Section 3.14 (fourteenth khaṇḍa) (four texts)

Commentary (Śaṅkara Bhāṣya):

[Ānandagiri remarks that hitherto the Upaniṣad has dealt with the meditation of Brahman through its images or representatives, and now it proceeds to deal with the meditation of Brahman Itself, as equipped with qualities and powers.]

The ‘three-footed Immortal Brahman’ described above is equipped with endless qualities and endless powers and is capable of being meditated upon in various ways;—and of this Brahman, the Text now proceeds to lay down the meditation, as equipped with certain special qualities and powers.

Upaniṣad text:

All this indeed is Brahman, as it originates, becomes •absorbed and lives in It; one should meditate upon It calmly. Now, really, the Man consists of Volition; according as his Volition is in this world, so does he become on departing from here; hence he should exercise Volition.—(1)

Commentary (Śaṅkara Bhāṣya):

All,—the whole of—this, indeed,—this last term is an indeclinable particle introduced as an ornament of speech,—i.e. the whole of this world, differentiated in name and form, as apprehended by sense-perception and other means of cognition, is Brahman, the original source, called ‘Brahman’ on account of its being the highest.—In answer to the question ‘In what way is all this Brahman?’ it is added: As it originates, becomes absorbed and lives in It; all this world has come out of Brahman, gradually, through light, food etc., hence it is said to originate in It;—similarly in the same order of coming out, but reversed, the world becomes absorbed in the Brahman becoming one with it. hence it is said to become absorbed in It;—similarly while the world continues to exist, it lives, moves, operates, in that same Brahman; hence it is said to live in It.—Thus at all three points of time, the world remains in the Brahman, undifferentiated from It,—as is clear from the fact that it is never perceived apart, from It.—From this it follows that, all this is Brahman. In what way this is the same One without a second, we shall explain in detail under Discourse VI.—Inasmuch as all this is Brahman, one should meditate upon that universal Brahman, through the qualities that are going to be described,—calmly,—i.e, free from all love and hate and self-controlled.

In what way should this meditation be carried on?—One should exercise Volition; Volition is certain cognition, determination, the decision that this shall be so, not otherwise,—this one should exercise; i.e. thus should one meditate, this

being construed from the preceding sentence—

Question:—‘What is the purpose to be served by this exercising of Volition 1—How too should this Volition be exercised? How too is this exercising of Volition to accomplish the desired purpose?’—In answer to all this, we have the next sentence —Now really etc. etc. Because the man consists of Volition,—i.e. the Jīva, the individualised self, is entirely what his Volition is,—i.e. his nature consists of his volition; that is, he is as his Volition is—this is what is meant by his consisting of his Volition. According as his Volition is in this World)—i.e. according as his volition, determination, is while he is living in this world,—so does he become on departing from here)—i.e. on his departure from the body, i.e. on death. What is meant is that his condition is in accordance with the character of his Volition. This idea is found to be thus expressed in the scriptures;—‘Thinking of whatever form, does the man renounce his body (to that does he attain)’—(Bhagvadgītā). Inasmuch as such is the conclusion found in the scriptures, the man, knowing all this, should exercise his Volition, perform meditation,—that form of meditation which we are going to describe; because it is learnt from the scriptures that results accrue to one in accordance with his Volition) therefore the said exercise—of meditation,—should be performed.—(1)

Upaniṣad text:

Consisting of Mind, with the subtle body for his body, of the colour of light, of true volition, of the nature of Ākāśa, the creator of all, all-desire, allodour, all-taste, pervading over all this, without speech, without perturbation.—(2)

Commentary (Śaṅkara Bhāṣya):

Question:—“In what manner is one to meditate (upon Brahman)?”.

Answer:—He is consisting of Mind;—Mind is that whereby one thinks; by its very nature it functions over its objectives; it is of this Mind that He consists; that is. He operates as the Mind operates, and also ceases to operate as the Mind ceases to operate. Because He consists of the Mind, therefore, He has the Prāṇa for his body; the term ‘Prāṇa’ here stands for the Subtle Body (wherein the Self resides), endowed with the two functions of Cognition and Action; as declared in the text—‘That which is the subtle body is intelligence, that which is intelligence is the subtle body’; it is this Prāṇa that He has for His Body. It is declared in another Vedic Text that ‘He consists of the Mind, the controller of the Body of Prāṇa.’—Of the colour of light,—His form consists of light in the shape of intelligence;—of true volition; i.e. his volitions, wishes, are all true, infallible; that is to say, the volition of God is not like the volition of the ordinary worldly man, whose volition is not always sure of fruition. The volition of the ordinary man is generally beset with untruth, which leads to the falsity of its result; this is what makes the volition false in its fruition; this is going to be described later on in the text—‘Beset with untruth etc. etc.’—Of the nature of Ākāśa;—He whose form is like the Ākās a; God is like Akāśa, in the sense that He is allpervading, subtle and devoid of colour and other qualities. —The creator of all;—the entire universe is created by God; hence the whole universe is his work; that is how He is the creator of all as declared in the Vedic Text—‘He is the creator of all’.—All desires: i.e. all: His desires are free from evil; as declared in the Smṛti-text—‘Among living beings, I am such Desire as is not inconsistent with Right’.—

Objection:—“Inasmuch as in this Smṛti-Text, God speaks of Himself as being Desire itself, the term all-desire in the Upaniṣad text should not be construed as a Brahuvrīhi compound meaning ‘having all desires’”.—It is not right to argue thus; Desire is something to be done, brought into existence, and if God were desire itself, like sound and other things, He also would be subservient to the purposes of other persons. For these reasons, the expression ‘I am desire’ in the Smṛti-text quoted is to be taken in the same sense that is afforded by the term ‘all-desire’ taken as a Bahuvrīhi-compound. All-odour:—He whose odours are all pleasing; as declared in the Smṛti-Text—‘I am the pure smell in Earth’.—Tastes also should be understood in the same way.—The reason for this lies in the fact that the perception of disagreeable smell and taste has been described as due to the contact of Evil; as declared in the text—‘Therefore, by it one apprehends both agreeable and disagreeable odour, because it is perceived by evil’—and God has no contact with evil; as there is no possibility of any such defects in Him as ignorance and the rest.

