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The Philosophy of the Upanishads c9.s3.t5: 5. Appendix: Interpretations of and Substitutes for Ritual Practices

The Philosophy of the Upanishads c9.s3.t5

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5. Appendix: Interpretations of and Substitutes for Ritual Practices

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The partial interpretation in the oldest parts of the Upanishads of certain ritual conceptions and practices which are deeply rooted in consciousness in the light of the doctrine of Brahman, and the partial substitution for them of new ceremonies more in harmony with the spirit of the new doctrine, is related to the symbolic view of Brahman. We propose briefly to indicate the leading characteristics on both sides.

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That India more than any other country is the land of symbols is owing to the nature of Indian thought, which applied itself to the most abstruse problems before it was even remotely in a position to treat them intelligently. As early as the period of the Brâhmaṇas the separate acts of the ritual were frequently regarded as symbols, whose allegorical meaning embraced a wider range. But the Āraṇyakas were the peculiar arena of these allegorical expositions. In harmony with their prevailing purpose, to offer to the Vānaprastha an equivalent for the sacrificial observances, for the most part no longer practicable, they indulge in mystical interpretations of these, which are then followed up in the oldest Upanishads. In the latter we often see the fundamental conception of the ātman doctrine appearing in symbolical guise, and we should be disposed to trace in allegorical speculations of this nature the earliest origin of the Upanishad doctrine. That it is not so, that the doctrine of the ātman as the sole reality has not been developed originally from ritualistic conceptions, but was adapted to them first in later times, we have inferred above (p. 17 ff.) from the tradition surviving still in numerous instances in the Upanishads, that it was kings, i.e. Kshatriyas, from whom the Brāhmans first received the most important elements of the ātman doctrine. This they then appropriated in their own way, combining it in allegorical fashion with the entirely heterogeneous methods of the ritual. This view finds an unexpected but all the more valuable confirmation in the manner in which the different schools of the Veda arrived at the conception of the ātman, or the prāṇa as its precursor. It is evidenced, that is to say, by the fact that each Veda starts from the ritual service peculiar to it, the adherents of the Rigveda from the uktham, those of the Sâmaveda from the udgîtha, and the schools of the white Yajurveda from the aśvamedha, in order by a symbolical interpretation to arrive at the conception of the prâṇa or âtman. It is however inconceivable that the âtman doctrine should have originated on so different yet parallel lines of development, while the facts are completely explained on the supposition that the doctrine of the prâṇa-âtman was taken over from another source, and harmonised by each school to the best of its ability with the ruling ideas of its ritual. This we propose to illustrate by a few examples.

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The chief function of the priests of the Rigveda is the recitation of the śastram (hymn of praise), which was chosen for the purpose on each occasion from the hymns of the Rigveda. The uktham however is “the most beautiful, most famous, most potent among the śastras.”¹ This is identified by the Aitareyins under several allegorical forms with the prâṇa;² while the Kaushîtakins identify the uktham with Brahman (materialised in ṛic, yajus, sâman).³ As the priests of the Rigveda regarded the uktham as the climax of their service, so those of the Sâmaveda looked upon the chanting of the udgîtha, which was similarly identified with the syllable om, the prâṇa, the sun, or the purusha in the sun and the eye; while in Chând. 2 the complete sâman, whose climax is formed by the chanting of the udgîtha, is compared with various cosmical and psychical conditions. The early portions of the Upanishad-Brâhmaṇa, which including the Kena Upan., belongs to the Talavakâra school of the Sâmaveda, is concerned with allegories of an entirely similar character. For the priests of the Yajurveda who are entrusted with the carrying out of the sacred rites a similar part is taken by the act of sacrifice itself, and here again also it is the highest of all the sacrificial observances, viz. the horse-sacrifice (*aśvamedha*), with which Bṛh. 1. 1-2 begins, in order to recognise in the steed the universe, into which Prajâpati is transformed with the object of again offering himself in sacrifice. In Taitt. Saṃh. 7. 5. 25 also this allegorical interpretation of the horse of the sacrifice as the universe is found, and in Taitt. Up. 1. 5 in a different way the interdict of the sacrificial animal is broken through, in that a fourth sacred word of the sacrifice *mahas*, which must denote Brahman, is added to the three *bhûr bhuvaḥ svar*, which are interpreted as earth, atmosphere and heaven. The remaining schools of the Yajurveda appear to have started in their allegorising from another aspect of the cult, from the disposal of the sacred fire-altars, as may be inferred from Kâṭh. 1 and Maitr. 1. 1.¹ Throughout, however, we see how the ritual representations are, according to the Vedic schools themselves, only different means whereby expression may be given under an allegorical garb to thoughts common to all.

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¹ Kaush. 2. 6.

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² Ait. Âr. 2. 1–3.

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³ Kaush. 2. 6.

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¹ cp. Maitr. 6. 33.

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Of other allegorical interpretations we will cite further only that of the *Gâyatrî*, the first in order of Vedic metres, consisting of three feet (◡-◡-◡-◡, thrice repeated), to which an imaginary fourth was afterwards added. In this quadrupedal form the Gâyatrî is a symbol of Brahman, who is likewise four-footed. Later on we shall have to consider this four-footed character of Brahman, and its connection with the four states of the soul, waking, dreaming, deep sleep, and *turîya*. In their manner of treatment of the symbolic Gâyatrî the two chief texts adopt entirely different methods. According to Chând. 3. 12, the text of the Veda and all created things, the earth, the body, the heart, and the vital organs, these six form the one sixfold foot of the Gâyatrî, and the three remaining feet² are immortal in heaven, and are symbolised by space, the physical body and heart; in Bṛih. 5. 14, on the contrary, three feet of the Gâyatrî appear under a material form as the worlds, the vedas, and the vital breaths, while only the fourth (turîya) is transcendent, and finds expression symbolically in the sun, the eye, truth, power, and life.

