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I ADHYÂYA, 4 PÂDA, 15.
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He who knows the Brahman as existing him we know himself as existing'); it is further, by means of the series of sheaths, viz. the sheath of food, &c., represented as the inner Self of everything. This same Brahman is again referred to in the clause, He wished, may I be many;' is declared to have originated the entire creation; and is finally referred to in the clause, 'Therefore the wise call it the true.' Thereupon the text goes on to say, with reference to what has all along been the topic of discussion,
On this there is also this sloka, Non-being indeed was this in the beginning,' &c. If here the term ' Non-being' denoted the absolutely Non-existent, the whole context would be broken; for while ostensibly referring to one matter the passage would in reality trcat of a second altogether different matter. We have therefore to conclude that, while the term 'Being' ordinarily denotes that which is differentiated by names and forms, the term 'Non-being' denotes the same substance previous to its differentiation, i. e. that Brahman is, in a secondary sense of the word, called Non-being, previously to the origination of the world. The same interpretation has to be applied to the passage
Non-being this was in the beginning' (K 1. Up. III, 19, 1); for that passage also is connected with another passage which runs, 'It became being;' whence it is evident that the 'Nonbeing' of the former passage cannot mean absolute Nonexistence. And in the passage, Others say, Non-being this was in the beginning' (Kh. Up. VI, 2, 1), the reference to the opinion of others' does not mean that the doctrine referred to (according to which the world was originally absolutely non-existent) is propounded somewhere in the Veda; for option is possible in the case of actions but not in the case of substances. The passage has therefore to be looked upon as a refutation of the tenet of primitive absolute non-existence as fancifully propounded by some teachers of inferior intelligence; a refutation undertaken for the purpose of strengthening the doctrine that this world has sprung from that which is.—The following passage again, 'Now this was then undeveloped,' &c. (Bri. Up. I, 4. 7), does not by any means assert that the evolution of
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