and supplement them by quotations from the Visnupurana. If we criticize the results of his exegesis, we criticize the authority of his texts and the validity of his exegetical principles. We are free to do so; but if we do so in order to pass judgment on things metaphysical, we can claim faith, not proof.

§3. The influence of Pañcarātra Agama:

It has often been suggested, and indeed taken for granted, that Rāmānuja attached great importance to the so-called Agama or Tantra of the Pañcaratra, that is that class of multitudinous and voluminous texts which present themselves since 5th-7th centuries A.D. side by side with the Puranas with which they have much in common. They embody the ancient tradition [[P37]] of Pancaratra, combining a Samkhyan or Samkhya-inspired cosmogony with the devotion of Viṣṇu-Nārāyaṇa. Although ideally treating of metaphysics as well, they are for the greater part manuals of Tantric ritual and mantra. Their metaphysical doctrines and speculations are, if at all, stated in a cosmogonical context.¹⁰⁴ A striking feature is the doctrine that the Supreme Personal God, quasi-independent of whom his personified sakti or creative potency operates as his active female counterpart, at the beginning of creation becomes differentiated into four Vyuhas or divisions, Vasudeva, Samkarsana, Pradyumna and Aniruddha, over whom the perfections and functions of the God are distributed and who develop the new universe in several successive stages. Although most of the origin of Pañcarātra is obscure, it would in my opinion not be too speculative to regard this system, at least the cosmogonical-metaphysical side of it, as a continuous development of presystematized theistic Samkhya as alluded to or expressed in Upanisads like the Chandogya, Svetāśvatara and Katha and in philosophical portions of the epic. Extraneous elements may have been absorbed when the personality of Visnu became increasingly complex. Esoteric speculations on hidden meanings in language, as old as the Brahmanas, may always have formed part of it, even though the contents of these speculations-jealously kept secret, even now-have changed. The conspicuous ritualistic tendencies would also point to ancient associations. One is inclined to think of this comprehensive and syncretistic ‘system’ as one of the main channels by which the old Brahmanistic spirit continued to flow through the wasteland of the Buddhist period, never quite running dry but receiving from underground tributaries that sprang from distant and unexplored sources. That this spirit was able to receive inspiration from the popular beliefs around the divine figure of Visnu the viśvarupa could find some explanation in the fact that of the Vedic gods who in Hinduistic times became prominent Vişnu was from of old intimately associated with the life-preserving ritual.

Agama appears to have played an important rôle with Rāmānuja’s precursors who attempted to emancipate their traditional Vaisnavism and Bhagavatism. No less a part did it play in post-Ramanuja Visiṣṭādvaita. Yamuna composed a special prakarana to defend its authority, the Agamaprāmāṇya. Venkaṭanatha the Vedantadesika wrote a Pañcaratrarakṣā, and in the brief but authoritative manual Yatindramatadipika the authority of Pañcarātra is stated without question.¹⁰⁵ This often emphatically expressed favour of ancient and modern Visiṣṭādvaitins for Pañcaratra is the main reason for the prevailing view that this corpus of mythological, cosmogonical,

[[P38]] ritualistic and occult speculations and practices occupied a priviliged place in Rāmānuja’s philosophical system.

We have already seen that Rāmānuja, far from being a “sectarian commentator fabricating śrutis” actually took the utmost care to avoid any parochialism and, when attacking his adversaries and erecting his own school on the ruins of their systems, used recognized weapons and tools. When he adduces evidence from so venerable a smrti text as the Visnupurana he carefully proceeds to define and confine the scope of its authority. We would expect, and his adversaries demand, a similar avant-propos before he would introduce the Agama in evidence.

It is however remarkable that neither in the Vedarthasamgraha nor in the Śrībhāṣyaexcept in the utpattyasambhavadhikaraṇaRāmānuja quotes a single pada from the one and a half crore of slokas in which, according to the tradition, the Agama consists.¹⁰⁶ Nor are any of the characteristic doctrines of this system as much as hinted at. It is true that Rāmānuja enlarges upon Pañcarātra in his comments on Brahmasutras 2, 2, 39-42, but even there it should be noted that he does not confess himself a Bhāgavata or Satvata and that he mainly repeats and restates the arguments adduced by Yamuna against Sankara’s and Bhaskara’s controversial explanations. As this section of the Śrībhasya is our only evidence that Rāmānuja admitted the Pañcarātra at all, we should not interpret its significance too pregnantly. We cannot conclude that he regarded those texts, three of which he quotes, as authoritative in any other sense than other smrti texts like Manusmrti, Mahābhārata and Rāmāyaṇa, each of which is quoted more often than all Agamas together.

The main points of his commentary are 1. Pañcaratra does not hold that the soul has a beginning;¹⁰⁷ 2. The Vyuhas are the subtle or causal phase of the Supreme Being as the material and operative cause; ¹⁰⁸ 3. Agama embodies the Vedic doctrine in an easily comprehensible popular form; 4. Bādarāyaṇa the Sutrakāra and Vyasa the composer of the Mahābhārata are identical and therefore cannot deny in one place what they affirm in another;¹⁰⁹ 5. Pañcaratra, in contrast to Samkhya, Yoga and Pasupata, is not founded by men but promulgated by God himself.¹¹⁰

Taking all positive and negative evidence of all his works together we may say that the Agama, albeit recognized in passing as an orthodox system [[P39]] of thought, is not at all utilized as a source of knowledge in its own right to corroborate Ramanuja’s system of Vedanta. One reason has been offered: Rāmānuja addresses himself to all Vedantins and endeavours to support his original theses by scriptural evidence that is acceptable to all. Another reason is no doubt that he was very little interested in the mechanics of world creation and evolution and had no occasion to make use of a class of texts whose only contributions to metaphysics were inseparably linked up with cosmogonical speculations that are of small value in explaining God’s relation to the world in harmony with śruti and reason. Rāmānuja’s and indeed Vedanta’s main concern is with ontology: only when the ontological relation between the supreme Cause and the phenomenal Effect has been established cosmology and cosmogony may proceed. Ramanuja’s evident indifference toward Pañcaratra should therefore not necessarily be regarded as typical of this Vaisnavite philosopher.

B. DARSANAS

§1. Mimamsā:

That Rāmānuja was well-grounded in Purvamīmāmsā need hardly be mentioned. For all Vedāntins, however differently they may ultimately conceive of the relation of the two mīmāmsās, the First Exegesis is propaedeutic to the second.

Both schools of Karmamimamsa on the basis of Sabarabhāṣya, the Bhatta and the Prabhakara, were known to Rāmānuja. But, apart from one occasional quotation of Kumārila, his principal, though antagonistic, interest is directed to the doctrines of Prabhakara’s school. This is interesting in view of the fact that in later time the Visiṣṭādvaitins have come to be associated with the Prabhakaras in the same way as the Advaitins were associated with the Bhattas, though perhaps not so exclusively.

a. Sabarasvamin:

That Ramanuja was familiar with Sabara’s commentary on the Karmamīmāmsāsūtras is-if proof were needed-evidenced by several passages dealing with fundamental Mimamsaka concepts. Quotations from the Vedic scriptures of the karmakanda have generally the form-also abbreviated-in which they are cited by Sabara, and though I have taken some pains in my notes to identify them in śruti, it is certain that Rāmānuja himself knew them from or through Sabara. What Edgerton remarked¹¹¹ can be fully applied to the Vedantins as well: “For the most part it is clear that the

[[P40]] later Mīmāmsakas limited themselves to the passages used in Sabarasvamin’s Bhasya as illustrations of the laws of Jaimini. These were the accepted stock in trade of the school and were discussed and worked over. again and again, obviously with little reference to the original Vedic texts. This is the custom of scholasticism everywhere”. This holds good for the stock-instances of the various schools, and also, but in a lesser degree, for the śruti quotations of the Vedanta schools separately.

b. Kumārila:

The founder of the Bhatta school of Mimamsă is once found quoted with approval. The citation is from the Niralambanavādakanda of the Ślokavārttika and fits in so neatly with Rāmānuja’s exposure of the advaitin’s ultimate nihilism that we are inclined to look for other verbal reminiscences. So it would seem probable that Ramanuja’s example of the real vision of an imaginary gandharvanagara has been inspired by Kumarila’s mention of the same in st. 110 of this kända.

c. Prabhakara:

It seems very likely that Ramanuja’s main source of the doctrines of Prabhakara was Sālikanatha’s Prakaranapañcikā, though we cannot be sure before we have more Prabhakara works available. He quotes half a śloka which is found in Salikanatha’s section on väkyärthamātṛkā (p. 190) with a slight variant, and there introduced as usual with aha. That Rāmānuja may have quoted directly from Salikanatha’s eventual source is not entirely out of the question, but not probable in view of other correspondences: from the same section, p. 190, Rāmānuja borrows a casual example verbally-with the rare word garbhadasa “born slave”, misunderstood by many copyists and develops it into a cosmic analogy. Other correspondences have been pointed out in my notes to the relative paragraphs of the translation.

§ 2. Vedānta

a. Advaita:

It would seem unquestionable that Rāmānuja knew Sankara’s works. For the Brahmasūtrabhāṣya this is evidenced clearly by the Śrībhāṣya where the purvapaksa’s that are set aside regularly confom to Sankara’s siddhantas. More difficult is it to decide the same on the comparatively scanty evidence of the Vedarthasamgraha, but probably § 49-51 are a case in point: it is plausible to connect the argumentation of Rāmānuja à propos of two analogies, that of a person dreaming and the stock-instance of the snake in the rope, with Sankara’s comments on Brahmasutras 2, 1, 14 (p. 198) yathā [[P41]] suptasya prakṛtasya janasya svapna uccāvacān bhāvān paśyato niścitam eva pratyakṣabhimatam vijñānam bhavati etc.

Rāmānuja’s refutation of the advaitin’s interpretation of BĂUp. 2, 3, 6 athāta ādeśo neti netiti may have been evoked either by Sankara’s commentary ad BrS. 3, 2, 22 or by his comments on the passage in his upaniṣadbhāṣya. The fact that Ramanuja quotes BrS. 3, 2, 22 in favour of his own exegesis probably means that he refers to Sankara’s view as expressed in his sūtrabhāṣya.

There is at least one clear indication that Rāmānuja knew other works as well. His polemical explication of the meaning of satyam jñānam anantam brahma is no doubt directed against Sankara’s interpretation in his commentary on the Taittiriya Up. 2, 1, which will be discussed in another connexion; here the requisite terminological correspondences are clear enough. Less obvious is a possible reference to Sankara’s Chandogya Up. Bhāṣya: commenting on the satkāryavada of the sadvidya (6, 2, 2), Rāmānuja introduces a rival theory that contends that the passage katham asataḥ saj jāyeta intends mainly to refute the Buddhist nihilist view by way of rejecting the asatkāryavāda, instead of refuting this last naiyāyika theory only. In fact, Šankara in his Chandogyabhāṣya formulates this precise view, but so does Mandanamiśra in his Brahmasiddhi.¹¹² However, I have not been able to identify unequivocal references to the latter thinker in the Vedarthasamgraha;¹¹³ besides, Ramanuja’s subsequent discussion of lakṣaṇā in tat tvam asi as assumed by the rival advaitin would point to Sankara rather than to Mandana.

The question to whom Ramanuja would here refer is of special interest, for the purvapaksa is formulated in significant terms: nanu niradhisthānabhramasambhavajñāpanāyāsatkāryavādanirāsaḥ kriyate / tatha hy ekam cidrūpam satyam evāvidyacchäditam jagadrupena vivartata ity avidyaśrayatvāya mülakaranam satyam ity upagantavyam ity asatkāryavādanirāsaḥ. Variant readings for avidyachāditam are “sabalam and °śabalitam. It is [[P42]] difficult to decide whether acchaditam is a lectio facilior or sabalam an hypercorrectness of a copyist inspired by vivartate. The fact that Ramanuja does not use the term sabalam elsewhere and that the best MS. reads acchāditam make the latter alternative the more probable one. Both sabala(but rather māyāśabala-) and vivartawould remind us of Sarvajñātman. On the other hand neither Mandana nor Sankara use vi-Vort and its derivatives in the sense of an illusory evolution or causation, which sense is clearly intended by Ramanuja. His use of the term is in itself noteworthy: neither Bhaskara nor Yamuna use or know it in this sense. Yamuna employs it in an important description¹¹⁴ of the advaita doctrine of God (= impersonal brahman): . .Its essence (viz. of pure consciousness) is subject to limiting conditions (upadhis): it obtains such perfect qualities as omniscience because it is conditioned by māyā, which undergoes a variety of evolutions that are dependent on itself (.. svarupam eva.. svādhīnavicitravivartasvabhāvamāyopahitataya samaṣādita[! not adhyastaor adhyāropita-] -särvajñyādisampadam upahitam abhidadhati). It is evident that for Yamuna vivarta equals parināma, vikāra, etc.: māyā, not brahman, is vicitravivartasvabhava. So, though there be occasion to connect Rāmānuja’s purvapakṣin with Sankara ad ChUp. 6, 2. other arguments, mainly Rāmānuja’s special use of vivarta tell against direct connexion, so that at most we can say that if Ramanuja referred to his august antagonist he already interpreted the later vivartavāda into Sankara’s doctrine. Besides, there are more associations: it would seem probable, as we saw, that Ramanuja consulted the Slokavārttika here.

Unless certain authors are quoted verbally it is exceedingly difficult to identify them in purvapaksins. Moreover, we have to consider the supreme probability that Rāmānuja addressed himself in the first place to living adversaries of his time and milieu, in whose teachings old advaita doctrines were being restated and developed. It will also happen that the references are just too vague: Vimuktātman, on clear terminological grounds identifiable in the Śrībhāṣya,¹¹⁵ does not emerge in the Vedarthasamgraha, whereas Salikanatha, so evidently referred to in the latter text, can only be guessed behind the corresponding portions of the Śrībhāṣya.

b. Bhedabhedavāda:

Bhaskara’s doctrine, as presented here by Ramanuja, that Brahman is conditioned by upadhis into becoming the phenomenal world cannot be entirely derived from the Brahmasūtrabhāṣya. Though certain dṛṣṭāntas [[P43]] can be identified, they appear much more elaborate and may hail from followers. One instance is curious: Rāmānuja avails himself of the analogy of space and a space-unit enclosed in, that is conditioned by, a pitcher. This analogy had already been given by Sankara and we note that Ramanuja’s terminology corresponds more closely to Sankara’s than to Bhaskara’s: tasmäd yatha ghaṭakarakādyākāśānām mahākāśānanyaṭvam evam asyabhogyabhoktṛādiprapañcajātasya brahmavyatirekeṇābhāva iti draṣṭavyam (BrSBh. 2, 1, 14, p. 197).

