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( 86 ) Māyā, they recognized importance of Karma in the Māyic world but the Pāśupata system stands on its own footing based on the belief in the absolute freedom of īśvara. The Indian system of philosophy, as a whole, recognized the value of Karma in the human soul as the principle of distinction between the moral and immoral. The fruits of Karma are distributed by the Divine power on the basis of Karma and the Sanskāras attached to the human soul. These systems recognize man as a free agent and from that point of view holds him responsible for all his actions -good or evil. The function of God is simply to distribute the fruit or bring out the result according to the nature of Karma. The initiative in each Karma lies with the human soul which is relatively free and God as such, has no relation with the initiative. God is more or less like an Impartial Moral Governor whose main function is to judge as to the merit and demerit of the action and distribute its fruits. This general attitude recognized in all systems of thought is rejected by the Pasupata philosopher who are in favour of the theory that initiative towards every action comes in the ultimate resource from the Divine Source. Men are mere puppets in the hands of the Lord and are made to move in one direction or the other according to His sweet will.2 The exponents of this system take it for granted that every human soul who is bound up in the world is subject to ignorance and has no real freedom of action. It is a sort of determinism which implies that the true aim of life of man is to regain access through this freedom which he lost on his entry into the mundane life. As soon as this freedom is regained, man is no longer a man, a slave to the circumstances, but is the maker of his own fate. When this lost freedom is regained, a man rises upto the level of Maheśvara and enjoys a life of eternal freedom. These philosophers say that a mere freedom from worldly pain should not be the supreme ambition of man. This freedom is known as Kaivalya and the 1. Ganakārika, Appendix II
कर्मादिनिरपेक्षस्तु स्वेच्छाचारी यतो ह्ययम् । aa: situa: FIFT AdeniulTur 11
