Vedanta-Sutras Part I · 92 of 103

Adhyaya II: Pada II: Sutra 11

If it is understood that its suffering is not real, we do not object to the phrase ‘as it were 1.’ For the amphisbena also does not become venomous because it is ‘a serpent as it were’ (‘like a serpent’), nor does the serpent lose its venom because it is ‘like an amphisbena.’ You must therefore admit that the relation of causes of suffering and of sufferers is not real, but the effect of Nescience. And if you admit, that, then my (the Vedântic) doctrine also is free from objections 2.

But perhaps you (the Sânkhya) will say that, after all, suffering (on the part of the soul) is real 3. In that case, however, the impossibility of release is all the more undeniable 4, especially as the cause of suffering (viz. the pradhâna) is admitted to be eternal.—And if (to get out of this difficulty) you maintain that, although the potentialities of suffering (on the part of the soul) and of causing suffering (on the part of the pradhâna) are eternal, yet suffering, in order to become actual, requires the conjunction of the two—which conjunction in its turn depends on a special reason, viz. the non-discrimination of the pradhâna by the soul—and that hence, when that reason no longer exists, the conjunction of the two comes to an absolute termination, whereby the absolute release of the soul becomes possible; we are again unable to accept your explanation, because that on which the non-discrimination depends, viz. the guna, called Darkness, is acknowledged by you to be eternal.

And as 1 there is no fixed rule for the (successive) rising and sinking of the influence of the particular gunas, there is also no fixed rule for the termination of the cause which effects the conjunction of soul and pradhâna (i.e. non-discrimination); hence the disjunction of the two is uncertain, and so the Sânkhyas cannot escape the reproach of absence of final release resulting from their doctrine. To the Vedântin, on the other hand, the idea of final release being impossible cannot occur in his dreams even; for the Self he acknowledges to be one only, and one thing cannot enter into the relation of subject and object, and Scripture, moreover, declares that the plurality of effects originates from speech only. For the phenomenal world, on the other hand, we may admit the relation of sufferer and suffering just as it is observed, and need neither object to it nor refute it.

Herewith we have refuted the doctrine which holds the pradhâna to be the cause of the world. We have now to dispose of the atomic theory.

We begin by refuting an objection raised by the atomists against the upholders of Brahman.—The Vaiseshikas argue as follows: The qualities which inhere in the substance constituting the cause originate qualities of the same kind in the substance constituting the effect; we see, for instance, that from white threads white cloth is produced, but do not observe what is contrary (viz. white threads resulting in a piece of cloth of a different colour). Hence, if the intelligent Brahman is assumed as the cause of the world, we should expect to find intelligence inherent in the effect also, viz. the world. But this is not the case, and consequently the intelligent Brahman cannot be the cause of the world.—This reasoning the Sûtrakâra shows to be fallacious, on the ground of the system of the Vaiseshikas themselves.

Footnotes 376:2 In the former case the five intellectual senses are looked upon as mere modifications of the sense of touch.

376:3 Buddhi in the latter case being the generic name for buddhi, ahankâra, and manas.

376:4 Lit. that which burns and that which is burned, which literal rendering would perhaps be preferable throughout. As it is, the context has necessitated its retention in some places.—The sufferers are the individual souls, the cause of suffering the world in which the souls live.

377:1 In the case of the lamp, light and heat are admittedly essential; hence the Vedântin is supposed to bring forward the sea with its waves, and so on, as furnishing a case where attributes pass away while the substance remains.

377:2 ‘Artha,’ a useful or beneficial thing, an object of desire.

379:1 In reality neither suffering nor sufferers exist, as the Vedântin had pointed out in the first sentences of his reply; but there can of course be no doubt as to who suffers and what causes suffering in the vyavahârika-state, i.e. the phenomenal world.

379:2 In order to explain thereby how the soul can experience pain.

379:3 And that would be against the Sânkhya dogma of the soul’s essential purity.

379:4 So that the fact of suffering which cannot take place apart from an intelligent principle again remains unexplained.

379:5 Âtmanas tapte sattve pratibimitatvâd yuktâ taptir iti sankate sattveti. An. Gi.

380:1 For it then indicates no more than a fictitious resemblance.

380:2 The Sânkhya Pûrvapakshin had objected to the Vedânta doctrine that, on the latter, we cannot account for the fact known from ordinary experience that there are beings suffering pain and things causing suffering.—The Vedântin in his turn endeavours to show that on the Sânkhya doctrine also the fact of suffering remains inexplicable, and is therefore to be considered not real, but fictitious merely, the product of Nescience.

380:3 Not only ‘suffering as it were,’ as it had been called above.

380:4 For real suffering cannot be removed by mere distinctive knowledge on which—according to the Sânkhya also—release depends.

381:1 This in answer to the remark that possibly the conjunction of soul and pradhâna may come to an end when the influence of Darkness declines, it being overpowered by the knowledge of Truth.

