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The Views Regarding God and the Doctrine of Brahman
conscious
living beings from within, is a real repository of auspicious qualities. In its original form it is verily something eternal-undergoing-no-change but with the help of its inherent capacities it turns its body existing in the state of a cause a body non manifest, subtle and of the form of elements non-conscious and conscious into a manifest body or body existing in the form of an effect. The elements prakṛti and souls which were there with Nārāyaṇa in the form of His body are guided by a capacity inherant in Him. This non-conscious and conscious creation-that is, the cum-nonconscious world-is something real and not maya-born. While seeking to establish the Supreme Brahman in the form of God and Vasu. deva Ramanuja has chiefly adopted the support of scripture and has contended that the means-of-valid-cognition called inference is not at all competent to undertake such a performance. Besides, he has maintained that God undertakes world-creation depending on the acts performed by the mass of living beings, and yet he has also kept in tact the independ. ence exercised by God. Thus even while baving a difference-of-opinion with his own early-preceptor Yamunācārya on the question of the superiority or otherwise of the means-of-valid-cognition called inference Ramanuja, while establishing the Supreme Brahman in the form of Vasudeva or Narayana with the help of the means of valid cognition called scripture, profusely makes use of Upanisads; in this connection whatever texts are interpreted by Sankara in the sense of absolute nondualism are interpreted by him in the sense of modified nondualism, thus contending that Upanisads and Brahmasutra verily mean to understand the Supreme Brah. man as Näräyana; besides, he makes clear that it is the Supreme Brahman Nārāyaṇa who is the material cause as well as efficient cause of the conscious-cum-nonconscious world. 16
Nimbarka too has established the element Brahman in the form of God and has given to the same the designation 'Visnu'. He too is an advocate of a real difference-cum-non difference or dualism-cum-nondualism. Again, on his view too it is verily the Supreme Brahman or Viṣṇu who is the material cause as well as efficient cause of the mobile-cum-immobile world. Similarly, he too establishes his position chiefly on the basis of the means of valid cognition called scripture and considers world-creation to be something dependent on the acts performed by the mass of living beings. 17
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16 See Dasgupta's 'History of Indian Philosophy' Vol. III, p. 156; also the following statement in Sribhāṣya 1.1.1-'Suks nacid cidvastusarirasyaiva brahmanaḥ sthulacidacidvastusariratvena kāryatvät.'
17 See Dasagupta ibid. pp. 405-6; also the following statement in Nimbārkabhāṣya (Brahmasutra) 1.1.4-Tasmat sarvajñaḥ sarvacintyasaktiviśvajanmädihetur vedaikapramanagamyaḥ sarvabhinnabhinno bhagavan vasudevo viśvātmaiva jijñäsävisayas tatraiva sarvam sastram samanyetity aupanişadänām siddhāntaḥ,'
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