A Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy c5.4

c5.4

3. To begin with the elements as constituting the φύσις of things, we have first to take into account the theory in the Bṛhadāraṇyakopanishad which tells us almost in Thalesian fashion that water was the source of all things whatsoever: “In the beginning, verily, the Waters alone existed; from the Waters was born Satya or Truth; Satya produced Brahman, Brahman gave birth to Prajāpati, and from Prajāpati were born the gods; these gods worship Satya alone" (S. 2. a). In this passage we are told not that the Ātman or any personal Being existed originally, but that the waters were the first to exist, and that everything later came from them. It is curious to note also that Brahman is here declared to have been created from Satya, which means that we have not to understand the word Brahman in the sense of primal reality as we understand it later. Then, again, when it is said that Satya was born from Water, we have to understand by Satya the ultimate "concrete" existent. We are also told that the Satyam consists of three syllables: the first is Sa, the second is Ti, and the third is Yam, the first and the last being real, and the second unreal (S. 2. b). Freely interpreted, this passage would mean that unreality is enclosed on both sides by reality: the present moment which is evanescent is enclosed on both sides by an eternity which is real: we move from eternity to eternity, halting for a short while in the caravansary of the present; and it is wonderful to notice that the whole of the "Satyam" has been supposed to have come out of the primeval waters. This is almost Thalesian, for Thales regarded water as the origin of all things and his philosophy did not need the hypothesis of a God as responsible for the creation of Water, unlike the Genesis which required the spirit of God to move upon the face of the primeval waters, or unlike Manu who said that water was only the first existence that was created by God. The Bṛihadāraṇyakopanishad, like Thales, regards Water as the origin of all things whatsoever, disposing of a belief in God as the creator of the Water itself.