11.Or (the world may originate from Brahman)

as the great and the long originate from the short and the atomic.

The system of the Vaiseshikas is the following;—The atoms which possess, according to their special kind 1, the qualities of colour, &c., and which are of spherical form 2, subsist during a certain period 3 without producing any effects 4. After that, the unseen principle (adrishta), &c. 5, acting as operative causes and conjunction constituting the non-inherent cause 6, they produce the entire aggregate of effected things, beginning with binary atomic compounds. At the same time the qualities of the causes (i.e. of the simple atoms) produce corresponding qualities in the effects. Thus, when two atoms produce a binary atomic compound, the special qualities belonging to the simple atoms, such as white colour, &c., produce a corresponding white colour in the binary compound. One special quality, however, of the simple atoms, viz. atomic sphericity, does not produce corresponding sphericity in the binary compound; for the forms of extension belonging to the latter arc said to be minuteness (anutva) and shortness. And, again, when two binary compounds combining produce a quaternary atomic compound, the qualities, such as whiteness, &c., inherent in the binary compounds produce corresponding qualities in the quaternary compounds; with the exception, however, of the two qualities of minuteness and shortness. For it is admitted that the forms of extension belonging to quaternary compounds are not minuteness and shortness, but bigness (mahattva) and length. The same happens 1 when many simple atoms or many binary compounds or a simple atom and a binary compound combine to produce new effects.

Well, then, we say, just as from spherical atoms binary compounds are produced, which are minute and short, and ternary compounds which are big and long, but not anything spherical; or as from binary compounds, which are minute and short, ternary compounds, &c., are produced which are big and long, not minute and short; so this non-intelligent world may spring from the intelligent Brahman. This is a doctrine to which you—the Vaiseshika—cannot, on your own principles, object.

Here the Vaiseshika will perhaps come forward with the following argumentation 2. As effected substances, such as binary compounds and so on, are engrossed by forms of extension contrary to that of the causal substances, the forms of extension belonging to the latter, viz. sphericity and so on, cannot produce similar qualities in the effects. The world, on the other hand, is not engrossed by any quality contrary to intelligence owing to which the intelligence inherent in the cause should not be able to originate a new intelligence in the effect. For non-intelligence is not a quality contrary to intelligence, but merely its negation. As thus the case of sphericity is not an exactly parallel one, intelligence may very well produce an effect similar to itself.

This argumentation, we rejoin, is not sound. Just as the qualities of sphericity and so on, although existing in the cause, do not produce corresponding effects, so it is with intelligence also; so that the two cases are parallel so far. Nor can the circumstance of the effects being engrossed by a different form of extension be alleged as the reason of sphericity, &c. not originating qualities similar to themselves; for the power of originating effects belongs to sphericity, &c. before another form of extension begins to exist. For it is admitted that the substance produced remains for a moment devoid of qualities, and that thereupon only (i.e. after that moment) its qualities begin to exist. Nor, again, can it be said that sphericity, &c. concentrate their activity on originating other forms of extension 1, and therefore do not originate forms of extension belonging to the same class as their own; for it is admitted that the origin of other forms is due to other causes; as the Sûtras of Kanabhug (Kanâda) themselves declare (Vais. Sût. VII, 1, 9, ‘Bigness is produced from plurality inherent in the causes, from bigness of the cause and from a kind of accumulation;’ VII, 1, 10, ‘The contrary of this (the big) is the minute;’ VII, 1, 17, ‘Thereby length and shortness are explained 2’).—Nor, again, can it be said that plurality, &c. inherent in the cause originate (like effects) in consequence of some peculiar proximity (in which they are supposed to stand to the effected substance), while sphericity, &c. (not standing in a like proximity) do not; for when a new substance or a new quality is originated, all the qualities of the cause stand in the same relation of inherence to their abode (i.e. the causal substance in which they inhere). For these reasons the fact of sphericity, &c. not originating like effects can be explained from the essential nature of sphericity, &c. only, and the same may therefore be maintained with regard to intelligence 1 Moreover, from that observed fact also, that from conjunction (samyoga) there originate substances, &c. belonging to a class different (from that to which conjunction itself belongs), it follows that the doctrine of effects belonging to the same class as the causes from which they spring is too wide. If you remark against this last argument that, as we have to do at present with a substance (viz.

Brahman), it is inappropriate to instance a quality (viz. conjunction) as a parallel case; we point out that at present we only wish to explain the origination of effects belonging to a different class in general. Nor is there any reason for the restriction that substances only are to be adduced as examples for substances, and qualities only for qualities. Your own Sûtrakâra adduces a quality as furnishing a parallel case for a substance (Vais. Sût. IV, 2, 2, ‘On account of the conjunction of things perceptible and things imperceptible being imperceptible the body is not composed of five elements’).