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VEDANTA-SUTRAS.
the flowing rivers disappear in the sea, having lost their name and their form, thus a wise man freed from name and form goes to the divine Person who is greater than the great' (Mu. Up. III, 2, 8). I.e. as the rivers losing the names and forms abiding in them disappear in the sea, so the individual soul also losing the name and form abiding in it becomes united with the highest person. That the latter half of the passage has the meaning here assigned to it, follows from the parallelism which we must assume to exist between the two members of the comparison1.
22. (The initial statement is made) because (the highest Self) exists in the condition (of the individual soul); so Kâsakritsna thinks.
Because the highest Self exists also in the condition of the individual soul, therefore, the teacher Kâsakritsna thinks, the initial statement which aims at intimating the non-difference of the two is possible. That the highest Self only is that which appears as the individual soul, is evident from the Brahmanapassage, 'Let me enter into them with this living Self and evolve names and forms,' and similar passages. We have also mantras to the same effect, for instance, 'The wise one who, having produced all forms and made all names, sits calling the things by their names' (Taitt. Âr. III, 12, 7) 2.
1 Bhâmatî: The individual soul is absolutely different from the highest Self; it is inquinated by the contact with its different limiting adjuncts. But it is spoken of, in the Upanishad, as non-different from the highest Self because after having purified itself by means of knowledge and meditation it may pass out of the body and become one with the highest Self. The text of the Upanishad thus transfers a future state of non-difference to that time when difference actually exists.. Compare the saying of the Pânkarâtrikas: 'Up to the moment of emancipation being reached the soul and the highest Self are different. But the emancipated soul is no longer different from the highest Self, since there is no further cause of difference.'-The technical name of the doctrine advocated by Audulomi is satyabhedavâda.
2 Compare the note to the same mantra as quoted above under I, I, II.
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