English
* Accord¬ ingly, the ascent above the merely animal level, which is shot through with that stress and strain between duty and inclination, between free causality and nature-necessity, between the desirable and the agreeable (jppwrTC*. and and the HHl) ,t symptomatic of the moral manhood, naturally seeks its fulfilment in a state of holiness wherein this necessary concomitant of the moral life,—an element of coercion and friction—is fully transcended. But such transcendence—which has proved to be the source of endless misdirection to the critics of Advaita-Vedanta—is not to be construed, as is so often done but without any warrant whatsoever, in the sense of annulment or abrogation of recognised laws of morals or ethical distinctions. In any such conceivable consummation of the moral life, the life according to rule—the code of injunctions and pro* hibitions (ftlfcfsftvft) —undergoes only a transfigure- * ffc iron** swinro; ftsrrt surfk wt...*nbnsra j ifl'Sftl i ubt s yuwwflW l Q Com. on Taittiriya Vpanuhad, II. i. - - -t Vide Com. on BhagavadgitS III. 88; also on Kafka Ufonhhwd, !. ii. verees 1-8. THE ETHICS OP THE V1DINTA $4$ tion and acquires a new dimension of value, the- centre of gravity having been shifted from the externally imposed law to the eternally realised Atman within the inner self (nffltnwT) as the author and inspirer of the entire code of ethics. The life of law thus culminates in the life of love, for love, as they say, is * the fulfilling of the law,’ and this is exactly what the Samkara-Yedtinta seeks to con¬ vey by the ideal of a cosmic expansion of self which is another name for Ved&ntic re¬ demption When this supreme knowledge of the oneness of soul dawns upon the philosophic pilgrim in his uphill work ‘ with aching hands and bleeding feet,’* a new light bursts upon him and the erstwhile moral probationer is tempted to exclaim in the words of the poet: "I who saw Power, see now Love perfect tco.”f From such a higher altitude of spiritual realisation, it is easier to appreciate the deeper philosophic import of the Nietzschean maxim of ‘ the transvaluation of all values ’ than it was possible for the author himself, from his own standpoint of * amoralism.’ Critics who, out of a scrupulous regard for the so-called ‘ conservation of moral values ’ charge Samkara along with Spinoza, Nietzsche and Russell, with formulating a system of philosophy that is subver¬ sive altogether of ethical distinctions or moral values, do but confuse the issue between * values ’ and ‘ valuation. ’ It is an ethical commonplace that * Matthew Arnold, Pom* : “ Morality'.’* t Browning, Rabbi Ben Beta, r > ^44 A BTSTKMATIO S TUBS OS' 1901 YBDilKTA out valuations are not at all constant, but are subject to change and development. While the Admit#- Vedanta stands pledged to the consolidation and conservation of- *the ethical values, it gives by no means a pledge of continuance to the distracting varieties of ethical valuations, destitute of a survival value. To that extent Samkara-Yedanta is on the true line of advance—in hearty agreement with Spinoza and Russell. An * ethically inspired meta- physics ’—with its faith pinned to the division of the world into two hostile camps, as it were, of good and evil, by which ethics always swears,—is to Russell something of the nature of a hybrid construc¬ tion, a monstrous aberration on the part of the strictly theoretical impulse in man; for, ‘ ethics, however refined, remains more or less subjective ’ and- * the philosophy which it inspires is always more or less parochial, more or less infected with the prejudices of a time and a place.’* To Russell good and evil have a meaning wholly practical in character—a meaning traceable to the ‘ gregarious ’ or group-instinct of man as their originative source. Accordingly ' so long as we remain merely impartial (in our contemplative life) we may be content to say that both the good and the evil of actions are illu¬ sions. But if we find the whole world worthy of love and worship we shall say that there is a higher good than that of action, and that this higher good helongs to the whole world as it is in reality.’t Jt is with reference to this ' higher good than that of * The Httbeti Bpenker Lecture, pp. 6, 14, it! ■ t MyetioUm and Logta, - * THE ETHICS OP THE VEDANTA 346 action,’ as we might note here conveniently, that the Svetahatara Upanishad speaks of a ‘ stage of supreme illumination in which there is neither day nor night, neither reality iior unreality, but the good alone ’*—the good of mystic contemplation, the good in an absolute reference, beyond the good and evil of the life of action or morality. What Russell recommends as his considered opinion on the subject is ‘ that the elimination of ethical considerations