A Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy c4.s1.2

Language: English

c4.s1.2.1

4. When we come to the age of the Brāhmaṇas, we come to an age of ceremonialism and ritualism. As the chief topic of the Atharvaveda is incantation, similarly the chief topic of the Brāhmaṇas is sacrifice. It passes one’s understanding how the original purity of the hymnology of the Rigveda should have been so much sullied in the age of the Brāhmaṇas, which only try to foist a superstructure of meaningless ceremonialism upon the hymnology of the Veda, and press into their service passages and texts from the Vedas which they utilise in such a way as to support the not-very-glorious life of the sacrificer. Curious indeed are the ways in which the Brāhmaṇa passages mingle together legends, exegeses, dogmas, philological and philosophical speculations so as to exhibit the efficacy of the Mantras for the practical life of the sacrificer. It is a pitiful phenomenon to notice how at the time of the Brāhmaṇas so much intellect should have been wasted on the formulation of the details of the various sacrificial rites : it only reminds one of the wheels within wheels of the scholastic interpretations of Christian dogma in the Middle Ages. The spirit of the Upanishads is, on the other hand, barring a few exceptions here and there, entirely antagonsitic to the sacrificial doctrine of the Brāhmaṇas.

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The halting attitude of the Muṇḍaka in regard to the efficacy of Brāhmaṇic ritualism is an exception to the general Upanishadic reaction in favour of philosophical thought against the barren and empty formalism of the Brāhmaṇa literature. While, in one passage, the Muṇḍaka tells us that the only way towards securing the goal of human life consists in blindly following the routine of sacrificial and ritualistic works enjoined upon us by our ancestors (S. 1. a), in another passage closely following upon the one which we are discussing, we are told that "Sacrifices are like those unsteady boats on the ocean of life which may take one at any time to the bottom of the sea. Those who regard sacrifices as the highest good of human life, go again and again from old age to death. Living in the midst of darkness, these soi disant wise men move about to and fro like blind men led by the blind. They regard themselves as having reached the goal of their life even while living in the midst of ignorance. Full of desire, they fall down from their places in the heavens as soon as their merit is exhausted. Thinking that sacrifice is the highest end of human life, they cannot imagine that there is any other end. Having enjoyed in the heavens the reward of their good works, they descend down to this world, or to a lower world still.

c4.s1.2.3

It is only those who practise penance and faith in a forest, who tranquil their passions, lead the life of knowledge and live on alms,—it is only these that go to the immortal Ātman by the door-way of the Sun" (S. 1. b). The Upanishads which stand for knowledge as against the Brāhmaṇical philosophy of works very rarely exhibit even this halting attitude towards ritualism to be met with in the Muṇḍaka. Their general tone is to try to find out the philosophical end of human life. Even so early as at the time of the Chhāndogya, the efficacy of the "inner sacrifice" had come to be definitely recognised: "Our real sacrifice consists in making oblations to the Prāṇa within us. One who does not know this inner sacrifice, even if he were to go in for a formal sacrifice, throws oblations merely on ashes. On the other hand, he who knows this inner sacrifice is relieved of his sins as surely as wool is burnt in a flame of fire. Knowing this inner sacrifice, even if a man were to do acts of charity for a Chāṇḍāla, he may verily be regarded as having sacrificed to the Universal Soul" (S. 2. a). The Kaushītaki again tells us definitely, referring probably to the custom at the time of the Āraṇyakas to perform acts of mental sacrifice, that "the ancient sages did not go in for a formal sacrifice knowing that an endless sacrifice was going on all the while within themselves" (S. 2. b).

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We thus see how the Brāhmaṇical idea of sacrifice comes to be modulated in the days of the Upanishads so as ultimately to be entirely transformed into a new conception of sacrifice altogether—that of a mental sacrifice—which is helpful to the process of the acquisition of spiritual knowledge. On the whole, it may not be untrue to say that the futility of works was definitely recognised at the time of the Upanishads which tried to substitute a philosophy of knowledge for the Brāhmaṇical philosophy of works.