6. The Identity Statement Context

I said that it is was not easy to see what new information the negative characteristics add to the notion of Brahman in Śaṅkara’s account. It becomes, however, abundantly clear when we look at the third chapter of the verse portion of the Śaṅkara’s Upadeśa-Sāhasrī that these characteristics become meaningful on the assumption that Brahman is the Self, not before that. The reasoning in this four-verse composition is as follows. The question that is under discussion in, how should one understand the identity statement “I am he,” where “he” stands for Īśvara or Brahman? Two options are available: Īśvara can be understood either as one’s own Self, such that this would be a full identity statement, meaning that I am literally Brahman, or it can be understood as something which is not the Self. Ānandagiri’s example clarifies what the second really means: does “I am he” mean something like “I am Meru,” the great mountain and the greatest thing out there one could possibly conceive of? If that were the case, the identity statement would intend to affirm assimilative meditation.

The key argument for the first possibility is that characteristics such as “not gross” and “not fine” are predicated of Brahman, and if they are predicated to some external Meru-like thing, then such a thing would be unknowable—what could possibly such a “not gross, not fine” thing be—and the worst theological nightmare would follow: a scriptural statement would be either meaningless, or would intend to affirm the Buddhist emptiness. If, however, Brahman is the Self, myself, then such statements would be purposeful, because they would mean that I who am Brahman am not any of the products that may be described either as gross or as fine.

Whatever Brahman is said to have created, I am not that, and by the principle of residue it would follow that I am Brahman pure and simple. The similar situation is with descriptions such as “without prāṇa” and “without a mind:” if they, attributed otherwise to Brahman, are not taken to refer to the transmigrating Self, then they would be useless because of being not informative, as I also indicated at the end of the satyaṃ jñānam anantam ānandam brahma analysis. From the Brahman = Self standpoint, however, they become most informative, because now we can say that whatever one may identify with in the field of points of identification is meaningfully denied. Am I gross? No! Am I fine? No! Am I mortal? No! Do I have a mind? No! And so on. As Śaṅkara says, these characteristics are predicated to Brahman for negating the false superimposition of characteristics that do not belong to the Self.

Whatever we may otherwise think of the argument, it helps us understand that Śaṅkara’s attribution of negative characteristics to Brahman was not just a theological requirement posed by the Brahma-Sūtra attributed to Bādarāyaṇa procedure of forming the notion of Brahman: it was quite meaningful, but not in isolation from the context of the identity statement. We are now, then, deep in this context, where two things need to happen. First, the individual reference of the category of tvam must be fixed, if it has not been fixed yet: while the reference of the category of tat is quite independent, the reference of tvam seems to require procedurally the context of the identity statement. Second, some sense must be made of the identity statement itself. Let us go back, therefore, to this context, and the Taittirīya Upaniṣad.

The Taittirīya text that we have been considering says that Brahman is Being, knowledge, infinite. Later the text says that one should know Brahman as bliss, and that completes the definition of Brahman. This Brahman is related to one’s Self in three important ways. First, creation proceeds from this Brahman and culminates with the birth of man who is the Self consisting of food, puruṣa anna-rasamaya; the Self comes from Brahman. Second, once this creation has been completed, Brahman enters created beings, tat sṛṣṭvā tad evoprāviśat, and is said to reside in the cavity that Śaṅkara interprets as the intellect.^[1] Third, this Brahman that creation proceeds from is most directly called the Self: “From that [Brahman] which is this Self, space is born,” tasmād vā etasmād ātmana ākāśaḥ sambhūtaḥ, etc. Thus, Brahman is presented as the source of creation in general and the five-layered Self in particular, is directly identified with the Self in tasmād vā etasmād ātmanaḥ, and is said to have entered creation as the Self: Brahman that creates is the Self, and as that same Self it enters creation and becomes nested in the man of five sheaths.

