Upanishads : "The cream of Vedas"

 ====================================================================== ======================================================================= Monday, November 29, 2021. 8:00.AM. Yajnavalkya in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad - 2.   Discourse-2. ======================================================================= The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad is not intended for everybody. It is a cosmic meditation. In the Chhandogya Upanishad we have cosmological meditations which are wonderful by themselves. But in the Brihadaranyaka we have the cosmic meditation. The whole thing is transcendent, beyond ourselves. How would we think of anything that is beyond ourselves? Even when we think of self, we place it within ourselves. My self is inside me. But this great admonition of the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad says the Self is not within us – it is within everybody, within everything, within all the worlds and the universes. In all space and all time, the Self is there. Can anyone close one'...

 ====================================================================== ====================================================================== Tuesday, November 23 2021. 8:00. PM. The Kathopanishad: A Wondrous Epic of the Spirit : 6. (Spoken on June 19, 1972) ===================================================================== Lord Yama says, “Into the mysteries of this universal fire, Vaishvanara, whom the Vedanta speaks of as Hiranyagarbha or the creative force, Sutratma, into the mystery of this Universal Being I hereby initiate you, Nachiketas. You shall glory in this universe as long as this universe lasts; immortal shall be your fame, everything shall be your possession, you shall lack nothing, you shall neither sweat nor sorrow, and neither shall you die. You shall be magnificently ruling over the realm of the cosmos as long as the cosmos lasts. Are you happy? Are you satisfied? What else do you want? The whole world is with you, society is your friend, the world is in harm...

 ======================================================================= ===================================================================== Saturday, November 20 2021. 9:00. PM. The Kathopanishad: A Wondrous Epic of the Spirit : 4. Swami Krishnananda (Spoken on June 19, 1972) Discourse - 5. ======================================================================= This encounter came before this master spirit Nachiketas also. After three days' discipline of fasting, Yama appeared before Nachiketas. “My dear child, you have been fasting for three days. I am very sorry. What do you want from me?” asked Lord Yama. Then we have the real Upanishad describing the history of the march of the spirit to its destination. What does the lad say?  What does the spirit speak?  What does Nachiketas beg of Yama?  He asks first of all that he may be set in harmony with the law that operates in the world. “May my father not be angry with me, and may he recognise me when I go back.” Th...

 ========================================================================= ======================================================================= Saturday, November 20, 2021. 6:00.AM. Yajnavalkya in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad - 1.   Discourse-1. ====================================================================== ==================================================================== Idam brahma, idam kshatram, ime lokah, ime devah, imani bhutani, idam sarvam yad ayam atma. "This Source of knowledge; this source of power; all these worlds; all these gods; all these beings – All this is just the Self." ==================================================================== This proclamation is like a Brahma Astra that Sage Yajnavalkya is discharging against every kind of attachment one can conceive in this world. It is somewhat easy to accept that God is everywhere. It becomes easy because we always externalise the location of God, however much we may try to universalise Hi...

 ======================================================================== ===================================================================== Saturday, November 13, 2021. 7:00. PM. The Kathopanishad: A Wondrous Epic of the Spirit : 4. Swami Krishnananda (Spoken on June 19, 1972) POST-4. ======================================================================= ======================================================================= The mind is the index of our nature, as they say, while the mind is the ruler of the subtle body. It is the king in this realm of the astral personality of ours. Unless that is disciplined, fasted down, the body, poor thing, is nowhere. The bodily discipline assumes a significance only when the subtle body, the real force within the physical body, is disciplined. That is the second day's fast. But that alone will not do. We are much more than what our mind is. This is what ordinary psychology cannot detect, that we are more than what the mind is. Psycholog...

 ========================================================================= ======================================================================== Monday, November 8, 2021. 9:00. PM. The Kathopanishad: A Wondrous Epic of the Spirit : 3. Swami Krishnananda (Spoken on June 19, 1972) POST-3. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Now, those three days passed by the spirit of Nachiketas before the palace of Yama have a tremendous significance on the path of the spirit. They are not four days or seven days, but only three days, and Yama is absent for three days. The starvation of the spirit is implied here as, for example, we have a famous saying of Christ given to us in the New Testament: “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” It is not poverty of economic existence, but poverty of the spirit; starvation and fasting of the spirit in its threefold entanglement is what is meant by Nachiketas' three days of fasting....

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Deepavali at Chinmayamission   ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Monday, November 8, 2021. 9:00. PM. The Kathopanishad: A Wondrous Epic of the Spirit : 2. Swami Krishnananda (Spoken on June 19, 1972) POST-2. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- These three days mentioned in the Upanishad are also of great mystical significance. Nachiketas stands for the human spirit, as Arjuna in the Bhagavadgita stands for mankind in its completeness. The human spirit is in search of the Supreme Spirit, and in this quest there is a very peculiar encounter which seems to be unavoidable. The Lord of Death is to be faced before we come face to face with the Spirit Supreme. In ...

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------   ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Friday, November 5, 2021. 8:00. PM. The Kathopanishad: A Wondrous Epic of the Spirit : 1. Swami Krishnananda (Spoken on June 19, 1972) POST-1. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The search for truth is an arduous task demanding of us the spirit of real adventure. We have records of such instances where adventurous spirits had to encounter forces which were most unexpected in their search and quest for the unknown. A remarkable example given to us through the Upanishads is the heroic march of that lad called Nachiketas to that unknown mystery which began to work within him in a subtle, inexpressible manner. In that mystical tale of the Kathopanishad we are given a...