Part 6 - Relation of Sāṃkhya and Vedānta according to Bhikṣu

Bhikṣu thinks that the Sāṃkhya and Yoga philosophies are intimately connected with the Vedānta and are referred to in the Upaniṣads. For this reason when certain topics, as for example the problem of experiential knowledge, are not described in the Vedānta, these are to be supplemented from the Sāṃkhya and Yoga. If there is any seeming antagonism between the two, these also have to be so explained that the opposition may be reconciled.

Bhikṣu takes this attitude not only towards Sāṃkhya-yoga but also towards Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika, and the Pañcarātra. According to him all these systems have their basis in the Vedas and the Upaniṣads and have therefore an internal affinity which is not to be found in the Buddhists. The Buddhists are therefore the only real opponents. Thus he attempts to reconcile all the āstika systems of philosophy as more or less supplementary to one another or at least presenting differences which can be reconciled if they are looked at from the proper angles of vision.

Bhikṣu collects his materials from the Upaniṣads, the Purāṇas and the smṛtis and tries to build his system of interpretation on that basis. It may, therefore, be regarded on the whole as a faithful interpretation of the theistic Vedānta which is the dominant view of the Purāṇas in general and which represents the general Hindu view of life and religion. Compared with this general current of Hindu thought, which flows through the Purāṇas and the smṛtis and has been the main source from which the Hindu life has drawn its inspiration, the extreme Sāṃkhya, the extreme Vedānta of Śaṅkara, the extreme Nyāya, and the extreme dualism of Madhva may be regarded as metaphysical formalisms of conventional philosophy.

Bhikṣu’s philosophy is a type of bhedā-bheda which has shown itself in various forms in Bharṭr-prapañca, Bhāskara, Rāmānuja, Nimbārka and others. The general viewpoint of this bhedā-bheda philosophy is that it believes in the reality of the universe as well as in its spirituality, the distinctness of the individual souls as well as in their being centres of the manifestation of God, moral freedom and responsibility as well as a spiritual determinism, a personal God as well as an impersonal reality, the ultimate spirit in which matter and pre-matter are dissoved into spirituality, an immanent teleology pervading through matter and souls both in their origin and mutual intercourse as well as in the holiness of the divine will, omnipotence and omniscience, in the superior value of knowledge as well as of love, in the compulsoriness of moral and social duties as well as in their abnegation.

The ordinary classical Sāṃkhya is well known to be atheistic and the problem arises as to how this may be reconciled with theism and the doctrine of incarnations. In interpreting sūtra I. i. 5, of the Brahma-sūtra, Bhikṣu says that since the scriptures say that “it perceived or desired,” Brahman must be a Person, for desire or perception cannot be attributed to the inanimate pre-matter (prakṛti). Śaṅkara, in interpreting this sūtra, asserts that the purport of the sūtra is that prakṛti is not the cause of the world because the idea of a prakṛti or pradhāna is unvedic. Bhikṣu quotes a number of passages from the Upaniṣads to show that the idea of a prakṛti is not unvedic.

Prakṛti is spoken of in the Upaniṣads as the cause of the world and as the energy of God. Prakṛti is also spoken of as māyā in the Śvetāśvatara, and God is spoken of as māyāvī or the magician who holds within Himself the magic power. The magician may withhold his magic, but the magic power lies all the same in him (māyāyā vyāpāra-nivṛttir eva v agamy ate na tiāśaḥ)^[1]. The ordinary prakṛti is always undergoing change and transformation and it is only the special sattva-stuff associated with God that is always regarded as unchanging.

A question that may naturally arise in this connection is, if God is Himself unchangeable and if the sattva -body with which He is always associated is also always unchangeable, how is it that God can have a desire to produce the world at any particular time? The only explanation of this is that the attribution of will to God at a particular creative moment is only a loose usage of language. It means only that when the proper collocation of the causal conditions is ready for emergence into creative production at any particular point of time, it is designated as the manifestation of the creative will of God. God’s knowledge and will cannot have a beginning in time^[2]. But if God’s creative will be regarded as the cause of the movement of the prakṛti, then the Sāṃkhya view that the movement of the prakṛti is solely due to its inherent teleology to be of service to the puruṣas becomes indefensible. The sattva, rajas and tamas in the mahat are indeed regarded in Sāṃkhya as the triad of three persons, Brahmā, Viṣṇu and Maheśvara—the three created gods as it were (janye-śvara). But the Sāṃkhya does not believe in any eternal God (nitye-śvara). According to Yoga the sattva part of mahat associated with eternal powers and existing eternally in the emancipated state is the person called Īśvara. His sattva body is, however, of the nature of an effect as it is derived from the sattva part of mahat and His knowledge is also not timeless.

In justification of Sāṃkhya, Bhikṣu maintains that the denial of God by the Sāṃkhya may be interpreted to mean that there is no necessity of admitting God for salvation. Salvation may be achieved by self-knowledge also. If this process is to be adopted, then it becomes quite unnecessary to prove the existence of God. It may, however, be remarked in this connection that this explanation of Bhikṣu can hardly be regarded as correct, for the Sāṃkhya-sūtra is not merely silent about God, but it makes a positive effort to prove the non-existence of God, and there is not one redeeming statement that can be interpreted to mean that Sāṃkhya was not antagonistic to theism. Bhikṣu, however, further reiterates that Sāṃkhya was not atheistic and refers to the statement in the Śvetāśvatara (vi. 16) that salvation can be obtained by knowing the ultimate cause as declared in the Sāṃkhya-yoga and to the statement of the Gītā where atheism is regarded as a demonic view.