Rāmānuja’s last argument against the aupadhikavādin’s view that not God but his creative potency undergoes modification is no doubt to be connected with Bhaskara’s commentary ad BrS. 1, 4, 25.

c. Yamuna:

The doctrine of Yamuna, Ramanuja’s predecessor and teacher’s teacher, has not yet been made the subject of a monograph, in spite of the fact that his Siddhitraya, in which his doctrine is preserved fragmentarily, seems to be of great importance for the history not only of Višiṣṭādvaita but also of Vedānta as a whole. This is not the place to go into great detail and we have to content ourselves for the time being with mentioning a few fundamental points.

His principal tenets can best be described in his own words, taken from the beginning of the Atmasiddhi, where he enumerates a great many different views that were held by Indian schools of thought before him on the cardinal truths. Generally his own opinion concludes the series of theories as a preliminary thesis to be demonstrated later on.

On the nature of the atman, the individual, ’empirical’ soul, he concludes that it is not material and non-spiritual, is not identical with the body, or the vital breath, or the manas; nor yet is it unqualified consciousness upon which certain qualities are projected by nescience¹¹⁶ or by limiting conditions,¹¹⁷ but that it is a substance qualified by the essential property knowledge.¹¹⁸ This special knowledge acquires the designation ‘beatitude’, ‘bliss’, etc., from the fact that its object is pleasurable, not because it would be pleasurable itself.¹¹⁹ This atman, though self-illuminating, can be the object of our knowledge by the pramāņas of scriptural revelation, reasoning, introspective perception: by means of these instruments and sources of

[[P44]] knowledge we can come to an immediate apprehension of the atman so as it is, in its essential and categorical difference from everything else, with a gradually increasing clarity of cognition which finally culminates in a perfect lucidity.¹²⁰ Although the atman is in itself without magnitude, it is localized by the magnitude of the corporeal mass which it pervades in its totality, not merely by knowledge or consciousness.¹²¹ It is unchanging and eternal.¹²² In each of the fields of empirical experience, that is in each body, the ātman has a distinct individuality.¹²³

The Supreme Spirit, the paramātman, is described as a person, dependent on whom are the existence and the activity in all its forms of the three classes of spiritual beings, or ātmans, and of non-spiritual, material entities. This personal God is a mighty ocean of all perfections, primarily the six beautiful qualities of knowledge, strength, dominion, heroism, power and splendour, which are natural properties, limitless and absolute.¹²⁴

Dasgupta, describing Yamuna’s doctrine of the soul on the basis of the Atmasiddhi,¹²⁵ comes to the conclusion that “Yamuna’s main contribution consists in establishing the self-consciousness of the soul” but “gives hardly any new ideas about Isvara and His relation to the souls and world.” As the manner in which Rāmānuja’s vedantic predecessors conceived of the relation between the absolute and the non-absolute is of importance to decide his own originality of contribution, we may inquire whether, and if so to what extent, Dasgupta’s verdict is just.

In Atmasiddhi p. 4-5, after summing up the advaitin’s relation brahman —avidya and the bhedabhedavādin’s relation brahman-upāhitabrahman, Yamuna states finally what, by exclusion, should be his own view or siddhānta: “granted that there is diversity, yet the relation itself is nondifference it is an intimate connexion definable as that between amsa and amsin, or has the form of a sesa-seşin¹²⁶ relation that is characterized by

[[P45]] dependence, or again is the relation between possession and possessor that is characterized by servant and master.”¹²⁷

Again, at the end of the Isvarasiddhi, we have a notable reading: “the entire Universe in its three phases of past, present and future, is for its subsistence and resorption dependent on a Being that has a wealth of qualities, among which the capacity of sustaining and resorbing the Universe, because it is of an inconceivably varied and various composition: it may be compared to paintings and sculptures which we infer to be exclusively dependent for their existence, etc., on an extremely gifted person.”¹²⁸

The same reading continues: “The Universe, which is described by the word vibhuti, stands to the One Being in a relation of object supported, object governed and object accessory, because it is His body, comparable to the relation between the “I” and its body.”¹²⁹ It is true that this reading is not found in the mss. that are mainly utilized by the different editors - whose critical principles, incidentally, remain completely mysterious¹³⁰-yet a comparison with the first quoted passage, found in all mss., renders this variant acceptable.

We may also compare the final stanzas of the Isvarasiddhi : “This Universe obeys the command of one person because it is not spiritual: like a body. All spiritual beings perform the task under the control of one person, as the senses-touch, etc., because the task requires the association of a body. The Universe, the topic of our polemic, has one Supreme Soul, because he is the soul of spiritual and non-spiritual beings: it forms as it were one country with one king.”¹³¹ In other words which would

[[P46]] seem the most plausible explication of these lines: the material Universe is obedient to God’s will, like a man’s body to that of man; the personal entities, the cetanas, again perform God’s work under God’s control, work that requires bodily action which they provide: but their function is of a higher order than that of matter, and they may be likened to the senses of the body of God. So the composite Universe in its totality is governed by one Supreme Person or Soul who is comparable to the soul of the body constituted by spirit and matter.

DASGUPTA is certainly right in asserting that it “is almost certain that his (Yamuna’s) own attitude did not differ much from the Nyaya attitude”. In isvarasiddhi, p. 75, the arguments of the Mimamsakas against a Nyaya view are countered in a kārikā with atra brumah, which supports the Naiyayikas; elsewhere, however, he attacks the Nyaya proofs for the existence of God ¹³² But Dasgupta’s statement that Yamuna, too, “left the duality of the world and Isvara absolutely unresolved” is, as we have seen, too sweeping. Not less sweeping is the pronouncement that “he is also silent about the methods which a person should adopt for procuring his salvation.”

In Ätmasiddhi, p. 5, Yamuna sums up the prevailing views of the way in which release is achieved and the final view or siddhanta is that it · paramapuruṣārthabhuta brahmapräptilakṣanamokṣa “man’s supreme goal release, which consists in attaining brahman” can only be achieved by means of the bhakti-yoga, of an exclusive and absolute character, of one whose inner faculty has been prepared by both jñānaand karmayoga.”

Similarly, in Gitarthasamgraha, st. 32, it reads aikantyātyantadāsyaikaratis tatpadam apnuyat “he whose only joy is in perfect and absolute servitude will achieve that end (or God’s place)”, an expression patently utilized by Rāmānuja in his Introduction to Gitābhāṣya: aseṣaseṣataikaratirupa and throughout the Gadyatraya.

Finally, in a special study, the Agamapramanya, Yamuna professes in emphatical terms his adherence to Pañcarātra which describes the relation between God and the Universe in terms of the farthest possible reduction of difference verging on, but never quite merging in, unity, and the method of salvation as that of a most humble and exclusive loving devotion or bhakti. We have seen that, on account of the fundamental problématique of Vedanta itself, the basic conceptions of the various systems concern the relation between the Absolute and the Universe, and that these conceptions can best be studied from the commentaries on the arambhanadhikarana which [[P47]] summarizes the import of the sadvidya. So also Yamuna’s conception, though he did not comment on the Sutras a task he assigned to Rāmānuja. Yet he too had to deal with the sadvidya, and he did so at some length in the Samvitsiddhi.

What is the meaning of advitiya? Is it a tatpurușa or a bahuvrihi compound? In neither case the existence of the Universe is denied. Skipping his more ingenious than convincing remarks on a grammatically possible tatpurușa and concentrating on the term as a bahuvrihi: he argues that advitīya is a višeṣaṇa, a qualifying adjective, and that therefore it cannot be explained thus that nothing else exists but Brahman.¹³³ The non-existence of a second thing cannot qualify Brahman: because it does not exist it is not qualifying, unless Brahman be itself non-existent. Consequently the real existence of the phenomenal world-the prapañca that consists in spirit and non-spirit (cidacinmaya-) — is not denied in this text of non-duality: proved by its own pramānas of perception and inference it is further corroborated by śruti.

For what does our text mean? Brahman has no second, that means that there is no one and nothing in past, present and future that can be counted his second, i.e., his equal or superior. ¹³⁴ The world, consisting of a particle of a division of His manifestation, ¹³⁵ can hardly be called a “second”. “Matchless” is the true sense: just as in the phrase: “The king of the Colas is a universal monarch who does not find his match in the present world.” The uncounted millions of existent beings are but drops in the ocean of the majestal manifestation of Visnu, the Paramount Sovereign unaffected by suffering, action, evolution, etc., the treasury of the six divine qualities, Visnu whose supernal manifestation is beyond imagination. Who, counting the seven seas by his fingers, could count their waves, foam-spots, bubbles and drops? If we say there is no second sun in the sky, do we deny by the sun its rays? The world with its animate and inanimate beings is just vācārambhana and vikara: sat is the unchanging radical cause.¹³⁶ The effect is not different fom its cause: sparks are not different from the fire from

[[P48]] which they shoot forth,¹³⁷ nor the pot from the clay, etc.¹³⁸ The element derives its power and force from its cause. So, by knowing the one material cause we know the Universe.¹³⁹

In the light of all this DASGUPTA’s judgment cannot well stand. On the contrary, in his, admittedly mainly polemical, works Yamuna departed from a more or less clearly defined conception of Vedantic cosmology and eschatology. The relation between the Personal God and the Universe is stated in various, mutually complementary ways: as that of amsa and amsin — so also sparks of fire—, of seșa and seșin, of body and soul: the Universe is God’s manifestation, governed, supported and ensouled by Him. These terms recall immediately those in which Rāmānuja couches his central idea: so much so that we are justified in saying that Rāmānuja, developed and elaborated systematically what Yamuna had already discovered. Yamuna did not yet systematize his views nor exhaust the fertile concept of sarīrasariribhāva, but it is clear that his thoughts went in the direction of this analogy as the basic solution.

IV. OBSERVATIONS ON RAMANUJA’S EXEGETICAL PRINCIPLES AND METHOD

The increasing tendency among historians of Indian philosophy to study the systems of Indian thought, particularly Vedanta, with special reference to and in comparison and juxtaposition with Western philosophies has created an unfortunate misunderstanding of the typically theological character of Vedantic speculation as a whole. The reasons are many and diverse. On the Indian side this tendency is an interesting cultural phenomenon which may well prove to be of the greatest importance for the future of Indian thought in the context of world philosophy. On the Western side there is often apparent a certain aversion to theology as such and an inability to keep in mind that the soteriology of Vedanta is not ‘philosophic’ in purpose, but religious, inspired and borne out by scripture and revelation. Vedanta is after all a positive theology based upon scripture. The fact that the results of scriptural exegesis do not conform to the conclusions of historical philological research does not mean that therefore scripture plays a subordinate rôle, as a handmaiden to the philosopher who cannot hope to put across his original views without the authority of revelation, and so makes it fit in with his own doctrine. This view fails to take into account the importance of the tradition of exegesis, of its method and rules.

[[P49]] It is only recently that a studious attempt has been made to describe systematically the theological method of Sankara,¹⁴⁰ Now that a serious beginning has been made, one realizes how far we are still removed from a complete and comprehensive study of the theological principles and hermeneutical methods of the great Indian commentators, without and within Vedanta, and generally of the rules of ancient Indian commentatorial industry. When studying the many bhāṣyas on scriptures and sutras the student is surprised at the freedom, and often arbitrariness, with which the commentators thought fit to treat their texts. A just appreciation of these interpretations will remain difficult: not only are the presuppositions of theological exegesis far removed from, if not actually in conflict with, those of philological explication and ultimately the profane scholar has no criterion to evaluate supra-rational significance, but also the breach in the commentatorial tradition of the Vedanta before Sankara prevents us to understand the why and wherefore of interpretations that are taken for granted later on.¹⁴¹

Especially in Rāmānuja’s case the loss of ancient väkyas, vṛttis and bhāṣyas make themselves gravely felt. He more than Sankara names and cites many precursors, of whom only a few are identifiable, and he claims that his system is nothing but a systematical elaboration of their views: “I have come to the conclusion that this is the central doctrine of the Vedanta texts after having made a painstaking study not only of the whole mass of all the various śrutis but also of the commentaries that have been composed and accepted by judicious thinkers”.

But even less than Sankara is Rāmānuja concerned with describing, or even alluding to his exegetical principles, which for him and his contemporaries were doubtless self-evident. We have to gather them from his works. In the following sections a few topics have been discussed, in so far as relevant to the Vedarthasamgraha, which may contribute a little to our understanding of his principles and method.

[[P50]]

§1. The authority of sabda:

The authoritative character of sabda “verbal testimony” is, within the pales of orhodox Indian philosophy, one of the fundamental assumptions; for those systems, moreover, which deal especially with metaphysics, sabda is the only valid instrument and criterion (pramana) for suprasensible knowledge. We should bear in mind that sabda is not only human and profane language, but also and even primarily, sacred language, the revelation of scripture, which, by its self-sufficiency,¹⁴² is authoritative in its own right. The principle that sabda-i.e. sacred revelation can give us reliable information about things which, by their very nature, fall outside the scope of the other two fundamental pramānas of sensual perception and rational inference, has been developed by the Mimamsakas. The precise extent of this authoritativeness has, however, been disputed.

In order to understand the controversy we have to consider the suppositions of Purvamīmāmsā and remember that the authority of sabda in the form of scriptural revelation had been taken for granted long before the necessary theories had been evolved to account for it and define it. Then the very trustworthiness of śruti, without which the whole fabric of ritual would crumble, necessitated the assumption that it did not derive from human agency with its implicit fallibility, but must be apauruşeya “preterhuman”.¹⁴³ This again led to the conclusion that the language of the scriptures, and by extension all languagewhich derives from the scriptures-¹⁴⁴ has not a human but a preterhuman origin: if its trustworthiness be preterhuman, it must be preterhuman itself. In other words, it could never have come into being on the strength of a convention or agreement to which man was a party;¹⁴⁵ consequently, that peculiar power that makes language significative, the power by which words can denote meanings and refer to objects, could not be based upon an immemorial agreement of human beings that henceforth this word was to denote that meaning, but must have been eternally inherent in the words themselves, which were not created or invented by man but in their entirety of language given at the beginning of creation.¹⁴⁶

[[P51]] Pūrvamīmāmsa was primarily concerned with studying and systematizing the principles governing the ritual with respect to its fruits as described in the karmakanda. Accordingly the whole mass of śruti was classified into three categories: 1. those portions which prescribe or enjoin the performance of certain rites to secure certain results, vidhi or codana “injunction”, comprising nisedha “prohibition”; 2, those portions which explain, describe or generally add to the injunctions, arthavada; 3. those portions which comprise the Vedic mantras that are used in the rite.¹⁴⁷ In this classification the order of importance is given: the injunction constitutes the principal element to which the others are accessory.

This principal importance of injunction, without which all the rest. would be purposeless and hence meaningless, was generally recognized. Mīmāmsă as a whole maintains that the non-vidhi portions derive their relevancy from their being accessory and supplementary to injunction. It follows that purposive signification of scriptural testimony abides, and its authoritative validity is vested, in injunction only.

