Reading section 29

This objection we negative, on the ground that we observe the eternity of the connexion between such words as cow, and so on, and the things denoted by them. For, although the individuals of the (species denoted by the word) cow have an origin, their species[197] does not have an origin, since of (the three categories) substances, qualities, and actions the individuals only originate, not the species. Now it is with the species that the words are connected, not with the individuals, which, as being infinite in number, are not capable of entering into that connexion. Hence, although the individuals do not originate, no contradiction arises in the case of words such as cow, and the like, since the species are eternal. Similarly, although individual gods are admitted to originate, there arises no contradiction in the case of such words as Vasu, and the like, since the species denoted by them are eternal. And that the gods, and so on, belong to different species, is to be concluded from the descriptions of their various personal appearance, such as given in the mantras, arthavâdas, &c. Terms such as 'Indra' rest on the connexion (of some particular being) with some particular place, analogously to terms such as 'army-leader;' hence, whoever occupies that particular place is called by that particular name.--The origination of the world from the 'word' is not to be understood in that sense, that the word constitutes the material cause of the world, as Brahman does; but while there exist the everlasting words, whose essence is the power of denotation in connexion with their eternal sense (i.e. the âk/r/itis denoted), the accomplishment of such individual things as are capable of having those words applied to them is called an origination from those words.

How then is it known that the world originates from the word?--'From perception and inference.' Perception here denotes Scripture which, in order to be authoritative, is independent (of anything else). 'Inference' denotes Sm/r/iti which, in order to be authoritative, depends on something else (viz. Scripture). These two declare that creation is preceded by the word. Thus a scriptural passage says, 'At the word these Prajâpati created the gods; at the words were poured out he created men; at the word drops he created the fathers; at the words through the filter he created the Soma cups; at the words the swift ones he created the stotra; at the words to all he created the /s/astra; at the word blessings he created the other beings.' And another passage says, 'He with his mind united himself with speech (i.e. the word of the Veda.--B/ri/. Up. I, 2, 4). Thus Scripture declares in different places that the word precedes the creation.--Sm/r/ti also delivers itself as follows, 'In the beginning a divine voice, eternal, without beginning or end, formed of the Vedas was uttered by Svayambhû, from which all activities proceeded.' By the 'uttering' of the voice we have here to understand the starting of the oral tradition (of the Veda), because of a voice without beginning or end 'uttering' in any other sense cannot be predicated.--Again, we read, 'In the beginning Mahe/s/vara shaped from the words of the Veda the names and forms of all beings and the procedure of all actions.' And again, 'The several names, actions, and conditions of all things he shaped in the beginning from the words of the Veda' (Manu I, 21). Moreover, we all know from observation that any one when setting about some thing which he wishes to accomplish first remembers the word denoting the thing, and after that sets to work. We therefore conclude that before the creation the Vedic words became manifest in the mind of Prajâpati the creator, and that after that he created the things conesponding to those words. Scripture also, where it says (Taitt. Brâ. II, 2, 4, 2) 'uttering bhûr he created the earth,' &c., shows that the worlds such as the earth, &c. became manifest, i.e. were created from the words bhûr, &c. which had become manifest in the mind (of Prajâpati).

