A Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy c9.s2.4

c9.s2.4

9. The aim of the Upanishads is a practical one, and we find scattered throughout the Upanishads certain hints for the practical realisation of the Godhead by means of Yoga. In the Śvetāśvataropanishad we are told that our body should be regarded as the lower stick and meditation on Praṇava as the upper one, and that by rubbing together these two sticks, we have to churn out the fire of God that is hidden in us (S. 13. a). The reference to the body and the Praṇava as the lower and the upper sticks in the process of spiritual churning which we meet with in this passage of the Śvetāśvataropanishad is a remarkable one, as it enables us to interpret correctly another passage from the Kaṭhopanishad, where a reference to the sticks is to be met with again, and where we are told that just as the earthly fire is ensconced within the two churning sticks like a fœtus in the womb of a pregnant woman, and just as this fire is to be worshipped with offerings day after day by people who keep awake for that purpose, similarly in between the two sticks in the practice of Yoga,—namely, as we can now interpret the expression by reference to the Śvetāśvatara, the body and the Praṇava,—between these sticks is ensconced the spiritual fire, which we have to worship day after day by keeping ourselves awake, and giving it the offerings of the psychical tendencies in us (S. 13. b). This passage in the Kaṭhopanishad can also be interpreted in another way, as we find a little later on in the same Upanishad that the two sticks in the process of Yoga may also be regarded as the upper breath and the lower breath, the Prāṇa and the Apāna, and that between the two is seated the beautiful God whom all our senses worship (S. 14. a). Instead of regarding the two Araṇis as the body and the Praṇava as in the Śvetāśvataropanishad, we might as well take them to mean the upper and the lower breaths, in between which is seated the beautiful Ātman; and a reference from the Muṇḍakopanishad is also not wanting, where we are told that the mind for its purification is dependent upon the Prāṇas, and that it is only when the mind is purified after an initial control of the Prāṇas that the Ātman reveals himself (S. 14. b).