Jignasa Journal Of History Of Ideas And Culture Part 01

Author(s): Vibha Upadhyaya and Others
Publisher: University of Rajasthan

Page 130

92 / Jijñāsā
Greece. But the evidences suggest that this tri-partite doctrine developed in India and diffused thence to Greece. Although the Egyptian Osiris cult had an influence at some stage.
The Second point which I would like to stress is the comparison of early Greek Philosophy with Vedic by this new trend of historiography. I have taken some examples to bring out this new trend. The philosophical tendency represented by pre Socratic thought was called materialism by earlier scholars. (exception of Anaxagorus) although it was believed that nature and mind were not separated by pure Greek thought and that they always imagined nature as animate. No writing of Thales was extant even in the time of Aristotle. It was believed that Thales regarded the basis of all things is water, that all comes from water and to water it returns. Secondly that earth is a flat disc floating on water.
The new trend represented by Mc Evilly has compared this to Indian Monism. He says that in Rgvedic passages water is conceived as the source of universe in a narrative sense. This narrative mode gives place to metaphysical mode in the Upanisads. He gives an example from Chāndogya Upanisad (VII. 10.1-2) and says that Sanat Kumara expresses much the same doctrine of material monism that Aristotle attributed to Thales. In saying everything is water, water loses its specific meaning and becomes simply matter or some stuff. Sanat Kumara did not teach this concrete material Monism as an exclusive doctrine but as a part of a staged approach to the concept of Brahman or featureless being inspiring as the substrate, Uddalaka also taught this substrate monism without a material bias.
Here I would like to point out that in the Rgveda the famous Nāsādiya Sukta which mentions water as the primeval reality does not mean by it any substance or substrate (upādān) because the Sukta says that the primeval reality was neither being nor non being -na asat āsīta na sat āsīta. In the sense of the upmanifest (which does not have name or form) desire was the nimitta kārana which belongs to conscious being. Therefore, it means that the Sūkta believes Ātman as the first cause. The primeval reality is called water only to say that it did not have name or form. Being and non-being cannot be described in the sense of nature.
As regards Sanat Kumara we know that he mentions many views but ends in saying- yo vai bhūma tadsukham, bhūma is infinitive consciousness which is beatific in nature.
Similarly Anaximander's Apairon is compared to Aditi both having a sense of unlimited. Here it can only be said that both have only a literal similarity. Apairon being evidently a material entity.
Another similarity is seen between Anaximenes and Upanisads, Anaxmimenes named air as the first principle. But in the dialogue between Janshruti Pautrāyana and Raikva vāyu is described as samvarga. It really does not mean a material element nor an object in cosmos. Yojam Parvata-glowing is the feature of vāyu but this vāya stands for prāna.
Another comparison is made between Zenophanes and Upanişads. Zenophanes is regarded as the western branch of Greek monism called Eleatic. He attacked the belief in a number of gods and that the gods had a beginning. He said" The one is God". Hence it is more properly described as pantheism rather than monotheism, or monism. The comparison is made by saying that the one is both the universal object and universal subject. But in the Upanișadic thought Brahman is neither object nor a subject.