Of what nature then is the 'word' with a view to which it is said that the world originates from the 'word?'--It is the spho/t/a, the pûrvapakshin says.[198] For on the assumption that the letters are the word, the doctrine that the individual gods, and so on, originates from the eternal words of the Veda could not in any way be proved, since the letters perish as soon as they are produced (i.e. pronounced). These perishable letters are moreover apprehended as differing according to the pronunciation of the individual speaker. For this reason we are able to determine, merely from the sound of the voice of some unseen person whom we hear reading, who is reading, whether Devadatta or Yaj/ñ/adatta or some other man. And it cannot be maintained that this apprehension of difference regarding the letters is an erroneous one; for we do not apprehend anything else whereby it is refuted. Nor is it reasonable to maintain that the apprehension of the sense of a word results from the letters. For it can neither be maintained that each letter by itself intimates the sense, since that would be too wide an assumption;[199] nor that there takes place a simultaneous apprehension of the whole aggregate of letters; since the letters succeed one another in time. Nor can we admit the explanation that the last letter of the word together with the impressions produced by the perception of the preceding letters is that which makes us apprehend the sense. For the word makes us apprehend the sense only if it is itself apprehended in so far as having reference to the mental grasp of the constant connexion (of the word and the sense), just as smoke makes us infer the existence of fire only when it is itself apprehended; but an apprehension of the last letter combined with the impressions produced by the preceding letters does not actually take place, because those impressions are not objects of perception.[200] Nor, again, can it be maintained that (although those impressions are not objects of perception, yet they may be inferred from their effects, and that thus) the actual perception of the last letter combined with the impressions left by the preceding letters--which impressions are apprehended from their effects--is that which intimates the sense of the word; for that effect of the impressions, viz. the remembrance of the entire word, is itself something consisting of parts which succeed each other in time.--From all this it follows that the spho/t/a is the word. After the apprehending agent, i.e. the buddhi, has, through the apprehension of the several letters of the word, received rudimentary impressions, and after those impressions have been matured through the apprehension of the last letter, the spho/t/a presents itself in the buddhi all at once as the object of one mental act of apprehension.--And it must not be maintained that that one act of apprehension is merely an act of remembrance having for its object the letters of the word; for the letters which are more than one cannot form the object of one act of apprehension.--As that spho/t/a is recognised as the same as often as the word is pronounced, it is eternal; while the apprehension of difference referred to above has for its object the letters merely. From this eternal word, which is of the nature of the spho/t/a and possesses denotative power, there is produced the object denoted, i.e. this world which consists of actions, agents, and results of action.

Against this doctrine the reverend Upavarsha maintains that the letters only are the word.--But--an objection is raised--it has been said above that the letters no sooner produced pass away!--That assertion is not true, we reply; for they are recognised as the same letters (each time they are produced anew).--Nor can it be maintained that the recognition is due to similarity only, as in the case of hairs, for instance; for the fact of the recognition being a recognition in the strict sense of the word is not contradicted by any other means of proof.--Nor, again, can it be said that the recognition has its cause in the species (so that not the same individual letter would be recognised, but only a letter belonging to the same species as other letters heard before); for, as a matter of fact, the same individual letters are recognised. That the recognition of the letters rests on the species could be maintained only if whenever the letters are pronounced different individual letters were apprehended, just as several cows are apprehended as different individuals belonging to the same species. But this is actually not the case; for the (same) individual letters are recognised as often as they are pronounced. If, for instance, the word cow is pronounced twice, we think not that two different words have been pronounced, but that the same individual word has been repeated.--But, our opponent reminds us, it has been shown above, that the letters are apprehended as different owing to differences of pronunciation, as appears from the fact that we apprehend a difference when merely hearing the sound of Devadatta or Yaj/ñ/adatta reading.--Although, we reply, it is a settled matter that the letters are recognised as the same, yet we admit that there are differences in the apprehension of the letters; but as the letters are articulated by means of the conjunction and disjunction (of the breath with the palate, the teeth, &c.), those differences are rightly ascribed to the various character of the articulating agents and not to the intrinsic nature of the letters themselves. Those, moreover, who maintain that the individual letters are different have, in order to account for the fact of recognition, to assume species of letters, and further to admit that the apprehension of difference is conditioned by external factors. Is it then not much simpler to assume, as we do, that the apprehension of difference is conditioned by external factors while the recognition is due to the intrinsic nature of the letters? And this very fact of recognition is that mental process which prevents us from looking on the apprehension of difference as having the letters for its object (so that the opponent was wrong in denying the existence of such a process). For how should, for instance, the one syllable ga, when it is pronounced in the same moment by several persons, be at the same time of different nature, viz. accented with the udâtta, the anudâtta, and the Svarita and nasal as well as non-nasal[201]? Or else[202]--and this is the preferable explanation--we assume that the difference of apprehension is caused not by the letters but by the tone (dhvani). By this tone we have to understand that which enters the ear of a person who is listening from a distance and not able to distinguish the separate letters, and which, for a person standing near, affects the letters with its own distinctions, such as high or low pitch and so on. It is on this tone that all the distinctions

