A Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy c4.s1.13

c4.s1.13

The Kenopanishad which consists of four sections, two balancing against two, the first two being composed in verse, the last two in prose, exhibits also the division of the subjective and objective approaches to the proof of Ātman, namely, the psychological and the cosmological. The verse part of the Upanishad gives us a psychological argument for the existence of Ātman as the inspirer of the various sense-functions; it also breaks the idols, literally and metaphorically, in favour of the worship of Ultimate Reality conceived as Ātman; and finally it makes an essay in spiritual agniology telling us in a paradoxical fashion that those who know really do not know, and those who do not know may alone be said to know the ultimate reality. The prose part of the Upanishad gives us the famous myth of Indra and the Damsel and advances a cosmological argument for the proof of the Immeasurable Power which lies at the back of the forces of Nature. It teaches us a lesson of humility, inasmuch as it tells us that no man who is not humble may hope to come into the presence of this Power; while it lays the moral foundation for this "esoteric doctrine" when it tells us that austerity, restraint and action are its ποῦ στῶ, the Vedas its limbs, and Truth its shelter. The Upanishad also advises us to find the same reality in objective as well as subjective existence, in the flash of the lightning as in the motion of the mind.