English
AN APPBOACH THBOOGFI EPISTEMOLOGY exclaim : “ here lies exactly the danger-zone of the via negativa; herein is to be found a capital illustra¬ tion of a vicious abstractionism which has, with perfect logical consistency, represented Brahman, the supposed spiritual principle of unity, as an abs¬ tract colourless unity sublimated beyond the zero- point of existence, and consequently as a ‘ bundle of negations,’ a veritable ‘ lion’s den ’ that wipes out all trace of particularity.” Indeed, Samkara’s Brahman as a ‘ spiritual principle of unity ’ in the Hegelian sense has been the bete noire of critics who have, on the basis of supposed similarity with the Hegelian Absolute, preferred the same charges of ‘ intellectualism ’ or ‘ abstractionism ’ against Samkara-Vedanta. Even Bradley, to whom the fallen Hegel might well have said ‘ et tu Brute,’ had dealt the death-blow in his famous fling of ‘ the unearthly ballet of bloodless categories ’ the unkindest cut of all, as posterity would also repeat. It will he rather out of place to justify or refute the charges here levelled against Samkara’s Brahman ; for that will take us into the very heart of his metaphysics. Suffice it to say that such cheap criticisms, couched in worn-out shib¬ boleths, bet r ay a constitutional intellectual indo¬ lence in their authors and, as such, they are not to be taken seriously. It is to be noted that so long as we arc in the domain of philosophy and are in¬ spired by Truth as our end—the context in which alone Samkara’s characterisation of Brahman ap¬ pears—Truth must necessarily be abstract. Well might Bradley speak for Samkara on this point: _Q3 A SYSTEMATIC STUDY OF THE VEDANTA “ philosophy aims at intellectual satisfaction, in other words, at ultimate truth. It seeks to gain possession of Reality, but only in an ideal form. And hence it is the realization of but one side of our being.”* Philosophy being essentially an affair of the categories, it is not merely the Hege¬ lian, but all philosophy must, to a certain extent, exhibit ‘ an unearthly ballet of bloodless categories,’ for categories must needs be bloodless. They arc, by their very definition, pure universals; they at¬ tain flesh-and-blood existence when they are em¬ bodied in individuals. Starting from the varied particulars of experience, sentient or otherwise, and following the way of ascent () or abs¬ traction, Sarhkara demonstrates the inclusion of the different grades of universality in one summum genus .f But this highest universal is not to be compared to a ‘ lion’s den ’ that swallows up all particulars, without the possibility of their ever emerging out of it; for, as Samkara has clearly shown, the fundamental cause of all appears up to the last term of the series in the form of this or that effect like an actor, and thus becomes the basis of all current notions and usages 4 Now, what Descartes, in his enunciation of de omnibus dubitandmn, forgot to reckon is that it is * Essays on Truth and Reality, pp. 11 L 12. t ft firewnr. wn%urvn : wiwftiiAi: ftrt Tnw^nrcrr Nwwfa:—Com. on Brhad. Up. I twt Nr swnXINTSsi nffpwt—Com. on V. S. II. 1. xviii. AN APPROACH THROUGH EPISTEMOLOGY 119 not doubt that creates the self-certitude of the think¬ ing ego, and therewith the criterion of truth, but it is the prior certainty of the principle of conscious¬ ness, which is the very base-rock of certitude, that creates the doubt. That is clearly the implication of the dictum—H^TNTecfTO If that be really the case, is there any room for doubt (tfs&n:) and the consequent need of philosophical enquiry (fsrciTOT) ? To this Samkara readily re¬ plies that although no one doubts that there is an Absolute ( nw ) as the Self of all ( N4^l<M^ T q ), yet there are conflicting opinions as to what that Absolute is ; and, accordingly, these discrepancies and conflicts of opinion are sure to give rise to doubt.* Doubt is not, as is ordinarily believed, the mere absence or negative of belief. Just as there cannot be anything as bare negation, so there can¬ not be any such thing as mere doubt, meaning there¬ by a purely negative attitude. Doubt is the belief that some assertion is not certainly true ; this belief, for aught we know, may itself turn out to be false. Hence the determination of the validity or legitimacy of any doubt presupposes a criterion of certainty and a power of discrimination in the believing agent. In the face of current conflicting beliefs, Samkara exhorts the philosophic inquirer to assume a critical attitude, in order to sift the grounds of a belief be¬ fore espousing it, and not merely to rest in an ani¬ mal faith originating from non-discriminatioa and * *fa**fei Trtfr uraittsifswrrcrsi y i m w q t n qftiW Ufa foifaw—Com. on V,S. 1.1. i. 120 A SYSTEMATIC STUDY OF THE VEDANTA revealing itself in perceptual activities, etc.