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about the use of texts and of conclusions that need to be drawn if intelligent reading is to continue. |
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In its Advaita interpretation, UMS I.1.2 identifies in a preliminary fashion what we mean when we use the word "Brahman" to indicate the object of the Advaita jijnasa (UMS I.1.1). It confirms both the possibility of a discourse about Brahman and the location of this discourse only after and in dependence upon textual engagement. The sutra is relatively clear: |
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"Brahman" indicates that whence derive the origination, etc. of this world. |
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This designation (laksana)
39of "Brahman" as the source of the world is carefully interpreted in Advaita so as to discover and take advantage of an ambivalence regarding what can be said about Brahman, scripturally and reasonably. One wants to be able to speak meaningfully of "Brahman" and thus to know what one is talking about in reading the Text: to be able to read it coherently, yet without claiming a foreknowledge which would make the actual reading superfluous. As in the case of UMS III.3.11-13 and UMS I.1.5-11, the decision that when we speak of "Brahman" we mean the source of the world, is portrayed as a practical decision regarding the use of texts, and not as a deduction from their content or an allied appeal to a reasonable explanation of how the world came about.40 |
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By itself the sutra appears to describe Brahman in terms general enough to allow for inference, and opens the way to such reasoning. Sankara accordingly declares that only Brahman, the Lord, can be an adequate source for the complex and varied world we observe around us: |
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The universe as described cannot possibly be thought of as having its origin, etc. from anything other than the Lord who is possessed of the qualities already mentioned; [it cannot originate from] the non-conscious material source, or from atoms, or from non-existence, or from some human person; nor can it originate on its own, since in this world, things have causes specified according to space and time.41 |
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