Gita Rahasya -Tilak 228

Karma Yoga Sastra -Tilak

CHAPTER IX THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE ABSOLUTE SELF We also see in the course of ordinary affairs, that if theTe is no consistency in what a man says, and if he now says one thing and shortly afterwards another thing, people call him false. Then, why should not the same argument be applied to the Name and Form called 'rupee' (not to the underlying substance) and the rupee be called false or illusory ? For, we can take away the Name and Form, 'rupee' of a rupee, which out eyes see to-day, and give it to-morrow the Name and Form of 'chain' or 'cup' ; that is to say, we see by our own eyes that Names and Forms always change, that is, are not constant. Besides, if one says that nothing else is true except what one sees by one's eyes, then, we will be landed in the position of calling that mental process of synthesis by means of which we acquire the knowledge of the t world, and which is not visible to our eyes, unreal or false; and, thereby,, we will have to say that all knowledge whatsoever which we acquire is false. Taking into account this and such other difficulties, the ordinary and relative definition of 'satya namely, "that alone is 'satya' (Real) which can be seen by the eyes", is not accepted as correct; and the word 'satya" has been defined in the Sarvopanisad as meaning something- which is imperishable, that is, which does not cease to exist, though all other things have ceased to exist : and in the same- way, satya has been defined in the Mahabharata as : satyam nama 'vyayam nityam avikari tathaiva ca I that is, "that only is Real which is avyaya (i.e., never destroyed), nitya (i. e., always the same), and avikari (i. e., of which the form is never changed)". This is the principle underlying the fact that a person who now says one thing and, shortly afterwards another thing is called 'false' in common parlance. When we accept this non-relative definition of the Beal (satya), one has necessarily to come to the conclusion that the Name and Form which constantly changes is false, though it is seen by the eyes ; and that the immortal Thing-in-itself (vastu-tattva), which is at the bottom of and is covered by that Name and Form, and which always remains the same, is Real, though it is not seen by the eyes. The description of Brahman, which is given in the Bhagavadgita in the following words, namely, "yah sa sarvesu bhutesu nasyatsu na vinasyati" , that is, " that is the immutable (aksara) Brahman, which never ceases to exist, although all things, that is, the bodies of all things encased in Name and Form are destroyed", has been given on the basis of this principle ; and the same stanza has again appeared in the description of the Narayaniya or Bhagavata religion in the Mahabharata with the different reading "bhutagramasariresu" instead of "yah sa sarvesu bhutesu" .