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Samnyasa Upanishads: Hindu Scriptures on Asceticism and Renunciation c5.s2.t4: 2.4 The Emergence of a New World

Saṃnyāsa Upaniṣads: Hindu Scriptures on Asceticism and Renunciation c5.s2.t4

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2.4 The Emergence of a New World

c5.s2.t4.1

The challenge to the old Vedic views was made at two interrelated levels: theology and practical life-style. On the theological plane a set of ideas came into being that shaped a new symbolic world that was at total variance with the Vedic world. That symbolic world is so well known by anyone familiar with Indian culture that it is unnecessary to describe it in detail.

c5.s2.t4.2

Its principal components were: (1) *saṃsāra*: human existence is subject to rebirth and it is a state of bondage and suffering; (2) *karma*: ritual and moral actions determine the rebirth process and contribute to the continuation of human bondage; and (3) *mokṣa*: liberation from *saṃsāra* is the ultimate goal to which all religious efforts should be directed. Most religious traditions of India accept these doctrines as axiomatic. Their disagreements, however, center on the cause(s) of human bondage and release. This is not the place to discuss these doctrines in detail, but one can detect two rival viewpoints. One claims that the human predicament is due to a lack of understanding and that freedom can come only from acquiring the proper gnosis. The other locates the problem in human actions (*karma*) and/or intentions, and prescribes a path of self-control and asceticism. Elements of both viewpoints are often found in the same tradition.

c5.s2.t4.3

A couple of significant conclusions flow from this new framework for understanding human life and death. The two central religious activities of the Vedic world, offering sacrifices and begetting offspring, come to be considered as obstacles to achieving liberation, the ultimate religious goal of the new world; they are activities that a person who pursues the new religious ideal should seek to avoid. Liberation, the new equivalent of immortality, is a metaritual (according to some even a metaethical) state with regard to which ritual activity is ineffective. Sacrifice, the *karma* par excellence, far from being the source of immortality, is in fact a principal cause of human bondage and suffering. Ritual activity, therefore, is not only devalued but also acquires a negative connotation. Gods and heavenly worlds that formed the context of the sacrificial theology are now reduced to being mere components of *saṃsāra*. Rebirth follows upon death; sons and funeral offerings cannot assure personal immortality or permanent bliss. This is an individualist ideology where the situation after death as well as final liberation are determined by what an individual does and knows and not by intermediaries, whether they are priests or heirs. The individual stands alone at the center of this symbolic world, the sole architect of his or her own future.

c5.s2.t4.4

A passage in the *Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad* (1.4.10) states in effect that gods desire to keep people ignorant in order that they may continue to receive sacrificial offerings. The *Muṇḍaka Upaniṣad* (1.2.6–10) has an interesting and satirical passage regarding the inefficacy of sacrifices and the delusion that constitutes the sacrificial theology contained in the Vedic texts. After describing (1.2.1–5) the efficacy of sacrifices proposed by those theologians, the author puts these words in the mouth of the offerings personified:

c5.s2.t4.5

Saying, “Come, come!” the splendid offerings carry that sacrificer on the rays of the sun, praising him and saying sweet words to him: “This is your Brahma-world of merits (*puṇya*) and good acts (*sukṛta*).” (MuṇU 1.2.6)

c5.s2.t4.6

The author then exposes the guile of sacrificial theology:

c5.s2.t4.7

These are indeed unsteady rafts, the eighteen sacrificial forms,²⁶ which teach an inferior ritual (*karma*). The fools who hail it as superior (*śreyas*) sink repeatedly into old age and death.

c5.s2.t4.8

²⁶ The identity of these eighteen forms is unclear. According to Śaṃkara, they refer to the sixteen types of ritual specialists, the sacrificer, and his wife.

c5.s2.t4.9

Living in the midst of ignorance, self-wise, and thinking them-
selves to be learned, the fools go about hurting themselves, like
blind men led by one who is himself blind.
Living endlessly in ignorance, the fools think "We have reached
our goal!" Because of their passion, those who perform rites
(*karmin*) do not understand. When their worlds are exhausted,
therefore, they fall down wretched.²⁷
Regarding sacrifices and good works as the best, the fools know
nothing better (*śreyas*). After enjoying the highest heaven of good
acts (*sukṛta*), they enter again this or even a lower world. (MuṇU
1.2.7–10)

c5.s2.t4.10

²⁷ The meaning is that they fall to lower levels of existence when they have exhausted the reserve of merit that had won them the heavenly worlds.

c5.s2.t4.11

Several significant points are made in this passage. Those who perform rites (*karma*) gain, or perhaps make for themselves,²⁸ a heaven after death. They live in the realm of ignorance (*avidyā*) and consider this heaven as *śreyas*, a term that means the ultimate good or bliss.²⁹ But this heaven will one day come to an end, and the performers of rites will return once again to earth. Such people are referred to repeatedly as fools pretending to be wise; they are the guardians of the old sacrificial religion. I am tempted to think that the author of the *Muṇḍaka* is satirically referring to the Vedas, the knowledge par excellence for the ritualists, as ignorance. The ritualists who daily study the Vedas and follow their directions are wallowing in ignorance. Could it be that the blind man who leads other blind men is indeed the Veda? The *Muṇḍaka* (1.1.4–5) elsewhere denies the authority of the Vedas:

c5.s2.t4.12

²⁸ The heaven is said to be *sukṛta*. It probably means that the heaven is made by performing correctly (*su*) the ritual acts.

c5.s2.t4.13

²⁹ The *Kaṭha Upaniṣad* (2.1–2) opposes *śreyas* to *preyas*, the fleeting delights. The wise choose the former, and the fools the latter.

c5.s2.t4.14

Two kinds of knowledge are to be known, as, indeed, the
knowers of Brahman declare—the higher as well as the lower.
Of these the lower is the *Ṛg Veda*, the *Yajur Veda*, the *Sāma*
*Veda*, the *Atharva Veda*, phonetics, ritual, grammar, etymology,
metrics, and astrology. And the higher is that by which the Un-
decaying is apprehended.

c5.s2.t4.15

Vedic knowledge deals only with the ritual. It is useful only for worldly existence (MuṇU 1.2.1–6). It is not the knowledge that leads to final liberation, and from that perspective it is ignorance masquerading as knowledge.

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