of udâtta, anudâtta, and so on depend, and not on the intrinsic nature of the letters; for they are recognised as the same whenever they are pronounced. On this theory only we gain a basis for the distinctive apprehension of the udâtta, the anudâtta, and the like. For on the theory first propounded (but now rejected), we should have to assume that the distinctions of udâtta and so on are due to the processes of conjunction and disjunction described above, since the letters themselves, which are ever recognised as the same, are not different. But as those processes of conjunction and disjunction are not matter of perception, we cannot definitely ascertain in the letters any differences based on those processes, and hence the apprehension of the udâtta and so on remains without a basis.--Nor should it be urged that from the difference of the udâtta and so on there results also a difference of the letters recognised. For a difference in one matter does not involve a difference in some other matter which in itself is free from difference. Nobody, for instance, thinks that because the individuals are different from each other the species also contains a difference in itself.

The assumption of the spho/t/a is further gratuitous, because the sense of the word may be apprehended from the letters.--But--our opponent here objects--I do not assume the existence of the spho/t/a. I, on the contrary, actually perceive it; for after the buddhi has been impressed by the successive apprehension of the letters of the word, the spho/t/a all at once presents itself as the object of cognition.--You are mistaken, we reply. The object of the cognitional act of which you speak is simply the letters of the word. That one comprehensive cognition which follows upon the apprehension of the successive letters of the word has for its object the entire aggregate of the letters constituting the word, and not anything else. We conclude this from the circumstance that in that final comprehensive cognition there are included those letters only of which a definite given word consists, and not any other letters. If that cognitional act had for its object the spho/t/a--i.e. something different from the letters of the given word--then those letters would be excluded from it just as much as the letters of any other word. But as this is not the case, it follows that that final comprehensive act of cognition is nothing but an act of remembrance which has the letters of the word for its object.--Our opponent has asserted above that the letters of a word being several cannot form the object of one mental act. But there he is wrong again. The ideas which we have of a row, for instance, or a wood or an army, or of the numbers ten, hundred, thousand, and so on, show that also such things as comprise several unities can become the objects of one and the same cognitional act. The idea which has for its object the word as one whole is a derived one, in so far as it depends on the determination of one sense in many letters[203]; in the same way as the idea of a wood, an army, and so on. But--our opponent may here object--if the word were nothing else but the letters which in their aggregate become the object of one mental act, such couples of words as jârâ and râjâ or pika and kapi would not be cognised as different words; for here the same letters are presented to consciousness in each of the words constituting one couple.--There is indeed, we reply, in both cases a comprehensive consciousness of the same totality of letters; but just as ants constitute the idea of a row only if they march one after the other, so the letters also constitute the idea of a certain word only if they follow each other in a certain order. Hence it is not contrary to reason that the same letters are cognised as different words, in consequence of the different order in which they are arranged.

The hypothesis of him who maintains that the letters are the word may therefore be finally formulated as follows. The letters of which a word consists--assisted by a certain order and number--have, through traditional use, entered into a connexion with a definite sense. At the time when they are employed they present themselves as such (i.e. in their definite order and number) to the buddhi, which, after having apprehended the several letters in succession, finally comprehends the entire aggregate, and they thus unerringly intimate to the buddhi their definite sense. This hypothesis is certainly simpler than the complicated hypothesis of the grammarians who teach that the spho/t/a is the word. For they have to disregard what is given by perception, and to assume something which is never perceived; the letters apprehended in a definite order are said to manifest the spho/t/a, and the spho/t/a in its turn is said to manifest the sense.

Or let it even be admitted that the letters are different ones each time they are pronounced; yet, as in that case we necessarily must assume species of letters as the basis of the recognition of the individual letters, the function of conveying the sense which we have demonstrated in the case of the (individual) letters has then to be attributed to the species.

From all this it follows that the theory according to which the individual gods and so on originate from the eternal words is unobjectionable.

