Outlines of Indian Philosophy

Author(s): Paul Deussen
Publisher: Crest Publishing House

Page 54

CHAPTER 11 COSMOLOGY
Here again we meet the distinction of exoteric and esoteric doctrine, though not so clearly severed by Çarikara as in other parts of his system.
The exoteric Cosmology according to the natural but erroneous realism (avidya) in which we are born, considers this world as the reality, and can express its entire dependency on Brahman only by the mythical way of a creation of the world by Brahman. So a temporal creation of the world, even as in the Christian documents, is also taught in various and well-known passages of the Upanishads. But such a creation of the material world by an immaterial cause, performed in a certain point of time after an eternity elapsed uselessly, is not only against the demands of human reason and natural science, but also against another important doctrine of the Vedânta, which teaches and must teach (as we shall see hereafter) the "beginninglessness of the migration of souls", sansârasya anâditvam. Here the expedient of Çankara is very clever and worthy of imitation. Instead of the temporary creation once for ever of the Upanishads, he teaches that the world in great periods is created and reabsorbed by Brahman (referring to the misunderstood verse of the Rigveda: (fast at 14mque
is mutual creation and reabsorption lasts from eternity, and no creation can be allowed by our system to be the first and that for