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 ...

17. They (the prāṇas) are senses, on account of being so designated, with the exception of the best (the mukhya prāṇa).

We have treated of the mukhya prāṇa and the other eleven prāṇas in due order.--Now there arises another doubt, viz. whether the other prāṇas are functions of the mukhya prāṇa or different beings.--The pūrvapakṣin that they are mere functions, on account of scriptural statement. For scripture, after having spoken of the chief prāṇa and the other prāṇas in proximity, declares that those other prāṇas have their Self in the chief prāṇa, 'Well, let us all assume his form. Thereupon they all assumed his form' (Bṛ. Up. I, 5, 2l).--Their unity is moreover ascertained from the unity of the term applied to them, viz. prāṇa. Otherwise there either would result the objectionable circumstance of one word having different senses, or else the word would in some places have to be taken in its primary sense, in others in a derived sense. Hence, as prāṇa, apāna, &c. are the five functions of the one chief prāṇa, so the eleven prāṇas also which begin with speech are mere functions of the chief prāṇa.--To this we reply as follows. Speech and so on are beings different from the chief prāṇa, on account of the difference of designation.--Which is that difference of designation?--The eleven prāṇas remaining if we abstract from the best one, i.e. the chief prāṇa, are called the sense-organs (indriya), as we see them designated in Śruti, 'from him is born breath, mind, and all organs of sense' (Mu. Up. II, 1, 3). In this and other passages prāṇa and the sense-organs are mentioned separately.--But in that case the mind also would have to be excluded from the class of sense-organs, like the prāṇa; as we see that like the latter it is separately mentioned in the passage, 'The mind and all organs of sense.' True; but in Smṛti eleven sense-organs are mentioned, and on that account the mind must, like the ear, and so on, be comprised in the sense-organs. That the prāṇa on the other hand is a sense-organ is known neither from Smṛti nor Śruti.--Now this difference of designation is appropriate only if there is difference of being. If there were unity of being it would be contradictory that the prāṇa although one should sometimes be designated as sense--organ and sometimes not. Consequently the other prāṇas are different in being from the chief prāṇa.--For this conclusion the following Sūtra states an additional reason.

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