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saidevo
14 February 2008, 08:27 PM
LET us see now if this summation will give us all we want, if it will withstand and resolve all doubts and queries and objections, even as the rod of power wielded by Vasishtha swallowed up and made nought of all the weapons of Vishvamittra. Let us test it with questions the most wild and weird and fanciful. If it fails to answer one, it fails to answer all, and we must seek again for another summing up.



1. The distinction between brahma (ending with an unaccented short 'a'), and brahmA (ending with an accented long 'a') should be borne in mind. The former (in the neuter gender, nominative singular) is the same as param-AtmA, Supreme Universal Self (including Not-Self and Negation). It is also often named para-brahma; to make unmistakable its distinction from brahmA; and also to indicate that It is para, Ultimate, Highest, or rather Beyond compare, Transcendent.

brahmA (masculine, nominative singular) means the Individualised Ideating and Regulating Mind, the Personal God, of a world, a globe, a solar system, etc. brahmA is to brahma as individual to Universal, particular to General, singular to Total, part to Whole, whirlpool to Ocean; one focus, among pseudo-infinite foci, of space-filling Boundless Energy. The un-inflected base of both words is brahman.

In Samskrta script:

brahma is ... ब्रह्म
brahmA is .. ब्रह्मा
brahman is ... ब्रह्मन्

The word brahma has other meanings also:

(a) Veda, knowledge, science, learning,
(b) the class-caste of brAhmana-s, the clergy, the learned profession, the men of learning,
(c) the vital seed with potency of infinite multiplication; etc.

There will be no occasion to use the word in these senses in this work. They are dealt with in The Science of Social Organization.

2. dvandv-AtItam - beyond the pairs, i.e. transcending the Relative.




The splendid chapter on 'The Perception of Reality', pp. 283-324, of William James' Principles of Psychology, II, may be read in this connection; and the claims made for the Logion, here, may be tested by the requirements of "the perfect object of belief" laid down there. The rest of the present book should be open to the same test, since the writer has essayed to build it all upon the basis of the Logion, to derive and deduce it all therefrom.

Two quotations from James are subjoined. "Our own reality, that sense of our own life, which we at every moment possess, is the ultimate of ultimate for our belief"; p. 297.

(Cf. pp.22-23 supra Shankara, Shariraka Bhashya, on which Vachaspati Mishra's Bhamati is the most respected commentary, says: 'Everyone believes I am; none I am not'--I.i.1).

At p.317, James says: "The perfect object of belief would be a God or Soul of the World, represented both optimistically and moralistically if such a combination could be and withal so definitely conceived as to show us why our phenomenal experiences should be sent to us by Him in just the very way in which they come".

In other words, the perfect object of belief should satisfy our logical and intellectual requirements, our emotional cravings for happiness achievable in morally virtuous ways, and our volitional urges for activity which would not harm others.


Changeless Change and Un-Conscious Consciousness

'Aham Etat Na'--this logion, in its entirety, represents with the greatest accuracy that it is possible for words to attain, the nature of the Absolute, the Absolute which so many names and words endeavour to describe--the Unlimited; the Unconditioned; the Transcendent; Consciousness that includes Unconsciousness; the compactness, solidity, Plenum of Cognition (knowledge or thought), of Being, and of Bliss; the Supreme; the Indescribable; the Unknowable.



Some such descriptive words in Sanskrit are:

anavacChinnaM - unlimited; parA saMvit - unconditional; atItaM - transcendent; jnAnaghanaM - concentrated knowledge; chiddhanaM - wealth of consciousness and intelligence; saddhanaM - true wealth; AnandaghanaM - concentrated bliss; paraM - ultimate; anirdeshyaM - indefinite; anirvachanIyaM - undefinable, indescribable; avijneyaM - unknowable.

(Meanings collected by me; members may change/improve them where they are in error.--sd)


This timeless thought, this spaceless idea, taken as a whole, changelessly constitutes and is the nature of Brahman. So taken,

• it is one thought, one knowledge,
• one omnisciently rounded cognition of all 'this' that is possible to know,
• one omnipotently fulfilled and surfeited desire for all 'this',
• one omnipresently completed action of self-assertion and 'this'-(other)-denial,

• one single psychosis or mood or act of Consciousness, in which there is no particular content, but which yet contains the totality of all possible particulars;

• it is unbroken, pieceless; there is no motion in it, no space, no time, no change, no shifting, no unevenness, but all equality, an all-complete condition of balance and repose, pure, stainless and formless.



Some such descriptive words in Sanskrit are:

ekAkAraM - living alone, solitary; unchanging form;
anavarataM jnAnaM - uninterrupted, continual knowledge;
nirviShesaM - without attributes or distinction;
akhaMDaM - undivided, indivisible, not fragmentary, whole, entire;
niShkiyaM - immeasurable in time, space or value;
kAlAtItaM - beyond time;
deshAtItaM - beyond space;
nirvikAraM - unmoved, unchanged, without transformation;
samaM, sAmyaM - homogeneous, uniform;
shAntaM - peace, tranquillity;
nirUpaM - formless;
niraMjanaM - flawless, unstained;

(Meanings collected by me; members may change/improve them where they are in error.--sd)


We can call it Unconsciousness also, the absence of thought or cognition or desire or action or any mood at all. For where the This is the whole of the Not-Self, and even that is negated, the consciousness that is left may well be called Unconsciousness, as that of the state of sound slumber; it is clearly not any particular consciousness, such as that wherein the particularity of the This, as a this, a that, defines both the subject Self and the object Not-Self. And yet it includes the totality of all such particular consciousnesses, for the Not-Self includes all particular this-es.

