A Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy c2.9

Language: English

c2.9.1

This must verily be the upshot of that Upanishad wherein we are asked to meditate on Brahman as the Reality in the world of Nature and in the world of Mind: *tasyaisha ādeśo yadetad vidyuto vyadyutadā itīti nyamīmishadā ityadhidaivatam; athādhyātmam yadetad gachchatīva cha mano anena chaitad upasmaratyabhīkshṇam saṃkalpaḥ* (Kena IV. 29, 30). With all due deference to Hertel's favourite theme of the identification of Brahman with Fire, we must say that we cannot accuse the Upanishad of not having considered a point which is not the point at issue. The point at issue being the spiritual description of Brahman as a presence or power, it would be an *ignoratio elenchi* on the part of that Upanishad to go into the description of the Brahman as a "World-Soul in which all the other souls ultimately merge." Then, secondly, when Hertel points out that the Kenopanishad dispenses with the necessity of a Spiritual Teacher for the purpose of spiritual realization, that the Self must according to that Upanishad be regarded as capable of being realised simply by internal illumination, and that Umā in that Upanishad does in no way help Indra in realising the Absolute, he forgets entirely to notice the fact that the true rôle of a Spiritual Teacher consists just in the office which Umā has been performing, namely, like a lamp-post on the Pathway to God, of simply directing the benighted wanderer on the path of spiritual progress without herself going it.

c2.9.2

Dogmatic statements such as this about the teachings of Upanishads come merely out of taking partial views about a subject. This is also illustrated in Oltramare’s accusation against the Upanishads in his “L’Histoire des Idées théosophiques dans l’Inde” that “in affirming the identity of the Universal and the Individual Soul, from which follows necessarily the identity of all souls, the Upanishads have not drawn the conclusion—Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (p. 137). True that the Biblical expression “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” is not to be found in the Upanishads; but it would be bold on the part of any writer on Upanishadic Philosophy to affirm that the sentiment is not present in the Upanishads. What else is the meaning of that Upanishadic dictum yasmin sarvāṇi bhūtāni ātmaivābhūd vijānataḥ (Īśa 7), except that a Sage, who has realised the Ātman, must see the Ātman in all human beings, must, in fact, regard all human beings as living in a Kingdom of Ends?

c2.9.3

Finally, when Oldenberg in his brilliant work on the Upanishads “Die Lehre der Upanishaden” tells us that the true parallel for Upanishadic Philosophy is to be found rather in the teachings of Plotinus, the Sufis, and the Christian mystics like Eckhart than in the Philosophy of Kant, and when he therefore a little superciliously disposes of the teaching of the Upanishads by saying “ Der eine der Weg der Mystik, der andre der Kants”, we are tempted to say about Kant with a little variation upon what Aristotle said about Plato, “Let Kant be our friend, but let Truth be our divinity”. When Oldenberg commends Kant by saying that the central principle of Kant's philosophy is the “Formbegriff,” while that of Upanishadic Philosophy is the “Formlosigkeit,” he is blinding himself to the fact that his Critique of Pure Reason was only the first premiss of a grand philosophical syllogism whose minor premiss and conclusion were respectively the Critiques of Practical Reason and Judgment, wherein conceptions of Goodness and Value supplemented the considerations of Pure Reason, for, on the grounds of Pure Reason, what philosophy could there be about the ultimate realities of human life, the Self, the World, and God, except a philosophy of paralogisms that paralyse, antinomies that make one flounder, and ideals which can never be realised at all?

c2.9.4

The “ Cognoscendo ignorari ” of Augustine, the “ Neti Neti ” of Yājñavalkya, the “ Weder dies noch das ” of Eckhart, would be far more sure indexes of spiritual humility, and consequent possession of reality, than the self-satisfied and half-halting dictates of an Agnosticism on the grounds of Pure Reason, which must destroy knowledge in order to make room for faith.