MANDUKYA UPANISHAD with GAUDAPADA’S KARIKA : 3. Swami Advayanandaji

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MANDUKYA UPANISHAD 

on the Series of 19 Lectures by Swami Advayanandaji

MANTRAS-12.

“It HOPS Like a FROG”

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Saturday, December 03, 2022. 08:00.

MANDUKYA UPANISHAD 

With Part -1/4 of Goudapada's Karika

Agama Prakarana - "The Scriptural Treatise"

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THE MEANING OF “OM”

Upanishad Section 1: 

Mantras - 1-6

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Mantram - 1: Plurality is Nothing But OM : 

With Translation :

Harih Om. = Hari Om!

1Om iti etat aksharam idam sarvam;  =  Om, this word, is all this (world and also beyond it).

tasya upa-vyaakhyaanam;             =  On that matter, a clear explanation (is being started).

2bhootam bhavat bhavishyat iti,     =  That which is past, present and future (the immanent),

 sarvam omkaarah eva;               =  it is all verily the syllable Om.

3yat cha anyat trikaala ateetam,    =  And That which is beyond the three periods of time,

 tat api omkaarah eva.              =  (the transcendent) – even That is also but Om.

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Bhashyam (Vyakyanam ) :

1  “As all these objects that are indicated by names are non-different from the 

names, and as names are non-different from Om, therefore Om is verily all this.”

The Supreme Brahman is also known up to a certain point by a name, hence It, too, 

is only Om. At the outset, the declaration is made – Om is immanent and transcendent.

The word for “explanation” is interestingly built up from three Upasargas (prefixes): 

upa + vi + aa + ‘Khyaanam’. The 3 Upasargas mean “close, clear and full”, i.e. the 

explanation that is given is close, clear and full. ‘Close’ means close to the Self within. An 

exhaustive explanation of “Om” as the one to follow is hard to come by in any Upanishad.

2 i) The Immanent Om: 

All objects have a birth and death on the scale of Time. It 

follows whatever has been created, is being created, or will be created, will all be Om. 

Time itself is a creation of Hiranyagarbha. Before Hiranyagarbha created the subtle 

elements or Tanmatras, let alone creating any objects, there was no time. At the instant the 

first object was created, Time was zero. Within the difference between that moment and 

the second moment, time was created.

3 ii) The Transcendent Om: 

Avyakrita is that which is beyond time. It is the state 

that precedes Hiranyagarbha in the cosmic hierarchy, referred to as the Unmanifested. It is 

beyond the axis of time. This, too, is defined as Om. Om is thus all-inclusive.

Bhashya Link From Mantram 1 to 2 :

All this explanation is done in order to give more importance to the word Om, than 

to any object that it represents. This may invite the criticism of reducing the value of the 

object itself. For this reason the next verse speaks of the same truths but placing the stress 

on the object signified. This way their full identity can be understood.

The need to bring out this identity is so that later we shall need to focus only on the 

‘name’ and not the ‘named’ as well; that is when we eliminate both name and named to 

realize Brahman, which is beyond them both. It makes the process that much easier for the 

Sadhaka when, at this early stage, the ‘name’ is taken to include the ‘named’.

There is an important purpose behind this simplification: The groundwork is being 

laid to see the ‘World’ only as an extension of one’s mind, not as something physically 

present ‘out there’. Thus, the first verse, apart from plotting Om on the two axes of 

immanence and transcendence, also plots it in the third dimension of depth in our mind.

Surely, there cannot be a clearer start than this to the Upanishad.

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Next-
Mantram - 2: Brahman is Verily OM
To be continued

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