A new approach to the Vedas : an essay in translation and exegesis

A NEW APPROACH TO THE VEDAS

evil that befalls him; he gets, as we say colloquially, just what is coming to him, he “ asks forit.” As expressed in the Aitareya Aranyaka, II, 3, 2, yathaprajiam hi sambhavah, ‘‘ they are born according to the measure of their understanding,” cf. Kausttaki Up., I, 2, yathavidyam. ‘* Time, intrinsic nature, necessity, accident, the elements, and ancestry (yoni, purusa) may be posited (as causes of natural species) ; but inasmuch as the nature of Self is not a combination of these, the Self is not the Ruler (7sa) of the cause of pleasure and pain . . . that Self which takes on every form is not also the shaper of forms,” Svetdsvatara Up., 1, 2 and 9. So the Chandogya Up., VIII, x, 4, points out that begotten existences (praja/) get their deserts anusasana (lit. ““ according to what is decreed,”’ Sasana having here the force of “ natural law,” the “law of heaven,’ dharma, yta): inasmuch as the individual existences live-dependent-on (upajivanii) their such and such desired ends (yam yamantam-abhikamah). Similarly in our Upanisad, IV. 4, 5-7,and 22, summarised, “according to a man’s works, which are actuated by his will, good or evil, as the case may be, and though he may attain his ends, he must return again from the other world to this world: he only who is without desire, whose desire is fulfilled, whose desire is him-Self, reaches Brahman, there neither right nor wrong that he may have done affect him”: he escapes there from merit and demerit, punya-papa, dhavmadharmau.

Similarly Sankaracarya, Veddnta Sitra, II, 1, 32-35, Commentary, maintains that injustice cannot be charged to Brahman, for as much as he does not act independently, but with regard to (s@peksa) merit and demerit (dha?mddhaymau) : he being the common cause of the becoming of all things, but not of the distinctions between them, which distinctions are determined by the ‘‘ varying works inherent in the respective personalities.” *’

Quite or nearly in accord with this, St. Thomas, distinguishing Fate from Providence, says that it is * mani-