Zend Avesta Part 03

SR No.: 007673
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: L H Mills
Publisher: Oxford
Publication Year: 1887
Total Pages: 2618
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 49 MB

Page 1831

I ADHYÂYA, I PÂDA, 30.
JOI
the conclusion that, on account of the multitude of references to the interior Self, the chapter contains information regarding Brahman, not regarding the Self of some deity.-How then can the circumstance of the speaker (Indra) referring to himself be explained ?
30. The declaration (made by Indra about himself, viz. that he is one with Brahman) is possible) through intuition vouched for by Scripture, as in the case of Vamadeva.
The individual divine Self called Indra perceiving by means of rishi-like intuition—the existence of which is vouched for by Scripture-its own Self to be identical with the supreme Self, instructs Pratardana (about the highest Self) by means of the words 'Know me only.'
By intuition of the same kind the rishi Vâmadeva reached the knowledge expressed in the words, ‘I was Manu and Sûrya ;' in accordance with the passage, 'Whatever deva was awakened (so as to know Brahman) he indeed became that' (Bri. Up. I, 4, 10). The assertion made above in the půrvapaksha of the preceding Sûtra) that Indra after saying,
Know me only,' glorifies himself by enumerating the slaying of Tvashtri's son and other deeds of strength, we refute as follows. The death of Tvashtri's son and similar deeds are referred to, not to the end of glorifying Indra as the object of knowledge in which case the sense of the passage would be, 'Because I accomplished such and such deeds, therefore know me'-but to the end of glorifying the cognition of the highest Self. For this reason the text, after having referred to the slaying of Tvashtri's son and the like, goes on in the clause next following to exalt knowledge, 'And not one hair of me is harmed there. He who knows me thus by no deed of his is his life harmed.'—(But how does this passage convey praise of knowledge ?)—Because, we reply, its meaning is as follows: Although I do such cruel deeds,
II.e. spontaneous intuition of supersensible truth, rendered possible through the knowledge acquired in former existences.
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