Śaṅkara draws an explicit equivalence between tasmād vā etasmād ātmanaḥ and tat tvam asi, and in the context of the Taittirīya that we are following, this is the identity statement that juxtaposes the two categories.

Since in the statement “from that [Brahman] which is the Self [space came about]” the word “Self” is used in the sense of Brahman itself, it follows that Brahman is the Self of the cognitive agent. Further, the text shows that Brahman is the Self in the text “He attains the Self of bliss.” The same follows from the entrance of Brahman, for the text “Having created it, it entered into it” shows that Brahman entered into the body as the individual Self.^[2]

How is it that I am this great ground of Being, the causal Brahman? What does the Upaniṣad mean when it says, “You are that?” The statement is an instance of co-referentiality, sāmānādhikaraṇya, and it would appear that this co-referentiallity can be taken in two ways, depending on where one’s point of identification is located. The general purpose of tat tvam asi is to negate whatever one may understand as the Self but is not so, and in that sense, it is an instance of negational co-referentiality, apavāda-sāmānādhikaraṇya, which Śaṅkara says explicitly under Śaṅkara’s Bhāṣya on the Brahma-Sūtra 3.3.9.^[3] As such, the identity statement is intimately related to the negative characteristics of Brahman that can be subsumed under another famous Upaniṣadic text, neti neti: while the individual negative characteristics of Brahman negate individually, neti neti negates generally and it negates everything that the Self is not. To be more specific, at this level what the identity statement says is that one is not anything that can be an object of consciousness and conceived as separate from oneself: the objective part of any propositional consciousness that the subject can identify with, from parts of one’s body to one’s most intimate thoughts, what Śaṅkara otherwise calls idam-aṃśa.^[4] This does not mean that one is no longer aware of any objects, of course, but simply that one does not identify with them. What remains when such negation of superimposition has been applied is pure subjectivity, jñātṛtva. This is the intended meaning of the tvaṃ-padārtha in the identity statement, and when one understands it as such, the statement is more directly an instance of viśeṣya-viśeṣaṇa-bhāva, a case where two words stand for the same reference. The statement literally says that the subject of knowing is Brahman, that is, is Being, consciousness, infinite, bliss. This is the ultimate point that words can reach and exercise their direct signification function. Let us expand on this.

The relation of the Self to Brahman is established through Brahman’s feature of jñānam or consciousness, but there is a problem with this. Brahman was defined as jñānam anantam, unlimited consciousness and ontological omniscience, but its identification with the Self that is the cognitive agent imposes limitations on consciousness, since it presupposes the system of cognitive agency: agent, object, instrument, content, and action. The agent does not have to identify with any object that is presented to it, but objects are presented all the same, and they are required for the self-understanding as the pure agent. The distinction is, further, required for the very possibility of understanding the identity statement. So, if Brahman’s being consciousness means that Brahman is the cognitive agent, it would not be unlimited—an object is a second entity that eo ipso means limitation for the agent—and its being transient would follow because cognition implies change.

That Brahman is just consciousness is no less problematic either, when we pause to consider what that really means. Śaṅkara said that consciousness or jñāna means the verbal action of knowing–jñānaṃ jñaptiḥ avabodhaḥ, bhāva-sādhano jñāna-śabdaḥ –and any form of action implies change, a transition from one state to another, not Being, but becoming. The final punch, therefore, is that Brahman that is defined by the word jñānam and is identified with the cognitive agent cannot be directly signified by that word, but it can be indicated.

