The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v2.c40.s4.25

v2.c40.s4.25

But beyond these minor matters, which are none of them recognized as essential in the oldest Upaniṣads, a further question arises, how far there can be real knowledge at all of the Ātman. The natural desire of the philosopher is to know the Ātman: the Upaniṣads are in very real sense the search for that knowledge, but the conviction is clearly early felt that there were serious difficulties in assuming the possibility of empiric means giving the desired result. The Rigveda⁹ already contained the idea that the first principle in some degree disguised itself, and the world of name and form becomes in the Bṛhadāraṇyaka¹⁰ the immortal concealed in truth, or reality, and as the reality of reality is seen the self. The only normal sense which can be given to these passages is that suggested by the description of the whole universe in the Chāndogya¹¹ as a matter of words, a mere name. The reality of the world is empiric, the true reality is the Ātman, which the empiric reality conceals. It follows, therefore, that all so-called knowledge is really ignorance, Avidyā, and that in death in casting off the body the soul throws aside ignorance.¹²