Category :
UPSC
Goals of Life
- The ancient thinkers laid down that a person should strive for the attainment of four goals. These were economic resources or Artha, regulation of the social order or Dharma, physical pleasures or Kama, and salvation or Moksha.
- Each of these objectives was expounded in writing. Matters relating to economy were treated in the Arthashastra.
- Laws governing the state and society became the subject of the Dharmashastra, and physical pleasures were discussed in the Kamasutra. All these three branches of knowledge were primarily concerned with the material world and its problems.
- They occasionally touched on the question of salvation in a marginal manner.
- Salvation or moksha became the main subject of the texts on darshana or philosophy.
- It meant deliverance from the cycle of birth and death, which was first recommended by Gautama Buddha but later emphasised by some brahmanical philosophers.
- By the beginning of the Christian era, six schools of philosophy
- These were known as Samkhya, Yoga, Nyaya, Vaisheshika, Mimamsa and Vedanta.
Samkhya
- Samkhya, literally "count9, seems to have originated earlier. According to the early Samkhya philosophy the presence of divine agency is not essential to the creation of the world. The world owes its creation and evolution more to Nature or Prakrit! Than to God.
- This was a rational and scientific view. Around the fourth century A.D., in addition to Prakriti, Purusha or spirit was introduced as an element in the Samkhya system, and the creation of the world was attributed to both.
- According to the new view. Nature and the spiritual element together create the world. Thus.in the beginning the Samkhya School of philosophy was materialistic.
- Then it tended to be spiritualistic. However, according to this school a person can attain salvation through the acquisition of real knowledge.
- This knowledge can be acquired through perception (pratyaksha), inference (anumana) and hearing (shabda). Such a method is typical of scientific system of inquiry.
Yoga
- According to the Yoga school, a person can attain salvation through meditation and physical application.
- Practice of control over pleasure, senses and bodily organs is central to this system.
- In order to obtain salvation, physical exercises in various/postures called asana are prescribed and the breathing exercise called pranayama is recommended.
- It is thought that through these methods the mind gets diverted from worldly matters and achieves concentration.
Nyaya
- Nyaya or the school of analysis was developed as a system of logic.
- According to it salvation can be attained through the acquisition of knowledge.
- What is more important, the veracity of a proposition or statement can be tested through inference, hearing and analogy.
- An example of how they use logic is given below :-
(i) There is fire in the mountain
(ii) Because it emits smoke
(iii) whatever emits smoke contains fire as the hearth (kitchen).
- The stress laid on the use of logic influenced Indian scholars who took to systematic thinking and reasoning.
Vaisheshika
- The Vaisheshika School gives importance to the discussion of material elements (dravya).
- They draw a line between particularities and their aggregate.
- Earth, water, fire, air and ether (sky), when combined give rise to new objects.
- The Vaisheshika School propounded the atom theory.
- According to it, material objects are made up of atoms.
- The Vaisheshika thus marked the beginning of physic in India.
- But the scientific view was diluted with belief in God and spiritualism, and this school put its faith in both heaven and salvation.
- Mimamsa
- Mimamsa literally means the art of reasoning and interpretation.
- But reasoning was used to provide justifications for various Vedic rituals, and the attainment of salvation was made dependent on their performance.
- According to the Mimamsa, the Vedas contain the eternal truth.
- The principal object of this philosophy was to acquire heaven and salvation.
- A person will enjoy the bliss of heaven as long as his accumulated acts of virtue last.
- When his accumulated virtues are exhausted, he will come back to the earth.
- But if he attains salvation, he will be completely free from the cycle of birth and death. In order to attain salvation, the Mimamsa strongly recommended the performance of Vedic sacrifices.
- Vedanta
- Vedanta means the end of the Veda.
- The Brahmasutra of Badarayana compiled in the 200 B.C. formed its basic text.
- Later two famous commentaries were written on it, one by Shankara in the ninth century and the other by Ramanuja in the twelfth century.
- Shankara considers brahma to be without any attributes, but Ramanuja's brahma possesses attributes.
- Shankara considers knowledge or jnana to be the chief means of salvation, but Ramanuja's road to salvation lies in practising devotion/loving faith.
- The Vedanta philosophy is traced to the earlier Upanishads.
- According to it, brahma is the reality and everything else is unreal (maya).
- The self (soul) or atma is identical with brahma.
- Therefore, if a person acquires the knowledge of the self (atma) he realizes the knowledge of brahma, and thus attains salvation.
- Both brahma and atma are eternal and indestructible.
- Such a view promotes the idea of stability and unchangingness.
- The theory of karma came to be linked to the Vedanta philosophy.
- It means that in his present birth a person has to bear the consequences of his action performed in his previous birth.
Materialist View of Life
- The Samkhya and Vaisheshika systems put forwards the materialist view of life.
- Kapila, the earliest exponent of the Samkhya, teaches that a man's life is shaped by the forces of nature and not by any divine agency.
- Materialistic ideas also appear in the doctrines of the Ajivikas, a heterodox sect in the time of the Buddha. Charvaka was the main expounder of the materialistic philosophy,
- This philosophy came to be known as the Lokayata, which means the ideas derived fron the common people.
- It underlined the importance of intimate contact with the world (loka), and showed lad of belief in the other world. Many teachings are attributed to Charvaka.
- He was opposed to the quest for spiritual salvation.
- He denied the existence of any divine or supernatural agency.
- He accepted the existence/reality of only those things which could be experienced by human senses and organs.
- Charvaka's real contribution lies in his materialist outlook. He denies the operation of divine and supernatural agencies and makes man the centre of all activities.
- The schools of philosophy with emphasis on materialism developed in the period of expanding economy and society between 500 B.C. and A.D. 300.
- The struggle against the difficulties presented by nature in founding settlements and leading day-to-day life in the Gangetic plains led to the origin and growth of iron based agricultural technology, use of metal money, and the thriving of trade.
- The new environment gave rise to a scientific and materialistic outlook. This was mainly reflected in Charvaka's philosophy.
