The Upanishads form a part of a large body of ancient Indian sacred texts collectively known as the Vedas, orally transmitted and recorded around 700-400 BCE. Each Upanishad typically recounts one or more teaching sessions, through encounters between enlightened teachers and their students seeking knowledge of the Self. The word Upanishad suggests “sitting down near”: sitting at the feet of an illumined teacher in an intimate session of spiritual discourse. The wisdom of these intrepid thinkers of India from thousands of years ago, who sacrificed opinions and prejudices in the human quest for truth and meaning, is as relevant as ever in our modern world.
There are over a hundred Upanishads printed in Sanskrit, but there are a few select ones called the Principal Upanishads. The great philosopher sage, Sankara,(8th to 9th century CE), wrote commentaries on eleven of these “Principal Upanishads.” We as a group will read selections of these Principal Upanishads and four lesser known but equally inspiring Upanishads.
We do find descriptions of Vedic rituals and instructions on traditional obligations, societal customs of the times, the physical aspects of householder life consisting of marriage, raising a family and gaining wealth and material prosperity. But the principal male and female characters in the Upanishads find that material success and achievement by themselves do not bring about true contentment and the perennial quest remains to realize the true meaning of life and attain liberation by understanding the real Self which transcends the domain of death. Many of the Upanishads deal directly with what happens at the time of death and the question of what/who dies? Looking to address these issues we encounter both householders and renunciates with the sages. The sages may be based in the forest but they mingle with kings and princes who have the same concerns.
The knowledge that is sought in these encounters is aimed not at material success or even intellectual satisfaction, but by enabling the questioner to become free of worldly suffering and limitations of life as a body: “to attain fearlessness,” “to cross beyond sorrow,” “to dig up the supreme treasure,” and thereby attain abiding peace and happiness. These sacred writings are the inspired teachings of men and women for whom the transcendent reality was more real than the world reported to them by their senses. The Upanishads do not disclose any details as to the personal histories of their thinkers; but they provide us with a glimpse of their minds, their insights, and experiences of the highest order.
In the Upanishads we find an impressive procession of students and teachers, earnest and sincere, and a moving record of their animated discussions. Now and then, there are flights of thought which reach sublime heights of experience recorded in graceful and direct language with an effective use of beautiful metaphors and telling images serving as feathers to these arrows of thought in flight.
Also, there is a singular absence of an atmosphere of coercion, open or veiled, secular or sacred inhibiting the free pursuit of the truth or its communication. Rather we see in these writings the constant summons to human beings to verify for themselves the truths placed before them. This is why philosophers and writers such as the German philosopher Schopenhauer and the American transcendentalists, Emerson and Thoreau, found the Upanishads to be of enduring greatness with the strength of a perennial philosophy and the beauty and charm of an immortal literature.
When Prince Dara Shikoh, the son of the Mughal Emperor Shahjahan, builder of the Taj Mahal, was in Kashmir in 1640, he heard about the Upanishads and he had 50 of them translated into Persian. They were later put into Latin and published in Paris in 1802. This was read by Schopenhauer, who said of the Upanishads: their reading has been the consolation of my life and will be of my death.
Excerpts from the Vedanta Society literature, and the writings of Eknath Easwaran, Juan Mascaro, Patrick Olivelle and Valerie Roebuck.
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Join us on for a special meeting of this Unity Woods Group on Wednesday, 22 September from 2:00pm- 3:15pm a we are joined again by Graham Schweig as we embark on our journey though this canonical text.
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