Book Title: Sambodhi 1989 Vol 16
Author(s): Ramesh S Betai, Yajneshwar S Shastri
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

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Page 146
________________ 137 It is hardly necessary to clarify that liere the term "idealism' clearly means 'idea-ism.' (ii) We are told that "of the infinite possibilities,” it is only “one specific possibility of the Absolute" which has been manifested as the world. How do we come to know about the infinite possibilities or thoughts of the Absolute, we do not know. No amount of südhana can lead us to this knowledge because we are part of the world which is destined with God to lapse "into the Absolute.” At no moment, including this last moment, "the world of change" can "distrub the perfection of the Absolute." Thus the Absolute in its perfection and infinitude remains always unknowable to us. From the standpoint of realism, even the Absolute does not know itself because the realistic distinction between the knower and the known is not admitted in case of the Absolute. Thus a kind of agnosticism for all knowers is inescapable in Radhakrishnan's Absolutism. The same is the case with subjectivism because the world evolves from and merges into the Absolute just as one of its possibilities which are not other than 'ideal forms' or thoughts. Thus the world is created and dissolved "as a thought" of the Absolute. Now, agnosticism and subjectivism are theories in epistemology which are not at all compatible with realism in epistemology. Hence the incompatibility of Radhakrishnan's metaphysics with his cpistemology. (iii) God in Radhakrishnan's absolutism resembles Whitehead's God. Whitehead has criticised Aristotle for not providing God that is available for religious purposes. However, it has been rightly observed that in spite of Whitehead, the Whiteheadian God suffers from the same defect.”36 Radhakrishnan's Absolutism also takes away from God all that is significant from the standpoint of religion. No reality can be the object of man's moral and religious aspirations simply by being called by the name, God. Radbakrishnan cannot escape this criticism because his God is neither anādi nor ananta, neither self-existent nor the ultimate metaphysical ground of all-that-there-is. God and His world came into being, thanks to a contingent lila of the Absolute. We are clearly told that this lila “is not even necessary for the Absolute." Absolute would have gone quite well without ever playing this game of temporarily creating and absorbing God with His world of matter and souls aspiring to realize Him. We have seen that Radhakrishnan's exposition of ethical objectivism presented above includes the assertions like (i) “The search of mind for beauty, goodness and truth is the search for God;" (ii) "The rules of dharma are the mortal 18

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