Page:Essays On The Gita - Ghose - 1922.djvu/120

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ESSAYS ON THE GITA


Brahmavada of the current, Vedanta in which the Purusha, Deva, Ishwara,—supreme Soul, God, Lord,— of the Upanishads all became merged in the one all- swallowing concept of the immutable Brahman ;and it has to bring out again from its overshadowing by that concept but not with any denial of it the Yoga idea of the Lord or Ishwara, It has too its own luminous thought to add, the crown of its synthetic system, the doctrine of the Purushottama and of the triple Purusha for which, though the idea is there, no precise and indisputable authority can be easily found in the Upanishads and which seems indeed at first sight to be in contradiction with that text of the Sruti where only two Purushas are recognised. Moreover, in synthetising works and knowledge it has to take account not only of the opposition of Yoga and Sankhya, but of the opposition of works to knowledge in Vedanta itself, where the connotation of the two words and therefore their point of conflict is not quite the same as the point of the Sankhya-Yoga opposition. It is not surprising at all, one may observe in passing, that with the conflict of so many philosophical schools all founding themselves on the texts of the Veda and Upanishads, the Gita should describe the understanding as being perplexed and confused, led in different directions by the Sruti, s'rutivipratipannâ. What battles are even now delivered by Indian pundits and metaphysicians over the meaning of the ancient texts and to what different conclusions they lead! The understanding may well get disgusted and indifferent, gantâsi nirvedam, refuse to hear any more texts new or old, s'rotavyasya s'rutasya cha, and go into itself to discover the truth in the light of a deeper and inner and direct experience,