Brahma Sutras (Shankaracharya)

by George Thibaut | 1890 | 203,611 words

English translation of the Brahma sutras (aka. Vedanta Sutras) with commentary by Shankaracharya (Shankara Bhashya): One of the three canonical texts of the Vedanta school of Hindu philosophy. The Brahma sutra is the exposition of the philosophy of the Upanishads. It is an attempt to systematise the various strands of the Upanishads which form the ...

27. For the same reasons (the Vaiśvānara) cannot be the divinity (of fire), or the element (of fire).

The averment that the fanciful attribution of members contained in the passage 'His head is Sutejas,' &c. may apply to the elemental fire also which from the mantras is seen to be connected with the heavenly world, &c., or else to the divinity whose body is fire, on account of its power, is refuted by the following remark: For the reasons already stated Vaiśvānara is neither the divinity nor the element. For to the elemental fire which is mere heat and light the heavenly world and so on cannot properly be ascribed as head and so on, because an effect cannot be the Self of another effect.--Again, the heavenly world cannot be ascribed as head, &c. to the divinity of fire, in spite of the power of the latter; for, on the one hand, it is not a cause (but a mere effect), and on the other hand its power depends on the highest Lord. Against all these interpretations there lies moreover the objection founded on the inapplicability of the term 'Self.'

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