We will remember here that the empirical Self for Śaṅkara was at the core a reflection of the pure Self as the light of consciousness in the intellect, buddhi, which was for this reason the first and the closest point of Self-identification that happened through mutual superimposition. The Self as the agent of cognition, the one that is directly denoted by the personal affix tiṅ in the finite verbal form jānāti, “s/he knows,” and the one directly denoted by the personal pronouns tvam and aham, was the reflection of the Self in the intellect, the ātmābhasa. Cognition as action that involves the syntactic relations or kārakas, such as the agent and instrument, takes place in the intellect—which was why the most direct appellation for the individual Self or jīva was vijñānātman, the Self of cognition—and the intellect itself that accommodates such cognition was its instrumental factor, karaṇa. The object of cognition was also a transformation of the intellect in the shape of the external object. Now, all of this was possible because the intellect, buddhi, was suffused by the light of consciousness that is the Self. The intellect is insentient, so it cannot have cognition on its own, whereas the Self is cognition pure and simple that cannot involve change, so neither of the two can be the reference of the finite verb “s/he knows,” and the saving grace is found in the sense of Self—the reflection of the Self—and the processual action of knowing that happens in the intellect. The agent is denoted by the personal ending, whereas the action of knowing is denoted by the root to which the ending is applied. Because all of this is possible through the fact that the Self illumines the intellect, the Self is indicated by these two—the action and the agent of knowing—through immediate proximity, but it is not denoted directly.

The predication of the characteristic of jñānam to Brahman, thus, happens through the secondary signification function of the word, lakṣaṇā (to be distinguished from lakṣaṇa, the word for definition).^[5]

Because Brahman’s nature of being a knower cannot be separated from him and because it does not depend on instruments like senses, its being eternal is proven though Brahman’s nature of knowledge. Therefore, Brahman is not knowledge as the sense of the root, because [such knowledge that Brahman is] it is not action in nature. For this reason, Brahman is not the agent of knowing either, wherefore it is not denoted by the word “knowledge.” Still, it is indicated by the word “knowledge,” which is a specific attribute of the intellect and denotes the semblance of Brahman. However, it is not denoted, because it does not have the properties such as genus, which are the ground of uses of words.^[6]

This is supported with the most favorite Advaita argument that is like the garam masala for every curry: it is the only way that scripture can be meaningful. Knowing presupposes cognitive agency, yet such agency is empirically known. If scripture were to affirm agency, if Brahman were the cognitive action or the agent that knows another or knows itself directly, it would not be a reliable warrant since it would have no sphere of operation. The Upaniṣads as a reliable warrant must have a reference to it, but they do not affirm it. It is like the necessary prima facie view that must be stated so that the true and conclusive view can be stated against it.^[7] Thus, Brahman is consciousness, but not of any kind that can be actually experienced and named.

Now, this identification of Brahman with the inner Self in the feature of consciousness makes Brahman an inward category, myself, and this further poses a problem with the qualification of satyam, Being. We saw that this Being was what makes things grow and that it was coordinated with everything, but in such a way that the reality of all multiplicity was denied. This multiplicity is denied as real, but the assumption of multiplicity is necessary for the very possibility of affirming that Being is coordinated with everything, and for the possibility of denial, very much like the case of cognitive agency that requires the complex around knowing as action. This presents Brahman denoted by the word “Being” as an external object of knowing, and that cannot be reconciled with the sense of jñānam, myself as knowledge simple.

It turns out that Brahman cannot be denoted by satyam either, but must be indicated as well:

Likewise, by the word ‘Being.’ Brahman, on the account of its essence being the state where all distinctions have been abolished, is indicated in ‘Brahman is Being’ through the word ‘Being’ whose sphere is the external universal of ‘Being.’ It is not, however, denoted by it.^[8]

So, Brahman being that great Being out there that makes everything grow does not, in fact, make anything grow, because there is no second thing other than Brahman to begin with. All that causality is just a show whose only purpose is to make it possible to express how awesome the director is.

Unsurprisingly, the same is true of Brahman’s characteristic of bliss. The blissful Self that was closest to Brahman serves as a mark through which Brahman as bliss thick and solid can be indicated. Bliss is experienced in the intellect, and the intellect is in proximity to the Self that is the light of consciousness. The mental experience of bliss, thus, points to Brahman that is the ground of any experience of bliss,^[9] “but when the subject-object distinction that is a product of ignorance has been set aside by knowledge, there remains only the essential, thick and solid, one, non-dual bliss.”^[10] Such Brahman as bliss must be understood as just the ultimate point of aspiration in which the pursuit of that niratiśaya-prīti that was the synonym of the highest human good culminates. Brahman as bliss is indicated through the experienced bliss, but it is not denoted.

