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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 MUṆḌAKA

The Doctrine of Brahma-Ātman

First Khaṇḍa

The Imperishable, the source and the goal of all beings

1. This is the truth:—

As, from a well-blazing fire, sparks

By the thousand issue forth of like form,

So from the Imperishable, my friend, beings manifold

Are produced, and thither also go.

The supreme Person

• 2.

  Heavenly (divya), formless (a-mūrtta) is the Person (Purusha).
• He is without and within, unborn,
• Breathless (a-prāṇa), mindless (a-manas), pure (śubhra),
• Higher than the high Imperishable.

The source of the human person and of the cosmic elements

• 3.

  From Him is produced breath (prāṇa),
• Mind (manas), and all the senses (indriya),
• Space (kha), wind, light, water,
• And earth, the supporter of all.

The macrocosmic Person

4. Fire is His head; His eyes, the moon and sun;

The regions of space, His ears; His voice, the revealed Vedas;

Wind, His breath (prāṇa); His heart, the whole world. Out of His feet,

The earth. Truly, He is the Inner Soul (Ātman) of all.

The source of the world and of the individual

5. From Him [proceeds] fire, whose fuel is the sun;

From the moon (Soma), rain; herbs, on the earth.

The male pours seed in the female.

Many creatures are produced from the Person (Purusha).

The source of all religious rites

6. From Him the Rig Verses, the Sāman Chant, the sacrificial formulas (yajus), the initiation rite (dīksā).

And all the sacrifices, ceremonies, and sacrificial gifts (daksiṇā),

The year too, and the sacrificer, the worlds

Where the moon (Soma) shines brightly, and where the sun.1

The source of all forms of existence

7. From Him, too, gods are manifoldly produced,

The celestials (Sādhyas), men, cattle, birds,

The in-breath and the out-breath (prāṇāpānau), rice and barley, austerity (tapas),

Faith (śraddhā), truth, chastity, and the law (vidhi).

The source of the activity of the senses

8. From Him come forth the seven life-breaths (prāṇa),2

The seven flames, their fuel, the seven oblations,

These seven worlds, wherein do move

The life-breaths that dwell in the secret place [of the heart], placed seven and seven.

The source of the world—the Inner Soul of things

9. From Him, the seas and the mountains all.

From Him roll rivers of every kind.

And from Him all herbs, the essence, too,

Whereby that Inner Soul (antarātman) dwells in beings.

The pantheistic Person found in the heart

10. The Person (Purusha) himself is everything here:

Work (karman) and austerity (tapas) and Brahma, beyond death.

He who knows That, set in the secret place [of the heart]—

He here on earth, my friend, rends asunder the knot of ignorance.

Second Khaṇḍa

The pantheistic Brahma

1. Manifest, [yet] hidden; called ‘Moving-in-secret’;

• The great abode! Therein is placed that
• Which moves and breathes and winks.
• What that is, know as Being (sad) and Non-being (a-sad),
• As the object of desire, higher than understanding,
• As what is the best of creatures!

2. That which is flaming, which is subtler than the subtle,

On which the worlds are set, and their inhabitants—

• That is the imperishable Brahma.
• It is life (prāṇa), and It is speech and mind.
• That is the real. It is immortal.
• It is [a mark] to be penetrated. Penetrate It, my friend!

A target to be penetrated by meditation on ‘Om’

3. Taking as a bow the great weapon of the Upanishad,

One should put upon it an arrow sharpened by meditation.

Stretching it with a thought directed to the essence of That,

Penetrate1 that Imperishable as the mark, my friend.

• 4.

  The mystic syllable Om (praṇava) is the bow. The arrow is the soul (ātman).
• Brahma is said to be the mark (lakṣya).
• By the undistracted man is It to be penetrated.
• One should come to be in It, as the arrow [in the mark].

The immortal Soul, the one warp of the world and of the individual

5. He on whom the sky, the earth, and the atmosphere

Are woven, and the mind, together with all the life-breaths (prāṇa),

Him alone know as the one Soul (Ātman). Other

Words dismiss. He is the bridge to immortality.

The great Soul to be found in the heart

• 6.

  Where the arteries are brought together
• Like the spokes in the hub of a wheel—
• Therein he moves about,
• Becoming manifold.
• Om!—Thus meditate upon the Soul (Ātman).

Deliverance gained through vision of Him

• 8.

  The knot of the heart is loosened,
• All doubts are cut off,
• And one’s deeds (karman) cease
• When He is seen—both the higher and the lower.

The self-luminous light of the world

• 9.

  In the highest golden sheath
• Is Brahma, without stain, without parts.
• Brilliant is It, the light of lights—
• That which knowers of the Soul (Ātman) do know!

10. The sun shines not there, nor the moon and stars;

These lightnings shine not, much less this [earthly] fire!

After Him, as He shines, doth everything shine.

This whole world is illumined with His light.3

The omnipresent Brahma

11. Brahma, indeed, is this immortal. Brahma before,

Brahma behind, to right and to left.

Stretched forth below and above,

Brahma, indeed, is this whole world, this widest extent.

[1 ]That is, the world of the fathers, and the world of the gods, respectively; described in Chānd. 5. 10.

[2 ]Śaṅkara explains these seven prāna as the seven organs of sense in the head (i. e. two eyes, two ears, two nostrils, and the mouth). They are compared to seven different sacrificial oblations. The enlightenments produced by their activity are the flames of the sacrifice; the objects which supply their action, the fuel. Each sense moves in an appropriate world of its own; but they are all co-ordinated by the mind (manas), which is located in the heart. These same seven flames are probably referred to in Praśna 3. 5, end. Compare the seven flames of the regular sacrifices named at Muṇd. 1. 2. 4.

[1 ]With a double meaning, doubtless, in accordance with the great thought of metaphysical knowledge which is here being expounded. Besides being derivable from √vyadh, ‘to penetrate,’ viddhi means also ‘know.’

[3 ]This stanza = Katha 5. 15 and Śvet. 6. 14.