* The deep sushupta sleep is meant, in which personal con- sciousness is lost, and the self for a time absorbed in the Highest Self. Sleep is produced by fatigue. Speech, mind, and the senses rest, breath only remains awake, and the gfva, the living soul, in order to recover from his fatigue, returns for a while to his true Self (atm4). The Sat must be taken as a substance, nay, a$ the highest substance or subject, the Brahman. The whole purpose of the Upanishad is obscured if we translate sat or satyam by truth, instead of the True, the true one, 16 dvras dv.
Vi Prapathaka, 8 Khanda, 4. 99
own (Self). Therefore they say, svapiti, he sleeps, because he is gone (apita) to his own (sva) ?.
2. ‘As a bird when tied by a string flies first —
in every direction, and finding no rest anywhere,
settles down at last on the very place where it is
fastened, exactly in the same manner, my son, that
mind (the giva, or living Self in the mind, see VI,
3, 2), after flying in every direction, and finding no
rest anywhere, settles down on breath ?; for indeed,
my son, mind is fastened to breath.
3. ‘Learn from me, my son, what are hunger
and thirst. When a man is thus said to be
hungry, water is carrying away (digests) what has
been eaten by him. Therefore as they speak of
a cow-leader (go-naya), a horse-leader (asva-ndya), a
man-leader (purusha-n4ya), so they call water (which
digests food and causes hunger) food-leader (asa-
naya). Thus (by food digested &c.), my son, know
this offshoot (the body) to be brought forth, for
this (body) could not be vithout a root (cause).
4. ‘And where could its root be except in food (earth)*? And in the same manner, my son, as
* This is one of the many recognised plays on words in the Upanishads and the Vedanta philosophy. Svapiti, he sleeps, stands for sva (his own), i.e. the self, and apfta, gone to.
2 The commentator takes prima here in the sense of Sat, which it often has elsewhere. If so, this illustration would have the same object as the preceding one. If we took prama in the sense of breath, breath being the result of water, this paragraph might be taken to explain the resignation of the living Self to its bondage to breath, while on earth.
8 That food is the root of the body is shown by the commen- tator in the following way: Food when softened by water and digested becomes a fluid, blood (sonita). From it comes flesh, from flesh fat, from fat bones, from bones marrow, from marrow seed. Food eaten by a woman becomes equally blood (lohita),
100 KHANDOGYA-UPANISHAD.
food (earth) too is an offshoot, seek after its root,
viz. water. And as water too is an offshoot, seek
after its root, viz. fire. And as fire too is an off-
shoot, seek after its root, viz. the True. Yes, all
these creatures, my son, have their root in the True,
they dwell in the True, they rest in the True.
5. ‘When a man is thus said to be thirsty, fire
carries away what has been drunk by him. There-
fore as they speak of a cow-leader (go-ndya), of a
horse-leader (asva-naya), of a man-leader (purusha-
naya), so they call fire udany4, thirst, i.e. water-
leader. Thus (by water digested &c.), my son,
know this offshoot (the body) to be brought forth:
this (body) could not be without a root (cause).
6. ‘And where could its root be except in
water? As water is an offshoot, seek after its
root, viz. fire. As fire is an offshoot, seek after its
root, viz. the True. Yes, all these creatures, O son,
have their root in the True, they dwell in the True,
they rest in the True.
‘And how these three beings (devaté), fire, water,
earth, O son, when they reach. man, become each of
them tripartite, has been said before (VI, 4, 7). When
a man departs from hence, his speech! is merged
and from seed and blood combined the new body is produced.
We must always have before us the genealogical table :—
Sat, ro dv.
|
Tegas (fire) = Vak (speech). Ap (water)=Praza (breath).
Anna (earth)= Manas (mind).
‘ If a man dies, the first thing which his friends say is, He
speaks no more. Then, he understands no more. Then, he
moves no more. Then, he is cold.
Vi Prapathaka, 9 Khanda, 4. Ioi
in his mind, his mind in his breath, his breath in heat (fire), heat in the Highest Being.
7. ‘Now that which is that subtile essence (the
root of all), in it all that exists has its self. It is the
True. It is the Self, and thou, O Svetaketu, art it.’
Please, Sir, inform me still more,” said the son.
‘Be it so, my child,’ the father replied.
NintH KuHawnpa.
1. ‘As the bees?, my son, make honey by col-
lecting the juices of distant trees, and reduce the
juice into one form,
2. ‘And as these juices have no discrimination,
so that they might say, I am the juice of this tree
or that, in the same manner, my son, all these crea-
tures, when they have become merged in the True
(either in deep sleep or in death), know not that
they are merged in the True.
3. ‘Whatever these creatures are here, whether
a lion, or a wolf, or a boar, or a worm, or a midge,
or a gnat, or a musquito, that they become again
and again.
4. ‘Now that which is that subtile essence, in it
all that exists has its self. It is the True. It is
the Self, and thou, O Svetaketu, art it.’
‘Please, Sir, inform me still more,’ said the son.
‘Be it so, my child,’ the father replied.
? At the beginning of each chapter the commentator supplies the question which the son is supposed to have asked his father. The first is: All creatures falling every day into deep sleep (su- shupti) obtain thereby the Sat, the true being. How is it then that they do not know that they obtain the Sat every day?
102 KHANDOGYA-UPANISHAD.
TENTH KHawpA!.