Rotating Wheel of Life

Taken in two parts, the same thought gives:

1. Aham Etat, I-This, i.e., I am this something other than I, a piece of matter, a material or physical body; and

2. (Aham) Etat-Na, (I am) not this thing which is other than I, this piece of matter, this material or physical body.

(See foot-note 2, p.84. The incessant lIla, Pastime, of the Self is the playful endeavour to define the undefinable It-Self; 'Am I this minteral?', 'Well, I am this mineral'. 'But no, I am not this mineral.' And so with all possible pseudo-infinite kinds of minerals, vegetables, animals, humans, sab-and-super-humans, and all other kinds of things and beings.)

Here, in these two sub-propositions, inseparable parts and constituents of the one logion, we have, as we shall see later in details, the whole process of samsAra.

'Samsaara' means a process, (Skt. sr, to slide on, move on) a movement, of rotation, for it is made up of the alternation of opposites: birth and death; growth and decay; inbreathing and outbreathing; waking and sleeping; acceptance and rejection; greed and surfeit; pursuit and renunciation; evolution and involution; formation and dissolution; integration and disintegration; differentiation and re-identification; emergence and re-mergence.

saidevo
14 February 2008, 08:35 PM
Such is the essence and the whole of the World-Process, at whatever point of space or time we examine it, in whatever aspect we look at it, animate or so-called inanimate, chemical, or mechanical, physical, biological, psychological, or sociological, in the birth and death of an insect and also each rhythmic wing-beat of that insect, or the birth and death of a solar system and also each vast cyclic sweep in space and time of that system. Why the logion has to be taken in parts and also as a whole, will appear when we study further the nature of the 'This'.



Swing of Opposites

Indeed every science and every school of philosophy deals with one important aspect of, and gives its own characteristic names to, the alternately predominating terms of the 'pairs' of the World-Process. Thus:

physics ==> action and reaction;
chemistry ==> composition and decomposition;
biology ==> anabolism and katabolism;
physiology ==> secretions and excretions;
medicine ==> growth and atrophy, health and disease;

mathematics ==> addition and subtraction, multiplication and division, prolongation and bisection, composition and resolution, the static and the kinetic;

civics ==> competition and co-operation, or individualism and socialism;
law ==> right-and duty;
politics ==> aristocracy and democracy;
poetry ==> optimism and pessimism, l'allegro and il penseroso;

history ==> war and peace:

'war' (between human beings), abnormality, greater and greater differentiation, excess of love-hate born of primal ab-err-ation (out of which proceeds the bulk of the multifarious events and complications which make up the subject-matter of history), and of 'peace,' normality, greater and greater approach to the 'perfectness' and 'completeness' of homogeneity, serenity, restfulncss (which has no history, for 'no news is good news'; since the arts of peace are mostly arts of war with 'nature'; 'war' and 'peace' being used here in the usual comparative sense, with a hint of the ultimate metaphysical sense in which every srshti, every manifestation in the World-Process, is by a disturbance of the primal equilibrium of tho Three);

psychology ==> reminiscence and obliviscence, waking and sleeping, aroused and focussed attention and dormant and diffused sub-con-consciousness, manas-presentation and buddhi-memory;

philosophy, too, ==> (progressive and regressive) change and absolutist changelessness;
and finally, religion, ==> the worship of Shakti-Power and of Shiva-Peace.

For the 'pair' names used by various Samskrt philosophies and sciences, see The Science of Religion, or Sanatana Vaidika Dharma, pp.64 67, and The Science of Social Organisation, or The Laws of Manu, I,32-35.

A work like Rogers Thesaurus shows how the whole mental life of man, and all the corresponding vocabulary that he uses, is made up of thousands upon thousands of such antithetic pairs.

The principle, law, or fact of dvam-dvam, 'Two-and-Two' is so fundamental, so pervasive of all departments, all aspects, of Nature, is, indeed, so essentially the very 'nature' of Nature, that some more examples of the more important 'pairs of opposites' may not be unwelcome to the student. They all arise, of course, from the Primal Opposition of 'I' and 'Not-1', 'This' and 'Not-This'.

Temperamental types are, first and foremost, of which all others may be regarded as varieties,

• feminine and masculine, prakrti-(strI) and purusha;
• then, tender-minded and tough-minded (William James);
• romantics and classics (Ostwald);

• introverts and extroverts (Jung); antar-mukha and bahir-mukha. in Skt., i.e., in-faced and out-outfaced, in-turned and out-turned, introspective and extro-spective, (Yoga- Vedanta);

• inhibitive and exhibitive, nirodha-chitta and vyutthA-chitta (ditto);

• precocious dement and hysteric (psycho-analysis);
• abstractionist artist and sympathetic artist (Warringer);

• Dionysius and Apollo (Nietzsche), sentimental and naive (Schiller), passive voice and active voice, in language (Finch);

• centripetal and centrifugal (Jung), abstract and concrete;
• con-centric and ec-centnc;
• steady and unstable, equilibrated and unbalanced;
• credulous and sceptical;
• habit-ruled and inventive;
• agricultural and nomadic;
• peace-loving and warlike, realist and nominalist (reconciled in the conceptualist);
• spiritualist-idealist and materialist-realist (reconciled in the pantheist);
• jnAni-gnostic and bhakta-pietist (reconciled in the 'practical mystic');
• severe (style of writing) and flowery;
• synthetic and analytic, general and special, poetic and scientific;

• causalistic (dwelling on past causes as explanatory) and finalistic (emphasing the final cause or end, aim, future purpose);
• determinist and vitalist, i e. necessitarian or predestinarian and libertarian, or fatalist and free-will-ist (reconciled in the 'illusionist');
• Will-to-live (Freud, Jung) and will-to-power (Adler).

