Sramana Tradation

Author(s): G C Pandey
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 19

Sramaņa Tradition
from Jñana which eradicates the false sense of dualities. As Vidyāranya has pithily stated,"Vastutantram bhaved jñānam kartặtantram upasanam."'9 The mental state which is Upasana is directed by the will as an interior action and is quite different from Jñana which is of the nature of discovery or revelation entirely independent of the agent. Upasana rests on imagination and will while Jñana arises from the subsidence of imagination and will. Within the Brahmaņical tradition the external Karmakānda developed into the internal Upāsanākānda but before this could develop into Jñánakānda proper, the realizaticn of the basic limitations of worldly life was necessary and this was the point where Brāhmaṇism and Sramaņism came together.
The Brāhmaṇic tradition generally reached this revaluation of instinctive life or Pravrtti, not through a meditation over the sufferings of life and the fact of death, but through an extension of the concept of sacrificial worship. The Purusa-ya jña-vidyā of Mahidāsa Aitareya and Ghora Angirasa in the third adhyāya of the Chándogya furnish an example of the notion of regarding life itself as one continued worship, which implies making an offering of it to the gods, an attitude which certainly effects a profound change in the character of instinctive and egoistic life. It was this line of development which was taken up in the Bhagavadgitâ and propounded as an alternative to the Sramaņic ideology of the total renunciation of life.
The fourth adhyāya of the Chandogya contains a clearer recognition of Śramanic ideas and values. The legend of Jānaśruti and Raikva clearly indicates that the knowledge of Brahman is far superior to wealth and liberality and that the man who knows does not really care for worldly things. And yet we notice that Raikva ultimately accepts the gifts of the king including his daughter as wife. Again, we find Upakosala Kāmalāyana lamenting that human life is full of desires, transgressions and diseases so that death is no worse ( bahava ime's. min puruşe kámä nänätyaya vyadhibhih prati pūrno'smi naśisyāmiti'). His teacher Satyakama states that one who knows is never tainted by sin like a lotus leaf in water (yathā puskarapaläsa åpo na ślisyanta evam evamvidi papam karma na slis yata iti') Here by implication sinful
9. Pañcadasi, 9.74.