* Thus it is doubt or scepticism, as against animal faith, which is the distinctive prerogative of man as a rational animal; and it is to be invoked as being the very gateway to that rational conviction or criticised faith which alone promises salvation to those that hanker after it, with transparent sincerity and philo¬ sophical sobriety. Well might Samkara say in the words of Browning, t “ Rather I prize the doubt Low kinds exist without;” as also of Tennyson who assured us that “ There lives more faith in honest doubt Believe me, than in half the creeds. ”J The mere having of a stock of experience—in its three-fold aspect of feeling (l?tW5W) volition ^ * and cognition (imTSa^)>—is not what differentiates man from the lower animals that possess as much, perhaps a wider, range of experi¬ ence than men do. So much is clearly implied in the statement, viz., “ it is well known that in all animals spring (instinctively) from their, very nature the desire to experience pleasure and shun * Introduction to V.S. f Rabbi Ben Ezra. | In Memoriam. an Approach through epistemology 121’ pain as conditioned by the will to pleasure and avoidance of pain.”* The life of pleasure-seeking or avoidance of pain, is instinctive and unreflecting and does not vindicate the boasted superiority of man as a rational creature, Snmkara demonstrates the kinship of the human with the sub-human world from the cognitive side as well. From the sameness of volitional reaction on the part of men and the lower animals in the presence of same pre¬ sentations, Samkara rightly draws the conclu¬ sion that men and the lower animals follow the same procedure with reference to the means and objects of knowledge. Now it is well known that the perception of animals and their movements, based thereon, arc engender¬ ed in the absence of discrimination (between the self and the not-self); it is, therefore, concluded by parity of reasoning that the perceptions and the consequent actions of rational beings are also on the same footing with those of lower animals (so long as there is the same want of discrimination in them).f Samkara has rightly assigned the cog¬ nitive and volitional reaction of experience to the biological level and included it in animal psycho¬ logy, which is frankly behavioristic. It is only by transcending this uncritical stage—the instinctive, * tv sut wi: wtn- qifeqs i vw.—Hastamalakam. ffir Introductipn to V.S. . 16 122 A SYSTEMATIC STUDY OP THE VEDANTA biological or merely animal level of experience— that man can vindicate his higher certificate of birth. As did Socrates also preach his central message : ‘ a life without criticism or reflexion upon the meaning of life, is unworthy of man.* So far the philosophical importance of ‘ doubt’ ) as one of the constitutive factors of the attitude of questioning ( fepjTTHT) has been dealt with. Now as to the other factor, viz., prayojanam (irSfaPWj) or ‘value.’ Prayojanam has been defined as ‘ that which being known is sought after, in order to be converted into a mode of one’s being.’t It may, with a fair degree of accuracy, be rendered by the term ‘ Good for whatever we seek, we seek under the form of the Good (Quid quid petitur petitur sub specie boni). It is in this sense that Satan uttered the invocation “Evil, be thou my good.” The search after truth would be impossible, unless truth could be represented as a value. Tmth therefore, as Plato held, should be subordinated to the Good. Truth as mere cognition, truth as the ‘ barren rehearsal ’ of an already finished world has no value for us, and. as such, lacks the motivation to a philosophical inquiry. Accordingly, Bradley in our own day gives the verdict that ‘ a true philo¬ sophy cannot justify its own apotheosis ’ inasmuch as ‘ knowledge, taken apart from being, has no * Apologia. + — VedSntaparibhaahd, Chap. VIII, AN APPROACH THROUGH EPISTEMOLOGY 128 goodness or reality at all, and, further, a mere knowledge of being cannot satisfy by itself.’* Samkara rises equal to the occasion, and makes the significant assertion that the knowledge of Brahman (which the jijMsd has in view) is itself the Good, so far as it extirpates all evil, such as avidyd or nescience, which is the seed of all mundane exist¬ ence.! That Brahman itself is the supreme object of our quest (TCHTOl) and the conditioning ground of .'ll] philosophic inquiry presupposes the presence of this factor of goodness in Brahman. It is the essentia] attribute ) of Ananda which is, properly speaking, equated to Brahman as Saccidanandam ( u fa^R^ Tj ) that answers this need. Being as Being has a fictitious glamour of sanctity about it. It is this fascination of pure Being that has led astray metaphysicians from Par¬ menides downwards.