It will be seen that the two terms of each of these pairs often and readily change places, with difference of situation and standpoint; because non-Ego has borrowed the qualities of the Ego, and vice versa, Man is part Woman, and Woman is part Man.

Fuller understanding of the cult of Shakti-Power (as distinguished from the cult of Shiva-Peace) in India and Thibet, is likely to be helped by psychoanalytic literature, and vice versa; (see, e.g., ch. xxxiii. 'Psycho-path pathic Consequences', of The Sexual Crisis, by Crete Meisel Hess, translated by Eden and Cedar Paul; pub.1917, by the Critic and Guide Company, New York).

Cerebral energy and sex energy go together, as the two poles of the one magnet Energy. The complete exhaustion or suppression of either one of the two, means complete loss of the other also; whence the aphrodisiac quality of Ayur-vedic and other tonics for the cure of neurasthenia.

But the two energies are as the ends of a see-saw; physically reproductive energy, (generated primarily by food, which stands for primal Vital Energy, whence both sexual and cerebral energies), has to be continually sublimated into mentally and superphysically reproductive energy, by the person who would become urdhva-retas yogi, 'whose seminal energy always streams upwards'.

In connection with socialism, G.M.Hess notes the simultaneous rise of two opposed pairs, "(1) the woman emancipated from sex, i.e., the de-sexed, versus the woman emancipated for sex i.e., the very highly sexed who yet wants to be free; and (2) Ascetics versus Aesthetes." (among men). Amazon and hetaira were the correspondents in old Greece.

Renunciants of the world and pursuants of it. among men as well as women, are to be found everywhere, throughout history. The many aspects of Durga-Annapurna, destructive martial power and constructive food-and-life-giving power, and of Kali-Gauri, 'Dark'-and-'White', 'Hate'-and-'Love', blood-thirsty sadism and meek masochism, are similar pairs of opposites.

J.Langdon Davies' A Short History of Women is full of illustrations of how, age after age, country after country, 'Woman' has been alternately worshipped as supreme goddess (Ishtar, Astarte, seems to be only another form of the Skt. word strI, woman), and maltreated as slave; how every step forward in her emancipation has been followed by a step backward in the shape of some corresponding bond of disability.

Such is the case with the freedom and the bondage of men also. So, J.M.Robertson's A Short History of Christianity shows, principally in the case of the Christian religion, of course, but incidentally in that of others also, how growth and spread, and then decline and decay, are marked throughout, period after period, phase after phase, sect after sect, by one gain and one pain, one advantage and one disadvantage.

It comes as a great surprise, now and then, and is very informing, to see how Christian priests and rulers made converts, and suppressed pagans and heathens, and even mere dissidents belonging to other sects of Christianity than their own, with the help of the Bible as well as of 'fire and sword', at one time, under the stress of one kind of fanatical motive; and, at another time, under the stress of another kind of motive, political or economic or both, deliberately avoided making converts and positively checked the spread of Christianity. Similar has been the history of the spread of Aryan Vedism (how could this be?--sd), and of Islam and other religions.

It is patent that the consequences of every important scientific discovery and invention are similarly dual, good as well as evil, because of the two-fold nature of the human being; witness, the two World Wars of the first half of the 20th Century CE, and the chain of their causes and consequences; viz., awful misuse of science by the greed, pride, lust, jealousy, mutual fear, and hate, of the leaders, teachers, rulers, and propagandist-hypnotisers of the nations; thence, vast destruction of life and property and enormous mis-employment and waste of labor; and, again, more virulent la revanche.

Emerson's classical 'Essay on Compensations' is only a very brief study of the 'balancings' of Nature. The vast and ever-growing literature of science in every department of it, including that of Sex, provides instances at every step. Many very striking illustrations are to be found in H. G. Wells' The Science of Life and Outline of History, of the Law of Polarity, Duality, Two-and-Two, which pervades the World-Process and constitutes its very heart-beat.

saidevo
15 February 2008, 11:41 AM
Inclusion of All Opposites, Im-position and de-position

This single logion thus includes within itself both Changelessness and Change. It includes the fullness of the Absolute-Consciousness or Un-Consciousness, from the all-embracing timeless and spaceless standpoint of which, the Self is seen to have eternally negated, abolished, annihilated the Not-Self, in its totality, without remainder, and so has left behind a pure strifelessness of complete balance, utmost repose, Perfect Peace.

It also includes the pseudo-eternal, the pseudo-infinite, the in-de-finite, and, technically, the illusive, mayavic, endlessness of incessant identifications and separations, on the smallest and the largest scales, of the Self and the Not-Self;

• each identification being immediately balanced up by a separation;
• each separation at once neutralised by an identification;
• sarga, creation, and pra1aya, dissolution, following each other in untiring and ceaseless motion of rotation, chakra, 'cycling', 'circling';

in order to imitate and show out in time and space, in an ever-futile and ever-renewed endeavour, that which is complete, always and at once, in the Eternal and Infinite Absolute.

Thus it comes about that the method of true Vedanta,
• repeated super-im-position, adhy-Aropa, of an attribute upon the Supreme (object of enquiry and definition),
• and then de-position, refutation and striking away, apa-vAda, of it, till all particular attributes have been struck away
• and the Supreme remains defined as the Un-de-fin-able;

is also the method of all thought,
• (sup-position--op-position--com-position)

and the method of the World-Process,
• which is the embodiment of incessant endeavour to impose material Attributes upon the Attributeless throughout all time and space, endless at-tempt to de-fine Spirit in terms of Matter.

