The Bhāṣya attributed to Śaṅkara reads the series as a statement of the identity of all powers with the principle of the Self. Śukra denotes the pure or luminous, Brahman denotes Hiraṇyagarbha, and Prajāpati denotes the cosmic Virāj-form.
Śaṅkarānanda turns fire, sun, wind, moon, light, water and Prajāpati into different forms for meditation on Brahman. The verse thus teaches not multiple causes but the presence of the same ground of the world in every cosmic function.
Nārāyaṇa's Dīpikā adopts two striking word meanings: it understands Śukra as generative power or seed and Brahman as the Veda. These too are identified without qualification with the same divine ground.
Vijñānabhagavat arranges the named deities as cosmic totalities: fire stands for speech, the sun for sight, wind for the vital breath, and the moon for the mind. The series also represents all other collective organs and faculties.
<1: Der Anfangsvers des Tadeva-Liedes, Vāj. Saṃh. 32,1 (Gesch. d. Phil. I, 291).>
<1: Der Anfangsvers des Tadeva-Liedes, Vāj. Saṃh. 32,1 (Gesch. d. Phil. I, 291).>
<1: This is the explanation of Śaṅkara, and probably that of the Yoga schools in India at his time. But to take śukram for dīptiman nakṣatrādi, brahma for Hiraṇyagarbha, and Prajāpati for Virāj seems suggested by this verse only.>
<1: Śankara explains “Bramha” by “Hiraṇyagarbha,” that is to say, the universal soul, as pervading all subtle bodies, and Prajāpati by Virāt, or the universal soul, as pervading all gross bodies.>
tu*vaṃ jīrṇo, daṇḍena vañcasi; tu*vaṃ jāto, bhavasi viśvato-mukhaḥ ||3|| Analysis ▾ Analysis ▴
Śaṅkarānanda understands woman, man, child, old person and the form looking in all directions as concepts for the same Self of joy. Difference lies in the respective verbal conceptions and stages of life, not in a change of Ātman.
Nārāyaṇa explains differences of sex and age as determinations imagined in the Self. Whether female, male, young or old, the entire realm of forms brought forth is not a reality independent of the one Self.
Vijñānabhagavat compares the many individual forms with space in vessels and reflections of the moon in water. Through Māyā the Lord creates bodies and organs, enters them and only apparently receives their sex, age and names.
<1: = Atharvav. 10,8,27 (Gesch. d. Phil. I, 322).>
<1: This stanza = AV. 10. 8. 27.>
<1: = Atharvav. 10,8,27 (Gesch. d. Phil. I, 322).>
<1: Vañkayasi, an exceptional form, instead of vañkasi (A. B.).>
nīlaḥ pataṅgo, harito lohitākṣas; taḍid-garbha, ṛtavaḥ samudrāḥ | Analysis ▾ Analysis ▴
The Bhāṣya attributed to Śaṅkara supplies “you yourself” throughout and recognises the all-form of the Lord: bee, differently coloured birds, thundercloud, seasons and seas. The source of all worlds is beginningless in time and omnipresent in space.
Śaṅkarānanda explains the images from nature individually and interprets the lightning-like cloud as an image of a world visible one moment and gone the next. Time and water can appear as the two wings; the worlds brought forth are effects of the one ground.
Nārāyaṇa assigns the terse colour images to concrete appearances: the blue moth, red-eyed fire and the lightning-bearing cloud. Seasons, seas and all things whatsoever are, according to his Dīpikā, forms of the same One.
Vijñānabhagavat connects the series of images with a threefold limitlessness. Beginninglessness denotes freedom from temporal limitation, omnipresence freedom from spatial limitation, and the origin of all worlds shows the Lord as the unlimited material ground of their forms.
<1: Unter den, in Indien überaus zahlreichen, Vögeln treten besonders hervor die Krähen, die man allmorgendlich scharenweise und krächzend von einem der Riesenbäume zum andern fliegen sieht, und die kleinen, grünen Papageichen, die oft dutzendweise auf einem Baume zusammensitzen, und an deren liebliches, süßes Gezwitscher man sich nicht erinnern kann, ohne Heimweh nach Indien zu empfinden.>
<1: Unter den, in Indien überaus zahlreichen, Vögeln treten besonders hervor die Krähen, die man allmorgendlich scharenweise und krächzend von einem der Riesenbäume zum andern fliegen sieht, und die kleinen, grünen Papageichen, die oft dutzendweise auf einem Baume zusammensitzen, und an deren liebliches, süßes Gezwitscher man sich nicht erinnern kann, ohne Heimweh nach Indien zu empfinden.>
<1: We see throughout the constant change from the masculine to the neuter gender, in addressing either the lord or his true essence.>
ajo hy eko, juṣamāṇo 'nuśete; jahāty enāṃ, bhukta-bhogām ajo 'nyaḥ ||5|| Analysis ▾ Analysis ▴
The Bhāṣya attributed to Śaṅkara interprets the three-coloured Unborn female as Prakṛti consisting of fire, water and food. A Jīva bound from beginningless time by desire and Karma enjoys her products; another dispels the darkness of ignorance through a teacher's instruction and leaves her behind.
