Dear friends,
This is the last of postings on the series "Vedantic echoes in Socratic
Thought" that I have dispatched to the T'venkatam Group List.
In this concluding posting is reproduced parts of the famous dialogue between
SOcrates and his disciples Simmias and Cebes, just days before the Master's
death in Athens. It contains a brilliant exposition by Socrates of many
philosophical strands in traditional Greek thought. At many places, however,
during his wonderful discourse a keen student of Vedantic philosophy can easily
recognize the strong resonance of ancient Vedantic thought, concepts and themes
--- viz.: âsarira-sArira sambhandaâ, âkarma-bandhaâ, âsamskAraâ,
âtri-guNaâ, âatma-shuddhiâ, âmumukshuâ, âkaivalyAnubhavamâ and
âmOkshAnandamâ.
Those of you who have been following this series of postings of mine, please do
enjoy this concluding one and share your feedback/views.
Best Regards,
Sudarshan MK
********************
Socrates: If at its release the soul is pure and does not drag along with it
any trace of the body, because it has never willingly associated with it in
life; if it has shunned it and isolated itself because that is what it always
has practiced --- I mean doing or living philosophy in the right way and really
getting used to facing death calmly; now wouldnât you call this âpracticing
deathâ (even while living)?
Cebes: Most certainly.
Socrates: Very well; if this its condition, then it departs to the place where
things are like itself â invisible, divine, immortal and wise; where, on its
arrival, happiness awaits it, and release from uncertainty and folly, from
fears and gnawing desires, and all other human evils; and where (as they say of
the initiates in the Mysteries) it really spends the rest of the time with
divine beings (âmuktAtmAs-â in Vedantic parlance). Shall we adopt this view
Cebes or some other?
Cebes: This one by all means.
Socrates: But I suppose, if at the time of its release the soul is tainted and
impure; because it has always associated with the body and cared for it and
loved it, and has been so beguiled by the body and its passions and pleasures
that nothing seems real to it but those physical things which can be touched
and seen and eaten and drunk and used for sexual enjoyment, making it
accustomed to hate and fear and avoid what is invisible and obscure to our eyes
but intelligible and comprehensible by philosophy --- if the soul is in this
state, do you think that it will be released just by itself, uncontaminated?
Cebes: Not in the least.
Socrates: On the contrary, it will I imagine, be permeated by the corporeal,
which fellowship and intercourse with the body will have ingrained in its very
nature through constant association and long practice.
Cebes: Certainly.
Socrates: And we must suppose my dear fellow, that the corporeal is heavy,
oppressive, earthly and visible. So the soul which is tainted by its presence
is weighed down and dragged back into the visible world through fear of the
invisible and hovers about tombs and graveyards. The shadowy apparitions which
have actually been seen there are the ghosts of those souls which have not got
clear away, but still retain some portion of the visible; which is why they can
be seen.
Cebes: That seems likely enough Socrates.
Socrates: Yes it does Cebes. Of course, these are not the souls of the good,
but of inferior people (âbaddhA-sâ as per Vedantic terminology), and they
are compelled to wander about these places as a punishment for their bad
conduct in the past. They continue wandering until at last, through craving for
the corporeal, which unceasingly pursues them, they are imprisoned once more in
a body. And as you might expect, they are attached to the same sort of
character or nature which they have developed during life.
(âpoorva-janma-vAsanaâ in the parlance of Vedanta).
Cebes: What sort do you mean Socrates?
Socrates: Well, those who have cultivated gluttony or assault, or drunkenness,
(âtamasâ) instead of taking pains to avoid them, are likely to assume form
of donkeys and other perverse animals; donât you think so?
Cebes: Yes, that is very likely.
Socrates: And those who have deliberately preferred a life of injustice,
suppression, and robbery with violence (ârajasâ) become wolves and hawks
and kites; unless we can suggest any other more likely animals.
Cebes: No, the ones you mention are exactly right.
Socrates: So it is easy to imagine into what sort of animals all the other
kinds of soul will go, in accordance with their conduct during life.
Cebes: Yes, certainly
Socrates: I suppose the happiest people and those who reach the best
destination are the ones who have cultivated the goodness of an ordinary
citizen, so-called âtemperanceâ and âjusticeâ, which is acquired by
habit and practice, without the help of help of philosophy and reason.
Cebes: How are these the happiest?