All Space-Time-Motion within Self

'Aham Etat Na'--this transcendent samvit, thought, consciousness, awareness, idea, thus,

• timelessly, spacelessly, and changelessly, constitutes and is the sva-bhAva, 'own-being', Nature, of the Absolute, which Nature and which Absolute i.e., which Absolute-Nature is also, therefore, identical with the totality of the World-Process;

such totality being attained,

• not by endless addition of parts and pieces of moving things in time and space as outside of us;
• but by grasping of the Whole of the Not-Self, with all time and space and things moving therein, as within us;
• so that Past and Future, Behind and Before, collapse into Now-and-Here, and all relative parts are summed up, by abolition, in the Absolute Whole.

All Questions Answered At Once!

• What merits and qualifications, or absence of merits and qualifications, that may rightly be sought in and required of the Absolute, without which the Absolute would not be what its name implies, are missing from this?

• Is not that the Thought which is Independent of all Else?
• Does it not contain all in It-Self?

• The Absolute is the Unconditioned. What condition limits this perfect cognition, this Complete Idea, which is its own end and looks to no end beyond It-Self, which is also its own means and seeks no means out of It-Self for its realisation?

• It is One single act of Consciousness, which looks not before or after, to past or future, but is complete, and complete now, in the Eternal Moment, complete here, in the Infinite Point.

The 'I', holding the whole of the 'Not-I' before It-Self,

• denies, in one single moment which includes all time, at one single point which exhausts all space, in one single act which sums up the whole of the World-Process in It-Self, the whole of that 'Not-I';

• denies that It-Self is anything Other-than-I; a mighty truism which abolishes and yet covers all possible details of knowledge, for all possible 'not-I's' that may be known, are summed up in the 'Not-I' so denied.


• All possible conditions of space, time, causation, desha, kA1a, nimitta, are within this Absolute idea.

• All contradictions are within it: sarvavruddhadharmaNAM tatra samAveshaM darshayatIti | (Tatparya-prakasha Tikaa on Yoga-Vasishtha, VI, pUrvArdha, xxxvi,10.)

• All the Relative is, and all relatives are, within it.

• Yet it is not opposed to them or outside of them; for it indeed is the very substratum and possibility of them; nay, it is them, in their entirety; for, so taken all together, they counter-balance and abolish each other wholly, and leave behind only the Numberless Zero, out of which all plus-and-minus numbers emerge, and into which they merge back again.

• All divisions are within it; yet it is unbroken, un-divided, consistent, partless and numberless, the beyond number, for the One and the Many are both within it; addition neutralising subtraction, subtraction nullifying addition, multiplication counteracting division, and division completely balancing multiplication.

All Opposites, Parts within Whole

All possible opposites that constitute the factors of samsAra, are present in it, in equation and equilibration. It is the reconciliation of all opposites.

It is nir-guNam, attribute-less. It is guna-bhuksa-guNam, taster, eater, container of all attributes, also.

Being is in it; Nothing or Non-Being is in it too. It is beyond Being and Nothing. It is Being; it is Nothing; it is both; it is neither.



नासदासीन्नो सदासीत्

nAsadAsInno sadAsIt
--Rg-veda, X.cxxx.1.2

"In the beginning there was neither the unmanifest nor the manifest;"

नासन्न सन्न सदसन्न महन्न चाणु;

nAsanna sanna sadasanna mahanna chANu;
-- Hymn by Shankaracharya (Dhanyashtakam)

"He is indeed blessed, who is not good nor bad, nor great,..."


Yet it is there, within us, around us, unmistakable. It is the whole, and also the constant process, of our daily life.

"It moveth and it moveth not, far is it, yet 'tis near; it is within the heart of all and yet apart from all."

तदेजति तन्नैजति तद् दूरे तदु अन्तिके,
तद् अन्तरस्य सर्वस्य, तद् उ सर्वस्य अस्य बाह्यतः ।

tadejati tannaijati tad dUre tadu antike,
tad antarasya sarvasya, tad u sarvasya asya bAhyataH | --Isha-Upanishat, 5



A few more scripture-texts to the same effect may be cited:

etaM saMyadvAma iti AchakShate; etaM hi sarvANi
vAmAni abhisaMyanti eSha hi sarvANi vAmAni nayati;
--Chhandogya, 4-15-2

'The Self is known assamyad-vAma, because all contraries inhere in It; It leads forth, It is the commander of, all contradictory pairs.'

yasmin viruddha-gatayo hi anishaM paMtati,
vidyAdA&yo vividhashattakyaH AnupUrvyA;
--Bhagavata, 4-9-16.

tasmai samunnaddha-viruddha-shakttaye, namaH parasmai puruShAya vedhase;
--Bhagavata, 4-17-28.

'Salutation, adoration, to the Supreme Self, Parama-Purusha, Sovereign and Law-Giver of Nature, within Whom contrary energies, shakti-s, are revolving day-and-night, a(har)-nisham; Who spurs on as well as reins in these opposite-leaping forces (with sure hand)'.

yad avidhyA cha vidhyA cha, puruShastu ubhaya AshrayaH |
--Bhagavata, 2-6-10.

'Error, False Knowledge, and Wisdom, True Knowledge--the Reservoir of both is the Supreme Purusha.'

The metaphysical reason Why, of the psycho-analyst's 'ambivalence', heaven-and-hell, sub-conscious under-world of selfish hate devilish thoughts, devils, and supra-conscious upper-world of unselfish love, angelic thoughts, angels, is to be found here.

For further texts from scriptures of Vaidika Dharma as well as other religions, declaring the inherence of utterly antagonistic qualities in the Supreme, the reader may look into The Essential Unity of All Religions, index-references 'Duality', 'Opposites', 'Good', 'Evil'.


