Lessons on the Upanishads -1.5: Swami Krishnananda.

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Saturday 13, Apr 2024. 06:15.
Upanishads
Chapter 1: Introduction to the Upanishads-5.
Post-5.

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This is the highlighting principle of the Veda Samhitas. If we read the Vedas, we will find that every mantra, every verse, is a prayer to some divinity above, designated by various names: Indra, Mitra, Varuna, Agni, etc. We may give them any other name, according to our own language, style or cultural background. The point is not what name we give, but that there is something behind visible phenomena. Our heart throbs in a state of satisfaction of the fact that there is something above us. Religion, spirituality or philosophy, in the true sense of the term, is the recognition of something above oneself and a simultaneous recognition of the finitude of one's personality.

We are finite individuals in every way. Financially we are finite, geographically we are located in one place only and, therefore, we are finite; socially we are finite, historically we are finite, politically we are finite; even in the eyes of nature we are finite. Thus, the same argument can apply here: as change could not be perceived without the presence of something that is not changing in ourselves, the finitude of our existence also could not be known unless there is something in us which is not finite.

The non-finite is what we call the Infinite. The Infinite is masquerading in us, which is another way of saying that the Unchanging is present in us. The Infinite is summoning every finite individual. 

The Unchanging is calling us moment to moment: “Don't sleep, get up!” One of the passages of the Katha Upanishad is uttisthata jagrata prapya varan nibodhata (Katha 1.3.14):

 “Wake up. Sleeping mankind, stand up!” Are we slumbering? Are we seeing only what we are able to cognise through the sense organs or are we also aware of something that is deeply rooted in our own self? 

Prapya varan: “Go to the Masters.” Go to the wise ones in this world —masters and teachers and guiding lights of mankind—and nibodhata: “know the secret”. 

The Bhagavadgita also has this great teaching for us: tad viddhi pranipatena pariprasnena sevaya (Gita 4.34): “Go to the Masters.” How do we gain knowledge? 

Pranipatena: “Go and prostrate yourself before the great Masters.” Pariprasnena: “and question them.” “Great Master, this is the problem before me. I am not able to understand the solution for this. Please condescend to come down to my level and satisfy my inquisitiveness.

” Serve that great Master; prostrate yourself; question the Master. These three things are mentioned in the Gita. So says the Upanishad: uttisthata jagrata prapya varan nibodhata.

There is an Infinite at the back of all the sensations of finitude of our personality which is calling us, and an unchanging timeless and spaceless Eternity is summoning us. We may put a question to our own selves: “Why are we unhappy in this world?” What is it that is dissatisfying? It is that which is in space, that which is in time, that which is causally connected as a couple of terms of relation between cause and effect, and the insecurity that we feel in the presence of things outside.

The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad tells us in one little passage: dvitiyad vai bhayam bhavati (Brihad. 1.4.2). 

We can never be happy if there is another person near us. Always we have to adjust ourselves with that person and we do not know what to expect from that person. We cannot keep even a mouse in front of us; we will be very disturbed because the mouse is sitting in front. 

The mouse cannot do any harm to us, but we do not like the presence of even a little ant. “Oh, another thing has come.” This “another thing” is what is troubling us. The difficulty arising out of the cognition of another is because of the fact that the basic Reality, that unchanging Eternity, has no “another” outside It. 

Because of the absence of another in the basic reality of our own Self —the Truth of this cosmos—we feel a discomfiture at the perception of anything outside, human or otherwise. Whatever it is, we would like to be alone. Finally, we would like to be alone because that Aloneness, which is spaceless and timeless, is telling us: “You are really alone.”

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Continued

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