Among the Mimämsakas the school of Prabhakara went consistently a step further. Whereas the Bhattas admitted the authoritative character of speech that is pauruşeya, i.e. human and profane speech, the Prabhākaras¹⁴⁸ contended that as a pramana sabda is always sastra, that is to say, only the sacred language of revelation is a source of valid knowledge. In profane language words refer to objects which generally do not stand in need of verbal testimony in order to be validly known and established; the objects are established by other pramānas, perception or inference. Validly established objects cannot be again validly established by language. Even in those cases where there are no other pramānas to establish an object and we have to resort to verbal testimony, in other words to rely on hear-say, we have not invariably reliable knowledge, because of the human factor. Profane speech does not fulfil the necessary condition of authority: to be invariably a source of valid knowledge. Consequently only sastra is pramāņa stricto sensu. Here śästra is to be taken literally: scriptural injunction; for inasmuch as language cannot validly establish an object already completely established¹⁴⁹ (parinispannavastu, siddhavastu), it must invariably bear on something yet to be established, a task yet to be undertaken, an act yet to be performed, karya. The authority of sabda and therefore its exclusive significance as a source of valid knowledge, lies

[[P52]] in its enjoining a karya. Another consequence is that the smallest significative unit of language is the sentence, that is ideally the injunctive sentence,

To illustrate this theory they described the way in which a child learns a language. In this description they departed, understandably, from the verbal character of language: the verb is the operative word in the sentence without which the rest is not effective and significative. As it bears on action, the sentence can only be understood by a child when it sees it acted upon by its elders.¹⁵⁰

This theory that language is only significative when it is an injunction bearing on karya-which does not mean that every significative and validly authoritative sentence has to be an injunctive one, but that it can be either construed as one or subordinated to one leads to curious consequences when applied to that part of śruti whose purport is not to enjoin acts but to teach knowledge, the jñānakāṇḍa.

The Mimamsaka applying his categories, which had been developed and elaborated with exclusive reference to the karmakanda, to the descriptive jñānakāṇḍa, has only one way open: like all scriptural sabda it must derive its relevancy from the injunction. Accordingly the Bhāṭṭa subordinates the jñānakanda to the karmakanda as an arthavada of the eternity of the soul which is fundamental to the eternal validity of the Vedic injunctions. The Prabhakara appears to have taken a different view:like all sabda the Vedanta-i.e. jñānakanda, comprising the Aranyakas and the Upanisads must bear on karya. Brahman however, which is the object of the Vedanta texts, is not a karya but a completely established entity. Consequently it was held that “those Vedanta texts that speak of Brahman must be regarded as speaking of Brahman as something on which one is enjoined to meditate or know (sic), in order to escape the meshes of metempsychosis” ¹⁵¹

This view we find discussed and refuted in Ramanuja’s complicated commentary on the samanvayadhikarana, BrS. 1, 1, 4, where it is stated in these terms: “Although the Vedanta texts cannot be the means of valid knowledge about brahman’s proper form which is completely established, yet brahman’s proper form can be established (anew). How? Because the Vedanta texts can denote the injunction of meditation”.¹⁵² In the same connexion we find another Prabhakara view discussed, not mentioned by

[[P53]] Jha, which Sudarsanasuri styles nisprapañcikaraṇaniyogavāda: “Just because they bear on kärya, the Vedanta texts can bear validly on brahman itself. From where do they derive this authority? The object of these texts is an injunction by means of the annihilation of phenomenality: an injunction to this effect that “one is to render brahman-which, because of beginningless ignorance, is conceived as phenomenal-devoid of phenomenality, without second and essentially knowledge.”¹⁵³

To sum up, whereas the Bhaṭṭas do not admit that the jñānakāṇḍa can deal authoritatively with its object brahman in its own right, the Prabhakara allows that it can do so, provided that it be construed as a vidhi-or in his terminology-as a niyoga. Leaving aside the second alternativing the injunction to “dephenomalize” brahman-this goes to say that the meditation on, and knowledge of, brahman can be the object of an injunction.

To this construction Sankara took serious exception. In his view, brahmajñāna, in virtue of its nature, does not admit of being enjoined at all: it can only be evoked by a text: ¹⁵⁴ it cannot initiate any action but only remove our consciousness from any other entity but brahman: when this consciousness has been removed, then there is no room for any action. because that would be incompatible.¹⁵⁵ The knowledge of brahman puts an end to all activity.¹⁵⁶ Knowledge derives only from pramānas and the real existence of the object concerned; not from man’s volition, but simply from that which exists really and unchangeably,¹⁵⁷

Ramanuja, as far as I can judge, does not express himself so categorically, at least not in the Vedarthasamgraha. As a matter of fact, to know Brahman in Rāmānuja’s sense, that is to ascend to knowing the personal God through constant loving adoration, is the final stage of one road to perfection, leading from the conscientious performance of ritual acts to the self-recognition of the individual soul and from there to the love-attainment of the Supreme God, whom to serve is the soul’s sole purpose and essence. The ritual acts, whichever gods they are dedicated to, are essentially propitiations of the one God. To serve God would be imperative indeed, it is the paramapuruṣārtha, the supreme end to be achieved; there is noth[[P54]] ing in this to militate against the supposedly injunctive character of all śruti.

Rāmānuja’s objections are directed first against Prabhakara’s high and mighty command¹⁵⁸ that language can only be significative in enjoining actions to be effected. By a few well-selected examples he shows this. A child does not learn a language by watching how his elders react to a series of words, but by having things named: it is nominal description rather than verbal motivation by which he learns how to speak and understand. A dumb adult, conversant with the language of gestures, can read the meaning of a person who instructs his servant, not by word of mouth. but by gestures, to convey a certain message to another. When the dumb man, watching the whole story, hears the servant translate the message into worded speech, he knows what the words of the message mean without seeing any action taken on it.¹⁵⁹ Which goes to prove that the signification of the words cannot lie in their relation to an action that is to be effected in consequence thereof. On this showing there is no ground whatever to deny that language has the power of denoting a completely established entity, about which nothing is to be effected.

Then Rāmānuja proceeds that the arthavada brahmavid āpnoti param can indeed be construed as a vidhi. He compares this text with such śrutis as pratitisthanti ha vai ya etā (rātrīr) upayanti/brahmavarcasvino ’nnādā bhavanti ya etā (rātrīr) upayanti (Sabara ad KMS. 4, 3, 17 Pañcavimśa Br. 23, 2, 4) which is an example of a text which, though being arthavada, is yet vidhi and therefore significative:¹⁶⁰ with regard to the rite of ratrisattra it is an arthavada, but it is significative for the reward, pratistha, which is the phala that cannot be known by any other pramāna. Similarly brahmavid apnoti param is informative of the fruit, i.e. param, the highest Brahman. Consequently the phala that is the Supreme Brahman is established and all the śrutis and arthavādas which contribute to our knowledge of Brahman’s essence and qualities are therefore fully informative.

Another argument he borrows from Dramida,¹⁶¹ who reasons: if the arthavādas have the purpose of praising an object that has a function in a vidhi, it can only praise this object if it exists. It follows that all arthavādas are really significative or informative of the real existence of qualities, so as to give rise to the knowledge that the object of the act is praiseworthy. Hence follows again that in this very manner all objects known through

[[P55]] mantras and arthavadas are proved to exist. To sum up, arthavādas are really significative themselves, not merely laudatory.

The same question is touched upon in another connexion¹⁶² where the meaning of the śruti tad Visnoḥ paramam padam sada pasyanti surayaḥ is discussed. This śruti can be read either that those who are sūris regard or that those who regard are sūris. Here a Mimāmsaka objects that in either case not more than one guna can be enjoined; either the quality of being sūris or the quality of regarding, not both, otherwise there would be vakyabheda ¹⁶³ Rāmānuja points out that the objection is not to the point and demonstrates that here there is question of a visistavidhi where more than one quality can be enjoined. Here again he upholds that in themselves the mantras are informative of the objects or qualities which they describe and he concludes: As we have said before, even if we assume that mantras and arthavādas are significative only when bearing on an action to be effected their objects signified are established; a fortiori when etymological explication¹⁶⁴ proves that in fact they bear on established objects in their own right. In this manner everything is sound.

From all this we can conclude that Rāmānuja did not want to supersede the principles of Purvamīmāmsā, as Sankara had done, but to modify them with respect to the uttarabhāga, where emphasis is not on vidhi but on arthavāda, and admit of a fully significative character of these arthavādas. He does not exclude the view that, after all, these arthavādas may find their significance and purpose in vidhi, but he is obliged to refute the extreme views of the Prabhakaras who are not less radical in upholding the autonomy of the Purvamīmāmsā as Šankara is in maintaining the self-sufficiency of Uttaramimāmsā. For Rāmānuja, however, both mīmāmsās are not different śästras, but constitute one continuous discipline. The substance and objective of both inquiries is fundamentally the same: both inquire into the way in which brahman is worshipped. But whereas the pūrvabhāga describes the ritual acts by which God, the Supreme Brahman, is worshipped indirectly in His multiple manifestations of the Vedic deities, the uttarabhāga describes the way in which God is directly worshipped by an immediate knowledge of perfect love. The former is ancillary and propaedeutic to the latter; both chapters of the same sästra cannot, however, be in conflict.

The reservation which Ramanuja makes-reluctantly enough-for the possibility of construing the jñānakanda as injunctive is, it would seem, peculiar to the Vedarthasamgraha and has been abandoned in the Śrībhāṣya. [[P56]]

In the samanvayādhikaraṇa¹⁶⁵ Rāmānuja states his view in a preliminary thesis: “these aggregates of words (sc. sastra) which have the power of denoting completely established objects that have already been proved by the very etymology of the terms, can and do bear completely and harmoniously on the Brahman that is the cause of the origination, subsistence and annihilation of the entire universe, absolutely opposed to all imperfection, eminently possessed of unlimited perfections, and, in essence, boundless and incomparable bliss. Thus they serve no purpose conducive to activity or inactivity¹⁶⁶ and therefore do not bear on any other purport. For all pramānas terminate, not in a purpose, but in the knowledge of the objects with which they are concerned. Nor is the operation of any pramāna determined by a purpose: on the contrary, the purpose is determined by the knowledge resulting from the pramana. Nor does the fact that the pramana has no direct connexion with activity or inactivity mean that it is devoid of all purpose, for we see that it is related to anyone of the goals of human life.”

This thesis is meant to reject Kumarila’s definition: “Sastra is called that (verbal testimony) either eternal (sc. vaidika) or conventional (sc. laukika) which sets forth which actions man has to perform or is not to perform” ¹⁶⁷ According to the Bhāṭṭa, the jñānakāṇda is arthavāda, setting forth the eternity of the atman of man engaged in ritual acts, without which eternity the ritual acts themselves would lack permanence.

On Rāmānuja’s Vedānta thesis follows the Mimamsaka’s (Bhaṭṭa’s) purvapaksa, in the course of which two apparently Prabhakara views are discussed and refuted, the nisprapañcikaraṇaniyogavāda or the view that the jñānakända enjoins the establishing of a non-phenomenal Brahman, and the dhyānaniyogavada, the view that it enjoins the meditation on Brahman. In the course of the discussion of the latter view advaitavada and bhedabhedavāda are refuted. The Bhatta’s purvapakṣa is then refuted again in the Vedantin’s siddhanta, that is to say, the entire argumentation which preceded in the course of the Mimamsaka’s discussion is accepted, except the thesis that, in as much as the jñānakanda does not terminate in direct purpose, ie., describes what is to be done and what not, it has no purpose at all.

Consequently, Ramanuja’s provisional thesis and his Siddhanta, with in between the entire complicated argumentation, go to prove that he no longer made the reservation that the jñānakanda could possibly be construed as being injunctive. [[P57]]

§ 2. All śrutis are equally authoritative:

We have seen that whereas Sankara refuses to admit the Mimāmsā category of vidhi into Vedantamīmāmsā, Rāmānuja, in order to save the continuity of the First and the Second Inquiries, takes a more conciliatory view and, without denying the applicability of a typical Mimamsa construction vidhi — arthavāda to the jñānakāṇḍa as well, yet urges the independent informativeness of the latter category.

One of the most striking features of Sankara’s exegetical method is the distinction that he introduces between the pure Vedanta texts, which set forth the paramārthajñāna, and the far more sizeable texts in which definite upāsanas are set forth describing the absolute in anthromorphic terms and which consequently are vyavahārika. DE SMET attempts to show¹⁶⁸ that this distinction between major and minor texts corresponds to that which Pūrvamīmāmsā makes between the injunctions, which are principal, and the arthavadas, etc., which are accessory to the principal texts; on the strength of this correspondence he suggests that Sankara’s distinction. was inspired by Jaimini’s. This correspondence, which at a first glance looks plausible, breaks however down when we scrutinize it more closely. For Sankara the minor texts have a definite propaedeutic function, by preparing the mind of the pupil alike by describing magnificent projections of brahman, which are first to be contemplated upon, then to be abandoned, and by pointing out the underlying unity in the great variety of things with respect to their common cause, the Supreme Soul. Ultimately these texts cannot lead the student to the final truth by themselves. In other words, in the last analysis these minor texts are not at all accessory to the major texts. Actually the division between major and minor texts reflects that most general one between paramartha and vyavahara, a division far more fundamental than, and not at all related to, that of Purvamimämsä between the principal texts and the accessory texts which are relevant with regard to the principal ones.

This division between paramartha and vyavahāra is reflected in śruti on two different levels, first in śruti as a whole in the main division between major and minor statements, secondly in the major statements themselves, where the terms are distinguished as having their primary sense with regard to their empirical concepts and another sense by lakṣaṇā when they are referring to the non-qualified brahman. Ramanuja who does not allow Sankara’s distinction between an ‘ideal’ and a ‘practical’ reality, rejects consequently its twofold reflection in śruti.

To Rāmānuja, all śrutis are equally authoritative. This position is, as far as I can see, not expressly stated but throughout his works taken for granted. At one place,¹⁶⁹ for example, he maintains in passing the equal [[P58]] authority of the śruti ChUp. 1, 6, 6 atha ya eso ’ntarāditye hiranmayaḥ puruşo dṛśyate which according to Sankara does not even refer to the paramātman but only to a highly qualified individual soul¹⁷⁰ and of the ‘mahāvākya’ satyam jñānam anantam brahma: both śrutis predicate specific qualities of the personal God, who is the brahman.

Elsewhere he hints at the vicious circle implicit in the distinction between major and minor statements: we decide which texts are major and which are minor ultimately on the strength of an insight acquired by the study of those texts which later on we shall classify as major. Rāmānuja exposes the advaitin’s scriptural eclecticism in §§86-87, after he has reconciled the various texts, propounding difference, difference-non-difference and nondifference, within the conception of a Supreme Being modified by distinct but dependent orders of matter and soul. The advaitin objects: tat tvam asi, etc., clearly declares identity and it follows that this knowledge of iden- tity alone is conducive to release. Rāmānuja replies: no, for another śruti (Svet.Up. 3, 9-11) declares that release is obtained in consequence of the knowledge of the distinct orders of Supreme Spirit, individual soul and matter. The advaitin then exclaims that, since this is obviously in conflict with the śruti he quoted, the other śruti can only refer to knowledge con- ducive of attaining, not the absolute non-differentiated brahman, but the relative qualified and not absolutely real brahman, Rāmānuja then raises the question: why should the former śruti be more authoritative than the latter one? We are not to ignore but to reconcile, as to do he proceeds.

