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ASHTAVAKRA SAMHITA
sense that it is not in conflict with the demands of
reason. But it also recognizes the limitations of
reason and transcends the same by the help of a supra-
rational organon called self-realization, which directly
intuits the Truth. Reason is a helpful guide up to a
certain limit, but it is after all a negative instrument
and its findings are bound to be negative in character.
It helps us to discard and to negate what is untruth,
but for the realization of the positive Truth it is
incompetent and inadequate. Philosophy, which
absolutely relies upon reason as the only dependable
organon, has not been successful in its positive find-
ings, which have remained debatable points and have
failed to command universal acceptance.
The superiority of Vedanta lies in the fact that while
it fully utilizes the resources of reason, it at the same
time corrects and supplements the results attained by
that means by a supra-intellectual organon, which
does not contradict the findings of reason but supple-
ments them by its positive discoveries. The dis-
coveries of this supra-rational intuition satisfy the
demands of reason in full. The tremendous hold of
Vedanta upon the intellectuals of India is due to this
secret of reconciliation of reason with supra-rational
intuition. Undisciplined reason has got its idiosyn-
crasies, which lead to clash and conflict and so stands
in need of being checked by a corrective, which is
supplied by the supra-rational power of intuition in
man. This recognition of the inadequacy of unaided
reason must not be interpreted as an advocacy of the
anti-intellectual and anti-rational approach. Vedanta
is thoroughly rational, and where reason comes to a
ASHTAVAKRA SAMHITA
sense that it is not in conflict with the demands of
reason. But it also recognizes the limitations of
reason and transcends the same by the help of a supra-
rational organon called self-realization, which directly
intuits the Truth. Reason is a helpful guide up to a
certain limit, but it is after all a negative instrument
and its findings are bound to be negative in character.
It helps us to discard and to negate what is untruth,
but for the realization of the positive Truth it is
incompetent and inadequate. Philosophy, which
absolutely relies upon reason as the only dependable
organon, has not been successful in its positive find-
ings, which have remained debatable points and have
failed to command universal acceptance.
The superiority of Vedanta lies in the fact that while
it fully utilizes the resources of reason, it at the same
time corrects and supplements the results attained by
that means by a supra-intellectual organon, which
does not contradict the findings of reason but supple-
ments them by its positive discoveries. The dis-
coveries of this supra-rational intuition satisfy the
demands of reason in full. The tremendous hold of
Vedanta upon the intellectuals of India is due to this
secret of reconciliation of reason with supra-rational
intuition. Undisciplined reason has got its idiosyn-
crasies, which lead to clash and conflict and so stands
in need of being checked by a corrective, which is
supplied by the supra-rational power of intuition in
man. This recognition of the inadequacy of unaided
reason must not be interpreted as an advocacy of the
anti-intellectual and anti-rational approach. Vedanta
is thoroughly rational, and where reason comes to a