Shloka 22
परमार्थ-निर्णयः—श्रेयस्-भेदः, कर्म-ध्यान-सीमा, एकात्मदर्शनम्
यत् तु निष्पाद्यते कार्यं मृदा कारणभूतया तत् कारणानुगमनाज् ज्ञायते नृप मृण्मयम्
yat tu niṣpādyate kāryaṃ mṛdā kāraṇabhūtayā tat kāraṇānugamanāj jñāyate nṛpa mṛṇmayam
O king, whatever is produced from clay—clay being its material cause—is known, by tracing it back to that cause, as nothing other than ‘made of clay’.
Sage Parāśara (teaching by analogy; vocative address to a king appears within the verse)
Speaker: Parasara
Topic: By what reasoning can we judge the permanence/impermanence of ritual results and the highest end?
Teaching: Philosophical
Quality: authoritative
Concept: An effect is understood through its material cause: what is produced from clay is, in essence, ‘clay-made’.
Vedantic Theme: Atman
Application: Trace outcomes back to their causes—inputs shape outputs; apply this to habits, practices, and spiritual means to assess what kind of result they can yield.
Vishishtadvaita: Uses causal reasoning (kāraṇa–kārya) to prepare the claim that the imperishable goal requires an imperishable grounding, aligning means with the Supreme Reality.
Vishnu Form: Para-Brahman
Bhakti Type: Shanta
FAQs
It teaches that an effect is understood through its material cause: what is produced from clay is recognized as ‘clay-made’, supporting the Purana’s broader claim that the world can be known by tracing it back to its ultimate source.
He uses a clear inference: since clay is the causal substrate, the produced object is identified by that substrate—illustrating how one can reason from the visible effect to the underlying cause in cosmological explanation.
By establishing that effects are known through their cause, the text prepares the Vedantic conclusion that the universe, as an effect, points to and is pervaded by its supreme cause—Vishnu—as the ground of being and sovereign source of order.