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² With reference to Ṛigv. X. 90, 3.

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In this way on the rise of the new teaching an attempt was made to preserve the traditional heirlooms of the ritual, while transforming them into symbols of the âtman doctrine. Soon however men went further, and endeavoured to supersede the most important of the traditional observances by other ceremonies adapted to the teaching concerning the âtman. In Bṛih. 3. 1, for example, for the four priests (hotar, adhvaryu, udgâtar, brâhman) the four cosmical and the corresponding psychical phenomenal forms of the âtman are substituted (as fire and speech, sun and eye, wind and breath, moon and manas), and instead of the usual rewards there was introduced union with the âtman as realised in the universe. Similarly in Chând. 4. 16. 2, instead of the brâhman his manas is introduced, and instead of the hotar, adhvaryu, and udgâtar, the vâc' embodied in them.

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A further attempt to transcend the sacrificial ritual is found in the conception of the man himself and his life as an act of service. Thus in Chând. 3. 16 the three periods of human life appear in place of the three bruisings of the Soma, and in a different way in Chând. 3. 17 the functions of hungering, eating, begetting, etc., replace the chief acts of the Soma sacrifice. In detail this thought is carried out by assigning the different organs and functions to the requirements and acts of the sacrifice,¹ and elsewhere with still greater elaboration.²

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¹ Mahân. 64.

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² Prâṇâgnih. Upan. 3–4.

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Finally, in many of the instances enumerated it remains doubtful whether it is intended merely to interpret allegorically the still existing sacrificial cult, or to set it aside and replace it by physical and psychical conditions. The latter is distinctly the case with the last and most important phenomenon that we have to notice, where the agnihotram is replaced by the *prāṇa-agnihotram*.

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The agnihotram, consisting in a twice repeated libation of boiled milk, which was poured into the fire every morning at sunrise and at sunset every evening, and thus was offered to the gods, and with them to all beings, had to be maintained throughout his life (*yāvaj-jīvam*) by the man who had once entered into the estate of a householder. After the *prāṇa*, indwelling in us all, had been introduced in place of the gods, the attempt was made to replace the agnihotram or fire-sacrifice by a *prāṇa-agnihotram*, a sacrifice offered in the fire of *prāṇa*. The continual inspiration and exspiration necessary for the maintenance of life (*prāṇa*) might be regarded as such. A first trace of this idea may be found in the words of Bṛh. 1. 5. 23:—"Therefore if a man would observe a vow, he should inhale and exhale and wish, 'May not evil or death seize me.'"¹ This "inner agnihotram"² occurs with a more developed character and a clearer repudiation of the agnihotram cult in Kaush. Up. 2. 5:—"These two sacrifices (of inspiration and speech, *i.e.* exspiration³) are endless and immortal; for whether awake or asleep they are continually being offered. The other sacrifices, on the contrary, are limited, for they consist of works. Therefore the wise men of old (who in the Upanishads are cited quite commonly as authority when novel ideas are introduced) did not offer the agnihotram." Like the breathing here, so the nutrition of the body also might be conceived as a sacrifice offered in the fire of digestion (identified in Bṛih. 5. 9 with the *agni vaiśvānara*), and be substituted for the traditional agnihotram. Here also is found the first trace of the thought in Bṛih. 1. 5. 2:—"For all food which he (who knows this) consumes, that he presents (to the ātman and through it) to the gods." An amplified description of this new kind of agnihotram appears first in Chând. 5. 19–24. There is no further need of a specially prepared milk offering, "whatever food is nearest to hand, that is suitable for sacrifice."¹ Sacrifice is offered also in the *āhavanīya* fire of the mouth, since the five libations, of which this sacrifice presented to the prāṇa consists, viz.—the inspiration, interspiration, exspiration, the all- and up-breathing, and with them the corresponding five organs of sense, are for the benefit of the five nature gods and the five world spheres.² In a neighbouring passage the rinsing of the mouth customary before and after eating is conceived as a swathing of the prāṇa with water.³ Both acts, the nourishing and the swathing of the prāṇa (with obvious reference to Chând. 5. 24), are connected together, and provided with corresponding rules in Maitr. 6. 9. According to this passage also, the customary agnihotram seems to be superseded by the prāṇāgnihotram (*ātman eva yajati*), while in the appendix Maitr. 6. 34 both are preserved side by side in that the agnihotram restored to its rightful position is conceived as the "openly made" *prāṇāgnihotram*. A final step in this development is indicated in the Prāṇāgn. Up. 1–2, which, presupposing apparently all the passages just quoted, declares the customary agnihotram to be superfluous, and for the prāṇāgnihotram prescribes a minutely elaborated ritual.

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¹ cp. also Ait. Ār. 3. 2. 6. 8.

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² *ántaram agnihotram*; cp. also Kaush. Ār. 10.

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³ cp. Pras'na 4. 4: "The two libations of the exspiration and inspiration."

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¹ Chând. 5. 19. 1.

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² cp. the more detailed discussion in Deussen, *Upan.*, p. 146 f.

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³ Chând. 5. 2. 2; cp. Bṛih. 6. 1. 14.

Cites (12)