Book Title: Satapatha Bramhana Part 05
Author(s): Julius Eggeling
Publisher: Oxford


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Page 1608
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400
VEDÂNTA-SOTRAS.
and again passes away; and similarly the Mahabharata says, ' from that there sprung the Non-evolved comprising the three gunas ; the Non-evolved is merged in the indivisible Person.'—These texts, we reply, present no real difficulty. For Brahman having non-sentient matter for its body, that state which consists of the three gunas and is denoted by the term 'Unevolved' is something effected. And the text, When there was darkness, neither day nor night,' states that also in a total pralaya non-sentient matter having Brahman for its Self continues to exist in a highly subtle condition. This highly subtle matter stands to Brahman the cause of the world in the relation of a mode (prakára), and it is Brahman viewed as having such a mode that the text from the Kal. Upanishad refers to. For this reason also the text, the Imperishable is merged in darkness, darkness becomes one with the highest God,' declares not that darkness is completely merged and lost in the Divinity but only that it becomes one with it; what the text wants to intimate is that state of Brahman in which, having for its mode extremely subtle matter here called Darkness, it abides without evolving names and forms. The mantra, 'There was darkness, hidden in darkness,' &c. (Ri. Samh. X, 129, 3), sets forth the same view ; and so does Manu (I, 5), This universe existed in the shape of Darkness, unperceived, destitute of distinctive marks, unattainable by reasoning, unknowable, wholly immersed as it were in deep sleep.' And, as to the text, 'from that the Lord of Måyå creates everything,' we shall prove later on the unchangeableness of Brahman, and explain the scriptural texts asserting it.
As to the contention raised by the Parvapakshin that on the basis of invariable experience it must be held that one and the same principle cannot be both material and operative cause, and that effects cannot be brought about by one agency, and that hence the Vedanta-texts can no more establish the view of Brahman being the sole cause than the command 'sprinkle with fire' will convince us that fire may perform the office of water; we simply remark that the highest Brahman which totally differs in nature from
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