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I illustrate this point with reference to an adhikarana which deals with world renunciation (samnyasa). This is a reality that seems to be primarily outside the Text because it, of all things, is supposed to be free of words: It is the state of life of the person who knows Brahman.
24 In the Advaita version, UMS III.4.18-20 asks whether renunciation is a fourth asrama (state, stage of life),25 distinct from those of the householder, student and forest-dweller. Three important questions are asked: 1. Are there asramas other than that of the householder? 2. If there are, are these asramas of equal status with that of the householder? 3. If it is the case that persons who truly know Brahman are unencumbered by the rules which govern the earlier asramas, are they entirely free of such location, or are they placed in their own, special asramaand thus legitimated but also confined? |
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These are "real life" questions with important social ramifications which could be discussed entirely apart from the Text, and the third question points toward a state of life which should ostensibly be free from all boundaries, which should not be textually circumscribed, and which should not even need the legitimation offered by Badarayana and the Advaitins. Yet the Advaita takes the project of textual legitimation seriously, and respond to the three questions entirely by the examination of an upanisadic text, Chandogya 2.23.1: |
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There are three branches of dharma: sacrifice, study, and the giving of alms form the first; asceticism forms the second; the student who lives in the house of the teacher is the third, provided that he settles down permanently in the house of the teacher. All these [gain] the holy worlds; but he who remains steadfast in Brahman (brahmasamstha)attains immortality. |
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The answers to the three questions are made to hinge on how this text is read. The "real life" question of social ordering according to the asramas is defined by this adhikarana as a question of the interpretation of the Chandogya text; the text is authorized to determine a way of life, even the way of life of people who may not care particularly about texts. It is not just that texts are being used to illuminate an extratextual reality; rather, even in its most radical expression, orthodox societythe soci- |
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