A History of Indian Literature v1.c8.s8.29

v1.c8.s8.29

In the Brāhmaṇas or as appendices to them we find texts which were known as Āraṇyakas or "forest texts." These texts comprised everything which was of a secret, uncanny character, and spelt danger to the uninitiated, and which, for that reason, might only be taught and learnt in the forest, and not in the villages. The main contents of these Āraṇyakas are no longer rules for the performance of the sacrifices and the explanation of ceremonies, but the mysticism and symbolism of sacrifice, and priestly philosophy. After the doctrine of the Āśramas had been set up as the brahmanical ideal of life, these "forest texts" naturally came to be the prescribed portions of the Veda to be studied by forest-hermits.¹) (Now, the oldest Upaniṣads are in part included in these "forest texts," and in part appended to them; and it is often difficult to draw the line between the Āraṇyakas and the Upaniṣads. These texts formed, in more senses than one, the *Vedānta*, *i.e.*, "the end of the Veda."²) Firstly most of these texts are of later origin, and fall chronologically into the *end* of the Vedic period. Further, we must never forget that the whole of this Vedic literature did not consist of written books, but was only transmitted by word of mouth. What we find in the individual Brāhmaṇas, therefore, and usually call "works" or "books" is nothing but the subject of instructions of various priests' schools.) The subject was taught to the pupils within a certain period embracing a number of years during which the pupil had to live with the teacher and serve him. The teaching of that which was the most difficult to understand, the mysteries, the mystical and philosophical doctrines, as they are contained in the Āraṇyakas and Upaniṣads, naturally fell into the *end* of this period of instruction. (These texts form the *end*, too, of the Veda-recital, as a sacred act and religious duty. The later philosophers, lastly, saw in these doctrines of the Upaniṣads not the *end*, but the *final aim* of the Veda.³)