A Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy c6.s3.t2.42

c6.s3.t2.42

31. We now come to deal with the question of the idea of Transmigration in the Upanishads themselves. We have already tried to prove that the idea of Transmigration has been adumbrated in the great riddle-hymn of the Ṛigveda. In the Upanishads, on the other hand, the idea has been most explicitly advanced. When the father of Nachiketas told him that he had made him over to the God of Death, Nachiketas replied by saying that it was no uncommon fate that was befalling him : " I indeed go at the head of many to the other world ; but I also go in the midst of many. What is the God of Death going to do to me ? Look back at our predecessors (who have already gone) ; look also at those who have succeeded them. Man ripens like corn, and like corn he is born again" (S. 21. a). Nachiketas is anticipating the gospel, and saying more than the gospel of St. John : " Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone ; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit."¹ The gospel never says that the corn of wheat is reborn ; but Nachiketas says that just as a corn of grain ripens and perishes and is born again, so does a man live and die to be born again.