Incidentally, for the so-called mahāvākyas, which set forth the sole reality of the absolute non-qualified brahman, Ramanuja uses the term sodhakavākyas, which I have not been able to trace to an advaita source. It is plausible that it has been borrowed from the terminology of a milieu which used the term śuddhabrahman to describe the absolutely real non-qualified brahman, and we are reminded of this usage with Sarvajñātman, etc. For Rāmānuja, of course, these ‘purificatory’ statements are not privileged. They deny simply that God is affected by a number of specified imperfections and thereby assert that He possesses the opposite perfections. On this point he touches in connexion with his interpretation of satyam jñānam anantam brahma, to be discussed below.

[[P59]]

§3. Laksana:

The second level on which the distinction ‘ideal’-‘practical’ is reflected in śruti, viz., in the primary and secondary meanings of the terms employed with reference to the non-qualified brahman, comes in for a direct discussion in a polemical passage.

This polemic seems to be directed especially against Sankara’s inter- pretations ad Taittiriya Up. 2, 1. There it reads: bhāvasādhano jñāna- sabdo, na tu jñānakartṛ/ brahmaviseṣaṇatvāt satyānantābhyām saha / na hi satyātānantată ca jñānakartṛtve saty upapadyate. As this passage has been misunderstood before,¹⁷¹ a short analysis is indicated. The above quotation means “the term jñāna is a verbal noun with the sense of the root, not the agent of jñāna (in other words: jñāna “the knowing, knowledge”, not “know- ing, knower”), because it serves as an attribute of brahman, together with satya and ananta; for if brahman were the agent of knowledge, then it could be neither satya nor ananta.” Sankara develops the view that the viseṣanas satya, jñāna and ananta have here not an attributive but a definitive func- tion¹⁷² (lakṣaṇārtha). Since a specifying attribute (višesana-) serves only to specify members of a same class as distinct from one another (samā- najātibhya eva nivartakani višeṣaṇāni visesyasya), the terms cannot very well have this attributive function in this case, because brahman does not belong to any class: but they have a definitive function: definitives dis- tinguish the object from all other objects (lakṣaṇam tu sarvata eva [sc. nivar- takam višesyasya]). On the other hand, Sankara does not exclude the attri- butive function of the terms entirely: viseṣaṇārthavattve ‘pi satyādīnām svār- thāparityāga eva / śünyārthatve hi satyadiśabdānām visesyaniyantṛtvā- nupapattiḥ / satyadyair arthavattve tu tadviparītadharmavadbhyo višeṣye- bhya brahmano višeṣyasya niyantṛtvam upapadyate/.. tatranantaśabdo ’ntavattväpratiṣedhadvarena višeṣanam / satyajñānaśabdau tu svarthasamar- panenaiva višeşena bhavatah: “even if the terms satya, etc., are taken as attri- butes (not as definitions), they do not lose their proper sense. In fact, if they had a non-existent object, they could not determine the object to be attributed at all. However, while retaining their meaning, they determine brahman as their object attributed by distinguishing it from all objects that possess pro- perties opposite to those which they denote themselves. The term ananta is a višeşana of brahman by denying that brahman has a limit; the terms satya and jñāna, are viseṣanas particularly in their own right, just by apply-

[[P60]] ing their own meanings to brahman.” In other words, to the extent in which the terms are negative, i.e., deny properties of phenomenal objects rather than affirm properties of brahman, they are attributable to brahman. But how about terms like satya and jñāna? They cannot have the same signi- ficance for brahman as they have for the phenomenal objects or minds: from the point of view of brahman It alone is reality and knowledge and all other objects are unreality and nescience. Yet the terms are taken from pheno- menal life where they have a definite meaning. So Sankara replies: tathāpi tadabhāsavācakena buddhidharmaviṣayena jñanaśabdena tal lakṣyate na túcyate, sabdapravṛttihetujātyādidharmarahitatvāt / tathā satyaśābdenāpi / sarvavišesapratyastamitasvarupatvād brahmano bahyasattāsāmānyaviṣayena satyaśabdena lakṣyate satyam brahmeti/na tu satyaśabdavācyam eva brahma: “yet the term jñāna, which (in phenomenal life) has reference to a property, sc. knowledge, and which expresses only a phenomenal projec- tion of absolute knowledge, can only indicate brahman but not express it directly, because brahman is devoid of all properties like generality, etc. -which are the basis of the operation of all speech. Similarly the term satya: this term denotes the general concept of external being, but brahman. being essentially devoid of all differentiations can only indirectly be indi- cated in satyam brahma, and cannot be expressed directly by the term satya.” This view has been summarized by Sarvajñātman :¹⁷³

ākāśādau satyatā tāvad ekā pratyanmatre satyata kacid anyā / tatsamparkāt satyatātra canyā vyutpanno ‘yam satyaśabdas tu //

“the concept of satya when predicated of phenomenal entities-from space onwards - has another content than when predicated of that which is abso- lutely interior: in the latter case the concept of satya is analogously used, whereas the term has its proper meaning in the former.” The question is resumed by Madhusudana Sarasvati¹⁷⁴ who comments: na ca—anṛtasvarūpe śabale satyatvayogaḥ, yoge va tato nanṛtavyāvṛttir iti vācyam; śabale hi satyată eșaiva yat paramarthasamsargena pratiyamane tasmin satyaśabda- samgatigrahaḥ/ tad uktam Samkṣepaśarirake - ākāśādau etc., iti/evam anandădipadeşv api draṣṭavyam/tathaca katham teṣām nānṛtādivyāvarta- katvam? etena-. suddhad anyatra satyatvadyasambhavät satyatoādivākyasya lakṣaṇaya akhandarthatve suddhe satyatväder abhänät paryāyatvam durvāram iti-parāstam / svarupamätre ‘pi na padantaravaiyartham vyavṛttibheda- bodhanena saphalyäd iti coktam ca: (it is said that, when applied to the perfect brahman, the words satya, etc., which denote the imperfect brahman qualified by reality, etc., have to be taken with lakṣaṇā). Objection: no

[[P61]] reality, etc., can be predicated of the imperfect which is essentially unreal; or, if they are applied, it follows that they do not exclude, but imply, the unreal. Reply: You cannot say that; in fact, the reality in the imperfect is such that the applicability of the term satya “real” (to phenomenal objects) is grasped when the imperfect is understood in its relation to the ultimately real. This is stated in the Samkṣepaśārīraka: “..”. The same can be noted in the case of the words like ananda, etc. So how would these terms not exclude the unreal, etc.? This argument takes also care of the objection that, inasmuch as no reality, etc., is conceivable in anything but the perfect, the terms satya, etc., can only have their absolute sense by lakṣaṇā, but then, since satyatva, etc., are not apparent in the perfect, all such terms are neces- sarily synonymous. We may add another rejoinder: even when applied to the pure essential simplicity, other words do not lose their significance but retain their significance by conveying all the various aspects of exclusion.”

This view is summed up by Rāmānuja ($11) as follows: etacchodakāni prakaranäntaravakyāny api satyam jñānam anantam brahma (etc.) ityādīni sarvaviseṣapratyanīkaikākāratām bodhayanti / na caikākāratābodhane ‘pi padānām paryāyatā / ekatve ‘pi vastunah sarvapratyanīkākāratvopasthāpa- nena sarvapadānām arthavattvät: “the purifying statements in other con- texts, like satyam, etc., convey an object that is absolutely opposed to differ- entiations; yet, even though all words convey its perfect simplicity, they are not therefore synonymous: for they all are significant, even though referring to the simplicity of an entity, just by establishing its absolute opposition to everything else.” But Ramanuja refuses to admit that a number of words can refer to a non-differentiated object, even if they be merely apophatic : sodhakavākyāny api niravadyam sarvakalyāṇaguṇākaram param brahma bodhayanti / sarvapratyanīkākāratabodhane’pi tattatpratyanīkākāratāyām bhe- dasyavarjaniyatvan na nirviseṣatvasiddhiḥ: “the purifying statements, too, convey that the supreme brahman is perfect and possessed of perfect qualities: for even if they convey that He is essentially opposed to everything else, yet necessarily they convey differentiation in that He is essentially opposed to each different quality separately.”¹⁷⁵

Further objections are raised against Sankara’s interpretation of jñāna, and these objections are fundamental. Knowledge is not an independent substance but a property.¹⁷⁶ Not only is it logically absurd to maintain an objectless and subjectless knowledge, but also grammatically the advaitin is at a loss to find a term which could convey a non-differentiated notion. Jñana or its synonym jñapti are nouns of a certain gender and number and

[[P62]] take on certain functions, when used in a sentence, which are everything but non-differentiated. The occurrence of the substantive noun jñāna side by side with plain adjectives like satya and ananta is easily explained. More than “real” and “limitless”, jñāna is an essential property of God and may be used to describe it, in a way comparable to our “his Majesty, Holiness”, etc., which describe persons who are eminently possessed of majesty and holiness. Rāmānuja does not borrow Yamuna’s argument that the accent jñānd forbids us to take jñāna as a noun,¹⁷⁷ but takes essentially the same position that in this particular connexion jñāna cannot mean anything but one eminently characterized by knowledge; aptly he refers to the next line of the Taittiriya Up. so ‘snute sarvän kämän saha brahmana vipaściteti and BrS. 2, 3, 30-31 where the same problem is discussed with regard to the ätman.

The problem of lakṣana is touched upon immediately afterwards, in a discussion of tat tvam asi. Although, as far I as know, Śankara does no- where commit himself explicitly on this point, his interpretation on this cele- [[P63]] brated vakya implies lakṣaṇā. Most explicit perhaps, is he in Upadeśasă- hasri II (padyabhaga), 18, stt. 177-183, where he declares that when we establish the sense of tvam by means of positive and negative formula- tion,¹⁷⁸ the sense of the judgment tat tvam asi becomes clear (183).

vākyartho vyajyate caivam kevalo ‘hampadarthataḥ/ duḥkhity etadapohena pratyagātmaviniscayat // “thus it appears that the sentence is an identity judgment, for by abstract- ing the notion of empirical ego from the complete entity “I”, we establish (for the words aham in aham brahmasmi and tvam in tat tvam asi) the meaning of atman.”

And st. 197: tacchabdaḥ pratyagātmārthas tacchabdarthas tvamas tatha / duḥkhitvapratyagātmatvam vareyatām ubhav api // “the word tat has the meaning of interior self, the word tuam has the mean- ing of the word tat; both words drop part of their meaning, tvam that of empirical ego, tat that of non-self.”

This last stanza shows that the lakṣaṇā implied is that of jahad- ajahallakṣana. Sureśvara,¹⁷⁹ in his Naiskarmyasiddhi 2-3 follows Sankara’s view as expressed in the Upadeśasahasri very closely, without however enlarging on the particular significance of the implicit lakṣaṇā.¹⁸⁰ Padma- päda, in his Pañcapädikā 9, 21 (p. 307), is the first to compare the judgment tat tvam asi with so ‘yam (Vivarana: so ‘yam Devadattaḥ), which is the stock-instance of jahadajahallakṣaṇā. Most explicit of all is Sarvajñātman,

[[P64]] Samkṣepaśārīraka stt. 1, 149 ff. and Pañcaprakriya I, p. 10 sq… jahada- jahallakṣaṇā pārokṣyasadvitiyaśabale vyutpannayos tattvampadayor ekāmsa- parityāgenāmśāntare vṛttisambhavät so’yam ityādīvākyārthapadayor iva / tasmāj jahadajahallakṣaṇaya pratyagātmā bodhyate, “the words tat and tvam, which have their proper sense respectively for remoteness and for the manifold and imperfect, are to be taken with partial lakṣaṇā, since, by dropping part of their meaning, they can function significantly in another part of their meaning, like the words in judgments of the type ’this is he (that)”.” He also allows gunavṛtti, figurative use, of the type simho devadattaḥ “Deva- datta is (like) a lion (in that he is cruel, brave)”. This is the generally accepted advaita view until Dharmarāja suggests another solution (Vedanta- paribhāṣā IV).

Rāmānuja takes exception to assuming lakṣaṇā in “you are it”. Not only is there no need at all to resort to laksana in explaining the identity of “this here and now" (ayam) and “that there and then” (tat), because the differences between the two terms are accounted for by a lapse of time and do not as such militate against identity: “This is that Devadatta” means nothing but “Our Devadatta here was, at some previous time, some- where else, he is the same person who was there at the time”. This polemic, irrelevant though it may seem, touches again a fundamenal difference of view: for the same dṛṣṭanta is an illustration of the so-called indeterminate perception, by which an object is perceived without any determinant proper- ties, an analogy of the intuition of a non-differentiated brahman.

DE SMET has drawn a comparison between Sankara’s lakṣaṇājñāna and the knowledge by analogy of the scholastic theology;¹⁸¹ with some caution we may also avail ourselves of the term analogy to explain Rāmānuja’s method of interpreting the śruti. We have seen that Rāmānuja, by analogy of the microcosmic harmony between body and soul, conceived of a macrocosmic harmony between the phenomenal world of matter and spirit, and the Supreme God who is the soul that animates the world as his body. When we refer to a body, we refer simultaneously to the soul, on which the body is entirely dependent and apart from which it has no proper existence. Just because of this intimate relation between body and soul, judgments are possible of the type “I am stout”, by which a property of a body is predicated of the self. What is actually said is this: “I, the individual ātman, who am empiricised by my descent into a body, am stout as far as this body is concerned”. This type of judgment can be generalized to that of “I am my

[[P65]] body” which means “I am the soul which has taken possession of this body and apart from which this body does not exist”. Analogously we can under- stand the sāmānādhikaraṇyas of the śruti where the Absolute is described and defined by terms that express concepts which in profane linguistic usage are considered to be exclusively phenomenal. In tat tvam asi, where tat resumes the Deity called sat in the preceding section,¹⁸² tvam has its full significance of “individual atman within a body”; but this is not the complete significance of the term. Just as the body has no proper existence apart from serving the soul, similarly the soul has no proper existence apart from serv- ing the Supreme Soul, God, who is immanent in it as the inner Ruler. Just as the body terminates in the soul, so the soul terminates in the inner Soul. Consequently all words which describe the body, ultimately refer to the soul, and all words which describe the soul ultimately refer to God. This reference of words is not due to any significative power in themselves, but to the very constitution of the objects which they express. By denoting the part they do not imply the whole, but the part itself implies the whole compositum of matter animated by individual souls that are internally guided by the Supreme Self.