Socrates: Because they will probably pass into some other kind of social and
disciplined creature like bees, wasps and ants; or even back into the human
race again, becoming decent citizens (âsAtviksâ).
Cebes: âVery likelyâ
Socrates: But no soul which has not practiced philosophy, and is not absolutely
pure (âsuddha-sAttvaâ) when it leaves the body, may attain to the divine
nature (âparama-padamâ); that is only for the lover of learning. This is
the reason, my dear Simmias and Cebes, why true philosophers abstain from all
bodily desires and withstand them and do not yield to them. It is not because
they are afraid of financial loss or poverty, like the average man who thinks
of money first; nor because they shrink from dishonor and a bad reputation,
like lovers of prestige and authority.â
Cebes: No, those would be unworthy motives Socrates.
Socrates: They would indeed Cebes. And so those who care about their souls and
do not devote themselves to the body dissociate themselves firmly from these
others and refuse to accompany them on their haphazard journey; they believe
that it is wrong to oppose philosophy with her offer of liberation and
purification, so they turn and follow her wherever she leads.
Cebes: What do you mean Socrates?
Socrates: I will explain. Every seeker after wisdom (âmumukshuâ) knows that
up to the time when philosophy takes it over his soul is a helpless prisoner,
chained hand and foot in the body, compelled to view reality not directly but
only through its prison bars, and wallowing in utter ignorance. And philosophy
can see the ingenuity of the imprisonment, which is brought about by the
prisonerâs own active desire, which makes him first accessory to his own
confinement. Well, philosophy takes over the soul in this condition and by
gentle persuasion tries to set it free. She points out that observation by
means of eyes and ears and all the other senses abounds with deception, and
she urges the soul to refrain from using them unless it is necessary to do so,
and encourages it to collect and concentrate itself in isolation, trusting
nothing but its own isolated judgment upon realities considered in isolation,
and attributing no truth to any other thing
which it views through another medium in some other thing; such objects, she
knows, are sensible and visible but what she herself sees is intelligible and
invisible. Now the soul of the true philosopher (âmumukshuâ) feels that it
must not reject this opportunity for release, and so it abstains as far as
possible from pleasures and desires and griefs, because it reflects that the
result of giving way to pleasure, fear, pain, or desire is not as might be
supposed the trivial misfortune of becoming ill or wasting money through
self-indulgence, but the last and worst calamity of all, which the sufferer
does not take into account.
Cebes: What is that Socrates?
Socrates: When anyoneâs soul feels a keen pleasure or pain it cannot help
supposing that whatever causes the most violent emotion is the plainest and
truest reality; which it is not. It is chiefly visible things that have this
effect, isnât it?
Cebes: Quite so.
Socrates: Is it not on this sort of occasion that the soul passes most
completely into the bondage of the body?
Cebes: How is that?
Socrates: Because every pleasure or pain has a sort of rivet with which it
fastens the soul to the body and pins it down and makes it corporeal, accepting
as true whatever the body certifies. The result of agreeing with the body and
finding pleasure in the same things is I imagine that it cannot help coming to
share its character and its diet, so that it can never get clean away to the
unseen world, but is always saturated with the body when it sets out, and so
soon falls back again into another body, where it takes root and grows.
Consequently it has no share of fellowship with the pure and uniform and divine.
Cebes: Yes, that is perfectly true.
Socrates: It is for these reasons Cebes that true philosophers exhibit
self-control and courage; not for the reasons that most people do. Or do you
think itâs for the same reasons?
Cebes: No certainly not.
Socrates: No indeed. A philosopherâs soul will take the view which I have
described. It will not first expect to be set free by philosophy and then allow
pleasure and pain to reduce it once more to bondage, thus condemning itself to
an endless task; no, this soul brings calm to the seas of desire by following
Reason (âvivEkamâ) and abiding always in her company, and by contemplating
the true and divine and unambiguous and drawing inspiration from it; because
such a soul believes that this is the right way to live while life endures, and
that after death it reaches a place which is kindred and similar to its own
nature, and there is rid forever of human ills. After such a training, my dear
Simmias and Cebes, the soul can have no grounds for fearing that on its
separation from the body it will be blown away and scattered by the winds, and
so disappear into thin air, and cease to exist altogether.
*************************
CONCLUDED
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Oppiliappan Koil Varadachari Sadagopan
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