So, on the level of the identity statement, the two categories of tat and tvam, standing for Brahman the great Being out there described in superlative language, and the inner Self that is tinged by ignorance and is liable to suffering that is transmigration, restrict one another because of being co-referential, and there obtains a special meaning of the identity statement in which the reference is neither external nor liable to transmigration. Śaṅkara makes the point of emphasizing that this special meaning obtains without the respective categories giving up their individual meaning.^[11] This must be interpreted to mean that the respective categories do not directly obtain a secondary signification function in the sentence because the primary is blocked, as would be the case in “Devadatta is a lion,” where “lion” must be first reduced to “leonine.” In technical terms, the sentence does not require the words to exercise their gauṇa-vṛtti. This would be quite disastrous for the argument, in fact, because it would mean that either Brahman or the Self stands for something else, such as pradhāna or the body. However, when combining in sentences through the viśeṣya-viśeṣaṇa-bhāva, some restriction of meaning must obtain, as in Bhartṛhari’s black sesame or Śaṅkara’s black horse. This is not an equivalent case, as neither of the two padārthas have a respective class from which it can be delimited, but it is quite like the definition of satyaṃ jñānam anantaṃ brahma where something from the scope of the collocated categories had to drop. What drops in the meaning of the sentence is Brahman’s being external and the Self being liable to transmigration. In other words, clarifying the meaning of the tvaṃ-padārtha, one had reduced the scope of the word through removing the sheaths covering the Self, only to realize that s/he had not considered the one point of identification that made the removal possible, Brahman the light of awareness. One learns from the sentence that this inner Self of mine is Brahman, that great unlimited Being that is not liable to change and transmigration, but is not extraneous either.^[12] It is in this tiny space between the literal and indicated meaning, both of which are necessary, that liberation becomes possible, when it dawns on one that I myself, known to me most intimately, in fact am that great ground of Being out there: that is, that this Being is not out there at all.

Elsewhere Śaṅkara says that what drops on the side of Brahman is its being the creator, which was, we should bear in mind, the key feature of Brahman as Īśvara.^[13]

That will have tremendous consequences in Sarvajñātman’s formulation of the mahā-vākya doctrine.

But, non-difference is also stated in sentences such as “You are that.” How could both difference and non-difference be possible, given that they are contradictory?–There is not that fault, since we have established in the respective places the possibility of both on the analogy of the great space and the space in a pot. Moreover, when non-difference has dawned on one through statements such as “You are that,” the individual Self’s being liable to transmigration is lost, and so is Brahman’s being a creator, because full knowledge defeats the practical reality of difference that extends through false awareness.^[14]

Brahman, thus, created the world, entered the cavity of the heart that is the intellect, enveloped itself with five sheaths to perform ritual and meditation and experience the “bliss” that is suffering that they bring, but really did nothing of the kind. I should like to point out here without going into details that this (and only this) is the demarcation line between the two truths or realities in Advaita Vedānta, the absolute, paramārtha, and the practical, vyavahāra.

However, that Brahman is literally the inner Self has tremendous consequences on the definition of Brahman as that inner, non-transmigrating Being. Precisely because the individual padārthas in the identity statement do not give up their individual meanings, the definition of Brahman the entity behind the identity statement as satyaṃ jñānam anantam ānandam but identified with the inner Self now obtains through lakṣaṇā, the secondary signification function: words do not reach Brahman to express it directly, but because of the proximity of the pure Self and the intellect they can indicate it. Being cannot be that external Being that persists through changes, because it is my inner Self; knowledge cannot be the action or the agent, because they change; and, bliss cannot be the positive experience of pleasure, because that is transmigration. With this feat Śaṅkara avoided, to his mind, the second problem with Brahman and language. By treating the attribution of characteristics as definiendum-definiens relation, he avoided the prasaṅkhyāna problem of Brahman being a vākyārtha, a sentential reference as a definite description; by claiming that words merely indicate Brahman, he avoided the problem of Brahman being designated directly by words, vācya.

