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 ...
III, 4, 32
32. The works of the āśramas (are incumbent on him) also (who does not desire release); because they are enjoined.
Under Sūtra 26 it has been proved that the work's enjoined on the āśramas are means of knowledge. Now we will consider whether those works have to be performed also by him who does not desire final release and therefore takes his stand on his āśrama merely without wishing for knowledge--Here the pūrvapakṣin maintains that as the works incumbent on the āśramas are enjoined as means of knowledge by the passage, 'Him the Brāhmaṇas seek to know by the study of the Veda' &c., the works of permanent obligation are not to be performed by him who, not desirous of knowledge, wishes for some other fruit. Or else they are to be performed by him also; but then they cannot be means of knowledge, since it would be contradictory to attribute to them a permanent and a non-permanent connexion.[1]
Against this conclusion the Sūtrakāra remarks that the works of permanent obligation are to be performed by him only who, not desirous of release, takes his stand on the āśramas merely, because they are enjoined by texts such 'as long as his life lasts he is to offer the agnihotra.' For to such texts no excessive weight must be ascribed.--The next Sūtra replies to the objection raised above in the words, 'but then they cannot be means of knowledge.'
Footnotes and references:
[1]:
I. e. we must not think that because they enjoin the 'nityatā' of certain works, other passages may not enjoin the same works as mere means of knowledge.