Śaṅkarānanda identifies the one Unborn female with Avidyā and its many projections. The bound Jīva continues as if asleep because it does not know the Self; the awakened one leaves concealment and projection behind through knowledge of Brahman. Bondage and liberation ultimately remain imagined states.
Nārāyaṇa reads the red, white and black Unborn female as Māyā of the three Guṇas. The Saṃsārin clings to her in enjoyment and takes this for well-being. The other Unborn male is the detached Paramātman, who neither enjoys nor needs to discard anything.
Vijñānabhagavat connects red, white and black both with fire, water and earth and with Rajas, Sattva and Tamas. The ignorant Jīva attributes their changes to itself; the knower burns root-Māyā through the direct knowledge “I am Brahman”.
<1: Lies lohita-śukla-kṛṣṇām und sarūpāḥ (wie auch der Telugudruck hat). Daß, wie Śaṅkara, und höchst wahrscheinlich auch schon Bādarāyana, annehmen (Brahmasūtra 1,4,8–10), die Stelle ursprünglich auf das Seiende und seine Produkte, Glut, Wasser, Nahrung, Chānd. 6,2, zu beziehen ist, dafür sprechen sowohl die Ausdrücke lohita, śukla, kṛṣṇa (siehe Chānd. 6,4,1) als auch ihre Reihenfolge, die nach dem Sāṅkhyasystem eine andre sein müßte. Auf der andern Seite ist die Beziehung von Bock und Ziege auf Purusha und Prakṛti (mit ihren drei Guna’s, Rajas, Sattvam, Tamas) der Sāṅkhya’s zu treffend, um abgewiesen zu werden. — Wir haben hier eine der Stellen, in denen wir aus dem Monismus der Upanishadlehre die dualistische Sāṅkhyatheorie hervorwachsen sehen (vgl. oben S. 290).>
<1: That is, Nature, Prakṛti, with three constituent Qualities (guṇa), namely Pureness (sattva), Passion (rajas), and Darkness (tamas).>
<2: The cosmic Person, father of all being.>
<3: The individual soul, or experiencer.>
<1: Lies lohita-śukla-kṛṣṇām und sarūpāḥ (wie auch der Telugudruck hat). Daß, wie Śaṅkara, und höchst wahrscheinlich auch schon Bādarāyana, annehmen (Brahmasūtra 1,4,8–10), die Stelle ursprünglich auf das Seiende und seine Produkte, Glut, Wasser, Nahrung, Chānd. 6,2, zu beziehen ist, dafür sprechen sowohl die Ausdrücke lohita, śukla, kṛṣṇa (siehe Chānd. 6,4,1) als auch ihre Reihenfolge, die nach dem Sāṅkhyasystem eine andre sein müßte. Auf der andern Seite ist die Beziehung von Bock und Ziege auf Purusha und Prakṛti (mit ihren drei Guna’s, Rajas, Sattvam, Tamas) der Sāṅkhya’s zu treffend, um abgewiesen zu werden. — Wir haben hier eine der Stellen, in denen wir aus dem Monismus der Upanishadlehre die dualistische Sāṅkhyatheorie hervorwachsen sehen (vgl. oben S. 290).>
<1: This is again one of the famous verses of our Upanishad, because it formed for a long time a bone of contention between Vedānta and Sāṅkhya philosophers. The Sāṅkhyas admit two principles, the Purusha, the absolute subject, and the Prakṛti, generally translated by nature. The Vedānta philosophers admit nothing but the one absolute subject, and look upon nature as due to a power inherent in that subject. The later Sāṅkhyas therefore, who are as anxious as the Vedāntins to find authoritative passages in the Veda, confirming their opinions, appeal to this and other passages, to show that their view of Prakṛti, as an independent power, is supported by the Veda. The whole question is fully discussed in the Vedānta-sūtras I, 4, 8. Here we read rohita-kṛṣṇa-śuklām, which seems preferable to lohita-kṛṣṇa-varṇām, at least from a Vedānta point of view, for the three colours, red, black, and white, are explained as signifying either the three guṇas, rajas, sattva, and tamas, or better (Chānd. Up. VI, 3, 1), the three elements, tejas (fire), ap (water), and anna (earth). A. reads rohitaśuklakṛṣṇām; B. lohitaśuklakṛṣṇā (sic). We also find in A. and B. bhuktabhogām for bhuktabhogyām, but the latter seems technically the more correct reading. It would be quite wrong to imagine that aja and ajā are meant here for he-goat and she-goat. These words, in the sense of unborn, are recognised as early as the hymns of the Rig-veda, and they occurred in our Upanishad I, 9, where the two ajas are mentioned in the same sense as here. But there is, no doubt, a play on the words, and the poet wished to convey the second meaning of he-goat and she-goat, only not as the primary, but as the secondary intention.>
<1: According to Śankara, this means nature which has the qualities of light, water, and food, that is to say, all qualities. It has, however, yet another meaning, if Aja is taken in the sense of a goat, which it also denotes.>
<2: Another who by the instruction of his teacher overcomes ignorance, and gets thereby separated from nature and its enjoyment, becomes of the same being with the supreme spirit. “Aja,” “unborn.” There are two substances unborn, according to the doctrine of the Sānkhya, nature and the soul. By the union of both the world is produced; by the separation from nature through knowledge, a soul attains its last object—liberation.>
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