It is the all. All is in it. Assertion by it, and in it, gives existence to an-AtmA, the Not-Self: rejection and denial by it, and within it, imposes non-existence on that same an-AtmA.

It sayeth: I (am) This; and the This, the Not-Self, is.
It sayeth: (I this) Not-Self (am) not; and the Not-Self is no more.
But it sayeth both these things in the same breath, simultaneously!

What is the result? This Endless Process that is ever coming out of nothing into being, and vanishing out of being into nothing.

We see it plainly, yet may not describe it adequately. Truly indescribable, a-nir-vachanIya, has it been called; as also has been called the World-Process which is It.

It is the Vacuum, shUnya, of the shUnya-vAdI, when Self and Not-Self are regarded as having neutralised each other in mutual Negation. (Shunya-vadi is one who holds the doctrine that all is Nothing, a mere Vacuum, Shunya, or that all arises from and goes back into Nothing, Emptiness.)

It is the Plenum, ghanam, of the ghana-vAdI, which is ever full of both, in the Affirmation that ever lies implicit and hidden in the heart of the Negation. (A Ghana-vadi is one who holds that all is one ghana, Density, Plenum.)

saidevo
16 February 2008, 11:00 AM
Pseudo-Eternal within Eternal, All Relatives within the Absolute

Two eternals are here in this Absolute, eternal 'I' and pseudo-eternal 'Not-I', eternal Being and pseudo-eternal Nothing; yet they do not limit or restrict each other in any way, for there is only one eternal, and the other eternal is pseudo, is not.

Beyond space and time are they yet, and therefore beyond limits; and neither limits the other, but rather each necessarily fits into the other, or, yet rather, the other is entirely lost in the one.

None can take objection to the eternity of a pure Nothing beside the eternity of pure Being; yet they are within, opposed and not identical; and yet also both inhere in and make up the Absolute.

If we are inclined to feel that 'I', holding up to itself and denying 'Not-I', implies a duality, let us remember what 'Not-I' is, essentially, and what this denial of it by 'I' amounts to. 'Not-I' is the Negation of 'I', and this denial of it is the Negation of a negation of itself by the 'I'.

What objection can there be to the statement that "I am not Not-I", "I am nothing else than I"? Is it not purely equivalent to the statement "I am only I"? And if so, where is duality in it?

A difficulty seems to arise when we vaguely feel that pure 'Not-I' cannot be equivalent to the totality of all particular 'Not-I's'. This difficulty will be dealt with, later, in a further endeavour to show that pure 'Not-I' is equivalent to the totality of all particular 'Not-I's'.

Compare the Samskrt expressions
anyad anyasmAd, 'other than other', i.e., other than-not-I; and
ananyatvAd anyat, 'not other than other', i.e., including the other or not-I within Itself.
These expressions, occur in the footnote on p.125 supra. See also f.n.s on pp.113,114,121.

Meaning of 'Indescribable'

Such, then, is the In-de-scrib-able of which the Totality of the World-Process is the Endless Description. Exact, rigorous, scientific description here perforce becomes a hymn, which may seem 'mystic' to the unscrutinising observer, yet is strictly accurate, 'rational', 'practical' also.

The indescribability of the Absolute Brahman is not the result of a powerlessness of thought, but of thought's completion. It is indescribable if we will use only one of the two sets of thought-counters, terms of Being or terms of Nothing, such as are used in dealing with things relative and limited; but it is fully describable if we will use both sets at once.



But not in the way of Hegel, see ch.vi, supra. After going through the considerations of this chapter, the reader will have realised that Hegel should have said, not that 'Being is Nothing,' but that 'Being is not-Nothing,' or 'Being is no-Thing', or 'Being is no-particular-thing';

also that, instead of saying this last, he should have said 'Ego is not non-Ego'; and instead of that, that '1 is not not-I'; and instead of that, again, he should have said that 'I am not not-I'; and, finally, he should have said that 'I am not This', i.e., 'I-This-Not'.


From Pratyag-Atma to Param-Atma

Many are the names of this Absolute, as said before.



From the manu smRti:

etam eke vadanti agniM manum, anye prajApatim,
indraM eke, pare prANam, apare brahma shAshvatam |

12.123. Some call him Agni (Fire), others Manu, the Lord of creatures, others Indra, others the vital air, and again others eternal Brahman.

prashAsitAraM sarveShAm aNIyAMsam anor api |
rukma-abhaM svapnadhIjamyaM vidyAt taM puruShaM param ||

12.122. Let him know the supreme Male (Purusha, to be) the sovereign ruler of them all, smaller even than small, bright like gold, and perceptible by the intellect (only when) in (a state of) sleep (-like abstraction).


To fix the nomenclature and prevent confusion, the English term used to describe it in future in this work will ordinarily be the word Absolute, and the Samskrt Brahman. Para-Brahman is the same word as the last, with only the intensive and eulogistic para, i.e., Supreme, added.

One other common and significant Samskrt name for it, which should be specially noted here, is Param-Atma the Supreme Atma, Supreme Self. In strictness, the Absolute is as much the whole of Not-Self as Self; but it is given the name of the 'Supreme Self' especially, because the human Jiva, as will be apparent from what has been said in Chapters IV and V,

• arrives first at the Pratyag-atma, the 'inward' or 'abstract' and universal Self;

pratyAgAtmA paramAtmA mAyA ceti katham | Sarva-sara Upanishad

"What is the Pratyagatman (Inner Self), what the Paramatman (Supreme Self), the Atman, and also Maya?"

• and being established there, it then includes the pseudo-universal Not-Self within itself;

• and thus realises ultimately its identity with the Absolute, which it then calls the Param-Atma--the Supreme Self, because it is first seen, through and as the universal Self, though now seen also to contain the Not-Self; and because the Self is the element, the factor, of Being in the triune Absolute.

