Mandukya Karika, verse 4.14

Text

हेतोरादिः फलं येषामादिर्हेतुः फलस्य च ।
हेतोः फलस्य चानादिः कथं तैरुपवर्ण्यते ॥ १४ ॥

hetorādiḥ phalaṃ yeṣāmādirhetuḥ phalasya ca |
hetoḥ phalasya cānādiḥ kathaṃ tairupavarṇyate || 14 ||

14. How can they, who assert that the effect is the cause of the cause and the cause is the cause of the effect maintain the beginninglessness of both the cause and the effect?

Shankara Bhashya (commentary)

The Śruti, in the passage, “When all this has, verily, become his Ātman” declares, from the standpoint of the Ultimate Reality, the absence of duality. From this standpoint of the Scriptural text, it is said: The cause,1 i.e., the merit (Dharma) and the demerit (Adharma), etc., has, for its cause, the effect, viz., the aggregate of the body, etc. Similarly, the cause,2 viz., merit and demerit, etc., is the cause of the effect, viz., the aggregate of the body, etc. How can disputants3 who maintain this view, viz., that both the cause and the effect are with4 beginning on account of mutual interdependence of the cause and the effect, assert that both the cause and the effect are without beginning? In other words, this position implies an inherent contradiction.5 The Ātman,6 which is eternal and immutable, can never become either the cause or the effect.