1. ‘ These rivers, my son, run, the eastern (like the
Gang4) toward the east, the western (like the Sindhu)
toward the west. They go from sea to sea (i.e. the
clouds lift up the water from the sea to the sky, and
send it back as raintothesea). They become indeed
sea. And as those rivers, when they are in the sea,
do not know, I am this or that river,
2. ‘In the same manner, my son, all these crea-
tures, when they have come back from the True,
know not that they have come back from the True.
Whatever these creatures are here, whether a lion,
or a wolf, or-a boar, or a worm, or a midge, or a
gnat, Or a musquito, that they become again and
again.
3. ‘That which is that subtile essence, in it all
that exists has its self. It is the True. It is the
Self, and thou, O Svetaketu, art it.’
‘Please, Sir, inform me still more,’ said the son.
‘Be it so, my child,’ the father replied.
ELEVENTH KHAwWDA 2.
1. ‘If some one were to strike at the root of this
large tree here, it would bleed, but live. If he were
to strike ‘at its stem, it would bleed, but live. If he
were to strike at its top, it would bleed, but live.
* The next question which the son is supposed to have asked is: If a man who has slept in his own house, rises and goes to another village, he knows that he has come from his own house. Why then do people not know that they have come from the Sat?
* The next question is: Waves, foam, and bubbles arise from the water, and when they merge again in the water, they are gone. How is it that living beings, when in sleep or death they are merged again in the Sat, are not destroyed?
Vi Prapathaka, Ii Khanda, 3. 103
Pervaded by the living Self that treé stands firm, drinking in its nourishment and rejoicing ;
2. ‘But if the life (the living Self) leaves one of
its branches, that branch withers; if it leaves a
second, that branch withers; if it leaves a third, that
branch withers. If it leaves the whole tree, the
whole tree withers'. In exactly the same manner,
my son, know this.’ Thus he spoke:
3. ‘ This (body) indeed withers and dies when the living Self has left it; the living Self dies not.
‘That which is that subtile essence, in it all that
exists has its self. It is the True. It is the Self,
and thou, Svetaketu, art it.’
‘Please, Sir, inform me still more,’ said the son.
‘Be it so, my child,’ the father replied.
* The commentator remarks that according to the Veda, trees are conscious, while Buddhists and followers of Kanfda hold them to be unconscious. They live, because one sees how their sap runs and how it dries up, just as one sees the sap in a living body, which, as we saw, was produced by food and water. Therefore the simile holds good. The life, or, more correctly, the liver, the living Self, pervades the tree, as it pervades man, when it has entered the organism which produces breath, mind, and speech. If any accident happens to a branch, the living Self draws himself away from that branch, and then the branch withers. The sap which caused the living Self to remain, goes, and the living Self goes away with it. The same applies to the whole tree. The tree dies when the living Self leaves it, but the living Self does not die; it only leaves an abode which it had before cccupied. Some other illustrations, to show that the living Self remains, are added by the commentator: First, with regard to the living Self being the same when it awakes from deep sleep (sushupti), he remarks that we remember quite well that we have left something unfinished before we fell asleep. And then with regard to the living Self being the same when it awakes from death to a new life, he shows that crea- tures, as soon as they are born take the breast, and exhibit terror, which can only be explained, as he supposes, by their possessing a recollection of 2, former state of existence.
104 KHANDOGYA-UPANISHAD.
TWELFTH KHANDA}!.
1. ‘Fetch me from thence a fruit of the Nyagrodha tree.’
‘Here is one, Sir.’
‘Break it.’
‘It is broken, Sir.’
‘What do you see there ?’
‘These seeds, almost infinitesimal.’
‘Break one of them.’
‘It is broken, Sir.’
‘What do you see there ?’
‘Not anything, Sir.’
2. The father said: ‘My son, that subtile essence
which you do not perceive there, of that very
essence this great Nyagrodha tree exists.
3. ‘Believe it, my son. That which is the subtile
essence, in it all that exists has its self. It is the
True. It is the Self, and thou, O Svetaketu, art it.’
‘Please Sir, inform me still more,’ said the son.
‘Be it so, my child, the father replied.
THIRTEENTH KHANDA?,
1. ‘Place this salt in water, and then wait on me in the morning.’
The son did as he was commanded.
The father said to him: ‘ Bring me the salt, which you placed in the water last night.’
' The question which the son is supposed to have asked is: How can this universe which has the form and name of earth &c. be produced from the Sat which is subtile, and has neither form nor name?
* The question here is supposed to have been: If the Sat is the root of all that exists, why is it not perceived ?
Vl Prapathaka, 14 Khanda, I. 105
The son having looked for it, found it not, for, of course, it was melted.
2. The father said: ‘ Taste it from the surface of the water. How is it ?’
The son replied: ‘It is salt,’
‘Taste it from the middle. How is it ?’
The son replied: ‘It is salt.’
‘Taste it from the bottom. How is it ?’
The son replied: ‘It is salt.’
The father said: ‘ Throw it away! and then wait on me.’
He did so; but salt exists for ever.
Then the father said: ‘Here also, in this body,
forsooth, you do not perceive the True (Sat), my
son; but there indeed it is.
3. ‘ That which is the subtile essence, in it all that
exists has its self. It is the True. It is the Self,
and thou, O Svetaketu, art it.’
‘Please, Sir, inform me still more,’ said the son.
‘Be it so, my child,’ the father replied.
FOURTEENTH KHANDA 2.