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 ...
I, 3, 4
4. (Nor) also the individual soul (prāṇabhṛt).
Although to the cognitional (individual) Self the qualities of Selfhood and intelligence do belong, still omniscience and similar qualities do not belong to it as its knowledge is limited by its adjuncts; thus the individual soul also cannot be accepted as the abode of heaven, earth, &c., for the same reason, i.e. on account of the terms not denoting it.--Moreover, the attribute of forming the abode of heaven, earth, and so on, cannot properly be given to the individual soul because the latter is limited by certain adjuncts and therefore non-pervading (not omnipresent)[1].--The special enunciation (of the individual soul) is caused by what follows[2].--The individual soul is not to be accepted as the abode of heaven, earth, &c. for the following reason also.
Footnotes and references:
[1]:
Bhogyasya bhoktṛśeṣatvāt tasyāyatanatvam uktam āśaṅkyāha na ceti, jīvasyādṛṣṭadvārā dyubhvādinimittatve'pi na sākṣāt tadāyatanatvam aupādhikatvenāvibhutvād ity arthaḥ. Ānanda Giri.
[2]:
It would not have been requisite to introduce a special Sūtra p. 159 for the individual soul--which, like the air, is already excluded by the preceding Sūtra--if it were not for the new argument brought forward in the following Sūtra which applies to the individual soul only.