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Shri Datta Swami

Jnana Saraswati – Parabrahma Sutras

    

62. Bliss is Brahman in the sense of 'greatest in the category'


सोऽपि वर्गोत्तमो ब्रह्म श्रुतः।६२।
so'pi vargottamo brahma śrutaḥ|62|

If you say that the Veda says that bliss is Brahman, here the word Brahman stands for the best in the category of desirable qualities. The contradiction appears when you always give the same meaning to Brahman.

Explanation:

The Veda also says that bliss is Brahman (Anando Brahma). Here the word Brahman stands for the best in the category of desirable qualities. Bliss is the most desirable quality of awareness. Hence, bliss can be called as Brahman. Like this, you have to give different meanings for the word Brahman in both these contexts [1]. Otherwise, there will be a self-contradiction. If you say that this is the house of the king and at the same time say that the house itself is the king [2], it becomes a self-contradiction. In the first statement, king means a living person. In the second statement, king means the best among houses. Now both the statements can be correlated.


[1] The two contexts are: (i) The bliss of Brahman implying that bliss is different from Brahman and (ii) Bliss is Brahman. Brahman means God in the first context while it means the greatest quality in the second context.

[2] In the sense of ‘King of houses’.

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