English
The principle of difference or distinctness consists in nothing but a difference of moments; a colour is different from a sound because it is experienced at a different moment, while the psychological elements and the indi- vidual are not experienced at different moments‘. But it is argued in reply that, as the sense-data and the individual are neither different nor identical (ratio essendi), so their cognition also is neither different nor identical in experience (ratio cognoscendi)>. But Vasubandhu says that, if such a view is taken in this case, then it might as well be taken in all cases wherever there is any con- glomeration®. Moreover, the separate senses are all limited to their special fields, and the mind which acts with them is also limited * yatha riipadiny eva samastani samuditani ksiram iti udakam iti va prajnapyate, tathad skandhas ca samasta paca iti prajnapyate, iti siddham. MS. of Yaso- mitra: Ss commentary, Pp. 339 2 yatha riipam ads Aaah kadranam bhavati sa ca tebhyo ’nyo na vaktavyah aloka-caksur-manaskara api riipopalabdheh karanam bhavati tad api tad-abhinna-svabhavah pudgalah prapnoti. Ibid. 3 Ibid. p. 339 B. * svalaksandad api ksanadntaram anyad ity udahadryam. Ibid. ° yatha riipa-pudgalayor anyananyatvam avaktavyam evam tadupalabdhyor api anyananyatvam avaktavyam. Ibid. * yo ’yam siddhantah pudgala eva vaktavyah so ’yam bhidyate samskritam apt avaktavyam iti krtvd. Ibid, x1] Soul in Vedanta and Buddhism 61 to the data supplied by them; there is, therefore, no way in which the so-called individual can be experienced. In the Ajita sermon Buddha is supposed to say: ‘‘ A visual consciousness depends upon the organ of sight and a visible object. When these three (object, sense organ and consciousness) combine, a sensation is produced. It is accompanied by a feeling, a representation and a volition. Only so much is meant, when we are speaking of a human being. To these (five sets of elements) different names are given, such as a sentient being, a man, Manu’s progeny, a son of Manu, a child, an individual, a life, a soul. If with respect to them the expression is used ‘he sees the object with his own eyes,’ it is false imputation (there being in reality nobody possessing eyes of his own). In common life such expressions with respect to them are current as ‘that is the name of this venerable man, he belongs to such a caste and such a family, he eats such food, this pleases him, he has reached such an age, he has lived so many years, he has died at such an age.’ These O brethren! accordingly are mere words, mere conventional designations. ‘Expressions are they, (but not truth)! Real elements have no duration: Vitality makes them combine In mutually dependent apparitions?.’” The VAtsiputriyas however refer to the Bhara-hara-sitra, in which Buddha is supposed to say: ‘‘O brethren, I shall explain unto you the burden (of life), and moreover I shall explain the taking up of the burden, the laying aside of it and who the carrier is.... What is the burden? All the five aggregates of elements—the substrates of personal life. What is meant by the taking up of the burden? The force of craving for a continuous life, accompanied by pas- sionate desires, the rejoicing at many an object. What is the laying aside of the burden? It is the wholesale rejection of this craving for a continuation of life, accompanied as it is by passionate desires and rejoicings at many an object, the getting rid of it in every circumstance, its extinction, its end, its suppression, an aversion to it, its restraint, its disappearance. Who is the carrier? We must answer: it is the individual, i.e. ‘this venerable man having this name, of such a caste, of such a family, eating such food, finding pleasure or displeasure at such things, of such an age, who after a 1 Stcherbatsky’s translation in Bulletin de l Académie des Sciences de Russte. 62 The Sankara School of Vedanta [cH. life of such length will pass away having reached such an age?.’” But Vasubandhu points out that the carrier of the burden is not to be supposed to be some eternal soul or real individual. It is the momentary group of elements of the preceding moment that is designated as the burden, and the immediately succeeding one the carrier of the burden (bhara-hara)?. The Vatsiputriyas again argue that activity implies an active agent, and, since knowing is an action, it also implies the knower who knows, just as the walking of Devadatta implies a Devadatta who walks. But Vasubandhu’s reply to such a contention is that there is nowhere such a unity. There is no individual like Devadatta: what we call Devadatta is but a conglomeration of elements. “‘'The light of a lamp is a common metaphorical designation for an un- interrupted production of a series of flashing flames. When this production changes its place, we say that the light has moved. Similarly consciousness is a conventional name for a chain of conscious moments. When it changes its place (i.e. appears in co-ordination with another objective element), we say that it ap- prehends that object. And in the same way we speak about the existence of material elements. We say matter ‘is produced,’ ‘it exists’; but there is no difference between existence and the element which does exist. The same applies to consciousness (there is nothing that cognizes, apart from the evanescent flashing of consciousness itself) %.”’ It is easy to see that the analysis of consciousness offered by the Vedanta philosophy of the Sankara school is entirely different from this. The Vedanta holds that the fact of consciousness is entirely different from everything else. So long as the assemblage of the physical or physiological conditions antecedent to the rise of any cognition, as for instance, the presence of illumination, sense- object contact, etc., is being prepared, there is no knowledge, and it is only at a particular moment that the cognition of an object arises. This cognition is in its nature so much different from each and all the elements constituting the so-called assemblage of con- ditions, that it cannot in any sense be regarded as the product of 1 Stcherbatsky’s translation. * Yasomitra points out that there is no carrier of the burden different from the collection of the skandhas—bhdrddanavan na skandhebhyo ’rthantara-bhitah pudgalaity arthah. Abhidharma-kosa-vyakhya, Visvabharati MS. % Stcherbatsky’s translation in Bulletin de l’ Académie des Sciences de Russie, PP. 938-939. x1] Soul in Vedanta and Buddhism 63 any collocation of conditions. Consciousness thus, not being a product of anything and not being further analysable into any constituents, cannot also be regarded as a momentary flashing. Uncaused and unproduced, it is eternal, infinite and unlimited. The main point in which consciousness differs from everything else is the fact of its self-revelation. There is no complexity in consciousness. It is extremely simple, and its only essence or characteristic is pure self-revelation. The so-called momentary flashing of consciousness is not due to the fact that it is momentary, that it rises into being and is then destroyed the next moment, but to the fact that the objects that are revealed by it are refiected through it from time to time. But the conscious- ness is always steady and unchangeable in itself. The immediacy (aparoksatva) of this consciousness is proved by the fact that, though everything else is manifested by coming in touch with it, it itself is never expressed, indicated or manifested by inference or by any other process, but is always self-manifested and self-reveaied. All objects become directly revealed to us as soon as they come in touch with it. Consciousness (samvid) is one. It is neither identical with its objects nor on the same plane with them as a constituent element in a collocation of them and consciousness. The objects of consciousness or all that is manifested in consciousness come in touch with consciousness and themselves appear as conscious- ness. This appearance is such that, when they come in touch with consciousness, they themselves flash forth as consciousness, though that operation is nothing but a false appearance of the non- conscious objects and mental states in the light of consciousness, as being identical with it. But the intrinsic difference between consciousness and its objects is that the former is universal (pratyak) and constant (anuvrtta), while the latter are particular (apratyak) and alternating (vydurtta). The awarenesses of a book, a table, etc. appear to be different not because these are different flashings of knowledge, but because of the changing association of conscious- ness with these objects. The objects do not come into being with the flashings of their awareness, but they have their separate existence and spheres of operation!. Consciousness is one and unchanging; it is only when the objects get associated with it that 1 tattva-darsi tu nityam advitiyam vijndnam visayds ca tatradhyastah prthag- artha-kriya-samarthas tesam cabadhitam sthayitvam astiti vadati. Vivarana- prameya-samgraha, p.74, the Vizianagram Sanskrit Series, Benares, 1893. 64 The Sankara School of Vedanta [cu. they appear in consciousness and as identical with it in such a way that the flashing of an object in consciousness appears as the flashing of the consciousness itself. It is through an illusion that the object of consciousness and consciousness appear to be welded together into such an integrated whole, that their mutual difference escapes our notice, and that the object of consciousness, which is only like an extraneous colour applied to consciousness, does not appear different or extraneous to it, but as a specific mode of the consciousness itself.