In referring to Yoga, Bhikṣu says that it is curious that though the Yoga admitted the existence of God yet it did not make any effort to repudiate the idea that He might be partial or cruel; and instead of giving God His true cosmological place accepted a naturalistic view that prakṛti of itself passes through the trans-formatory changes, being determined by its own inherent teleology in relation to the puruṣas. Īśvara, in Patañjali’s Yoga-sūtra, is an object of Yoga meditation and He shows His mercy to his devotees and other beings. Bhikṣu, however, thinks that unless God is made to serve a cosmological purpose the association of prakṛti with the puruṣas cannot be explained.

The Īśvara is not conditioned in His activities by any entities which are associated with rajas or tamas which are of a fluctuating nature but with an entity which is always the same and which is always associated w'ith eternal knowledge, will and bliss^[3]. The natural implication of this is that the will of God behaves like an eternal and unchangeable law. This law, however, is not a constituent of God but a constituent of prakṛti itself. It is through this part, an eternal unchangeable law which behaves as the eternal will and knowledge of God, that the phenomenal or the changeable part of prakṛti is determined.

In the Gītā Śrī Kṛṣṇa says that He is tht highest puruṣa and that there is nothing higher than Him. Bhikṣu gives two explanations of such statements which seem to be in opposition to the concept of God explained above. One explanation is that the reference of Kṛṣṇa as God to Himself is only a relative statement, made in a popular manner which has no reference to the nature of absolute God who is unrelationable to ordinary experience. The other explanation is that Kṛṣṇa calls Himself God by feeling Himself as identified with God. There is thus a distinction between para-brahma and kārya-brahma; and Śrī Kṛṣṇa, being the kārya-brahman, popularly describes Himself as the kāraṇa-brahma. When other beings identify themselves with brahma, such identification is true only with reference to kārya-brahma, Śrī Kṛṣṇa or Nārāyaṇa. They therefore have no right to speak of themselves as the absolute God. Beginningless absolute Brahman is unknown and unknowable, even bv the gods and the sages. It is only the Nārāyaṇa who can know Him in Ilis absolute nature. Nārāyaṇa is therefore to be regarded as the wisest of all beings^[4]. Those beings who in the previous creation became one with God bv sāvujva-mukti exist in the Vāsudeva-ryūha.

In the Vūsudeva-vyūha Vāsudeva alone is the eternal God; the other beings are but His parts. The other vyūhas, such as the Saṃkarṣaṇa, Pradyumna and Aniruddha, are but the manifestations of Vāsudeva (vibhūti) and they are to be regarded as partial creation of God or as Brahmā, Viṣṇu and Rudra. The power of the lesser gods, Viṣṇu or Śiva, is limited, since they cannot produce any change in the regulation of the cosmic affairs. When they speak of themselves as the Supreme God they do so only by a process of self-identification with the absolute God. The mahattatva, with its threefold aspect as sattva, rajas and tamas, forms the subtle body of Brahmā, Viṣṇu and Śiva or Saṃkarṣaṇa, Pradyumna and Aniruddha. These three gods, therefore, are supposed to have the one body, the “mahat,” which forms the basic foundation and substratum of all cosmic evolution. It is for this reason that they are said to have the cosmos or the universe as their body. These three deities are regarded as mutually interdependent in their operations, like vāta, pitta and kapha. It is for this reason that they are said to be both different from one another and yet identical^[5]. These three deities are identical with “mahat” which again is the unity of puruṣa and prakṛti. It is for this reason that Brahmā, Viṣṇu and Maheśvara are to be regarded as the partial manifestations (aṃśāvatam) of Gods and not direct incarnations^[6].

The penetration of Īśvara into pradhāna and puruṣa is through His knowledge, will and effort by which He rouses the guṇas and helps the production of the mahat. Bhikṣu takes great pains to show that Bhagavān or absolute God is different from Nārāyaṇa or Viṣṇu who are direct manifestations of Him just as sons are of the father. Bhikṣu here differs from the opinion of the Pañcarātra school and of other thinkers such as Madhva, Vallabha and Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇavas who regard Nārāyaṇa, Viṣṇu and Kṛṣṇa as identical with God. The other avatāras, such as the Matsya, Kūrma, etc., are regarded by Bhikṣu as the lilā-vatāra of Viṣṇu and the āveśā-vatāra of God as bhagavān or parame-śvara.

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

Vijñānā-mṛta-bhāṣya, 1. 1. 5.

[2]:

Vijñānā-mṛta-bhāṣya, I. I. 5.

[3]:

rajas-tamah-sambhinnatayā malinaṃ kārya-tattvaṃ par ame-śvar asya no’ pādhiḥ kintu kevalayri nitva-jñāne-cchā-nandā-dimat-sadai-ka-rūpaṃ kāraṇa-sattvam era tasyo’ pādhiḥ.
     Iśrara-gītā. MS.

[4]:

nnādyam taṃ paraṃ brahma na dcrā narṣayo viduḥ
ekas tad vedti bhagm-ān dhātā nārāyatiaḥ prabhuḥ.
     Vijñānā-mṛta-bhāṣya, I. I. 5.

[5]:

Vijñānā-mṛta-bhāṣya, I. I. 5.

[6]:

In this connection Bhikṣu quotes the famous verse of the Bhāgavata, ete cā ṃśa-kalāḥ puṃsaḥ kṛṣṇas tu bhagavān svyam. I. 1. 5. He, however, paraphrases Kr§na as Viṣṇu and explains svayaṃ bhagavān as being the part of God just as the son is the part of the father:

atra kṛṣṇo viṣṇuḥ svayaṃ parame-śvaras tasya putravat sākṣād aṃśa ity arthaḥ.
     Ibid.

This, however, goes directly against the interpretation of the verse by the Gauḍīya school of Vaisnavas who regard Kr§na as being the absolute God.