Bhagavata says:

केचित् कर्म वदन्ति एनं, स्वभावम् अपरे जनाः,
एके कालं, परे दैवं, पुंसः कामम् उत् अपरे ।

4.11.22: kecit karma vadanti enaM, svabhAvam apare janAH,
eke kAlaM, pare daivaM, puMsaH kAmam ut apare |

"Some explain that karma [or being divided in fruitive action] as arising from one's particular nature or as brought about by others, o protector of men; some say it's due to Time, others refer to fate, while still others ascribe it to the desire of the living entity."

एष भूतानि, भूतात्मा भूतेशो भूतभावनः,
स्वशक्त्या मायया युक्तः, सृजति, अत्ति च, पाति च ।

4.11.26: eSha bhUtAni, bhUtAtmA bhUtesho bhUtabhAvanaH,
svashaktyA mAyayA yuktaH, sRujati, atti ca, pAti ca |

"This Supersoul, controller and maintainer of all beings, making use of the force of His own external energy, brings forth, devours and fosters."

(Bhagavata translations from the Website: http://www.srimadbhagavatam.org --sd)

Rg-Veda says:

इन्द्रं मित्रं वरुणम् अग्निम् आहुः अथो दिव्यः स सुपर्णो गरुत्मान् ।
एकं सद् विप्रा बहुधा वदन्ति, अग्निं यमं मातरिश्वानम् आहुः

[i]indraM mitraM varuNam agnim AhuH atho divyaH sa suparNo garutmAn |
ekaM sad viprA bahudhA vadanti, agniM yamaM mAtarishvAnam AhuH | (1.164.46)

"They hail Him as Indra, as Mitra, as VaruNa, as Agni, also as that divine and noble-winged Garutmaan.
It is of the One Truth that the wise ones speak in diverse ways, whether as Agni, or as Yama, or as Maatarishvaan."

(See The Essential Unity of All Religions, pp.139-140. et seq., for translation of the above, and many more such names, in Vaidika Dharma as well as in other religions and languages; also pp.96, et seq., for equivalents in the scriptures of other religions, of the Logion 'I-This-Not'.)

saidevo
16 February 2008, 11:07 AM
Here are samples of the author's inter-religious quotes that he perceives to be "equivalents of the Logion 'I-This-Not', from his book The Essential Unity of All Religions (Some captions mine):

(This book can be read online at: http://books.google.com/books?id=fJrnZXHE4TcC&pg=PA139&lpg=PA139&dq=+%22etam+eke%22&source=web&ots=McOoDThE0F&sig=5mpmAXbyo6BUGWmoDjMo8rdwxaM)

We as God

Bible, John 10:29-38
"Is it not written in your laws, I said, 'Ye are gods?' ... I am the son of God."

Bible, 1 Corintihians 3:16
"Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the spirit of God dwelleth in you?"

Bible, Luke 17:20-21
"Behold, the kingdom of God is within you."

Bible, The Epistle Of Paul The Apostle To The Ephesians, ch.4:6
"One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all."

Bhagavad Gita, 7.7
mattah parataram nanyat
kincid asti dhananjaya

"There is No-Other-thing-than-I in truth!)

Whispered Knowledge

The word 'Upanishat' implies that the guru whispers the sacred secret knowledge to the earnest disciple, who listens to it with rapt attention, for the 'psychic miracle' to occur. The purport of the Arabic-Persian phrase ilm-i-sinah, 'knowledge which is passed from heart to heart', 'the doctrine of the heart' is the same.

Among the Jews the 'Essences' were such. "Silence or secrecy was frequently employed by the early Rabbis in their mystical exegesis of Scripture. A typical illustration is the following, from Midrash Rabba (a Hebrew commentary on Genesis , iii.(B): "...The sage said this in a whisper... The other asked, Why dost thou tell this in a whisper, seeing that it is clearly taught in a scriptural verse? The sage replied, Just as I have myself heard it whispered unto me, even so I have whispered it unto thee..." --J.Abelson, Jewish Mysticism, (1913),18-23.

Incidentally, it may be noted that the derivation and meaning of the word 'Essences' is in doubt; see Enc. Britt. art. 'Essences'. 'Buddhist influence' is mentioned; also 'gymno-sophists'; but no western scholar seems to have thought of sannyAsis in this connection. 'Gymno-sophists' were met with, and some taken away also, by Alexander; one named Kalanos (KalyaaNa) is specifically mentioned by Greek writers. The word seems compounded of 'gymnast' and 'sophist', meaning hatha-yogi plus rAja-yogi, 'holy men' versed in various bodily as well as mental disciplines. Jesus is said to have lived and studied among the Essences.

Logion in Third Person

The Quran also says:
"I am in your own souls! Why see ye not?
In every breath of yours am I, but ye
Are blind, without true eyes, and see Me not."

Sufis have sung:
"Although the great glad news of Thee is writ
Plainly upon the Quaran's holy page:
'Nearer am I to thee than thy throat-vein'--
My eyes blinded with selfishness, saw not!"

The well-known Kalemaa of faith, the mahA-vAkya, the Logos-word, of Islam, is in terms of the third person, viz.,
La ila(a)h il-Allah, (Q)
"There is no god but God."

Bhagavatam, 11.13.24
aham eva na matto (a)nyad
iti buddhyadhvam anjasA

"I, only I, Naught-Else-than-I at all'--
This is the whole truth, understand it well."

