First Adhy&acir... | Sacred Texts Archive

The Vedanta Sutras, commentary by Sankaracharya (SBE34), tr. by George Thibaut [1890] at sacred-texts.com

25. And on account of both (i.e. the origin and the dissolution of the world) being directly declared (to have Brahman for their material cause).

This Sûtra supplies a further argument for Brahman's

p. 287

being the general material cause.--Brahman is the material cause of the world for that reason also that the origination as well as the dissolution of the world is directly spoken of in the sacred texts as having Brahman for their material cause, 'All these beings take their rise from the ether and return into the ether' (Kh. Up. I, 9, 1). That that from which some other thing springs and into which it returns is the material cause of that other thing is well known. Thus the earth, for instance, is the material cause of rice, barley, and the like.--The word 'directly' (in the Sûtra) notifies that there is no other material cause, but that all this sprang from the ether only.--Observation further teaches that effects are not re-absorbed into anything else but their material causes.