Therefore, it is proven that Brahman is not directly expressible by individual words, in keeping with the statements “Whence words return along with the mind without reaching it” and “inexpressible, non-supporting.” Furthermore, Brahman is not a sentential reference in the manner of the blue lotus.^[15]

Finally, by putting the absolute onus on the identity statement rather than the definition of Brahman or the injunction, in opposition to the prasaṅkhyāna-vādins, he could give the final punch and claim that such knowledge of Brahman, though obtained from verbal utterance, was not mediate in kind:

–One cannot experience the satisfaction of eating by hearing a sentence. The sentence analysis is like making milk-rice from cow-dung.–True, the understanding from sentences that are not about the Self is mediate. However, it certainly is immediate in respect to the inner Self, like in the case of getting the number right. The inner Self is its own evidence, synonymous with “knowable to itself.” When the sense of Self ceases, there is an experience of one's own Self.^[16]

The case of getting the number right refers, of course, to Śaṅkara’s famous example of how knowledge of the inner Self is available to oneself directly, perceptually, but may be forgotten, in which case the anamnesis can happen only through a linguistic utterance. A boy was told that there are ten boys in total, but his perception presents only nine. He had forgotten to count himself, and someone must tell him, “Well, you are the tenth.” As soon as that happens and he is competent enough to understand it, no further perception is needed, as he is known to himself most intimately.^[17] Likewise, our student has been counting the sheaths enveloping the Self and got very close in figuring out what the Self could not possibly be, but must be told eventually that it is the very possibility of counting what he really is.

Thus, tat tvam asi was a case of co-referentiality that was both a negation and qualification, apavāda and viśeṣya-viśeṣaṇa-bhāva. The definition of Brahman had been obtained from the Upaniṣads. Through the application of the negative characteristics of Brahman, all that is not the Self had been removed from the pure agent. Finally, tat and tvam qualified one another, where some negation again had to take place for a sentence reference to obtain through indication. This reference obtained through the denial of causality of Brahman and transitive awareness of the Subject, which was also the domain, we shall remember, of the negative characteristics.

And this reference, the reference behind tat tvam asi, was neti neti.

The word tat obtains the meaning of the inner Self, and the word tvam obtains the meaning of tat. The two conjointly remove suffering and mediacy. In this way, they mutually convey the meaning of neti neti.^[18]

Since there is no other more apposite description, Brahman is called neti neti. Because, apart from teaching by way of negating the phenomenal world of manifestations, there is no better description of Brahman.^[19]

We still need to address the question of “another cognition of Brahman,” but we will do that after we return to knowledge as cultivation. Let us summarize now what we have discovered so far. The passages of the Upaniṣads that are concerned with para-vidyā have as their goal to present the Self as single. They are governed by what we called the identity statements, because liberation follows as a result of understanding such identity statements. The identity statements correlate two categories, tat standing in general for Brahman as the cause of the world, and tvam standing for the individual who happens to listen to the Upaniṣads. The category of tat is defined in the Taittirīya Upaniṣad as satyaṃ jñānam anantam brahma, to which ānanda is added as fourth. These characteristics, which Śaṅkara calls brahmaṇo lakṣanam or the defining characteristics of Brahman, are elaborated in texts within the category of Upaniṣadic passages that are about the single Self. Tat, further, has negative characteristics too, but it turns out that their purpose is to apply on the side of the individual Self: they relate the categories that are placed in identity. The category of tvam presents the individual Self in all its points of identification, and is also elaborated in the Taittirīya Upaniṣad through the teaching of the five sheaths that envelop the Self that has lodged into the intellect. Initially the identity statement is an instance of negational co-referentiality, where Brahman’s negative characteristics are used to remove from the notion of the Self anything that it may objectively identify with. When tvam is purged of the sheaths so that only its relation to the intellect remains, the word stands for the cognitive agent that is a reflection of the pure Self/Brahman in the intellect. Once this reference has been fixed, the identity statement is an instance of viśeṣya-viśeṣana-bhāva where two words that stand for a single reference mutually restrict their scope: Brahman is no longer external and the creator/cause, whereas the inner Self is not liable to suffering/transmigration. The identity statement literally says that the inner Self is Brahman, but the thus denoted single entity is now defined by satyaṃ jñānam anantam ānandaṃ brahma through the secondary signification function of the words. While Brahman in its essential nature is directly expressed neither through words nor though sentences, these are the only way that one can learn about it and attain liberation.