29. And from this very reason there follows the eternity of the Veda.

As the eternity of the Veda is founded on the absence of the remembrance of an agent only, a doubt with regard to it had been raised owing to the doctrine that the gods and other individuals have sprung from it. That doubt has been refuted in the preceding Sûtra.--The present Sûtra now confirms the, already established, eternity of the Veda. The eternity of the word of the Veda has to be assumed for this very reason, that the world with its definite (eternal) species, such as gods and so on, originates from it.--A mantra also ('By means of the sacrifice they followed the trace of speech; they found it dwelling in the /ri/shis,' /Ri/g-veda Sa/m/h. X, 71, 3) shows that the speech found (by the /ri/shis) was permanent.--On this point Vedavyâsa also speaks as follows: 'Formerly the great /ri/shis, being allowed to do so by Svayambhû, obtained, through their penance, the Vedas together with the itihâsas, which had been hidden at the end of the yuga.'

30. And on account of the equality of names and forms there is no contradiction (to the eternity of the word of the Veda) in the renovation (of the world); as is seen from /S/ruti and Sm/ri/ti.

If--the pûrvapakshin resumes--the individual gods and so on did, like the individual animals, originate and pass away in an unbroken succession so that there would be no break of the course of practical existence including denominations, things denominated and agents denominating; the connexion (between word and thing) would be eternal, and the objection as to a contradiction with reference to the word (raised in Sùtra 27) would thereby be refuted. But if, as /S/ruti and Sm/ri/ti declare, the whole threefold world periodically divests itself of name and form, and is entirely dissolved (at the end of a kalpa), and is after that produced anew; how can the contradiction be considered to have been removed?

To this we reply: 'On account of the sameness of name and form.'--Even then the beginninglessness of the world will have to be admitted (a point which the teacher will prove later on: II, 1, 36). And in the beginningless sa/m/sâra we have to look on the (relative) beginning, and the dissolution connected with a new kalpa in the same light in which we look on the sleeping and waking states, which, although in them according to Scripture (a kind of) dissolution and origination take place, do not give rise to any contradiction, since in the later waking state (subsequent to the state of sleep) the practical existence is carried on just as in the former one. That in the sleeping and the waking states dissolution and origination take place is stated Kaush. Up. III, 3, 'When a man being asleep sees no dream whatever he becomes one with that prâ/n/a alone. Then speech goes to him with all names, the eye with all forms, the ear with all sounds, the mind with all thoughts. And when he awakes then, as from a burning fire, sparks proceed in all directions, thus from that Self the prâ/n/as proceed, each towards its place; from the prâ/n/as the gods, from the gods the worlds.'

Well, the pûrvapakshin resumes, it may be that no contradiction arises in the case of sleep, as during the sleep of one person the practical existence of other persons suffers no interruption, and as the sleeping person himself when waking from sleep may resume the very same form of practical existence which was his previously to his sleep. The case of a mahâpralaya (i.e. a general annihilation of the world) is however a different one, as then the entire current of practical existence is interrupted, and the form of existence of a previous kalpa can be resumed in a subsequent kalpa no more than an individual can resume that form of existence which it enjoyed in a former birth.

