{"collection":"Hinduism","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/hin/sbe34/sbe34014.htm","path":"hin/sbe34/sbe34014.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/hin/sbe34/sbe34014.htm","text":"The Vedanta Sutras, commentary by Sankaracharya (SBE34), tr. by George Thibaut [1890]\n8. And (the pradh\u00e2na cannot be denoted by the word 'Self') because there is no statement of its having to be set aside.\nIf the pradh\u00e2na which is the Not-Self were denoted by the term 'Being' (Sat), and if the passage 'That is the Self, that art thou, O Svetaketu,' referred to the pradh\u00e2na; the teacher whose wish it is to impart instruction about the\ntrue Brahman would subsequently declare that the pradh\u00e2na is to be set aside (and the true Brahman to be considered); for otherwise his pupil, having received the instruction about the pradh\u00e2na, might take his stand on the latter, looking upon it as the Non-Self. In ordinary life a man who wishes to point out to a friend the (small) star Arundhat\u00ee at first directs his attention to a big neighbouring star, saying 'that is Arundhat\u00ee,' although it is really not so; and thereupon he withdraws his first statement and points out the real Arundhat\u00ee. Analogously the teacher (if he intended to make his pupil understand the Self through the Non-Self) would in the end definitely state that the Self is not of the nature of the pradh\u00e2na. But no such statement is made; for the sixth Prap\u00e2thaka arrives at a conclusion based on the view that the Self is nothing but that which is (the Sat).\nThe word 'and' (in the S\u00fbtra) is meant to notify that the contradiction of a previous statement (which would be implied in the rejected interpretation) is an additional reason for the rejection. Such a contradiction would result even if it were stated that the pradh\u00e2na is to be set aside. For in the beginning of the Prap\u00e2thaka it is intimated that through the knowledge of the cause everything becomes known. Compare the following consecutive sentences, 'Have you ever asked for that instruction by which we hear what cannot be heard, by which we perceive what cannot be perceived, by which we know what cannot be known? What is that instruction? As, my dear, by one clod of clay all that is made of clay is known, the modification (i.e. the effect) being a name merely which has its origin in speech, while the truth is that it is clay merely,' &c. Now if the term 'Sat' denoted the pradh\u00e2na, which is merely the cause of the aggregate of the objects of enjoyment, its knowledge, whether to be set aside or not to be set aside, could never lead to the knowledge of the aggregate of enjoyers (souls), because the latter is not an effect of the pradh\u00e2na. Therefore the pradh\u00e2na is not denoted by the term 'Sat.'--For this the S\u00fbtrak\u00e2ra gives a further reason.","title":"The Vedanta Sutras, Sankaracharya, comm.: First Adhy\u00e2ya, First P\u00e2da: I, 1, 8","type":"page"}