Bhagavad Gita (18.63,64
18.63: iti te jnAnam AkhyAtam guhyAd-guhyataram mayA |
18.64: sarva-guhyatamam bhUyaH SRNu me paramam vacaH |
18.65: man-manA bhava mad-bhakto mad-yAjI mAm namas-kuru |
18.65: mAm-evaishhyasi satyam te prati-jAne, priy-osi me ||
18.66: sarva-dharmAn pari-tyajya mAm ekaM sharaNaM vraja |
18.66: ahaM tvAM sarva-pApebhyo mokShyayishhyAmi mA shucha! ||

(Meanings from the Website: http://www.freewebs.com/srimadgeeta/chap18.html --sd)

18.63: "Thus, the knowledge more secret than all sectets has been imparted to you by Me. Reflect on it fully and then act as you wish."

18.64: "Hear again My Supreme Word, the most secret of all. You are exceedingly dear to Me, therefore, I shall tell it for your good."

18.65: "Fix your mind on Me, be devoted to Me, worship Me, prostrate before Me and you shall come to Me only. Truly this is My promise to you for you are dear to Me."

18.66: "Abandoning all duties, take refuge in Me alone, for I shall liberate you of all sins,-- grieve not."

saidevo
17 February 2008, 11:22 AM
Continued from post #4, concluding part of Chapter 8

"This udgIta, this music-sound, the AUM, is Supreme Brahman. In it are the Three, well indicated by the three letters. Realising the secret hidden between them, knowers of Brahman merge therein and become free from rebirth. When with the lamp of the AtmA, the jIva beholds Brahman with all-intentness, Brahman, the unborn, the time-less, the pure of all tattvas, then he becometh free from all bonds."

उद्गीतम् एतत्परमं तु ब्रह्म, तस्मिम्स्त्रयं सुप्रतिष्ठाक्षरं च ।
अत्रान्तरं ब्रह्मविदो विदित्वा, लीना ब्रह्मणि तत्परा योनिमुक्ताः ॥
यदा आत्मनत्वेन तु ब्रह्मात्वं दीपोपमेन इह युक्त्तः प्रपश्येत्,
आजं धुवं सर्वतत्वेर्विशुद्धं, ज्ञात्वा देवं मुच्यते सर्वपाशौः ।

udgItam etatparamaM tu brahma, tasmimstrayaM supratiShThAkSharaM cha |
atraantaraM brahmavido viditvA, lInA brahmaNi tatparA yonimuktAH ||
yadA Atmanatvena tu brahmAtvaM dIpopamena iha yukttaH prapashyet,
AjaM dhuvaM sarvatatvervishuddhaM, j~jAtvA devaM mucyate sarvapAshauH |

--Svetasvatara Upanishad, i.7.15

A Few More Ancient Texts

NOTE.--Some more texts from Vaidika as well as Buddhist writings may be added here, in support of the contents of this chapter.

Vedic Writers

Bhagavad Gita

4.22: yadRuchChAlAbhasaMtuShTo 'dvaMdvAtIto' vimatsaraH |
4.22: samaH siddhau Asiddhau cha, kRutvA&pi na nibadhyate ||

"He who has visioned That Which is Beyond Duality, Which includes all Duals, he becomes free from all bonds and fetters of the soul; sane, equable, tranquil, in all conditions of gain or of loss; satisfied with and welcoming all that befalls; devoid of all discontents and jealousies.

15.5: nirmaanamohAH, jitasa~ggadoShAH, adhyAtmanityAH, vinivRuttakAmAH |
15.5: 'dvaMdvair' vimuktAH sukhaduHkhasaMj~jauH, gachChaMti amUDhAH padama avyayaM tatH ||

"Changeless, undecaying, unincreasing, is the state of That Which Transcends Duality. To It go those who have cast off pride and fear, clinging attachments, blinding infatuating desires; who look equably on the primal Duals, Pleasure and Pain; and devote themselves constantly to meditation on that Self Beyond Duality".

Manu Smriti

1.26: karmaNAM cha vivekArthaM dharmAdharmau vyavechyat |
1.26: 'dvaMdvair' ayojavat cha imAH sukhaduHkhAdibhiH prajAH ||

"The Supreme (It-Self beyond all Pairs, becoming focussed in a Brahmaa, to create this our world) created Pleasure-and-Pain (as Primal Pair), and invested all living things with them: and (out of the experiencing, by humans, of these two, in innumerable settings, forms, situations, the Brahmaa-Ruler of our solar system, or this earth) wove the Scheme of Sin-and-Merit and- distinctions between Good-and-Evil deeds."

Isha Upanishad

11: vidyAM cha, avidyAM cha, yaH tad veda abhayaM saha (saH ha) |
11: avidyayA mRutyuM tIrtvA, vidyayA amRutaM ashnute ||

"The True Knowledge (I-am-Not-This) and the False Knowledge (I-am-This-body etc.)--he who knows the Pair of both these together, he crosses beyond death, after having tasted and experienced it in consequence of the False Knowledge; and he tastes Immortality through the True Knowledge (which includes the False Knowledge plus its simultaneous repudiation)."

5: tad ejati, tan na ejati, tad dUre tad u antike |
5: tad antar asya sarvasya, tad u sarvasya asya bAhyataH ||

"It moveth, and It moveth Not; 'Tis far, and yet 'Tis near: It is within all This, It is without."

