Both 'Nimitta' and 'Upaadana' Ajnanam in the Adhyasa Bhashya

[V Subrahmanian]

Namaste

In the Adhyasa Bhashya, at the beginning, is a sentence:

तथाप्यन्योन्यस्मिन्नन्योन्यात्मकतामन्योन्यधर्मांश्चाध्यस्येतरेतराविवेकेन अत्यन्तविविक्तयोर्धर्मधर्मिणोः मिथ्याज्ञाननिमित्तः सत्यानृते मिथुनीकृत्य ‘अहमिदम्’ ‘ममेदम्’ इति नैसर्गिकोऽयं लोकव्यवहारः ॥

  "Nevertheless, due to mutual superimposition of the self and the non-self and their attributes upon each other, caused by false ignorance and failure to discriminate between two absolutely distinct entities - the subject and the object - there arises this natural human behavior of mixing truth and untruth, expressed as 'I am this' and 'This is mine'."  

The primordial samsara is caused by Ajnana.  Shankara says that there are two levels in this ajnana:  Basic ajnana that is the root cause, called 'nimitta' and an instrumental, immediate, cause that is called 'aviveka', non-discrimination between the subject and object, real and unreal.

In the following audio, in a class expounding (in Tamil) the Adhyasa Bhashya, renowned Vidwan Sri Mani Dravid Sastrigal, dwells at length on these two terms used by Shankara. Sri Sastrigal parses the compound word 'mithyAjnAna' as mithyA cha tat ajnAnam = that Ajnana that is unreal/mithyA. And justifies such a parsing by a detailed explanation. The other aspect taken up for discussion is: while Shankara uses the term 'nimitta', how can that be given the meaning 'upAdAna'? The discussion starts at about 15 minutes in the audio and goes up to 30 minutes in the audio:   

https://www.centreforbrahmavidya.org/acharyas/dr-mani-dravid-sastri/brahma-sutra-bhashya-0003-sutra-01-01-01-adhyasa-bhashya.html?filter=brahma-sutra-bhashya-adhyaya-1-pada-1&back=/acharyas/dr-mani-dravid-sastri.html?filter=brahma-sutra-bhashya-classes-of-dr-mani-dravid-sastri:back=/acharyas/sri-shankara-bhagavatpada.html&v=1.8 

He cites the Amarakosha which has the general meaning: hetu/kAraNam = cause.  

Amarakosha

निमित्त नपुं।

कारणम्

समानार्थकाः हेतु, कारण, बीज, प्रमाण, निमित्त, प्रत्यय, इति, हि, यत्_तत्, यतः_ततः

मृत्सुवर्णकारणा हि घटादयश्च रूचकादयश्च मृत्सुवर्णात्मानोऽनुभूयन्ते   Bhamati.

(Pot, etc. have indeed clay, gold..as their cause)

The Kalpadruma Lexicon (not cited by MDS):

उपादानं, क्लीबम् ( उप + आङ् + दा + ल्युट् । ) स्वस्व-विषयेभ्य इन्द्रियाकर्षणम् । तत्पर्य्यायः । प्रत्याहारः२ । इत्यमरः ॥

( ग्रहणम् । “स्यादात्मणोप्युपादा-नात् एषोपादानलक्षणा” । इति साहित्यदर्पणे१० परिच्छेदः । ) हेतुः । इति त्रिकाण्डशेषः ॥

upAdAna can also mean simply a cause, hetu.  There is a usage too cited. 

MDS highlights:  The segment  इतरेतराविवेकेन (non-discriminating) already gives the nimitta kaaranam for adhyAsa.  Therefore the segment मिथ्याज्ञाननिमित्तः has to be upAdAna kAraNam.  

AdhyAsa has for its cause: 1. the unreal ajnAnam, mithyA ajnAnam, as the upAdAna and 2. the aviveka, non-discrimination, as the nimitta. 

There are some more points he elaborates that I have not stated in the foregoing.  In any case, the discussion is very interesting.  He raises very pertinent questions against his interpretation and answers them.

Om Tat Sat

   

 

[V Subrahmanian]

Here is yet another usage to show that the wod 'nimitta' can mean upAdAna kAraNam:

There is a work 'AtmapuraNam' authored by Sri Shankarananda Saraswati believed to be the Guru of Swami Vidyaranya.  The work is a compendium of several (10 plus) upanishads in verse form.  It has a very useful commentary too.  In the Aitareya Upanishad there is the statement: The Three states, waking, etc.are three dreams.  While explaining the dream state the text says:


तत्रात्मनि तथा दृश्ये नियतं नैव पश्यति । तत्र दृश्यो गजः क्वापि तरुर्भवति तत्क्षणात् ॥ २०४ ॥

तरुश्च पर्वतः क्वापि पर्वतश्च क्वचित् तृणम्। एवं द्रष्टा क्वचिद् विप्रः शूद्रो भवति तत्क्षणात् ॥ २०५ ॥ 

क्वचित् पशुः देवो महाराजः क्षणात् | देशकालादिनियमो नात्र कश्चिद्धिं विद्यते ॥ २०६ ॥

In the dream one will not see regularity (niyatam) in respect of himself and the observed world. In a trice an elephant can  become a tree, a tree a mountain, that a blade of grass. The observer, a brahmana, could become a shudra, an animal, a god, a king in a trice. Thus there is no regularity seen there with respect to place, time and causality.

While explaining about the causality aspect, the commentary says: मृद एव घट इत्यादिनिमित्तनियमः |

(there is no rule that a pot is produced from clay alone).

Here the word nimitta is used to convey the idea of material, upAdAna, cause. 

One can see an exactly similar usage made by Shankara in the Adhyasa bhAshya:  mithyAjnAna-nimittah.  

Since the word 'itaretara avivekah' has already been used there itself to convey that the aviveka, non-discrimination, is the nimitta, instrumental cause, the word nimitta in the next compound word mithyAjnAna-nimittah has to be decidedly mean upAdAna kAraNa for the bhrama/adhyAsa.

What was explained in the earlier post on this topic is now reinforced by a very unambiguous analogy shown above: nimitta = upAdAna.

Those who have not read the earlier post may please do so for greater clarity of this post. 

Incidentally, a study of the Atmapuranam along with the commentary could turn out to be extremely rewarding, especially for those who have not studied the Upanishad Bhashyam.   

Om Tat Sat