From this discussion of Ramanuja’s polemics, which for all their abstru- sity concern the most fundamental problems, a general idea of his realism emerges. He has been called all-too-literal; and so he is. But this literal- ness lies at the very root of his hermeneutics. His glorious vision of a God who includes the world like the soul includes the body would never allow him a method of interpretation by which any term is applicable to God, only when all worldly connotations have been carefully excluded from it. To his mind such a procedure would detract from God’s glory. He realizes that in the end we would be left without any means of knowing Him at all. All Scripture is of necessity anthropomorphist; Sankara and Rāmānuja represent diametrically opposed views of how to approximate the Absolute in its transcendence in spite of the anthropomorphism of Revelation. Whereas for Sankara brahman is the Other, and he goes ever farther the way of exclud- ing from its concept all that is related to the world, to the point of denying the reality of the world in the final analysis, Rāmānuja worships a God that is verily Supreme and includes in His concept all that is of this world, to the point of affirming this world just because it is related to God. Devout Vaisnava if ever there was one, his vision can be understood. Visnu, the god of incarnations par excellence, who in every age takes personally a hand in the direction of the world’s affairs, god of preservation and maintenance, who pervades the Universe, the Viśvarupa and omnipresent one, will lead [[P66]] his devotee to a very different conception of Absolute and World from that to which Śiva would inspire, the god of annihilation, who represents yogic renunciation and systematic abnegation.

§4. Context:

Rāmānuja’s categorical rejection of the two methodological principles of Sankara’s exegesis, the distinction of major and minor statements and of primary and secondary sense, a distinction which is ultimately purely human and therefore presumptuous to make in preterhuman revelation- naturally aggravates the difficulty of interpreting the kaleidoscopic and often contradictory teachings of the sacred texts in a satisfying and consistent sense.

In order to arrive at a consistent sense, which is of course given since śruti is not subject to human fallibility, Rāmānuja makes an ingenious and skillful use of the criterion of prakarana, or context: “We have declared that the scriptural statements are no longer in conflict as soon as we have deter- mined their true purport correctly.”¹⁸³

How he applies this criterion of context may be illustrated by a few. exemplary śrutis which are often quoted by advaitins to prove their own. views.

The celebrated vakya of Bṛhadaranyaka Upanisad (2, 3, 6): athata adeśo neti netiti “thus the instruction that it is neither such nor such”, which ac- cording to Sankara denies all differentiation of brahman by negating that brahman has any form, either embodied or disembodied, takes, according to Rāmānuja, an entirely different sense when we consider the context to which it belongs. Does it really deny the initial statement of 2, 3, 1 dve vāva brahmano rūpe murtam caivāmurtam ca, as Sankara holds?¹⁸⁴ But then, what is the point of introducing this admitted falsehood at all, only to deny it in the same breath? This is unconceivable. Besides, in the immediate sequel the same text affirms that brahman has qualities like satya etc. Clearly upakrama, or initial statement, and upasamhāra, or concluding statement, are in agreement, so that the context is established¹⁸⁵ Within this context neti neti cannot mean to deny differentiation. For the true explication he refers to the Brahmasutras (3, 2, 22): prakṛtaitavattvam pratisedhati tato braviti ca bhūyah “this expression denies that brahman is only so much as has been

[[P67]] set forth here, and affirms consequently that brahman is more than that alone”.

Similarly, only a painstaking scrutiny of the entire sadvidyā will help us in understanding the true sense of the upasamhāra tat tvam asi within this context. The context opens with the pratijna or thesis that when the adeśa-i.e. the directing Person¹⁸⁶ is known this all is known. This person, later on called sat, is described as the universal cause by which we can. know the world its effect: in sat the world has its material cause (sanmula) and its operative cause (sadayatana). The effectuation of this world with all its variety of material objects and conscious spirits takes place by the descent of sat into this world by means of the individual atman (jivenātmanānupraviśya nāmarüpe vyākaravāņi). Finally, all has been summed up in the complete statement aitadätmyam idam sarvam tat satyam sa ātmā; tat tvam asi, Śvetaketo “the entire Universe is ensouled by Him who is sat, it is real, for He is the atman: so you are He, Svetaketu”: which can only mean that you are ensouled by God, so that you are He in so far as you are the body to Him, your soul. There can be no question that the declaration tat tvam asi only means to say that tvam does not exist as the ensouled effect at all: this would militate against the obvious sense of the entire prakarana. What is expressed here is not the identity of cause with cause, but the relation between God and creature as that between soul and body: aitadātmyam idam sarvam, sa ātmā.

These interpretations are comparatively straightforward and simple. So to make good his challenge that all superficial contradictions between the many śrutis will disappear instantly as soon as we have discovered the true purport of them, Ramanuja quotes a few apparently conflicting śrutis: “Brahma, Viṣṇu, Rudra and Indra have all been begotten, but not the cause: therefore we are to meditate on the cause: Sambhu, the Supreme One who enjoys universal paramountcy should be meditated upon in the middle of space.”¹⁸⁷ He combines this with a śruti from SvetUp 3, 9-11 where the Supremacy of the great person is declared. Here we have two claims to uni- versal paramountcy which we are at a loss to reconcile within one being. Yet, replies Rāmānuja surprisingly, everything fits in perfectly when we bear in mind that Narayana is the Supreme Brahman, and he proceeds to substan- tiate this statement.

As he states elsewhere, we cannot understand the śruti properly unless we consider all the śākhās: they often help us to understand the full signifi- cance of certain statements. ChUp. 6 asserts that sat was here alone in the [[P68]] beginning, in other words, is the universal cause. Elsewhere, this sat is called brahman, elsewhere ätman, all in the same connexion: sat, brahman and atman are different designations of the same being. Who is this being? We turn to another śākhā: Nārāyaṇa was here at the beginning. Sat, brah- man and atman denote Nārāyaṇa: it is He who is the first and universal cause. We have specified the being who appears as the cause in the AtharvasikhUp.

The same Upanisad describes the Sovereignty of the cause. Do we find a similar description of Nārāyaṇa? He refers to TaittĀr. 10, 13 where it is said of some personal deity that the sages weave him in the middle of the sea (we are reminded of the AtharvaśikhUp. where the cause is to be meditated upon in the middle of space) and that no one is master to him. Who is this deity? The text itself refers us further: it quotes as its context adbhyaḥ sambhutaḥ, etc., TaittÄr. 3, 13, 2. Here we find that this deity is styled “Great Person” and that Hri and Laksmi are his consorts: from which it is clear that the Paramount Deity of 10, 13, 1 and the Great Person of 3, 13, 2 are no one but Nārāyaṇa.

The connexion with the Nārāyaṇānuvāka, TaittÄr. 10, 11, 1 is now given. This text, inspired by the Purusasukta, concludes that Nārāyaṇa is Brahmā, Šiva, Indra, Aksara, the supreme, self-sufficient Sovereign. Mean- while it has been shown that SvetUp. must be understood within the Mahā- puruşaprakarana of TaittAr. 3, 13, 2. Now it is clear that the originally totally unrelated statements between which we suspected contradiction have clarified each other and themselves: Sambhu and the Great Person are Nārā- yana, who is the first and universal cause and who enjoys paramount sovereignty. The description of the dissolution of prana and senses into the manas and the manas into the supreme object of meditation in AtharvasikhUp., is compared with the description in Mahānārāyaṇa Up. of the dissolution of the Veda into Om and of Om into the A which is Närä- yana, who, we may recall, was called Brahma, Śiva, Indra, ‘Akşara, that is the ensouling principle and cause of them. Yet another statement of the AtharvaśikhUp., that the cause is to be meditated upon in the middle of space, fits into the established context where MahānārUp. 10, 7 reads dahram vipapmam varam veśmabhūtam etc., which without any doubt is inspired by the Daharavidya of ChUp. 8; this will lead Rämänuja to a further discussion of the true sense of this śruti. So we see how each śruti can and should be understood only when all the references, correspondences and parallels have been brought out by a subtle analysis. Only then we can pretend to interpret the śruti, without resorting to convenient but presumptuous distinctions between statements which suit our views and which do not.

[[P69]] But apart from these detailed interpretations, at what general conclu- sions does Rāmānuja arrive about the sense of the Scriptures? Can we ex- plain them in the sense of a strict monism, denying all qualities of the Absolute and reality of the Universe, or of a radical dualism, separating God from world and matter from souls, or of difference-non-difference in a pantheistic harmony? To a certain extent all these senses are valid, but we have to harmonize them within a new conception of the relation between Absolute and World. When the śruti denies qualities of brahman, it denies imperfect ones; when the reality of the world is negated, it affirms the utter dependence of the World on God. When diversity is denied, the uniqueness of God as the unitive inner soul of the diverse Universe is affirmed. When diversity is asserted, the wonderful variety of God’s manifestations in the Universe of matter and spirit is affirmed. All these senses find their place within the fundamental doctrine that the Personal God, who is possessed of perfect qualities, is modified by the world of pralti and puruşa, whether in subtle or causal state, or gross or effectual state, which constitute the body to which He is the Soul.

EDITORIAL NOTE

[[Pi]] §1. The editio princeps of the Vedarthasamgraha was published by TIRUMULACHARYA and VIJAYARAGHAVACHARYA in Telugu character at the Sarasvati Bhaṇḍār in Madras, in Kaliyuga 4984 = A.D. 1882. A new, but considerably less satisfactory and critical edition was published by S. Sum. P. S. RAMA MISRA Sastri in the issues of the Pandit (15) 1893, nos. 9-12; 16; and 17, and reprinted separately Benares 1924. Occasionally a few other editions are met with, which are published privately and distributed for devotional and charitable purposes and have only a limited circulation. As they are not critical, have in fact no claims to scholarly principles and are usually hard to obtain, we shall neglect them here. Quite recently another edition was brought out by T. K. V. N. SUDARSANACHARYA and published at Tirupati. All these editions are accompanied by Sudarśanasuri’s commentary Tatparyadipikā.

§ 2. Though the first to be published, over 70 years ago, the Telugu edition of Madras is the most, if not the only, critical one that has appeared so far. It is based on 13 MSS., 12 of which were privately owned. The variant readings are carefully noted and references are given to the num- bers indicating the various manuscripts. MS. 13, from the Madras Govern- ment Oriental Manuscripts Library, appears to have served as the basis of the established text. 8 MSS. are in Grantha character: nos. 1 and 6, both from the Sarasvati Bhandar at Triplicane; 2, of Samijachariar of Mysore; 3, of Ayyuvayyangar; 4, of Karappangadu Jiyar Swami; 5, of Tiruvali Ayyangar; 7, of Narasimhachariar; 13, from Madras Government Oriental Manuscripts Library. 3 MSS. are in Telugu character: nos. 9, from the Sarasvati Bhandar at Melkote; 10, of Astagotram Raghavachariar; 12, of Kunnapakkam Srini- vasachari. Finally, 2 MSS. are in Devanagari character: nos. 8, of Mila- kalwar; 9, of Bhasyakar, Melkote. The edition, blessed by Yadugiri Jeer, is very well printed with few errors. Unfortunately no account is given of the critical criteria of the editors. I have gone through all the variants and tried to classify the MSS. utilized, while allowing for a reasonable margin of error by misprints and omissions. MS. 1 is almost certainly a copy of MS. 7, but very much conflated; moreover, the copyist has permitted him- self a fair number of ‘improvements" on the text. MSS. 4 and 5 belong together intimately either one is a copy of the other, or both are extremely faithful copies of one prototype. MSS. 3 and 6 are more closely related to each other than to any other MS., but 3 shows a great number of individual variants and seems to be younger. Various relations can be detected be- tween other MSS., notably between MSS, 8, 9 and 11, but the exact arrange- ment of the material has not become completely clear to me. Since the [[Pii]] Telugu text was based on other material than was at my disposal, I have made a point of noting its readings where they differ from those preferred by me.

§ 3. The Pandit edition is far from being an improvement on the editio princeps. In one line the Editor disposes of his MSS. material. He states that he has consulted three MSS., one in Grantha script from Madras -probably the Government Oriental MSS. Library, and two in Deva- nagarī one from the Satyasarasvati Library in Mysore, which is now the Mysore Oriental Research Institute, and another one from a Library called Brahmämṛtavarsini. The Mysore MS. is no doubt the present manuscript D.G. 1776, which has also been collated for the present edition. Although the Editor does not state it, it appears from his notes that he has also con- sulted the Telugu edition. Only a very few variant readings are noted and no references are given. Misprints abound.

§ 4. The Tirupati edition, which dates itself 1953 on the title-page, was actually made available only towards the end of 1954, when my own text had already been established. A great number of variants are entered in notes, but one searches in vain for even a plain enumeration of the manu- scripts utilized or consulted; the variant readings are simply noted pāṭhān- tarani. The references to quotations in text and commentary, esp. śruti quotations, are not always reliable. On the other hand, the book is very neatly printed with few errors, and it will be found very useful by those who want to consult the Tatparyadipika. In an extensive and erudite intro- duction the Editor, who is a sastri in both Vedantas, treats of a number of relevant topics from the view-point of Śrīvaisnavasampradaya, which deserves the interest of all who take the tradition of Śrīvaiṣṇavism into consideration.

§ 5. With text like the present one the difficulties of establishing a critical edition are usually not very great and concern mainly details. The text is not very old. It could, by its very character, never be subject to the vicissitudes of ancient, popular, devotional and literary texts. It is a technical scholastic treatise, whose readers have always been confined to comparatively small communities; when their own copies happened to be broken or spoiled, they had other copies at hand, or available in libraries of temple or monastery. Sudarsanasuri’s excellent and extensive com- mentary, being generally transmitted along with the commented text, left hardly any scope for additional glosses that might find their way into the text. On the other hand, the constant repetition of a relatively small num- ber of technical terms in consecutive lines led naturally to haplographies, whereas also the numerous quotations from śruti and smrti could be added to or abbreviated without impairing the argument. Though there are a [[Piii]] considerable number of manuscripts extant, in the main they do not show important differences of reading. But, since conflation must have been going on constantly, it is often very difficult with texts like the present one to classify the manuscripts plausibly and set up an hypothetical stemma codicum, except possibly by collating painstakingly all manuscripts that are available: a procedure not always practicable and not always justified by the requirements of the individual texts. Therefore I have had to make a selection of manuscripts which would not only suffice to give a presentable text but also be representative enough to justify the claim to critical pro- cedure. So 6 MSS. from different sources were collated in their entirety and another ten in part. Soon it became plain that one Mysore MS., indi- cated below Me, gave the best text and it has therefore been made the basis of this edition

§ 6. The following MSS. have been collated completely: i. a paper MS., deposited at the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Insti- tute in Poona, cat. no. 660 of 1884/87; Devanagari, 44 pages 10" X 6"; 13 lines per page, 38 aksaras per line; well-written, but carelessly copied: errors and haplographies abound. On the first three pages the śruti etc. quotations are indicated by red marks; the colophon gives as the scribe’s name Utkoli from Mathura; the MS. is not dated. Symbol: P.

ii. a paper MS. of the Mysore Oriental Research Institute, Mysore; cat. no. D.C. 1776; Devanagari; 56 pages 11" X 5"; 10 lines per page, 86 letters per line; clearly and carefully written; it gives the impression of being a faithful copy of its Vorlage; no colophon, no date. Symbol: M1.

iii. a palm-leaf MS. of the Mysore Government Oriental Research Institute, cat. no. Gr. 878; Grantha script; 45 pages 151⁄2" X 14"; 9 lines per page, 86 letters per line; well-written, rather old; hardly any errors; no colophon, no date. Symbol: M2.

iv. a palm-leaf MS., of the Mysore Oriental Research Institute; cat. no. A 2409; Telugu character; 51 pages 17" X 11"; 6 lines per page, 74 letters per line; beautifully written; young; careful copy, leaving blank space where the prototype was obscure; colophon gives as the scribe’s name Nrsimhatā- tadāsa; dated: Monday, in the bright fortnight of the month śrāvana in the year Plava, probably 1841, but not impossibly 1901.