Footnotes and references:

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[1]:

Śaṅkara’s Bhāṣya on the Taittirīya Upaniṣad 2.1.1, VI.67.

[2]:

tasmād vā etasmād ātmanaḥ iti brahmaṇy eva ātma-śabda-prayogāt veditur ātmaiva brahma. etam ānandamayam ātmānam upasaṅkrāmati iti ca ātmatāṃ darśayati. tat-praveśāc ca; tat sṛṣṭvā tad evānuprāviśat iti ca tasyaiva jīva-rūpeṇa śarīra-praveśaṃ darśayati. ato vedituḥ svarūpaṃ brahma. Śaṅkara’s Bhāṣya on the Taittirīya Upaniṣad 2.1.1, VI.65.

[3]:

“A negation, to define it, is the posterior correct notion which removes a prior deep-rooted false notion, when there is such a deep-rooted false and settled notion in regard to a certain thing; for instance, the notion of the Self in regard to the psychophysical complex is subsequently driven away by the notion of the Self in regard to the Self only through the correct notion arisen from ‘You are that.’” apavādo nāma—yatra kasmiṃścid vastuni pūrva-niviṣṭāyāṃ mithyā-buddhau niścitāyām, paścād upajāyamānā yathārthā buddhiḥ pūrva-niviṣṭāyā mithyā-buddheḥ nivartikā bhavati—yathā dehendriya-saṃghāte ātma-buddhiḥ, ātmany eva ātma-buddhyā paścād-bhāvinyā tat tvam asi ity anayā yathārtha-buddhyā nivartyate. Śaṅkara’s Bhāṣya on the Brahma-Sūtra 3.3.9, III.629.

[4]:

Śaṅkara’s Upadeśa-Sāhasrī 6.5.

[5]:

This is largely based on Śaṅkara’s Upadeśa-Sāhasrī 18.

[6]:

vijñātṛ-svarūpāvyatirekāt karaṇādi-nimittānapekṣatvāc ca brahmaṇo jñāna-svarūpatve 'pi nityatva-prasiddhiḥ. ato naiva dhātv-arthas tat, akriyā-rūpatvāt. ata eva ca na jñāna-kartṛ; tasmād eva ca na jñāna-śabda-vācyam api tad brahma. tathāpi tad-ābhāsa-vācakena buddhi-dharma-viśeṣeṇa jñāna-śabdena tal lakṣyate; na tu ucyate, śabda-pravṛtti-hetu-jāty-ādi-dharma-rahitatvāt. Śaṅkara’s Bhāṣya on the Taittirīya Upaniṣad 2.1.1, VI.66.

[7]:

Śaṅkara’s Upadeśa-Sāhasrī 18.3-8.

[8]:

tathā satya-śabdenāpi. sarva-viśeṣa-pratyastamita-svarūpatvād brahmaṇaḥ bāhya-sattā-sāmānya-viṣayeṇa satya-śabdena lakṣyate satyaṃ brahma iti; na tu satya-śabda-vācyaṃ brahma. Śaṅkara’s Bhāṣya on the Taittirīya Upaniṣad 2.1.1, VI.66-7.

