Upanishads : "The cream of Vedas"

======================================================================== ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 01/03/2020. Spoken on January 14th, 1973) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. #The Om that is referred to in the Mandukya Upanishad is not merely a linguistic chant. It is not a sound that we make through the vocal cords. It is a vibration that is set up.  ##The Upanishad wants to tell us that the universe is nothing but a bundle of vibrations. It is not made up of things, objects, substances, etc.  ###Today people are slowly trying to realise how vibrations are ultimately the essential constituents of even solid things.  *Light can be converted into matter; matter can be converted into light.  *We do not say light is an object like a stone, but what we call ...

======================================================================== ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 25/02/2020. Post-12. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1. The reason or the rationale behind this study, this activity, is something beyond reason itself. The reason behind the need for study for the nature of the nature of the Atman – you have to say this reason is super-rational. #What can be more important than your own self? ##Is any burden of material value superior to your own existence? ###Has the world any meaning minus you? Let your existence be isolated completely. You will find that the world will stand as a series of zeros or ciphers unless there is a single stroke of a figure that makes sense and which is the Atman who does things. -------------------------------------------...

======================================================================== ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 23/02/2020 Post - 6. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1. #There was a very learned lady in that assembly of Janaka called Gargi. ##"I'll challenge Yajnavalkya with my questions. Answer them!" #She discharged arrows like Rama's arrows. ###"Where is the sky located? Where is time located? Where is Brahma Loka located? Where is anything located?" "Don't ask more. Don't ask questions like that," said Yajnavalkya, "lest your head be down." Then she did not speak, she kept quiet. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2. #Do not talk too much about the Self...

======================================================================== -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 22/02/2020. Chapter :1.Introduction - 7. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. With this introduction, we may now turn to the message of some of the Upanishads, the great legacy not merely of this country but of mankind as a whole, one should say. The Upanishads are the record of the experiences of superhuman thinkers, those who had risen above the level of ordinary mankind and beyond the limitations of sensory knowledge. It is the Upanishads that will guide us in answering these questions which we raised at the beginning. We cannot independently walk with the strength of our own legs in this arduous task of solving universal questions. --------------------------------------------------...

======================================================================== ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 21/02/2020. Post-5. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1. Taittiriya Upanishad  Chapter-2.On the Bliss that is Brahmam : Brahmananda Valli - Section-1. Brahmam is Sathyam, Jnanam, anantham .... Enunciation of the Doctrine of Sheaths - Mantram-2. First Line #"Tasmat va etasmad atmana akasas sambhutah" (Tait. 2.1.2):  "From this Universal Atman, space emanated" – as it were.  This is something hard for us to conceive at the present moment. Space is actually the negation of the infinity of Brahman. Infinity does not mean extension or dimension – but space is extension, dimension, distance.  So, immediately a contradiction is introduced at the very begi...

======================================================================== ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 19/02/2020. Sri Aurobindo translates Prasna Upanishad, Sixth Question, Verses 1-2:  ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. “Then Sukesha the Bharadwaja asked him : ‘Lord, Hiranyanabha of Koshala, the king’s son, came to me and put me this question, ‘O Bharadwaja, knowest thou the Being and the sixteen parts of Him?’ and I answered the boy, ‘I know Him not: for if I knew Him, surely I should tell thee of Him : but I cannot tell thee a lie: for from the roots he shall wither who speaketh falsehood.’ But he mounted his chariot in silence and departed from me.  Of Him I ask thee, #who is the Being?’  #To him answered the Rishi Pippalada : ‘O fair son, even here is that Being...

======================================================================== ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 18/02/2020. Mandukya Upanishad : Chapter-1. Agama Prakarana ( The Scriptural Treatise ) Sri Gaudapada's glossary : Karika Mantram-s 10 to 18. Mantram-11. ======================================================================== #Chinmaya mission Vedanta discourse audience -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "karya-karana-baddhau tavishyete visva-taijasau. prajnah karana-baddhas-tu dvau tau turye na siddhytah." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- karya = the effect; karana = the cause; baddhau = conditioned by; tau = are both; ishyete = concidered to be; visva-taijasau = visva and tai...

