e based.

But at the same time we have seen that, in a not inconsiderable number
of cases, the interpretations of /S/a@nkara and Ramanuja diverge more or
less widely, and that the Sutras affected thereby are, most of them,
especially important because bearing on fundamental points of the
Vedanta system. The question then remains which of the two
interpretations is entitled to preference.

Regarding a small number of Sutras I have already (in the conspectus of
contents) given it as my opinion that Ramanuja's explanation appears to
be more worthy of consideration. We meet, in the first place, with a
number of cases in which the two commentators agree as to the literal
meaning of a Sutra, but where /S/a@nkara sees himself reduced to the
necessity of supplementing his interpretation by certain additions and
reservations of his own for which the text gives no occasion, while
Ramanuja is able to take the Sutra as it stands. To exemplify this
remark, I again direct attention to all those Sutras which in clear
terms represent the individual soul as something different from the
highest soul, and concerning which /S/a@nkara is each time obliged to
have recourse to the plea of the Sutra referring, not to what is true in
the strict sense of the word, but only to what is conventionally looked
upon as true. It is, I admit, not altogether impossible that
/S/a@nkara's interpretation should represent the real meaning of the
Sutras; that the latter, indeed, to use the terms employed by Dr.
Deussen, should for the nonce set forth an exoteric doctrine adapted to
the common notions of mankind, which, however, can be rightly understood
by him only to whose mind the esoteric doctrine is all the while
present. This is not impossible, I say; but it is a point which requires
convincing proofs before it can be allowed.--We have had, in the second
place, to note a certain number of adhikara/n/as and Sutras concerning
whose interpretation /S/a@nkara and Ramanuja disagree altogether; and we
have seen that not unfrequently the explanations given by the latter
commentator appear to be preferable because falling in more easily with
the words of the text. The most striking instance of this is afforded by
the 13th adhikara/n/a of II, 3, which treats of the size of the jiva,
and where Ramanuja's explanation seems to be decidedly superior to
/S/a@nkara's, both if we look to the arrangement of the whole
adhikara/n/a and to the wording of the single Sutras.