Pervading over—permeating—all this—universe; the term ‘abhyātta’ being derived from the root ‘atati’, to pervade with the active past-participial affix (with the prefix ‘abhi’)—Without speech;—‘Vāk’ is that wherewith one speaks; the reflexive form of the same is ‘vāka’; or the form ‘vāka’ may be taken as formed from the root ‘vac’ to speak with the Ghañ affix used instrumentally; one who is endowed with this ‘vāka’ speech, is ‘vākī’; and one who is not-Vākī is avākī, without speech. The denial of speech is purely illustrative, it stands for the denial of all those organs of smell, taste and the rest, whose presence in God would be supposed as necessary for the apprehension of smell, taste and other things found mentioned in connection with God; all this is clear also from such Mantra-texts as ‘Without hands and feet, He moves fast and holds things; without eyes, He sees; without ears He hears.’—Without perturbation;—not confused; when a man who has not all his desires fulfilled fails to obtain something which he does not possess, he becomes perturbed in mind; not so God, who has all his desires fulfilled and is always satisfied and happy; He is never perturbed.—(2)

Upaniṣad text:

This is my Self within the heart, smaller than a corn, than barley, than mustard, than the Śyāmāka-grain, than the seed of the Śyāmāka-grain—This is my Self within the heart, larger than the Earth, larger than the Sky, larger than Heaven, larger than all these Regions.—(3)

Commentary (Śaṅkara Bhāṣya):

This—the One described above with the stated qualities—is my Self, within the hearty—in the middle of the lotus of the Heart;—smaller—in size—than the corn, than barley etc., etc. All this is meant to indicate extreme smallness.—When the words of the Text have declared the Self to be smaller ‘than the śyāmāka-grain, than the seed of the śyāmāka-grain—it would seem as if it were smaller than all measurable smallness, and hence of the smallest dimension, i.e. atomic; hence, with a view to preclude such an idea, the text proceeds to add—This is my Self within the heart, larger than the Earth etc., etc. By asserting that the size of the Self is larger than all measures of largeness, what is meant is that It is infinite in size.—Such is the sense of the text beginning with the ‘Consisting of the mind’ (Text 2) and ending with the words ‘Larger than all the Regions’ (in the present Text).—(3)

Upaniṣad text:

‘All-action, All-desire, All-odour, All-taste, pervading over all this, without speech, without perturbation,—such is my Self within the heart; it is Brahman; I shall surely attain that on departing from here,’—verily, for one who has this conviction, there is no vacillation or misgiving;—so said Śāṇḍilya,—yea, Śāṇḍilya.—(4)

Commentary (Śaṅkara Bhāṣya):

People may have the following idea—“God is surely to be meditated upon in the form indicated by the qualities described,—and not as actually endowed with those qualities;—just as when it is said, ‘bring the king’s officer who has multi-coloured cows’ the man addressed does not proceed to bring the qualification (in the shape of the cows; he brings only the man indicated by that qualification). Similarly in the present context also (the meditation is to be of the God indicated by the qualifications, not of the God along with these qualifications.)

With a view to preclude this notion, the text reiterates that He is the creator of all etc., et./, the idea being that God should be meditated upon as qualified by the qualifications of consisting of the mind and the rest described above. It is for this reason that what is taught here does not exalt the meditator to that ‘self-sovereignty’ which is attained by the realising of such truths as ‘That Thou Art’,; ‘The Self is all this’, as described under Discourses VI and VII; in fact what the text says here is that ‘Such is my Self, I shall surely attain this on departing from here’, which clearly indicates distinction between the human self and the Supreme Self, and it is clear that the term ‘self’ here does not stand for the counter-self (human self); because the Genetive ending in ‘mama ātmā’, ‘my self’, connotes relationship, which can only subsist between two distinct things; specially as the phrase ‘I shall attain that’ clearly makes one (the human self) the active Agent and the other (the supreme Self) as the objective (of attainment).

Objection:—“Under Discourse VI, (Sec. 14, verse 2) also the expression used is ‘atha sampatsye’ (‘then shall I reach perfection’), which clearly shows that the reaching of perfection is further removed in point of time.”

Not so; because what is meant by that expression is the final stage of the process of embellishment, and not any interval of time. If it were not so, then this phrase would set aside the idea conveyed by the text ‘That Thou Art’.Though it is true (1) that the term ‘Self’ does stand for the human self,—(2) that what forms the subject-matter of the context is 'Brahman that is all this’, and (3) that this is spoken of as ‘my self within the heart’ and ‘this is Brahman’—yet, with all this, when the present Text speaks of ‘reaching that self after departing from here’, it is clear that the distinction between the two is still retained to a certain extent.

When a man knows this and has the firm conviction ‘I shall attain that Self who is of the nature of volition’, then there is no such uncertainty as ‘may be so, I may not be so’; so that in this matter of the connection between the said Volition and the ultimate result, the wise man does attain the position of God;—this is what was said by the sage Śāṇḍilya. The repetition is meant to indicate respect for the sage.—(4)

End of Section (14) of Discourse III.