[[Piv]] Symbol: M3.

v. a palm-leaf MS. from the Adyar Library, Adyar; cat. no. 24. D. 32, Grantha script; 19 leaves, 173"X15"; 14 lines per page; 85 letters per line; no colophon, no date. Symbol: A1.

vi. a palm-leaf MS. from Adyar Library, Adyar; cat. no. 28 H. 5; Grantha script; 27 leaves, 191" x 13"; 10 lines per page; 80 letters per line; no colophon, no date. Symbol: A3.

§ 7. After the above manuscripts had been collated completely, a number of other MSS. in Mysore, Adyar and Madras were consulted in addition. Since the material obtained from them does not contribute signi- ficant data on the text as established with the aid of the above manuscripts, their variant readings have not been included in the critical apparatus for reasons of economy except, at first, an Adyar Grantha MS. indicated A.

§ 8. I have noted the following relations between the six completely collated MSS. P and M1 derive from a common prototype, of which the latter is a more reliable representative; both belong together with MS no. 12 of the Telugu edition. The three of them constitute one group with M2. Another group is constituted on the one hand by the two Adyar MSS. A1 and A3, which are clearly but not too closely related, and on the other hand by M3, which stands more apart. This last MS., incidentally, proved to be very closely related to Madras Government MSS. Library MS Do 5030, but since the testimony of M3 is not of great importance, this relation has not been followed up by a complete collation of the Madras manuscript. Both groups, which may be indicated as Group A and Group B, are fre- quently found to be interrelated, but members of each group have a suffi- cient number of variants between them to justify their grouping together. Generally the readings of the first group A have been preferred to those of B. In a few cases the exclusive testimony of M2 has been accepted. Sometimes Sudarsanasuri’s glosses have helped to settle the reading.

§ 9. Acknowledgements are due to the following gentlemen: P. K. Gode, Curator, Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Poona; H. Devee- rappa, Director, Oriental Research Institute, Mysore and Pandits Sri Niga- manthacharya and Palhada Thulasi Sreenivasacharya, Mysore; Alain Daniélou, Director, Adyar Library, Adyar; Dr. V. Raghavan, Professor of Sanskrit, University of Madras; T. Chandrasekharan, M.A., Curator, Gov- ernment Oriental Manuscripts Library and Pandit T. A. K. Venkatachari, Madras. It is a pleasure here to express my gratitude for the help and cooperation which they have extended to me, officially and personally.