Nrsimha Taapini Upanishad

It is not large, nor small; not middling, yet the middle; not-pervading, ail-pervading pervading; with beginning, and beginningless also: not the whole, also the whole; attributeless, and yet possessed of every possible attribute. It is the Fourth which transcends the Three, and yet not such (for It is immanent also in everything which is within the Three); It is the Self, It is also the Not-Self; It is harsh (and all-destroying), It is gentle (all-preserving); heroic, timid too; great, small; all-grasping, all-abandoning; flaming, and cool; facing on all sides, and facing none."

asthUlo, anaNuH, amadhyamo, madhyamaH; avyApako vyApakaH;
hariH AdiH, anAdiH; avishvo, vishvaH; nirguNaH, saguNaH; iti |
turIyaM, aturIyam; AtmAnaM, anAtmAnaM; ugraM, anugraM;
vIraM, avIraM; mahAntaM, amahAntaM; viShnu, aviShnu;
jvalaMtaM ajvalaMtaM; sarvatomukhaM, asarvatomukhaM, iti |

Bhagavata

6.4.32: astIti nAstIti cha, vastuniShThayoH, ekasthathoH bhinnaviruddhadharmayoH,
6.4.32: aveshitaM kiMchana yogasAMkhyayoH, samaM paraM hyanukUmaM bRuhat tat;

"Is and is not--both, and also all possible other contradictory qualities abide within that ultimate Reality, which Yoga and Sankhya endeavour to describe as equal with all and greater than all, as friend of all and foe of all."

Nyaya Sutras

There is another 'mysterious' aphorism in the Nyaya-Sutras, which, like the one quoted on p.125, supra, is pure Vedanta, taken by itself; though, in the context, it is given another meaning:

iv.1.48: na san, na cha asan, na sad-asat, sad-asatoH vaidharmyAt;

"Not existent, nor non-existent, nor both, because it has not the quality of either."

Buddhist Writers

The famous Bhikkhu, Asanga, who spread Mahay Mahayana ana Buddhism in Thibet, writes in his Mahayana-sutra-Alankara, V.1.,

na san, na chAsan, na tatha, na chAnyatha, na jAyate, vyeti, na chAvahIyate,
na vardhate, nApi vishudhyate punaH; vishudhyate tat paramArthalakShanaM |

"Not being, nor non-being; not thus, nor otherwise; It is not born, nor disminishes, nor decays in any way, nor increases, nor can be made purer--such is that Pure and Perfect parama-artha, Highest object of understanding."

Another very famous Bhikkhu, Nagarjuna, great chemist, discoverer and inventor of metallic preparations, rasa-s, for medical purposes, as well as profound philosopher, writes in his Maadhyamika Kaarikaa,

anirodhaM, anutpAdaM, anucChedaM, ashAshvataM,
anekArthaM, anAnArthaM, anirgamaM, anAgamaM |

"Not destructible, nor constructible, not slayable, nor procreatable, not transient, nor permanent, not One, nor Many, not coming, nor departing such is It (the Self denying the Not-Self).

Gauda-pada, the guru's guru of Shankaracharya, practically copies the above, in his Mandukya-Kaarikaa, 32,

na nirodho, na cha utpatti:, na baddho, na cha muktatA,
na mumukShuH, na vimuktaH, iti eShA, paramArthatA |

"No in-hibition, no ex-hibition, no bondage, no freedom, no craving for deliverance, no emancipateness--such is the state of Parama-artha, Highest Object (of knowledge)."

Mutual Copying

During the 1200 years of the Buddhist period ot Indian history, followers of Gautama Buddha and followers of the Vedas reproduced more or less the same old old teachings; varied the words, and often, ostensibly and ostentatiously, (though, in private they may have spoken more sincerely and made honest confessions even), told their respective disciples, 'What I am teaching is different from all other teachings and quite original.' Human weakness--to afford another illustration of the inseparable duality--'high and noble thought' and 'mean and low motive' side by side!

In Gauda-pada's Kaarikaa-s, the words Buddha, Sambuddha, Pra-buddha, and Prati-buddha occur repeatedly. In two or three places Gautama Buddha is meant certainly; in some others, advanced souls, performing the functions of a Buddha, seem to be referred to, generally (see The Mahatma Letters, pp.43-44, regarding "the last Khobilgan, ... Sang-Ko-pa of Kokonor, XIV century"), in the remainder, only 'wise knowers' are meant. But Vaidika annotators, e.g., Shankaracharya, explain all in the last sense only.

The Beyond-the-Two

As regards the inclusion of both Pratya-Atma and Mula-Prakrti in Param-Atma, Vishnu Purana, says,

pravRutiryA mayA AkhyAtA, vyakta-avyakta-svarUpiNi,
puruShashchApi, abhau etau, liyete paramAtmani |

Gita says,

prakRutiM puruShaM chaiva viddhi anAdi ubhau api,
paramAtmA iti chApi ukto deheasmin puruShaH paraH; (13.19-22)

dvau imau puruShau loke, kSharaH na akSharaH eva cha;
uttamaH puruShastu anyaH paramAtmA iti udAhRutaH; (15.16-17)

"Prakrti and Purusha (Pratyag-Atma), both, are latent in Param-Atma. The former is changeful; the latter, changeless; the third, Param-Atma, is the highest, including both and distinguishable from each."

A Sufi's Testimony to the Distinctionless

Some beautiful lines by the famous Persian Sufi poet and philosopher, Maulana Rumi, on the disappearance, during slumber, of all time and space and motion, illustrate what has been said on the subject, in the text above.

Shab, ze zindan, be-khabar zindaniyan;
Shab, ze daulat, be-khabar sultaniyan;
Nai gham o andesha-e sud o ziyari;
Nai khayale in fulan o an fulari:
Hal-e a'rif in buwad be-khvftb ham.

(I have not properly accented the Persian text.--sd)

"Oblivious is the prisoner of his chains;
Oblivious in the monarch of his wealth;
The tradesman, of his losses and his gains;
The sick man, of his torment of ill-health;
And every one, of this, that, great and small;
When they sleep as the dead, at dead of night.
The wise man who has seen the Self in all,
Oblivious is of all, e'en in daylight.'