Questions of King Milinda Part 01

SR No.: 007681
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: T W Rhys Davids
Publisher: Oxford
Publication Year: 1890
Total Pages: 2695
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 47 MB

Page 868

IV ADHYAYA, 4 PÂDA, 17.
415
sleep; according to the text, 'He is gone to his own Self, he sleeps they say' (Kh. Up. VI, 8, 1). 'Union' means blissful isolation (final release), according to the text, ‘Being Brahman he goes to Brahman' (Bri. Up. IV, 4, 6). What the texts say about absence of specific cognition is said with reference to either of those two states, dreamless sleep or final release.-How do we know this -Because this is 'manifest,' owing to the fact that those two states form the topic there (where absence of all cognition is mentioned). Compare the passages, 'Having risen from out of these elements it perishes again after them. Having departed there is no more knowledge;' 'But where the Self only is all this;'
Where when asleep he desires no more desires, and dreams no more dreams' (Bri. Up. II, 4, 12; IV, 5, 15; IV, 3, 19). -Those passages, on the other hand, which describe lordly power refer to an altogether different condition, whichlike the heavenly world and so on-is an abode where qualified knowledge produces its results. Thus there is no contradiction.
17. With the exception of world-business (the released possess all lordly power), (the Lord) being the topic (where world-business is referred to), and (the souls) not being near (to such business).
The following doubt here presents itself. Do those who through meditations on the qualified Brahman enter, together with their manas, into a condition of equality with the Lord, possess unlimited lordly power, or power limited to some extent -The pūrva pakshin maintains that their power must be unlimited, because we meet with texts such as 'He obtains Self-lordship' (Taitt. Samh. I, 6, 2); All the gods bring an offering for him' (Taitt. Samh. I, 5, 3); 'For them there is freedom in all worlds' (Kh. Up. VIII, 1, 6).- To this the Sûtra replies, 'Excepting the world. business. With the exception of the origination and so on of the world all other lordly powers, as e. g. rendering one's self of atomic size, must belong to the released. The world. • business, on the other hand, can belong to the everlastingly
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