Vedanta Paribhasha - Pratyaksham - 11

Hari aum

Prostrations to Guru. Prostrations to All

Happy New Year to All.


Now the (various) connections of the organs viz., conjunction, identity with what is conjoined, and so on, are considered to produce mental states that reveal Consciousness.

As explained earlier, when an object is perceived, the mind goes out through the sense organs and takes the Vritti of the object. The Consciousness limited by the object and the Consciousness limited by the Vritti of the object occupy the same space and it doesn’t have the reality other than the Consciousness of the Pramata. The object thus becomes a perceivable and the knowledge is the Perceptual knowledge of the object. The mind which goes out through sense organs forming a Vritti can be for one of the following.
Samyoga – this is normal conjunction through which we perceive the object such as jar.
Samyukta tadatmya – this is when a particular attribute or quality of an object is perceived, say the color of an object.
Samyukta Abhinna tadatmya – when a particular attribute or quality of the same object which the mind is conjoined with is perceived.


That mental state is of four kinds: doubt, certitude, egoism and recollection. Owing to this diversity of states, the mind, though one, is designated as the manas, the intellect, the ego and the citta. So it has been said: “The manas, the intellect, the ego and the Chitta constitute the internal instrument. Doubt, certitude, egoism and recollection – these are their objects”.

Dharmaraja here explains about the Anthah karanam and its four kinds based on its functionality. We can divide the anthah karanam into four kinds based on its functions as we have learned from other works. The four kinds are Manas, bhuddhi, chittam and ahamkaram.
Manas – this part of the mind has all thoughts about the objects of the world in the form of doubts.
Bhuddi – the intellect part, which is involved at times of decision making.
Chittam – this is the store house of the mind or the memory.
Ahamkaram – the ego part of the mind


The perception spoken of above is of two kinds: Savikalpaka (determinate) and nirvikalpaka (indeterminate). Of these, the former is that knowledge which apprehends relatedness (of the substantive and qualifying attribute); for example, knowledte such as, “I know the jar”. Whereas indeterminate perception is that knowledge which does not apprehend this relatedness; for example, knowledge arising from sentence like, “This is that Devadutta” or “Thou art That”

After explaining about the perceptual knowledge, the conditions of perceptual knowledge and objects being subject to perception, he enters into the next topic about the kinds of perceptual knowledge. Perceptual knowledge can be of 2 kinds, determinate and indeterminate. When we see pot in front of us, we get the knowledge that “I know this jar”. Now here the jar is related to the perceiver.

In the case of the knowledge “This is That Devadutta”, we ignore all the relations and hence it is indeterminate knowledge. The use of the word ‘This’ means the present time and the use of ‘That’ means past time, we cannot relate those two contradictory time periods and hence ignoring all the relations we get the knowledge ‘This is That Devadutta’. Similarly in the case of ‘Tat tvam Asi’, though the word meaning of Tat and Tvam are contradictory, still ignoring the limiting adjuncts the knowledge that is got is indeterminate knowledge.


Objection: but this knowledge is verbal comprehension, not perception, for it is not due to the organ.
Reply: no, for the fact of being due to the organs is not the criterion of perception, since it has already been condemned, but, as has been stated, it is the fact of the Consciousness associated with the means of knowledge not being different from the Consciousness associated with objects, when the latter are present and are capable of being perceived. Thus, as the knowledge due to the sentence, “This is that Devadatta”, has for its object something connected with an organ, and as states of the mind that goes out are assumed, the Consciousness limited by Devadatta is not different from that limited by the mental state (in the form of object), and hence the knowledge due to the sentence, “This is that Devadatta”, is a perception. Similarly with the knowledge due to sentences like, “Thou art That”, also, for there the subject itself being the object, the condition about the unity of the two is present.

Now an objection is raised. The objection is how can “This is That Devadatta” or “Tat Tvam Asi” can be a perceptual knowledge, since there is no sense organs involved in such knowledge. Earlier, a question was raised about mind being organ or not, in the explanation as an answer to that he explained clearly that for a knowledge to be immediate, there is no dependency on being generated by organs. So we cannot say that since it is not generated by organ the knowledge is not immediate. Also later the conditions for the perceptual knowledge are explained as Consciousness limited by the object not different from the Consciousness limited by the Vritti of the object and the object has the capability to be perceived.
In the case of knowledge “This is That Devadatta”, mind goes out through the sense organs and forms the Vritti of Devadatta. The Consciousness limited by Devadatta and Consciousness limited by Vritti of Devadatta are not different and Devadatta has the capability to be perceived. Thus the knowledge that we get from the sentence “This is That Devadatta” is perception only. The word ‘This’ generally denote to an object which is very close by and that we are perceiving through our eyes. In the same way, “Tat Tvam Asi” is also perception. Here subject itself becomes the object and are in the present. Thus the knowledge is perception only.

Prostrations to All.

Thanks,
Rajesh