from philosophy is both scientifically necessary— and though this may seem a paradox—an ethical advance.’f To all these findings of Russell’s Samkara would readily subscribe, but with a difference of emphasis. No one, for example, is more perfectly at home in the parochial character of ethical codes than Samkara himself. Says he, “ what is followed as the virtuous or right course of conduct in some particular clime at son e particular time and under some particular, circumstances, turns out to be the very rgverse.that is to say, the.yicious course in some other cljme, at some other time and under a different set of circum¬ stances. He would not surely go in for an un¬ conditional ‘ elimination of ethical considerations ’ —even though it were construed as ‘ an ethical * f**r *r w —Chap. IV, verse 18 . f Mysticism and Logie. X ft vtt flrfan * at vvfsstfWl, frwr w t- fliftrmaitwtff Com. on V.S., III. i. 25. 44 348? A SYSTEMATIC 8TTJDY OF THHVEDJCOTA advance ’—except it be*ion condition of-their ful¬ filment: in a supra-meral state- of existence. He would advocate, in other wards, sublimation, in place of elimination of ethical considerations, and this is striotly in accordance with his philosophic persuasion^ that it is only in the attainment of the knowledge of the Supreme Being that the entire code.of' duties and ethical maxims finds its natural completion and culmination.* It is his reasoned: conviction that the active and the contemplative life,— Karma- and JMna —though poles asundee in their essential nature, do yet co-operate towards the fulfilment of the supreme end of human life, Moksha or liberationit Such a philosophic consecration of Karma on the part of a radical anti-pragmatist or anti-Mimamsist like Samkara, who has left no stone unturned'to drive in a wedge between the theoretical and the practical aspects of human nature, between Karma leading unto bondage and JMna showing the way to liberation, may seem at: first sight to be strangely at variance with the fundamental creed of the philosopher-—to be condoned perhaps; only as an involuntary^concession to popular demand. But on a closer and' critical sifting of his utterances, it will be found that he has re-iterated this claim on- * sn.ud* m wrwl Waft mi wtfavt: a awar ante q ftww tl uafaffrgfaura : i ‘a*' art i ui% vftaaws ’ tfs aiwa*—Com. on B. G. Chap. XV n verse 15. t T Vide Coi., on V.8. IV. i. 16, 18; Com. on Brhai&rawaka XJp., HI. iii. 1; also B. G. XVHP; Com. on reraea 44, 46, 47T &HB ETHICS Of THE VBDiNTA Ml behalf oiKarma and’the life of voluntary discharge of ethical duties as > being ancillary or instrumental to the attainment of the supreme end () of life. Although he appears^ herein to have' mitigated the opposition 'between the two; such a minimising of the interval between Karma and Jti&na does in no way-lend countenance to the hybrid doctrine of action-cum-c * ’ " ” ’S’/ V which his own anti-pragmatic dianoetic system of ethics was a sustained polemic. All that this moderation amounts to is a denial of antagonism between the two, while antithesis there surely is, and must ever remain. In consonance with his fundamental‘tenet that'the liberated state is eter¬ nally accomplished and not contingent upon any human activity, Sandkara only allows a subsidiary function to Karma —as a direct means of that supreme knowledge which has the saving grace.* 'Hence Karma- acquires a metaphorical extension of its efficacy as an instrument of redemption and thus is established the authority or (empirical) reality of the ethical code from the standpoint of Sargkara- Vedanta. f Par from being subversive, therefore, of my station as a moral being and the duties inci- dentaP thereto, the Knowledge of the Self in its i: i Ik srwf mb hvtot dim arswbwewWk—Com.' . 1. 16 * — Com.onB'.G., XVIII, verse 67. 8 A SYSTEMATIC STUDY OF THE VBDiNTA integrity—which is the metaphysical implication of all ethical dualism—is the fitting epilogue to the drama of moral life. There is thus relative justifi¬ cation for Deussen’s contention that 4 when the knowledge of the &tman has been gained, every action, and therefore every moral action also, has been deprived of meaning.’* But this is, as we know, only a half-truth which is too apt to be dis¬ torted into flagrant untruth by ever so slight a change of emphasis; and one need not wonder if this dictum were made to sponsor the current mis¬ conception that there is no room for morality in the so-called pantheistic or monistic system of Advaita- Vedanta. The absurdity of this contention will be increasingly apparent as we proceed. The very fulcrum and moving spring, the Alpha and the Omega in a sense, of the ethics of Adoaita- Vedanta is the doctrine of the oneness of Self, which is identical with Brahman (*rr&TT ^ 3TO).