A Short History of Religious and Philosophic Thought in India: 1.3 - Swami Krishnananda.

 

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Friday 18, April 2025, 17:00.

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Srimad Bhagavad Gita

A Short History of Religious and Philosophic Thought in India: 1.3

1. INTRODUCTION-3.

Swami Krishnananda.

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The Yoga-Vasishtha rises to a high watermark in the philosophic thought of India. It is a classic inimitable in its kind. Through elaborate descriptions, almost in an epic style, it works upon the fundamental principles enunciated in the Upanishads and combines philosophy with a lofty psychology by which it explains creation, evolution and involution purely from a spiritualistic point of view. In this way, it tries to give an ultimate explanation of everything in terms of the Infinite consciousness which manifests itself as the objects of experience on one side and the experiencing subjects on the other side. 

The sorrows which follow in the wake of every effort of man for acquisition of happiness in a world of transient phenomena, the knowledge needed to diagnose the common malady of everyone, and the ethical prerequisites to be cultivated for the attainment of true freedom are its main subjects. The uniqueness of the methodology of the Yoga-Vasishtha is in its attempt to analyse all things in terms of consciousness which is the ultimate reality of everything. 

Health and disease, happiness and misery, success and failure, bondage and freedom are all explicable in terms of the right adjustment or maladjustment of consciousness. Finally, even birth and death are traced to this mysterious cause which cannot be directly seen, as it is involved in the seeing consciousness itself. Another text, known as the Tripurarahasya (Jnana-kanda), follows the lead of the Yoga-Vasishtha in the treatment of a spiritual idealism which it regards as the alpha and omega of all things.

An interesting part of the manifestation of Indian Philosophy as religion is its concept of the pantheon which has an immense practical significance in the day-to-day life of the country. The gods (devatas) hold such sway over the minds of persons that the theological evaluation of life may be regarded as a commonplace throughout India. A final interpretation of any problem hinges upon a Daiva or a presiding deity, a heritage of thought which may be said to have directly come down to the present day from the Upanishads that viewed the universe as constituted of the object (adhibhuta), subject (adhyatma) and deity (adhidaiva).

There is nothing which is not involved in this triadic relation, in any stage of creation. It is interesting to note this concept of deity entering as an invariable concomitant of every stratum of evolution in the recent philosophy of emergent evolution, particularly in Samuel Alexander; who propounds this theme in his Space, Time and Deity. 

Herein he makes the principle of deity unavoidable in the evolutionary process on a nisus to progress upwards. It is needless to add that the Upanishads have already, many centuries back, anticipated in their intuitions this novel doctrine of deity; with an added significance and purpose, and even today it is impossible to remove from the minds of the Indian people the belief in the governance of the subject-object relation by a presiding deity. 

It is this presiding principle which the Bhagavadgita confirms as the final deciding factor in all actions and processes of man and the world. The crystallisation of this doctrine is the great religious theology of India, which posits various deities as the guardians of the cosmos and sets forth rules of their worship in the interest of man's march towards his great destiny. Theology is an essential part of religion, which is a name for philosophy in practice.

The rules of conduct are a part of the religious way of life. The Smritis are the codes which lay down the laws of human behaviour in one's personal capacity as well as in society. The ancient dictum of the Veda that satya (truth as being) and rita (truth as law) are the primary principles of Reality and its manifestation is the background of the canons of dharma, or a life of righteousness. It is the intention of the Smritis to make explicit the forms of righteousness as they manifest themselves in practical life, which are only implicit in the principles of satya and rita or in the account of creation given in the Upanishads. The modes of living according to class (varna) and order (ashrama) instituted for the purpose of ensuring mutual cooperation in society are the main contents of the Smritis. 

These texts not only deal with the ethical problems of man as an individual and as a member of a family or of society in general, but also dilate upon the rules of administration, politics and statesmanship, legal principles and statecraft. The Smritis of Manu, Yajnavalkya and Parasara, the Santi-Parva of the Mahabharata and the Arthasastra of Kautilya are the primary sources of information on this subject. 

The social, political and legal systems enunciated in these codes are ultimately spiritual in their tone, for they analyse the life of man into the fourfold scheme of practical endeavour, known as rectitude of conduct (dharma), and a righteous pursuit of economic values (artha) and of the fulfilment of one's normal desires (kama), to culminate in the blossoming of the flower of existence into the experience of eternal bliss (moksha). There is, thus, no clash between the individual and society, man and the State, or between God and creation.

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Next

Chapter 1: The Vedas

The Vedas and Their Classification

Continued

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