[9]:

Śaṅkara’s Bhāṣya on the Taittirīya Upaniṣad 2.6.1.

[10]:

niraste tu avidyā-kṛte viṣaya-viṣayi-bhāge, vidyayā svābhāvikaḥ paripūrṇaḥ ekaḥ ānandaḥ advaitaḥ bhavatīty etam arthaṃ vibhāvayiṣyann āha. Śaṅkara’s Bhāṣya on the Taittirīya Upaniṣad 2.8.1-4, VI.109.

[11]:

Śaṅkara’s Upadeśa-Sāhasrī 18.171.

[12]:

Śaṅkara’s Upadeśa-Sāhasrī 18.169-172, 194-5.

[13]:

Julius Lipner (2000) is most certainly wrong in claiming that nothing is lost from the meaning of tat, as I hope is amply clear. What is crucially lost is the sense that Brahman is mediate, external, and that Brahman is the creator.

[14]:

nanv abheda-nirdeśo’pi darśitaḥ—tat tvam asi ity evaṃ-jātīyakaḥ; kathaṃ bhedābhedau viruddhau sambhaveyātām? naiṣa doṣaḥ, mahākāśa-ghaṭākāśa-nyāyenobhaya-sambhavasya tatra tatra pratiṣṭhāpitatvāt. api ca yadā tat tvam asi ity evaṃ-jātīyakenābheda-nirdeśenābhedaḥ pratibodhito bhavati, apagataṃ bhavati tadā jīvasya saṃsāritvaṃ brahmaṇaś ca sraṣṭṛtvam, samastasya mithyā-jñāna-vijṛmbhitasya bheda-vyavahārasya samyag-jñānena bādhitatvāt. Śaṅkara’s Bhāṣya on the Brahma-Sūtra 2.1.22, II.328-9.

[15]:

ataḥ siddham yato vāco nivartante aprāpya manasā saha (Taittirīya Upaniṣad 2.4.1), anirukte 'nilayane (Taittirīya Upaniṣad 2.7) iti ca avācyatvam, nīlotpala-vad avākyārthatvaṃ ca brahmaṇaḥ. Śaṅkara’s Bhāṣya on the Taittirīya Upaniṣad 2.1.1., VI.67.

[16]:

yathānubhūyate tṛptir bhujer vākyān na gamyate |
vākyasya vidhṛtis tadvad gośakṛt-pāyasī-kriyā ||
satyam evam anātmārtha-vākyāt pārokṣya-bodhanam |
pratyagātmani na tv evaṃ saṅkhyā-prāpti-vad adhruvam ||
svayaṃ-vedyatva-paryāyaḥ svapramāṇaka iṣyatām |
nivṛttāv ahamaḥ siddhaḥ svātmano 'nubhavaś ca naḥ ||—Śaṅkara’s Upadeśa-Sāhasrī 18.198-200.

[17]:

The analogy is found in the Śaṅkara’s Bhāṣya on the Taittirīya Upaniṣad 2.1.1 and Śaṅkara’s Upadeśa-Sāhasrī 18.169ff.

[18]:

tac-chabdaḥ pratyag-ātmārthas tac-chabdārthas tvamas tathā |
duḥkhitvātpratyag-ātmatvaṃ vārayetām ubhāv api ||
evaṃ ca neti netyarthaṃ gamayetāṃ parasparam ||—Śaṅkara’s Upadeśa-Sāhasrī 18.197-8.

[19]:

na hi, etasmāt iti na, iti na, iti prapañca-pratiṣedha-rūpāt ādeśanāt, anyat paramādeśanaṃ brahmaṇo’stīti. Śaṅkara’s Bhāṣya on the Brahma-Sūtra 3.2.22, III.600.