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• Preface
• Remarks Concerning the Translation Its Method and Arrangement
• List of Abbreviations
• Errata
• An Outline of the Philosophy of the Upanishads
• Chapter I: The Place of the Upanishads In the History of Philosophy
• Chapter II: The Upanishads and Their Place In Indian Philosophy
• Chapter III: First Attempts At the Conception of a Unitary World-ground
• Chapter IV: The Development of the Conception of Brahma
• Chapter V: The Development of the Conception of the Atman and Its Union With Brahma
• Chapter VI: The Realistic Conception of the Ultimate Unity, and the Doctrine of Illusion
• Chapter VII: Idealism and the Conception of Pure Unity
• Chapter VIII: The Outcome On Religion and On the Doctrine of Karma
• Chapter IX: The Outcome On Practical Life and On Morals
• Chapter X: The Artificial Method of Unity In Renunciation and In Yoga
• Chapter XI: Concluding Estimate
• BṚihad-ĀraṆyaka Upanishad
• First AdhyĀya
• Second AdhyĀya
• Third AdhyĀya
• Fourth AdhyĀya
• Fifth AdhyĀya
• Sixth AdhyĀya
• ChĀndogya Upanishad
• First PrapĀṬhaka a Glorification of the Chanting of the Sāma-veda 1
• Second PrapĀṬhaka the Significance of the Chant In Various Forms
• Third PrapĀṬhaka Brahma As the Sun of the World-all
• Fourth PrapĀṬhaka Conversational Instructions
• Fifth PrapĀṬhaka Concerning Breath, the Soul, and the Universal Soul
• Sixth PrapĀṬhaka the Instruction of Śvetaketu By Uddālaka Concerning the Key to All Knowledge
• Seventh PrapĀṬhaka the Instruction of Nārada By Sanatkumāra
• Eighth PrapĀṬhaka Concerning the Nature of the Soul
• TaittirĪya Upanishad
• First VallĪ (Śikshā Vallī, ‘chapter Concerning Instruction’)
• Second VallĪ (brahmānanda Vallī, ‘bliss-of-brahma Chapter’)
• Third VallĪ (bhṛigu Vallī, ‘chapter Concerning Bhṛigu’)
• Aitareya Upanishad
• First AdhyĀya
• Second AdhyĀya
• Third AdhyĀya
• KaushĪtaki Upanishad 1
• First AdhyĀya the Course of Reincarnation, and Its Termination Through Metaphysical Knowledge 2
• Second AdhyĀya the Doctrine of Prāṇa, Together With Certain Ceremonies
• Third AdhyĀya Doctrine of Prāṇa (the Breathing Spirit)
• Fourth AdhyĀya a Progressive Definition of Brahma 2
• Kena Upanishad 1
• (first KhaṆḌa)
• (second KhaṆḌa)
• (third KhaṆḌa) 3
• (fourth KhaṆḌa)
• KaṬha Upanishad
• First VallĪ 1
• Second VallĪ
• Third VallĪ
• Fourth VallĪ
• Fifth VallĪ
• Sixth VallĪ
• ĪŚĀ Upanishad 1
• MuṆḌaka Upanishad
• First MuṆḌaka Preparation For the Knowledge of Brahma
• Second MuṆḌaka the Doctrine of Brahma-Ātman
• Third MuṆḌaka the Way to Brahma
• PraŚna Upanishad 1
• First PraŚna
• Second PraŚna
• Third PraŚna
• Fourth PraŚna
• Fifth PraŚna
• Sixth PraŚna
• MĀṆḌŪkya Upanishad
• ŚvetĀŚvatara Upanishad
• First AdhyĀya
• Second AdhyĀya
• Third AdhyĀya
• Fourth AdhyĀya
• Fifth AdhyĀya
• Sixth AdhyĀya
• Maitri Upanishad
• First PrapĀṬhaka
• Second PrapĀṬhaka
• Third PrapĀṬhaka
• Fourth PrapĀṬhaka
• Fifth PrapĀṬhaka
• Sixth PrapĀṬhaka
• Seventh PrapĀṬhaka
• A Bibliography of the Upanishads Selected, Classified, and Annotated

SECOND VALLĪ

The failure of pleasure and of ignorance; the wisdom of the better knowledge

[Death:]

1. The better (śreyas) is one thing, and the pleasanter (preyas) quite another.

Both these, of different aim, bind a person.

Of these two, well is it for him who takes the better;

He fails of his aim who chooses the pleasanter.

2. Both the better and the pleasanter come to a man.

Going all around the two, the wise man discriminates.

The wise man chooses the better, indeed, rather than the pleasanter.

The stupid man, from getting-and-keeping (yoga-kṣema), chooses the pleasanter.

3. Thou indeed, upon the pleasant and pleasantly appearing desires

Meditating, hast let them go, O Naciketas.

