The inner experiences of pleasure and pain also are generated by a false identification of antahkarana transformations as pleasure or pain with the self, by virtue of which are generated the perceptions, “I am happy,” or “I am sorry.”

In continuous perception of anything for a certain time as an object or as pleasure, etc. the mental state or vritti is said to last in the same way all the while so long as any other new form is not taken up by the antahkarana for the acquirement of any new knowledge. In such case when I infer that there is fire on the hill that I see, the hill is an object of perception, for the antahkarana vritti is one with it, but that there is fire in it is a matter of inference, for the antahkarana vritti cannot be in touch with the fire; so in the same experience there may be two modes of mental modification, as perception in seeing the hill, and as inference in inferring the fire in the hill. In cases of acquired perception, as when on seeing sandal wood I think that it is odoriferous sandal wood, it is pure perception so far as the sandal wood is concerned, it is inference or memory so far as I assert it to be odoriferous.

Vedanta does not admit the existence of the relation called samavaya (inherence) or jati (class notion); and so does not distinguish perception as a class as distinct from the other class called inference, and holds that both perception and inference are but different modes of the transformations of the antahkarana reflecting the cit in the corresponding vrittis. The perception is thus nothing but the cit manifestation in the antahkarana vritti transformed into the form of an object with which it is in contact. Perception in its objective aspect is the identity of the cit underlying the object with the subject, and perception in the subjective aspect is regarded as the identity of the subjective cit with the objective cit. This identity of course means that through the vritti the same reality subsisting in the object and the subject is realized, whereas in inference the thing to be inferred, being away from contact with antahkarana, has apparently a different reality from that manifested in the states of consciousness. Thus perception is regarded as the mental state representing the same identical reality in the object and the subject by antahkarana contact, and it is held that the knowledge produced by words (e.g. this is the same Devadatta) referring identically to the same thing which is seen (e.g. when I see Devadatta before me another man says this is Devadatta, and the knowledge produced by “this is Devadatta” though a verbal (shabda) knowledge is to be regarded as perception, for the antahkarana vritti is the same) is to be regarded as perception or pratyaksha.

The content of these words (this is Devadatta) being the same as the perception, and there being no new relationing knowledge as represented in the proposition “this is Devadatta” involving the unity of two terms “this” and “Devadatta” with a copula, but only the indication of one whole as Devadatta under visual perception already experienced, the knowledge proceeding from “this is Devadatta” is regarded as an example of nirvikalpa knowledge. So on the occasion of the rise of Brahma-consciousness when the preceptor instructs “thou art Brahman” the knowledge proceeding from the sentence is not savikalpa, for though grammatically there are two ideas and a copula, yet from the point of view of intrinsic significance (tatparya) one identical reality only is indicated. Vedanta does not distinguish nirvikalpa and savikalpa in visual perception, but only in shabda perception as in cases referred to above. In all such cases the condition for nirvikalpa is that the notion conveyed by the sentence should be one whole or one identical reality, whereas in savikalpa perception we have a combination of different ideas as in the sentence, “the king’s man is coming” (rajapurusha agacchati). Here no identical reality is signified, but what is signified is the combination of two or three different concepts (1).

It is not out of place to mention in this connection that Vedanta admits all the six pramanas of Kumarila and considers like Mimamsa that all knowledge is self-valid (svatah-pramana). But prama has not the same meaning in Vedanta as in Mimamsa. There as we remember prama meant the knowledge which goaded one to practical action and as such all knowledge was prama, until practical experience showed the course of action in accordance with which it was found to be contradicted. In Vedanta however there is no reference to action, but prama means only uncontradicted cognition. To the definition of self-validity as given by Mimamsa Vedanta adds another objective qualification, that such knowledge can have svatah-pramanya as is not vitiated by the presence of any dosha (cause of error, such as defect of senses or the like). Vedanta of course does not think like Nyaya that positive conditions (e.g. correspondence, etc.) are necessary for the validity of knowledge, nor does it divest knowledge of all qualifications like the Mimamsists, for whom all knowledge is self-valid as such. It adopts a middle course and holds that absence of dosha is a necessary condition for the self-validity of knowledge.

It is clear that this is a compromise, for whenever an external condition has to be admitted, the knowledge cannot be regarded as self-valid, but Vedanta says that as it requires only a negative condition for the absence of dosha, the objection does not apply to it, and it holds that if it depended on the presence of any positive condition for proving the validity of knowledge like the Nyaya, then only its theory of self-validity would have been damaged. But since it wants only a negative condition, no blame can be attributed to its theory of self-validity. Vedanta was bound to follow this slippery middle course, for it could not say that the pure cit reflected in consciousness could require anything else for establishing its validity, nor could it say that all phenomenal forms of knowledge were also all valid, for then the world-appearance would come to be valid; so it held that knowledge could be regarded as valid only when there was no dosha present; thus from the absolute point of view all world-knowledge was false and had no validity, because there was the avidya-dosha, and in the ordinary sphere also that knowledge was valid in which there was no dosha. Validity (pramanya) with Mimamsa meant the capacity that knowledge has to goad us to practical action in accordance with it, but with Vedanta it meant correctness to facts and want of contradiction. The absence of dosha being guaranteed there is nothing which can vitiate the correctness of knowledge (2).

1. See Vedantaparibhasha and Shikhamani.
2. See Vedantaparibhasha, Shikhamani, Maniprabha and Citsukha on svatahpramanya.

antahkarana, false identification, inference, inner experiences, manifestation, perception, pleasure and pain, vedanta