The sense of the Taittirîya-text therefore is as follows. The highest Self, which in itself is of the nature of unlimited knowledge and bliss, has for its body all sentient and non-sentient beings—instruments of sport for him as it were—in so subtle a form that they may be called non-existing; and as they are his body he may be said to consist of them (tan-maya). Then desirous of providing himself with an infinity of playthings of all kinds he, by a series of steps beginning with Prakriti and the aggregate of souls and leading down to the elements in their gross state, so modifies himself as to have those elements for his body— when he is said to consist of them—and thus appears in the form of our world containing what the text denotes as sat and tyat, i.e. all intelligent and non-intelligent things, from gods down to plants and stones. When the text says that the Self having entered into it became sat and tyat, the meaning is that the highest Self, which in its causal state had been the universal Self, abides, in its effected state also, as the Self of the different substances undergoing changes and thus becomes this and that. While the highest Self thus undergoes a change— in the form of a world comprising the whole aggregate of sentient and non-sentient beings—all imperfection and suffering are limited to the sentient beings constituting part of its body, and all change is restricted to the non-sentient things which constitute another part. The highest Self is effected in that sense only that it is the ruling principle, and hence the Self, of matter and souls in their gross or evolved state; but just on account of being this, viz. their inner Ruler and Self, it is in no way touched by their imperfections and changes. Consisting of unlimited knowledge and bliss he for ever abides in his uniform nature, engaged in the sport of making this world go round. This is the purport of the clause 'it became the real and the unreal': although undergoing a change into the multiplicity of actual sentient and non-sentient things, Brahman at the same time was the Real, i.e. that which is free from all shadow of imperfection, consisting of nothing but pure knowledge and bliss. That all beings, sentient and non- sentient, and whether in their non-evolved or evolved states, are mere playthings of Brahman, and that the creation and reabsorption of the world are only his sport, this has been expressly declared by Dvaipâyana, Parâsara and other Rishis,'Know that all transitory beings, from the Unevolved down to individual things, are a mere play of Hari'; 'View his action like that of a playful child,' &c. The Sûtrakâra will distinctly enounce the same view in II, 1, 33. With a similar view the text 'from that the Lord of Mâya sends forth all this; and in that the other is bound by Mâyâ' (Svet. Up. IV, 9), refers to Prakriti and soul, which together constitute the body of Brahman, as things different from Brahman, although then, i.e. at the time of a pralaya, they are one with Brahman in so far as their extreme subtlety does not admit of their being conceived as separate; this it does to the end of suggesting that even when Brahman undergoes the change into the shape of this world, all changes exclusively belong to non-sentient matter which is a mode of Brahman, and all imperfections and sufferings to the individual souls which also are modes of Brahman. The text has to be viewed as agreeing in meaning with 'that Self made itself.' Of a similar purport is the account given in Manu, 'He being desirous to send forth from his body beings of many kinds, first with a thought created the waters and placed his seed in them' (I, 8).
It is in this way that room is found for those texts also which proclaim Brahman to be free from all imperfection and all change. It thus remains a settled conclusion that Brahman by itself constitutes the material as well as the operative cause of the world.
28. And because it is called the womb.
Brahman is the material as well as the operative cause of the world for that reason also that certain texts call it the womb, 'the maker, the Lord, the Person, Brahman, the womb' (Mu. Up. III, 1, 3); 'that which the wise regard as the womb of all beings' (I, 1, 6). And that 'womb' means as much as material cause, appears from the complementary passage 'As a spider sends forth and draws in its threads' (I, 1, 7)—
29. Herewith all (texts) are explained, explained.
Hereby, i.e. by the whole array of arguments set forth in the four pâdas of the first adhyâya; all those particular passages of the Vedânta-texts which give instruction as to the cause of the world, are explained as meaning to set forth a Brahman all-wise, all-powerful, different in nature from all beings intelligent and non-intelligent. The repetition of the word 'explained' is meant to indicate the termination of the adhyâya.
SECOND ADHYÂYA
FIRST PÂDA.
1. If it be said that there would result the fault of there being no room for (certain) Smritis: (we reply) 'no,' because there would result the fault of want of room for other Smritis.
The first adhyâya has established the truth that what the Vedânta-texts teach is a Supreme Brahman, which is something different as well from non-sentient matter known through the ordinary means of proof, viz. Perception and so on, as from the intelligent souls whether connected with or separated from matter; which is free from even a shadow of imperfection of any kind; which is an ocean as it were of auspicious qualities and so on; which is the sole cause of the entire Universe; which constitutes the inner Self of all things. The second adhyâya is now begun for the purpose of proving that the view thus set forth cannot be impugned by whatever arguments may possibly be brought forward. The Sûtrakâra at first turns against those who maintain that the Vedanta- texts do not establish the view indicated above, on the ground of that view being contradicted by the Smriti of Kapila, i. e. the Sânkhya- system.