1. Cf. such formulae as sac ca tyac ca (TaittUp. 2, 6, where the context tempts us to understand asat by tyad), which is not merely a folk-etymology of the etymologically transparent satya but in which sat “that which is here” is also opposed to “that which is that or there”, e.g. Brahman (cf. BAUp. 3, 9, 9 katamo deva itiprina iti-sa brahma tyad ity acaksate, where we may recall that ib. 2, 3, 1 sat as an embodied form is distinguished from a disembodied form described as the wind and the sky: prana as the microcosmic counterpart of vayu is quite well known).
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1. sató bándhum ásati nir avindan (4c)…
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1. I cannot quite believe in a mystical or alogical “neither being nor non-being” as generally translated, which renders the poet at once capable of admirable abstractions but incapable of logical thinking; the poet is neither “ganz barock” nor guilty of “geheimnisvolle Gestammel” (RUBEN, Philosophen, p. 161), but, trying to do away with asat as an independent magnitude but still allowing a beginning of sat, he reduces asat to sat ’s matrix, existing only by virtue of sat.
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1. This ádhyaksa in the sky must be a solar deity corresponding to Daksa in 10, 72, Viśvakarman ib. (cf. 10, 170, 4), Brahmanaspati in 10, 81 (cf. 2, 24, 3; 4, 50, 4; 10, 68, 12); worth noting is also TaittBr. 2, 2, 9 where the sun originates from asat.
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1. cf. OLDENBERG, Die Lehre der Upanishaden, pp. 185f.; JACOBI, Ueber das Verhältnis des Vedanta zum Samkhyam, Festschrift Kuhn, p. 38.
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1. JACOBI, o.c.; HEIMANN, Studien zur Eigenart des indischen Denkens, p. 49; RUBEN, Die Philosophen der Upanishaden, pp. 156ff,, and again, but extremely tendentious, Geschichte der indischen Philosophie, pp. 87 ff.
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1. brahmanaspátir etá sám karmara ivadhamat/devanam purvyé yugé ‘sataḥ sád ajayata (with c. cf. 10, 129, 6 arvág devá asyá (sc. sato) visárjanena / “the gods are since its emanation”)// tád ása ánv ajayanta.
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1. Stt. 2 and 4 (see below), 3 (sám bähúbhyām dhámati sám pátatrair dydväbhamī janayan devá ékah), and 7 (väcáspátim viśvákarmānam); Brhaspati, of course, is called vacaspati in such texts as MS. 2, 6, 6 and SatBr. 14, 4, 1, 23. Note that Ramanuja cites the adhyaksa as the personal deity in the immaterial heaven (§§ 81; 127f.).
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1. 1 kásya sármann; 7 iyám visrstir játa ábabhüva yadi va dadhé và ná/ vó asyádhyaksah paramé vyoman só angá veda yádi va ná véda :
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1. Cf. GELDNER ad 10, 129 “das Bild der Zeugung und Geburt wird in dem ganzen Liede folgerichtig durchgeführt”; it is difficult, however, to decide to what extent it is just “Bild” or symbolic representation: could, in that mythological period, world creation be easily conceived in other terms than those of procreation?
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1. táma āsīt támasă gülhám ágre ‘praketám salilám sárvam āidám; GELDNER: apraketá “unerkenntlich” in the sense of “unterschiedslos” which is perhaps already too abstract.
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1. kamas tád égre sám avartatádhi mánaso rétaḥ prathamám yád ásit (4 ab); GELDNER: “über dieses kam am Anfang das Liebesverlangen, was des Denkens erster Same war,” where yád is a loose relative conjunction; perhaps it is preferable to take sam-Vert in the attested sense of “to conglomerate, take shape in, become”: the procreative impulse took concrete shape in that which then became the first seed of mánas (which is nearer to ‘will’ than ’thought’); cf. this will-to-create personified as the first self-created creature AthV, 9, 2, 19 ff.; cf. also 13, 1, 6ff. and 13, 2, 25 ff. where the sun personifying tapas (rohita-) is the first creating creature. [[P5]] sages found out that this sat is fastened to asat-and one is inclined to add: with the omphalical cord.² This intimate connexion between that which is sat and that which is not sat enables us to understand the somewhat enigmatic beginning of the hymn: asat “another than sat” is there only to account for sat’s origin and has no proper existence apart from sat, so that before sat came to be, its counterpart was not there either; it is rightly said that originally there was absolutely nothing, neither sat, or this which is here, nor another than this.³ Asat, the other, the womb from which sat arises, has been completely abstracted from a primeval progenitrix; a reminiscence of a progenitor persists, though his function is questioned and he is at most, if at all, someone watching the process from the far-away sky.⁴
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1. As against the more or less contemporaneous contentions of TaitttUp. 2, 7, 1; BAUp. 1, 2, 1; ChUp. 3, 19, 1, that sat originated from asat, which was the old-fashioned position.
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1. brutain a more technical sense of “known by or as Vedic revelation.”
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1. mahāśālā mahāšrotriyah; the former term is invariably translated “having great houses” (BÖHTLINGK “grosze Hausherren”; DEUSSEN even “Groszen an Reichtum”; SENART “grands maîtres de maison”; RADHAKRISHNAN “great householders”) but the term in this sense is pointless in this connexion; besides śālā is “court, compound, enclosure, hall” rather than “house as living-quarters”, and used for receiving guests, etc., as place of meeting, teaching and discussion (cf. pathasälä, etc.); in connexion with mahasrotriya I would suggest “he who entertains large parties of theologians in his hall and hence himself shining in disputations” or “whose hall-disputes are great”; cf. ChUp. 5, 11, 1/3.
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1. apagad agner agnitvam.. adityad adityatuam, invariably translated “the quality of fire, etc. vanished from fire, etc.” can be understood much more significantly as describing further emanations: for this is the topic of this and the following khandas where creation by triplication is described (tejas/fire > sun and sun-like, moon and moon-like, lightning and the like); suffix tuain the sense of a collective (cf. RENOU, Grammaire sanscrite § 187); esp. the translation of DEUSSEN, and those based on it (HUME’S, RADHAKRISHNAN’s) reveal a monistic bias more inspired by Sankara than by their texts.
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1. lohamani-; mani"any more or less precious stone, or stone-like metal ore, that. is mined or delved"; RADHAKRISHNAN “nugget of gold”, but “gold” is a late sense of loha borrowed from Sankara.
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1. idam adverbially, as its position would indicate; otherwise BöHTLINGK, SENART, DEUSSEN cum suis.
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1. RADHAKRISHNAN’S comment that “aiksata, thought, lit. saw[but rather ~ akamayata, cf. SatBr. 14, 4, 2, 30, TaittUp. 2, 6, 1 etc.; DEUSSEN rightly “beabsichtete”] indicates that pure being[abstract; but the term is a concrete “a being”, less equivocal “this which is”] is conscious” suggests more than there is to it and rather begs the question if these mythologizing thinkers were able to conceive of world creation in non-anthromorphic terms; RADHAKRISHNAN’S remark is inspired by BrS. 1, 1, 4 ikṣater nāśabdam.
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19a. I follow here Edgerton’s translation (JAOS, 1915, p. 240f.). ↩︎
1. According to ChUp. 3, 11, Uddālaka Aruni was the eldest son of Aruna: this Aruna (his name “the ruddy one” is significant in view of his preoccupation with the sun) described the sun-power under five colours or aspects, under which the existent beings are classified: in this respect Aruna’s five correpond to Uddalaka’s three; noteworthy is moreover that his five colours are evidently built on the three mentioned by Uddalaka: they are 1. rohita (3, 1, 4); 2. Sukla (3, 2, 3); 3. krana (3, 3, 3); 4, parah-krsna (3, 4, 3); and 5. yad etadadityasya madhye kṣobhata iva. Obviously father and son had a common starting-point; RUBEN’S remark that Uddālaka “unter dem erdrückenden Eindruck der mythisch-mystischen Sonnenverherrlichung seines Vaters Aruna zu seinem realistischen Gegner werden. muszte, weil der Sohn (= Svetaketu) unter der Grösze des Vaters litt” (Philosophen, pp. 158-59) is rather facile romance.
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1. SO SENART ad ChUp. 6, 3, 2, note.
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1. For the original three seasons, cf. e.g. FILLIOZAT, L’Enigme des 256 Nuits d’Asoka, J. As. 1949; OLDENBERG, o.c., p. 185, makes in passing a similar suggestion.
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1. SvetUp. 4, 5 ajām ekām lohitaśuklakṛṣṇam bahvih prajāḥ sṛjyamānām, etc. where sat has already completely become matter.
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1. Ved. §§ 16; 33.
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1. In this respect SvetUp. 4, 5 is illustrative: matter which is red, etc. starts to create.
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1. An important parallel is furnished by AthV. 13, 1 and 2 where rohita is a personification of tapas (cf. 2, 25) from which or whom agni, sun, etc. arise; 1, 48; 2, 49 (with which compare ChUp. 6, 4, 4 and the note above 9).
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1. The latter function of the egg in cosmogony is already announced early: cf. Aitareya Up. 1 in a very similar context ātmā vā idam eko ‘gra sin.. so ‘dbhya eva puruşam samuddhṛtyämürcchayat/ tam abhyatapat tasyabhitaptasya mukham nirabhidvate yathandam / mukhad väg, etc. and more explicitly ChUp. 3, 19 in similar context: asad evedam agra asit tat sad äsit tat samabhavat tad andam niravartate tat samvatsarasya mātrām asayata tan nirabhidyate te ändakapale rajatam ca suvarnam cabhavatām; already ad RV. 10, 129, 4 GELDNER remarks “im tápas steckt zugleich die Vorstellung des brütenden Vogels” (cf. also Sayana ad ekam RV. 10, 82, 6 andabhiprayeṇoktam); the idea that tapas “heat, body-heat” was a creative power naturally led to creation being conceived as originating from the brooded egg-How near the notion of originating from a plant was to Uddalaka himself shows 6, 8, 6 clearly. A fourth way of birth, mentioned AitUp. 3, 3, origination from sweat, has a cosmic correspondent in Gopatha Br. 1, 1 where the primaeval waters originate from Brahman’s sweat.
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1. I take ätmand as a reflexive pronoun; cf. a parallel passage in SatBr. 13, 1, 1, 1 brahma vai svayambhu tapo ’tapyate / tad aikṣata-na vai tapasy anantyam ásti: hantaham bhutesv ātmānam juhuvāni bhūtāni cätmani, etc., cf. also RENOU, On the word atman, esp. §6 (Vak 2, Poona 1952); we may also compare such expressions as “atmanā if.c. in the sense of “bhavena, ’taya, “tvena “as being..” 9
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1. ChUp. 6, 8, 6-7; ayatana in sadayatana can be more significantly translated than “abode” by deriving it from Vyat + “place where”: “the place where the beings meet, their common ground.”
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1. Since this was written I have resumed the subject in greater detail in Vācărambhanam, Festschrift S. K. CHATTERJEE Indian Linguistics vol. XVI (Poona 1955).
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1. GELDNER “er der ganz Auge ist”; but Viśvakarman/Daksa here represent the sun which separates earth from heaven by rising from night; cf. 10, 170, 4.
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1. He comments on the sutra: svatantrabahusadhana srstir loke drsti/ naivam brahmanah / svarupasämarthyad evaitasya srstih / kimsvid kathasil ity akşepah/ adhisthanadyukteh: “creation in the world proceeds in our experience with the aid of many instruments that have an independent existence; this is not so in brahman’s case: his creation proceeds from his essentially self-sufficient creativeness: this is implicit in RV. 10, 81, 2 ab, because of the mention of adhisthana, etc., (which may be explained as ‘instrument”).”
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1. V. S. GHATE, Vedanta, p. 81.
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1. The relation between väc and brahman is very close as witness RV. 10, 114, 3d yavad brahma tişthatt tavati vak (GELDNER remarks: “brahman ist hier die Grundlage der vác”); AitBr. 4, 21, 1, SatBr. 2, 1, 4, 10, BAUp. 1, 3, 20 väg vai brahma; TS. 7, 3, 1, 4, etc., etc. One wonders if a detailed study of the relation brahman-vāc as sacred and sacrally creative speech would not contribute materially to our understanding the ’evolution’ of the notion of brahman “sacred powerful speech, creative word, the word that is creation” to that of cause of creation, etc.
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1. ChUp. 5, 17, 1 atha hovācoddālakam Arunim-Gautama kam tvam ātmānam upassa iti/prthivim eva bhagavo rajann iti hovaca / eso vai pratisthātmā vaiśvānaro yant tvam upasse, etc.
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1. pratistha.
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1. cf. BELVALKAR, Lectures on Vedanta, I, p. 141 ff.
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1. RV. 1, 164, 46 “The visionaries give many names to the One that is”.
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1. AitUp. 1, 1 brahmaivedam agra äsit; BAUp. 1, 4, 1, atmaivedam agra äsit; MahUp. 1 eko ha vai Nārāyana äsit.
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1. The origin of this equation sat brahman should be studied further.
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1. That the Sūtrakāra adhered to the parināmavāda is now generally recognized.
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1. HACKER, Vivarta, §5, pp. 197 ff.
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1. HACKER, o.c. pp. 208 ff.
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1. See Ch. III.
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1. SRINIVASACHARI, Bhedabheda, p. 7.
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1. Ramanuja defines the body: “that substance (dravya) that a spiritual entity can use and support entirely for his own purposes and that in its essence is exclusively subordinate (sesa-) to that entity, is the body of that soul”; cf. trsl. note 21.
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1. Ved. §93; Srinivasa, YID. I, p. 2 gives a similar list where Bodhayana’s name is followed by those of Guhadeva and Bharuci, then Brahmanandin’s (= Tanka) and Dramida’s: does he suggest that Guhadeva and Bharuci were the masters who summarized the Vṛtti?
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1. MM. S. KUPPUSWAMI SASTRIGAL, Bodhayana and Dramiḍācārya-two old Vedantins presupposed by Ramanuja (Proc. & Tr. 3rd Or. Conf. Madras 1924), pp. 465.
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1. DASGUPTA, Indian Philosophy III, pp. 105 ff.; cf. also S. KRISHNASWAMI IYENGAR, Manimekhalai in its historical setting, pp. 91 ff.; V. A. RAMASWAMI SASTRI, intr. to Vacaspati’s Tattvabindu (Annamalai Un. Skt. Ser. 3, 1936), pp. 14 ff.
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1. bhagavadbodhāyanakṛtām vistirnam brahmasūtravṛttim pārvācāryaḥ samciksipuḥ/ tanmatānusarena sūtrākṣarāṇi vyākhyasyante; Abhyankar’s reading Baudh is incorrect.
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1. Collected and shown against the relevant sutras in Appendix §1.
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1. BrSBh, 1, 1, 19/23/31; 1, 2, 23; S. quotes him by name ad 1, 3, 28 varṇā eva tu sabda iti bhagavan Upavarṣaḥ,
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1. The utmost caution should be observed in assuming that comparatively late commentators knew works which have been lost long since; in many cases it is probable that they too inferred rather than knew. We should not even be too sure that Ś. knew Upavarṣa’s complete commentary: both citations may easily have been current dicta in school-tradition; his one citation varna eva tu sabda iti summarizes Sabara’s Upavarṣa quotation; his other one is also found in Bhaskara 1, 1, 1, (Chaukh. ed. p. 6) ata evopavarṣācāryeṇoktam prathamapade —átmavādam tu śārīrake vakṣyama iti. If Upavarṣa’s prestige was great enough to render these relatively unimportant citations significant, one wonders why his authority is not evoked in more controversial sections-if his views were known, That Bhaskara quotes Upavarșa in exactly the same connexions as $. (though under different sutras) and only there makes it probable that Bh. quoted from ??$
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1. kah sabdaḥ gakāraukāravisarjanīyā iti bhagavan Upavarsaḥ: if, as is generally accepted, the quotation of the Vṛttikära (vṛttikaras tv anyathenam grantham varnayam cakre, etc.) runs to the end of bhasya ad 1, 1, 5, then, JACOBI argues (the Dates of the philosophical sutras of the Brahmans, p. 17 (JAOS 1911); followed by P. V. KANE, Gleanings from the Sabarabhāṣya (JBBRAS 1921)), the Vrttikara quotes Upavarșa and cannot be identical with him; this is too cautious: it is clear from the context as well as Sankara’s reference 1, 3, 28 that this Vrttikära is Upavarsa; for an account of his views, cf. V. A. RAMASWAMI SASTRI, Old Vṛttikāras on the Purva Mimämsä Sūtras (IHQ 1934), p. 431 ff.
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1. Tattvaṭikā, p. 149.
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1. Another interpretation is possible by which prathama tantra comprises I-XII, a second tantra the Samkarṣakanda XIII-XVI, and the Sariraka is appended as the third part; cf. this use is Prapancahṛdaya, p. 39. A third one is suggested by Bhaskara who has prathame päde where S. has prathamatantra-; ad 1, 3, 10 Bh. however uses tantra for the entire corpus of KM Sutras when quoting Upavarsa: prathamatantrasiddhatvac cätra sphotaniräkaranam nisphalam syat. The use of tantra as a whole of sutras “threads” is of course natural.
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1. S. K. BELVALEAR was the first to accept the direct sense of this remark (Jaiminiya’s Sārīraka-Sutra, Fest-Gabe Garbe “Aus Indiens Kultur”, Erlangen 1927), but he has not answered Hiriyanna’s pertinent objection to taking it literally: H. rightly points out that Padmapada, Suresvara’s contemporary, does not know a Jaiminiyasariraka (even denies it: cf. Pañcapädika 40, 153-54 cf. also Sankara BrSBh. 1, 1, 4); Belvalkar’s summary condemnation of the traditional view that the pupil shares his teacher’s opinions and that Jaimini therefore may just stand for Badarayana may be right from the point of view of modern scholarship, but the question is what view Sureśvara himself held. On the other hand the fact remains that the point of Sureśvara’s argumentation is that Jaimini (and no other) did compose a sutra; striking also is the almost conversational tone which suggests that it is a fact of common knowledge.
