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trols are enjoined as subsidiaries of knowledge; and hence have to be practiced. |
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Although rites are not necessary for the person who already has knowledge of Brahman, and although rites cannot cause knowledge, they are nonetheless necessary for the person whose desire to know Brahman is inchoate, inarticulate and therefore not yet constructive of a program of inquiry. Sankara explains that they help make the person into the right kind of person who can inquire properly: ". . . knowledge does not at all depend on the performance of the duties of the various stages of life for producing its own result . . . [But] knowledge needs the help of all the duties of the various stages of life, and it is not a fact that there is absolutely no dependence on them . . . once knowledge has emerged, it does not depend on any other factor for producing its result, but it does depend on others for its emergence."
55 Both the internal virtues of self-control, etc., and the performance of rites are required for the seeker.56 |
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Vacaspati pays close attention to the temporal process of change in the knowing person, and to how helps such as ritual performance play their part in knowledge's emergence: |
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Therefore, like control of the mind, control of the sense organs, etc., ritual actions are required for knowledge, with respect to its emergence. According to the text, "One who thus knows,"57 control of the mind, control of the sense organs, etc., are interior subsidiaries regarding the origin of knowledge, because they are connected with the proper form of knowledge. Ritual actions are exterior subsidiaries, because they are connected with the desire to know. By the performance of the obligatory rites prescribed for the various states of life, therefore, dharma arises, and due to that sin is destroyed. For [sin] deeply soils the mind by the confusion of the permanent, pure, happy, etc. with this world, the non-self which is essentially impermanent, impure, unhappy, etc.; these confusions are connected with adharma . . . [The student] learns from his teacher's words and from scripture that the means [to the destruction of sin] is the thorough understanding of the nature of the self. Ritual actions are a help in the origination of this knowl- |
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