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424
VEDANTA-SUTRAS.
in five special forms. Nor again does it answer to define a body as either the abode of the sense-organs or as the cause of pleasure and pain; for neither of these definitions takes in the bodies of stone or wood which were bestowed on Ahalya and other persons in accordance with their deeds. We are thus led to adopt the following definition-Any substance which a sentient soul is capable of completely controlling and supporting for its own purposes, and which stands to the soul in an entirely subordinate relation, is the body of that soul. In the case of bodies injured, paralysed, &c., control and so on are not actually perceived because the power of control, although existing, is obstructed; in the same way as, owing to some obstruction, the powers of fire, heat, and so on may not be actually perceived. A dead body again begins to decay at the very moment in which the soul departs from it, and is actually dissolved shortly after; it (thus strictly speaking is not a body at all but) is spoken of as a body because it is a part of the aggregate of matter which previously constituted a body. In this sense, then, all sentient and non-sentient beings together constitute the body of the Supreme Person, for they are completely controlled and supported by him for his own ends, and are absolutely subordinate to him. Texts which speak of the highest Self as 'bodiless among bodies (e. g. Ka. Up. I, 2, 22), only mean to deny of the Self a body due to karman; for as we have seen, Scripture declares that the Universe is his body. This point will be fully established in subsequent adhikaranas also. The two preceding Sutras (8 and 9) merely suggest the matter proved in the adhikarana beginning with II, 1, 21.
10. And on account of the objections to his view.
The theory of Brahman being the universal cause has to be accepted not only because it is itself free from objections, but also because the pradhana theory is open to objections, and hence must be abandoned. For on this latter theory the origination of the world cannot be accounted for. The Sânkhyas hold that owing to the soul's approximation to Prakriti the attributes of the latter
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