Thou art not one who has taken that garland1 of wealth

In which many men sink down.

4. Widely opposite and asunder are these two:

Ignorance (avidyā) and what is known as ‘knowledge’ (vidyā).

I think Naciketas desirous of obtaining knowledge!

Many desires rend thee not.2

5. Those abiding in the midst of ignorance,

Self-wise, thinking themselves learned,

Running hither and thither, go around deluded,

Like blind men led by one who is himself blind.3

Heedlessness the cause of rebirth

6. The passing-on4 is not clear to him who is childish,

Heedless, deluded with the delusion of wealth.

Thinking ‘This is the world! There is no other!’—

Again and again he comes under my control.

The need for a competent teacher of the soul

7. He who by many is not obtainable even to hear of,

He whom many, even when hearing, know not—

Wonderful is the declarer, proficient the obtainer of Him!

Wonderful the knower, proficiently taught!

8. Not, when proclaimed by an inferior man, is He1

To be well understood, [though] being manifoldly considered.2

Unless declared by another,3 there is no going thither;

For He is inconceivably more subtile than what is of subtile measure.

9. Not by reasoning (tarka) is this thought (mati) to be attained.

Proclaimed by another, indeed, it is for easy understanding, dearest friend (preṣṭha)!—

This which thou hast attained! Ah, thou art of true steadfastness!

May there be for us a questioner (praṣtā) the like of thee, O Naciketas!

Steadfast renunciation and self-meditation required

[Naciketas:]

10. I know that what is known as treasure is something inconstant.

For truly, that which is steadfast is not obtained by those who are unsteadfast.

Therefore the Naciketas-fire has been built up by me,

And with means which are inconstant I have obtained that which is constant.

[Death:]

11. The obtainment of desire, the foundation of the world (jagat),

The endlessness of will,4 the safe shore of fearlessness,

The greatness of praise, the wide extent, the foundation (having seen1 ).

Thou, O Naciketas, a wise one, hast with steadfastness let [these] go!

12. Him who is hard to see, entered into the hidden,

Set in the secret place [of the heart], dwelling in the depth, primeval—

By considering him as God, through the Yoga-study of what pertains to self,

The wise man leaves joy and sorrow behind.

The absolutely unqualified Soul

13. When a mortal has heard this and fully comprehended,

Has torn off what is concerned with the right (dharmya),2 and has taken Him as the subtile,

Then he rejoices, for indeed he has obtained what is to be rejoiced in.

I regard Naciketas a dwelling open [for Ātman3 ].

14. Apart from the right (dharma) and apart from the unright (a-dharma),

Apart from both what has been done and what has not been done here,

Apart from what has been and what is to be—

What thou seest as that, speak that!

[Naciketas being unable to mention that absolutely unqualified object, Death continues to explain:]4

The mystic syllable ‘Om’ as an aid

15. The word5 which all the Vedas rehearse,

And which all austerities proclaim,

Desiring which men live the life of religious studentship (brahmacarya)—

That word to thee I briefly declare.1

The eternal indestructible soul

18. The wise one [i. e. the soul, the ātman, the self] is not born, nor dies.

This one has not come from anywhere, has not become anyone.

Unborn, constant, eternal, primeval, this one

Is not slain when the body is slain.5

• 19.

  If the slayer think to slay,
• If the slain think himself slain,
• Both these understand not,
• This one slays not, nor is slain.6

The Soul revealed to the unstriving elect

20. More minute than the minute, greater than the great

Is the Soul (Ātman) that is set in the heart of a creature here.

One who is without the active will (a-kratu) beholds Him, and becomes freed from sorrow—

When through the grace (prasāda)1 of the Creator (dhātṛ) he beholds the greatness of the Soul (Ātman).

His opposite characteristics

21. Sitting, he proceeds afar;

Lying, he goes everywhere.

Who else than I (mad) is able to know

The god (deva) who rejoices and rejoices not (madāmada)?

22. Him who is the bodiless among bodies,

Stable among the unstable,

The great, all-pervading Soul (Ātman)—

On recognizing Him, the wise man sorrows not.

The conditions of knowing Him

23. This Soul (Ātman) is not to be obtained by instruction,

Nor by intellect, nor by much learning.

He is to be obtained only by the one whom He chooses;

To such a one that Soul (Ātman) reveals his own person (tanūm svām).2

24. Not he who has not ceased from bad conduct,

Not he who is not tranquil, not he who is not composed,

Not he who is not of peaceful mind

Can obtain Him by intelligence (prajña).

The all-comprehending incomprehensible

25. He for whom the priesthood (brahman) and the nobility (kṣatra)

Both are as food,

And death is as a sauce—

Who really knows where He is?

[1 ]The word sṛnkā occurs nowhere else in the language—so far as has been reported—than in 1. 16 and here. Its meaning is obscure and only conjectural. Śaṅkara glosses it differently in the two places, here as ‘way.’