======================================================================= ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 17/02/2020. Sri Aurobindo translates Prasha Upnaishad, Fifth Question, Verses 5-7: ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- “But he who by all the three letters meditateth by this syllable, even by OM on the Most High Being, he in the Solar World of light and energy is secured in his attainings: as a snake casteth off its slough: so he casteth off sin, and the hymns of the Sama-veda escort him to the heaven of the Spirit.  He from that Lower who is the density of existence beholdeth the Higher than the Highest of whom every form is one city.  Whereof these are the verses:  ‘Children of death are the letters when they are used as three, the embracing and the inseparable letters: but the wise man...

======================================================================== ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 16/02/2020. 7. God, the Universe and the Individual- 5. Post-5. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1. #When we started philosophising, we came across three principles-God, the universe and the individual. We have advanced further and have found that God must include within Himself the universe and the individuals.  ##He is not merely a relation, but true existence. ###He is That which resolves into Itself the universe and the individuals. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2. #But, if, in God, the universe and the individuals are merged completely, why is there perception of differen...

======================================================================== -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 14/02/2020. Spoken on January 14th, 1973) Post-10. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. The Vaishvanara Vidya is a concrete instance of the saprapancha view of the Chhandogya Upanishad, how the cosmos is to be regarded and contemplated as the body of the Supreme Being, while the teachings of Yajnavalkya primarily in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad give us the nishprapancha or the acosmic view of Reality. There is no cosmos in Reality. It is acosmic, super-cosmic. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad Chapter-2 - Section IV - Yajnavalkya and Maitreyi (I) - Mantram-14. yatra hi dv...

======================================================================== ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 09/02/2020. Post-11. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1. #The great master said, "All this that you have learned is only a word; you have not gone to the depths of things – the Atman has not been studied. You have only collected words, names, information about the outer structure of things, the name and the form complex of things has been made available to you by your studies that you have enumerated just now, as a series of learnings." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2. ##Likewise in the Upanishads we have instances of great seekers humbly moving towards sages and saints for the purpose ...

======================================================================== ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 07/02/2020. Post -5. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1. Can anybody contain all things inside oneself and be at rest? #It is not possible even to hear these things. These admonitions and teachings are damaging to the egoistic individuality which locates the self inside the body only. Enough of it. Can you imagine that your self is sitting in the most distant stars? Can you imagine that you yourself are the stars, you are shining as the far-off luminary, and 'I am the Self'? #You are not seeing the stars; you yourself are the stars. You are the sky; therefore the sky is not extended. The moment you say sky is extended, it becomes an object. But you yourself are the space – then t...

======================================================================== ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 06/02/2020. Chapter :1.Introduction - 6. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. This can be very easily proved by a little bit of deep thinking. When a common purpose is before us, the individual idiosyncrasies recede to the background. The individual whims come to the forefront only when the basic security is granted, not otherwise.  If our life itself is going to be threatened, if the whole mankind is to be visited by a catastrophe, one can see how mankind joins together to avert this possibility. There would be no man-woman distinction, there would be no distinction of east, west, north, south, black, white, etc. People would, then, all stand up vigilant, wakeful to face this threat ...

======================================================================== -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 03/02/2020. Sri Aurobindo translates Prashna Upanishad, Fifth Question, Verses 1-4 : -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1.  “Then the Shaibya Satyakama asked him : ‘Lord, he among men that meditate unto death on OM the syllable, which of the worlds doth he conquer by its puissance?’ To him answered the Rishi Pippalada : ‘This imperishable Word that is OM, O Satyakama, is the Higher Brahman and also the Lower.  Therefore the wise man by making his home in the Word, winneth to one of these.  If he meditate on the one letter of OM the syllable, by that enlightened he attaineth swiftly in the material universe, and the hymns of the Rig-veda escort him to the world of men: there endowe...

======================================================================== ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 02/02/2020. Sri Aurobindo translates Prashna Upanishad, Fourth Question, Verses 5-6: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. “Now the Mind in dream revelleth in the glory of his imaginings.  All that it has seen it seemeth to see over again, and of all that it hath heard it repeateth the hearing: yea, all that it hath felt and thought and known in many lands and in various regions, these it liveth over again in its dreaming.  What it hath seen and what it hath not seen, what it hath heard and what it hath not heard, what it hath known and what it hath not known, what is and what is not, all, all it seeth: for the Mind is the Universe.  But when he is overwhelmed with light, then Mind, t...