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1. I refer to V. A. RAMASWAMI SASTRI, Sankarsakända a genuine supplement to the Purva Mimämsä Sutra (IHQ. IX, 1933).
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1. Right after the quotation he remarks: ataḥ pratipipadayiṣitärthabhedena satkabhedavad adhyayabhedavac ca purvottaramimamsayor bhedaḥ, etc. “purva and uttaramimämsä are distinguished according to their subject-matter like the division of (the 12 chapters of KMS in two parts of) six adhyayas and in separate adhyāyas”.
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59a. If we read it as a bahuvrihi: “(the commentary) in which arguments are made”. ↩︎
1. tasya vimsatyadhyāyanibaddhasya mīmāmsāśāstrasya kṛtakoṭinämadheyam bhā#yam Bodhayanena keṛtam/ tadgranthabahulyabhayad upeksya kimcit samkṣiptam Upavarsena kṛtam/ tad api mandamatin prati duspratipādam vistīrṇatvad ity upeksya şoḍaśalakṣaṇapūrvamīmāmsāṣāstramātrasya Devasvaminatisamkṣiptam kṛtam, etc. Prapancahrdaya IV, p. 39.
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1. cf. p. 40 tato mayasabalabrahmani samanvayad avirodho dvitiye; that he mentions neither Ramanuja nor Madhva does not necessarily mean that he preceded both Vaisnava vedantins.
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1. He is usually dated much later than Šabara.
↩︎
1. ed. G. OPPERT (Madras 1893) I, 3, Brahmanakanda, 158 cd. halabhūtis tūpavarsah krtakotikaviś ca sah..
↩︎
1. DASGUPTA III, p. 102.
↩︎
1. Far from the battle-fields of India, Kasmir and, in the extreme south, Travancore, have been traditionally the find-spots of rare or unique MSS,
↩︎
1. Atmasiddhi, p. 8.
↩︎
1. Similar confusions happen oftener: cf. TRIPATHI, Tarkasamgraha, p. XV “Šańkaracharya styled his commentaries on Katha and Bṛhadaranyaka vṛttis, yet as they are really bhasyas it appears that in old times both words were interchangeable”.
↩︎
1. Atmasiddhi p. 8: tathapy acaryatankabhartṛprapañcabhartṛmitrabhartṛharibrahmadattasankarabhaskarādiviracitasitäsitavividhanibandhanasraddhavipra labdhabuddhayo na yathavad anyatha ca pratipadyante; on Bhartṛprapanca cf. M. HIRIYANNA, Fragments of Bhartṛprapanca (Proc. & Tr. 3d Or. Conf., Madras 1924), p. 9; Bhartṛmitra is known as a commentator of the Karmamimämsäsütras and KUPPUSWAMI is inclined to see in him a precursor of Prabhakara (The Prabhakara School of Karma Mimämsä, Proc. & Tr. 2nd Or. Conf. Calcutta 1922), pp. 410 f.; Brahmadatta is reputed to have written o Karmamimämsä, cf. Prapancahṛdaya, p. 39 brahmakändasya bhagavatpadabrahmadattabhaskarādibhir matabhedenäpi krtam, ie., Sankara, Brahmadatta and Bhaskara, but there can be no question of it but Br. preceded S.: further material in HIRIYANNA’s paper Brahmadatta: an old Vedantin (J. Or.. Res. Madras 1928), p. 1 ff.; on Bhatṛhari see V. A. RAMASWAMI SASTRI’s papers, Was Bhartrṛhari a Bauddha? and Bhartṛhari as a pre-Sankara Advaitin (resp. All-India Or. Conf. Mysore 1935 and Trivandrum 1937), also Bhartṛhari as a Mimämsaka (Deccan College Bulletin XIV, 1).
↩︎
1. Fragment XIII.
↩︎
1. Quoted by KUPPUSWAMI in the paper mentioned supra note 48; the Subodhini (Anandasrama ed.) identifies the Vakyakara with Brahmadatta; HIRIYANNA’s first alternative (o.c. p. 7-8) that this is an error is certainly the right one,
↩︎
1. Madhusudana comments: guṇasabdaḥ svarüpaparaḥ, anyă devatāḥ paragrupāḥ paradevată tu pratyagātmarūpāparokṣacidekarasety arthaḥ.
↩︎
1. On Sarvajñātman’s “stages of Vedanta”. Cf. HACKER, Vivarta, pp. 231 ft. See Samkṣepaśārīraka II, 60 ff.
↩︎
1. sutra karah Stutuanukari parinimapaksam sutrayāmbabhiva/ ayam eva chân dogye vakyakäravṛttikärābhyām sampradayah [DVIVEDIN’S text reads sampradayam]/ ataḥ samāśritaḥ/tatha ca vakyam parināmas tu syad dadhyadivad iti vigitam; the vṛttikara must be the same as Ramanuja’s bhāṣyakara; for the synonymy of urtti and bhäşya see above.
↩︎
1. I take it that the quotation by Bhaskara explains the meaning of the word vikara-; according to Sarvajñātman, the Vakyakāra first describes vikära still in terms of the first bhumi, or parināmavāda, before developing the meaning in terms of the second blūmi, or vivartavada. The fact that three different authors tried to make use of the same passage of an ancient gloss is too remarkable to go uncommented. One would suggest that Sarvajñātman endeavoured to challenge Bhaskara’s claim and forced his own interpretation of two didactic stages on the Vakya text, while Ramanuja again corrected Sarvajñātman by bringing out the full force of Dramida’s comments. This is a guess, but there is nothing in the chronology to conflict with it; besides, tacit references by one author to another are far more numerous than one would suspect at a first glance.
↩︎
1. See my translation and note ad Fr. XV; obscurity must have been the rule and may account for the divergency of interpretation.
↩︎
1. ChUpBh. Intr. and 3, 8, 10; S. Mandukya KBh. 2, 32; cf. also Anandagiri’s Tarkasamgraha and Tripathi’s (not conclusive) remarks p. XVI; KUPPUSWAMI is certainly right to consider the Dravida of the Advaitins identical with the Dramida of the Visistadvaitins; Dravida and Dramida are also in Visistadvaita MSS. variants of the same name.
↩︎
1. Värttika on Sankara’s BAUpBh., 2, 1, 506, included in Appendix §2 as Fragment XVI b.
↩︎
1. Cf. F. O. SCHRADER, Neues über die Bhagavadgita (Fest-Gabe Garbe “Aus Indiens Kultur”), p. 179.
↩︎
1. BrS. 3, 4, 44-45, which according to R. refers to the ritual accompaniments of the daharavidya, ChUp. 8, 1.
↩︎
1. I refer to V. S. GHATE’s important conclusions in Les Brahma-Sutras et leur cing commentaires (Thesis, Paris 1919), English translation, The Vedanta, A study of the Brahma-Sutras, etc., Poona 1926; cf. also DASGUPTA, II.
↩︎
1. S. K. BELVALKAR, Lectures on Vedanta I, p. 141: “There is nothing improbable in a “Chandogya” Brahmasutra having in fact formed the nucleus of the present Sūtras, and been even incorporated therein;” for his arguments see pp. 142 ff.
↩︎
82 Atreya, Asmarathya, Audulomi, Kasakṛtsna, Kārṣṇājini, Jaimini and Badari; note that all the names are patronymics and may refer to families rather than individuals; the Atreya family belongs to Samaveda, ↩︎
1. SBh. 1, 1, 1, p. 58, where reference is made to the Ved. explication of the Sadvidya (§ 13 ff.), and ib. p. 116, where reference is made to the Ved. discussion of God being denoted in sämänädhikaranya sentences with objects of which he is the inner Ruler (§§ 17; 21).
↩︎
1. See my Ramanuja on the Bhagavadgitä, Ch. III.
↩︎
1. Benares ed. p. 8 érutinydyavirodhas tu tesam bhäsye prapañcita iti neha pratanyate/ bhāṣyodito ‘dhikaranarthaḥ sasütravivaranaḥ sukhagrahanaya samkṣepenopanyasyate,
↩︎
1. Upodghata to his Vedarthasamgraha ed. p. 35.
↩︎
1. vyavahäränarhasükṣmabhedah; NARASIMHA Ayyangar (Adyar ed. 1953) translates ‘subtle and indescribable difference”.
↩︎
1. In his Gadyabhasya (Srimad-Vedantadesika-granthamālā, part 4, ed. by Sri Kanchi P. B. ANNANGARACHARYAR, Conjeeveram 1940), p. 104: atra parabhaktir uttarottarasākṣātkārecchātmaki dhiḥ, să ca yā prîtir ityädiṣv iva svabhāvajā, na tv istasādhanat= vabuddhijā / parajñānam uttarottarasäkṣātkāraḥ/ säkṣätkṛte nirantarānububhūṣā paramabhaktiḥ; the quotation is VP. 1, 20, 19 ya pritir avivekāṇām visayesv anapāyinī / tvām anusmarataḥ sa me hrdayän mäpasarpatu.
↩︎
1. See my Ramanuja, etc., pp. 19 ff.
↩︎
1. O. c. pp. 24 ft.
↩︎
1. KMS. 1, 1, 3.
↩︎
1. Ved. § 33.
↩︎
1. Sankara’s Sutrabhasya quotes the Puranas some 8 times (DEUSSEN, System of Vedanta, p. 31).
↩︎
1. Ved. § 94.
↩︎
1. § 94.
↩︎
1. § 94.
↩︎
1. § 110.
↩︎
1. SBh. 1, 1, 1, p. 70 f. (104, 23-26).
↩︎
1. $110.
↩︎
1. A comparison with the bhasya of Madhva is instructive; this author, who cannot have lived much later than Ramanuja, not only quotes Puranas and Tantras much more frequently than śruti, but treats their evidence as decisive for Vedanta; in the first adhyaya are quoted such texts as Aditya P. (1); Garuda (3); Naradiya (3); Padma (6); Bhag. Tantra (1); Bhag. P. (3); Brhat Samhita (4); Brahmavaivarta (5); Brahmaṇḍa (6); Mahakaurma (2); Vamana (4); Väräha (3); Vyoma Samhita (1); Skandha (19); Harivamsa (1).
↩︎
1. Indian Philosophy II, p. 720.
↩︎
1. I refer to SCHRADER’S Introduction to Pañcaratra, p. 27.
↩︎
1. YID VII, p. 45… śrīpāñcarātrāgamasya kvacid api vedavirodhābhāvāt kärtsneyena prāmāṇyam.
↩︎
1. SCHRADER, 0.c. p. 14.
↩︎
1. Corresponds to Agamapramanya, p. 54, 1. 6.
↩︎
1. O.c. 55, 1. 10 f.
↩︎
1. O.c. 54.
↩︎
1. O.c. 23 ff.; 42 ff.
↩︎
1. Intr. Mimansanyāyaprakāša, p. 23.
↩︎
1. BrSiddhi, p. 20: katham asataḥ saj jāyeteti ca svayam sunyataya niṣedhat/ bhavo hi yathavad aprakasamano ‘dhyastāvidyamānarupaḥ prakāśate; sünye tu kvādhyāsah, kim prakāśatām iti nirbijataiva; the expression nirbijatá occurs also in Sankara’s ChUpBh.; bija is what Ramanuja calls in this connexion mülakarana; the terms are suggested by ChUp. 6, 8, 6.
↩︎
1. HACKER, in his paper Jayantabhatta and Vacaspatimiéra (Schubring Festschrift, Hamburg 1951), p. 165, n. 4, remarks that SBh. 1, 1, 1 the confutation of advaita mainly concerns the monistic doctrine of pratyakṣa and may therefore have been inspired by Mandana; on closer inspection, however, it appears that R. investigates advaita theory on the basis of all three pramāņas, and I for one am not convinced that in dealing with pratyaksa R. had Mandana in mind,
↩︎
1. Atmasiddhi, pp. 4-5.
↩︎
1. For brevity’s sake I refer to HIRIYANNA’s introduction to the Istasiddhi (Baroda 1933), pp. XI-XII.
↩︎
1. Advaitavada.
↩︎
1. Bhaskara’s aupädhikavāda.
↩︎
1. ätmaviṣaye……āśrayanukülyapratilabdhānandasukhādivyapadeśabodhavišeşa evasya svabhävika ity anye, pp. 2-3.
↩︎
1. Cf. R.’s exposition, §§ 142-43,
↩︎
1. tathedrso (sc. svayamjyotiṣ-) ‘py āgamānumānayogajapratyakṣaiḥ svetarasakalavilakṣaṇasvabhāvyena visadaviŝadataraviśadatamatayantáto yathavad aparoksyata iti p. 3; cf. R.’s recurring expression visadatamapratyakṣatapannato describe the vividness of knowledge through bhakti.
↩︎
1. tatha svataḥ parimaṇarahito ‘pi vyapyavastuparimitikṛtapariccheda iti, vyaptir …svarupeneti, p. 3.
↩︎
1. tatha küṭastho nitya iti, p. 4.
↩︎
1. pratikṣetram nānābhūta iti, p. 4.
↩︎
1. tatha paramatmavisaye ‘pi anye tu svadhinatrividhacetanacetanasvarupasthitipravṛttibhedam svabhävikaniravadhikatisayajñānabalaiśvaryaviryasaktitejahprabhṛtisakalakalyanagunamaharnavam purusavisesam ivaram atisthante, p. 5.
↩︎
1. Indian Philosophy, III, p. 139 ff.
↩︎
1. On sesa see trsl. notes 3.
↩︎
1. nänätve saty evabhedo nämänvayaḥ/ amsamsibhavalakṣaṇaḥ samaväyaḥ/ paratantratalaksanaḥ śesafesitvarüpaḥ/svasvamibhavobhṛtyasvamilaksana iti ca nänävidhä vädäḥ; RAMANUJACHARYA in his translation of the Atmasiddhi, Journal, Annamalai University, connects nānāvidhā vādāḥ only with this paragraph, suggesting that these views are at variance mutually; but rather it sums up the entire section: .. iti kecit.. ityanye.. itare .. iti ca, nänävidhā vādāḥ.
↩︎
1. traikälikam kertsnam jagat tadanugunaśaketyādiguṇaganavadayattasthitilayakam acintyavividhavicitraracanatvät / atikusalaikayattasthityadikataya pramitacitrapratimādivat, Isvarasiddhi, p. 79-80 (Chaukh. ed.)
↩︎
1. vibhutipadabhidheyam kṛtsnam ekadheyavidheyaseṣabhavam / tacchariratvän macchariravat; RAMANUJACHARYA, o.c., renders “all things denoted by”, which is not so apt.
↩︎
1. Neither RAMA MISRA SASTRI, Chaukhamba Skt. Ser. ed., nor SRINIVASACHARI, Journal Annamalai University ed., give an account of their mss and critical methods; the Telugu ed. I have been unable to consult.
↩︎
1. ekecchānuvidhayīdam acaitanyāt svadehavat // ekenadhisthitaḥ karyam kurvate sarvacetanah / dehasambandhasüpeksakaryatvāt tvagādivat // ekapradhanapuruṣam vivädädhyasitam jagat / cetanacetanatmatvad ekarājakadeśavat // RAMANUJACHARYA’S translation differs but is less plausible.
↩︎
1. Atmasiddhi, pp. 75-78.
↩︎
1. dvitiyavastunästitvam na brahmano (Chaukh, ed, brahma na) viseşanam asattvän na hy asad brahma bhaven napi višesanam // tasmat prapañcasadbhāva nādvaitaśrutibādhitaḥ/svapramanabalat siddhaḥ śrutyä capyanumoditaḥ //Samvitsiddhi (Chaukh. ed. p. 82).
↩︎
1. samaand abhyadhika-, terms we find repeated by R., Ved. § 10; compare also Stotraratna, st. 16.
↩︎
1. vibhavavyuhakalämätram; vyuhais in Pañcaratra is fourfold personified projection of the Supreme, over which the six divine qualities are “divided”; together the four Vyuhas form also part of God’s vibhava “projection, manifestation”.
↩︎
1. kuṭastham mülakaranam; the radical cause is of course the material cause; cf. also supra note 110.
↩︎
1. From BAUp. 2, 1, 20.
↩︎
1. The drstäntas summed up in ChUp. 6, 1, 4-6.
↩︎
1. ekapradhānavijñānād vijñātam akhilam bhavet: the pratijna or promissory assertion of ChUp. 6, 1, 3.
↩︎
1. R.V. DE SMET, The Theological Method of Samkara (thesis Rome, Pontifica Universitas Gregoriana, 1953), mimeographed edition with limited circulation; a revised edition is under preparation; excerpta and partial French translation Langage et connaissance chez Samkara in Revue philosophique de Louvain, tome 52 (3e série, no. 33), 1954, p. 31-74.
↩︎
1. This is most clearly shown by the commentaries on the Brahmasutras where there is nothing in the text to account alike for the agreement and the disagreement of the bhāṣyakaras.
↩︎
1. svataḥpramanatva-.
↩︎
1. I will gladly give up this rendering for a better one; the usual “impersonal” is wholly inadequate.
↩︎
1. Cf. e.g. Ved.§ 21.
↩︎
1. The praācīna-naiyāyikas held that the relation word-object derives from a convention initiated by Išvara; the navya-naiyayikas simplified this formulation and stated that it derives from convention.
↩︎
1. The descripton is, of course, a rationale; the doctrine of the hypostasized character of the revealed Word is no doubt a continuation of the ancient speculations on the divine progenitrix Vāc.
↩︎
1. This is Ramanuja’s classification; Mimamsakas often make nisedha into a separate category and add nämadheya “proper name”,
↩︎
1. JHA, Prabhakara Mimämsä, p. 240.
↩︎
1. JHA, O.C., p. 237 f.
↩︎
1. JHA, o.c., p. 228 ft.
↩︎
1. JHA, O.C., p. 62.
↩︎
1. Bh. 1, 1, 4.
↩︎
150a. Same view refuted by Bhaskara ad BrS. 1, 1, 4; for a discussion cf. HIRIYANNA’S paper Prapanca-vilaya-vada-A doctrine of pre-Sankara Vedanta (J. Or. Res. Madras, 1927, p. 109 ff). ↩︎
1. ChUpBh. 6, 7, 7; in this paragraph I have made use of material collected by DE SMET, o.c., p. 202 f.
↩︎
1. BÄUpBh. 1, 4, 7.
↩︎
1. BAUpBh. 1, 4, 7.
↩︎
1. BrSBh. 2, 2, 21.
↩︎
1. räjäjna, Ved. § 116.
↩︎
1. $116.
↩︎
1. § 117.
↩︎
1. § 118.
↩︎
1. § 128.
↩︎
1. cf. MNPr.. § 33.
↩︎
1. vyutpatti-
↩︎
1. SBh. 1, 1, 4.
↩︎
1. pravṛtti and nivṛtti.
↩︎
1. Ślokavärttika, Sabdapariccheda st. 4; pravṛttir va nivṛttir va nityena kṛtakena ca/pumsam yenopadisyate tac chastram abhidhiyate//
↩︎
1. DE SMET, o.c., p. 199 £,
↩︎
1. Ved $136.
↩︎
1. BrSBh. 1, 1, 21.
↩︎
1. DE SMET, Langage et connaissance chez Samkara, p. 47.
↩︎
1. LACOMBE, who devotes a few pages to S.’s exposition ad TaittUp. 2, 1 (ASV. p. 79 ff), surprisingly mistakes laksana (n) in lakṣaṇartha- for [[lakesand|lakṣaṇā]] (f) and translates and argues accordingly.
↩︎
1. Samkṣepaśäriraka 1, 121.
↩︎
1. Advaitasiddhi, p. 692 (akhandarthalaksana).
↩︎
1. Ved. § 23.
↩︎
1. $24.
↩︎
173a. Atmasiddhi, p. 74: satyam jñānam ity atrapi brahmalakṣananirdese jñāna- jabdo na jñānamätravacanaḥ/ api tu tadvadvacanah, tadvacanatve liti ity adyudattatva- prasakteḥ/antodattas cayam jñānasabdaḥ/matvarthiyacpratyayantatve tathatvam gha- tate, nanyatha ity etat paramatmanirupane ’tinipunam upapädiṣyamaḥ / aitareyakopa- nisad api prajñānam brahma ity uktva sa etena prajñenātmana iti prakṛṣṭajñānavantam evesvaram darśayati/tat siddham jäätaivayam ātmā “the word jñāna in the text satyam jñānam, etc., with the function of defining brahman, does not mean ‘only knowledge’, but ‘one who possesses knowledge’: for if it were to mean ‘only knowledge’ it should have had the accent on the first syllable according to the rule liti, Panini 6, 1, 193; but here the word jñana has the accent on the final syllable. Now it can only be jñaná if the last syllable contains suffix ac in the sense of the possessive suffix matu (p), and not otherwise. We shall demonstrate this point exhaustively when we discuss the Supreme Soul. Incidentally, the Aitareya Up., too, expounds that the Lord is indeed possessed of eminent knowledge (prakṛsta- explaining pra-) in prajñānam brahma, continuing sa etena prājñenatmand. So it is proved that the atman is a knower.” Yamuna’s point is an interesting one; it appears that jñana in this śruti is recited at present as an oxytone: either this practice existed in Yamuna’s days already, or the practice then (and now) continues the original one: Yamuna is about half-way the age of the text. His argument is less acceptable: Panini 5, 2, 127 rules arśaadibhyo ‘c in cases of certain bodily deficiencies and colours (and similar ones: akṛtigano ‘yam adds Siddhantakaumudi). Oxytonesis of jñand, though as far as I know not attested, is not impossible and would point to an agent roun (WACKERNAGEL-DEBRUNNER II 2, § 81, a, B; § 82, c; WHITNEY, $1150, g. But as RENOU notes (Gr. acte § 26) “l’accent dans les textes classiques n’est pas noté, et rien ne permet d’indiquer avec précision la nature de l’accent dans la période post- védique.” The most recent translation of our text (RENOU-LESIMPLE, Paris 1948) follows the traditional interpretation “Brahman est réalité, connaissance, infinitude.” It should be remarked, however, that the line between personal and. impersonal, concrete and abstract, was infinitely less sharp for the Upanisadic thinkers than it is for us, and either translation cannot help being too clear-cut, ↩︎
1. ie., anvaya and vyatireka, not further explained in the US, occur again in Naişkarmyasiddhi II, 8-9 in identical connexion. HIRIYANNA notes ad 2, 8 (p. 236) not very helpfully: “there are two methods of inquiry which may, perhaps, be described as ‘method of agreement’ and ‘method of difference’.” HACKER, Untersuchungen, p. 74 describes the terms as “Reflexion darüber, dasz der Inhalt der Wörter und des Satzes wohl. begründet and das Gegenteil logisch unmöglich ist.” More precisely: the proposition is first considered positively by anvaya, whereby the connexion is realised between that in tat which is in team and contrariwise; then it is considered negatively by vyatireka, whereby that in tvam which is not tat is excluded from team and contrariwise.
↩︎
1. HACKER, Untersuchungen, p. 75 ff. has dealt extensively with Suresvara’s exegesis of tat tvam asi in the Naiskarmyasiddhi, but unfortunately has not gone into the question of its relation with the US. as quoted here.
↩︎
175a. This lakṣana is meant by Dharmaraja when he states: tasmät tat tuam asiti vākya ācāryānām (honorific plural = 6.) laksanoktir abhyupagamavadena (“by way of hypothesis” leaving scope for diverging interpretations) bodhya, Vedantaparibhasa TV. ↩︎
1. R. V. DE SMET, The correct interpretation of the definitions of the Absolute, according to Sankaracarya and Saint Thomas Aquinas (Philosophical Quarterly, 1955, XXVII, 4), p. 187 ff..
↩︎
1. ChUp. 6, 2, đi
↩︎
1. Ved. 83 F.
↩︎
1. BrSBh. 3, 2, 22.
↩︎
1. The most important of the indications of the coherence of a context.
↩︎
1. See trsl. n. 75.
↩︎
180a. AtharvaśikhUp.1 ↩︎