[2 ]This stanza recurs with unimportant variants in Maitri 7. 9.

[3 ]With a variation, this stanza recurs in Muṇḍ. 1. 2. 8; similarly in Maitri 7. 9.

[4 ]That is, death, the great transition, mentioned at 1. 29.

[1 ]With different grouping of words the first two lines may also mean:

• (1) ‘Not by an inferior man is He. [even] when proclaimed,
• To be well understood, [though] being often meditated upon.’

That is, the Ātman is to be obtained only by a superior person, as is stated in Muṇḍ. 3. 2. 4.

• Or, (2) ‘Not by an inferior man is He proclaimed.
• [But] He is easily to be understood when repeatedly meditated upon.’

[2 ]Or perhaps, ‘. . . [because] being considered manifoldly,’ i. e. by the inferior man the Ātman is falsely ‘conceived of as a plurality,’ while in reality He is absolute unity.

[3 ]Either (1) by another than an inferior man, i. e. by a proficient understander, or (2) by another than oneself, i. e. by some teacher.

[4 ]Or perhaps ‘work.’

[1 ]The word drṣṭvā is superfluous both logically and metrically.

[2 ]Here, in contrast with the latter half of the line, the idea of dharma may be philosophical: i. e. ‘the qualified.’ In the next stanza it is certainly ethical.

[3 ]Compare Muṇd. 3. 2. 4 d: ‘Into his Brahma-abode [i. e. that of a person qualified to receive Him] this Ātman enters.’ See also Chānd. 8. 1. 1.

[4 ]Śaṅkara and all translators except Deussen regard the previous section as an utterance by Naciketas. Instead of assigning so pregnant an inquiry to a pupil still being instructed, the present distribution of the parts of this dialogue interprets it (in agreement with Deussen) as continued exposition, rhetorically put in the form of an interrogation by the teacher himself.

[5 ]The word pada here doubtless is pregnant with some other of its meanings (twenty-two in all enumerated by Apte in his Sanskrit-English Dictionary), particularly ‘way,’ ‘place,’ ‘goal,’ or ‘abode.’

[1 ]The ideas and some of the language of this stanza recur in BhG. 8. 11.

[2 ]The word akṣaram here may also be pregnant with the meaning ‘imperishable’ (Apte gives fourteen meanings in all). Thus:—

• ‘That, truly, indeed, is the imperishable Brahma!
• That indeed is the supreme imperishable!
• Knowing that imperishable, truly, indeed, . . .’

[3 ]The word brahma(n) here may contain some of its liturgical meaning, ‘sacred word,’ as well as the philosophical meaning ‘Brahma.’ Thus:—

• ‘That syllable, truly, indeed, is sacred word!’
• or ‘That, truly, indeed, is imperishable sacred word!’

[4 ]This stanza recurs with slight verbal variation in Maitri 6. 4.

[5 ]Substantially this stanza is identical with BhG. 2. 20.

[6 ]Substantially this stanza is identical with BhG. 2. 19.

[1 ]This is an important passage, as being the first explicit statement of the doctrine of Grace (prasāda). The idea is found earlier in the celebrated Hymn of the Word (Vāc), RV. 10. 125. 5 c, d, and again in Muṇḍ. 3. 2. 3 c, d. This same stanza occurs with slight verbal variation as Śvet. 3. 20 and Mahānārāyaṇa Upanishad 8. 3 (= Taittirīya Āranyaka 10. 10. 1).

Inasmuch as this method of salvation ‘through the grace of the Creator’ is directly opposed to the general Upanishadic doctrine of salvation ‘through knowledge,’ Śaṅkara interprets dhātuh prasādāt as dhātu-samprasādāt, ‘through the tranquillity of the senses,’ according to the practice of the Yoga-method. There is this possibility of different interpretation of the word prasāda; for it occurs unquestionably in the sense of ‘tranquillity’ at Maitri 6. 20 and 6. 34; compare also the compounds jñāna-prasāda, ‘the peace of knowledge,’ at Muṇḍ. 3. 1. 8, and varṇa-prasāda, ‘clearness of complexion,’ at Śvet. 2. 13. In the Bhagavad Gīta there is the same double use:—‘peace’ or ‘tranquillity,’ at 2. 64; 2. 65; 18. 37, and ‘the grace of Kṛishṇa,’ at 18. 56; 18. 58; 18. 62; 18. 73; and ‘the grace of Vyāsa,’ at 18. 75.

The development of the doctrine of ‘salvation by grace’ by the Vishnuites proceeds through the Epic, culminating in the sharp controversy against this ‘Cat-doctrine’ by the ‘Monkey-doctrine’ of ‘salvation by works.’ Compare Hopkins, Religions of India, pp. 500, 501.

[2 ]This stanza = Muṇḍ. 3. 2. 3.