This objection, we reply, is not valid. For although a mahâpralaya does cut short the entire current of practical existence, yet, by the favour of the highest Lord, the Lords (î/s/vara), such as Hira/n/yagarbha and so on, may continue the same form of existence which belonged to them in the preceding kalpa. Although ordinary animated beings do not, as we see, resume that form of existence which belonged to them in a former birth; still we cannot judge of the Lords as we do of ordinary beings. For as in the series of beings which descends from man to blades of grass a successive diminution of knowledge, power, and so on, is observed--although they all have the common attribute of being animated--so in the ascending series extending from man up to Hira/n/yagarbha, a gradually increasing manifestation of knowledge, power, &c. takes place; a circumstance which /S/ruti and Sm/ri/ti mention in many places, and which it is impossible to deny. On that account it may very well be the case that the Lords, such as Hira/n/yagarbha and so on, who in a past kalpa were distinguished by superior knowledge and power of action, and who again appear in the present kalpa, do, if favoured by the highest Lord, continue (in the present kalpa) the same kind of existence which they enjoyed in the preceding kalpa; just as a man who rises from sleep continues the same form of existence which he enjoyed previously to his sleep. Thus Scripture also declares, 'He who first creates Brahman (Hira/n/yagarbha) and delivers the Vedas to him, to that God who is the light of his own thoughts, I, seeking for release, go for refuge' (/S/vet. Up. VI, 18). /S/aunaka and others moreover declare (in the Anukrama/n/îs of the Veda) that the ten books (of the /Ri/g-veda) were seen by Madhu/kkh/andas and other /ri/shis.[204] And, similarly, Sm/ri/ti tells us, for every Veda, of men of exalted mental vision (/ri/shis) who 'saw' the subdivisions of their respective Vedas, such as kâ/nd/as and so on. Scripture also declares that the performance of the sacrificial action by means of the mantra is to be preceded by the knowledge of the /ri/shi and so on, 'He who makes another person sacrifice or read by means of a mantra of which he does not know the /ri/shi, the metre, the divinity, and the Brâhma/n/a, runs against a post, falls into a pit[205], &c. &c., therefore one must know all those matters for each mantra' (Ârsheya Brâhma/n/a, first section).--Moreover, religious duty is enjoined and its opposite is forbidden, in order that the animate beings may obtain pleasure and escape pain. Desire and aversion have for their objects pleasure and pain, known either from experience or from Scripture, and do not aim at anything of a different nature. As therefore each new creation is (nothing but) the result of the religious merit and demerit (of the animated beings of the preceding creation), it is produced with a nature resembling that of the preceding creation. Thus Sm/ri/ti also declares, 'To whatever actions certain of these (animated beings) had turned in a former creation, to the same they turn when created again and again. Whether those actions were harmful or harmless, gentle or cruel, right or wrong, true or untrue, influenced by them they proceed; hence a certain person delights in actions of a certain kind.'--Moreover, this world when being dissolved (in a mahâpralaya) is dissolved to that extent only that the potentiality (/s/akti) of the world remains, and (when it is produced

again) it is produced from the root of that potentiality; otherwise we should have to admit an effect without a cause. Nor have we the right to assume potentialities of different kind (for the different periods of the world). Hence, although the series of worlds from the earth upwards, and the series of different classes of animate beings such as gods, animals, and men, and the different conditions based on caste, â/s/rama, religious duty and fruit (of works), although all these we say are again and again interrupted and thereupon produced anew; we yet have to understand that they are, in the beginningless sa/m/sara, subject to a certain determinateness analogous to the determinateness governing the connexion between the senses and their objects. For it is impossible to imagine that the relation of senses and sense-objects should be a different one in different creations, so that, for instance, in some new creation a sixth sense and a corresponding sixth sense-object should manifest themselves. As, therefore, the phenomenal world is the same in all kalpas and as the Lords are able to continue their previous forms of existence, there manifest themselves, in each new creation, individuals bearing the same names and forms as the individuals of the preceding creations, and, owing to this equality of names and forms, the admitted periodical renovations of the world in the form of general pralayas and general creations do not conflict with the authoritativeness of the word of the Veda. The permanent identity of names and forms is declared in /S/ruti as well as Sm/ri/ti; compare, for instance, /Ri/k. Sa/m/h. X, 190, 3, 'As formerly the creator ordered sun and moon, and the sky, and the air, and the heavenly world;' which passage means that the highest Lord arranged at the beginning of the present kalpa the entire world with sun and moon, and so on, just as it had been arranged in the preceding kalpa. Compare also Taitt. Brâhm. III, 1, 4, 1, 'Agni desired: May I become the consumer of the food of the gods; for that end he offered a cake on eight potsherds to Agni and the K/ri/ttikâs.' This passage, which forms part of the injunction of the ish/t/i to the Nakshatras, declares equality of name and form connecting the Agni who offered and the Agni to whom he offered.[206]