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IV ADHVẬYA, I PÂDA, 3.
717
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The following point is now taken into consideration. Is Brahman to be meditated upon as something different from the meditating Devotee, or as the Self of the latter ? The Purvapakshin holds the former view. For, he says, the individual soul is something different from Brahman ; as has been proved under II, 1, 22; III, 4, 8; I, 1, 15. And Brahman must be meditated upon as it truly is; for if it is meditated upon under an unreal aspect, the attaining to Brahman also will not be real, according to the principle expressed in the text, 'According as a man's thought is in this world, so will he be when he has departed this life' (Kh. Up. III, 14, 1). This view the Satra sets aside. Brahman is rather to be meditated upon as being the Self of the meditating Devotee. As the meditating individual soul is the Self of its own body, so the highest Brahman is the Self of the individual soul- this is the proper form of meditation.—Why ?—Because the great Devotees of olden times acknowledged this to be the true nature of meditation; compare the text.Then I am indeed thou, holy divinity, and thou art me.'-But how can the Devotees claim that Brahman which is a different being is their 'Ego'?-Because the texts enable them to apprehend this relation as one free from contradiction. "He who dwelling within the Self is different from the Self, whom the Self does not know, of whom the Self is the body, who rules the Self from within ; he is thy Self, the inner ruler, the immortal one' (Bri. Up. III, 7, 3); In the True all these beings have their root, they dwell in the True, they rest in the True ;-in that all that exists has its Self' (Kh. Up. VI, 8); 'All this indeed is Brahman' (Kh. Up. III, 14, 1)all these texts teach that all sentient and nonsentient beings spring from Brahman, are merged in him, breathe through him, are ruled by him, constitute his body; so that he is the Self of all of them. In the same way therefore as, on the basis of the fact that the individual soul occupies with regard to the body the position of a Self, we form such judgments of co-ordination as I am a god I am a man'; the fact of the individual Self being of the nature of Self justifies us in viewing our own Ego as belonging
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