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Updated: May 12, 2025
But as this view depends altogether on karman, to him who has freed himself from Nescience in the form of karman, this same world presents itself as lying within the intuition of Brahman, together with its qualities and vibhuti, and hence as essentially blissful.
This Nescience, viewed as a positive entity, is also proved by Inference, viz. in the following form: All knowledge established by one of the different means of proof is preceded by something else, which is different from the mere antecedent non- existence of knowledge; which hides the object of knowledge; which is terminated by knowledge; and which exists in the same place as knowledge; because knowledge possesses the property of illumining things not illumined before; just as the light of a lamp lit in the dark illumines things.
For in reality there is no such thing as an effect different from the cause, since all effects, and all empirical thought and speech about effects, are based on Nescience. Apart from the causal substance, clay, which is seen to be present in effected things such as jars, the so-called effect, i.e. the jar or pot, rests altogether on Nescience.
We finally remark that the arguments here set forth by us at the same time prove the untenableness of the view of those who teach that there is an eternally unchanging Brahman whose nature is pure, non-differenced intelligence, and which by being conscious of Nescience experiences unreal bondage and release.
For on their theory the enjoying subject is that which is conditioned by the power or Nescience or upadhi inhering in the causal substance, and the power or Nescience or upadhi is the object of enjoyment; and as the two are of different nature, they cannot pass over into each other.
And it is this distinction viz. of things that are objects of general consciousness, and of things that are not so which makes the difference between what is called 'things sublating' and 'things sublated. Everything is explained hereby. Neither Scripture nor Smriti and Purana teach Nescience.
But we assume a different Nescience for each soul; that soul whose Nescience is destroyed will be released, and that whose Nescience is not destroyed will remain in Bondage! You now argue on the assumption of a special avidya for each soul. But what about the distinction of souls implied therein? Is that distinction essential to the nature of the soul, or is it the figment of Nescience?
The highest Brahman, on the other hand, which is all-knowing, all- powerful, free from all evil and all shadow of Nescience and similar imperfections, cannot possibly exist as the 'All' which comprises within itself everything that is bad. Up.
Nor must it be urged against him who holds this view of avidya belonging to Brahman that he is unable to account for the distinction of bondage and release, for as there is only the one Brahman affected with Nescience and to be released by the cessation of that Nescience, the distinction of souls bound and released, &c., has no true existence: the empirical distinction of souls bound and released, of teachers and pupils, &c. is a merely fictitious one, and all such fiction can be explained by means of the avidya of one intelligent being.
This too we refuse to admit; for you yourself have proved that Brahman, which is pure Consciousness, is free from attributes which are objects of Consciousness. From all this it follows that Brahman, whose essential nature is knowledge, cannot be the substrate of Nescience: the theory, in fact, involves a flat contradiction.
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