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36. Also in the case of those outside, as this is seen.
It has been declared that the members of the four āsramas have a claim to the knowledge of Brahman, and that the duties connected with each āsrarna promote knowledge. A doubt now arises whether those men also who, on account of poverty and so on, stand outside the āsramas are qualified for the knowledge of Brahman, or rtot.--They are not, the Pūrvapakshin holds, since such knowledge is to be attained in a way dependent on the special duties of each āsrama; while those who do not belong to an āsrama are not concerned with āsrama duties.--This view the Sūtra rejects. Those also who do not stand within any āsrama are qualified for knowledge, 'because that is seen,' i.e. because the texts declare that men such as Raikva, Bhīshma, Samvarta and others who did not belong to āsrama were well grounded in the knowledge of Brahman.
It can by no means be maintained that it is āsrama duties only that promote knowledge; for the text 'by gifts, by penance, by fasting, and so on' (Bri. Up. IV, 4, 22) distinctly declares that charity also and other practices, which are not confined to the āsramas, are helpful towards knowledge. In the same way as in the case of those bound to chastity--who, as the texts show, may possess the knowledge of Brahman--knowledge is promoted by practices other than the Agnihotra and the like, so--it is concluded--in the case of those also who do not belong to any abrama knowledge may be promoted by certain practices not exclusively connected with any āsrama, such as prayer, fasting, charity, propitiation of the divinity, and so on.
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