A Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy c9.t1.1.2

c9.t1.1.2

The Bṛhadāraṇyakopanishad tells us that the Ātman, who constitutes the Reality within us as without us, is and ought to be the highest object of our desire, higher than any phenomenal object of love, such as progeny, or wealth, or the like, because, the Upanishad tells us, the Ātman, being the very kernel of our existence, is nearmost to us. "If a man may say there is another object of love dearer to him than the Ātman, and if another replies that if there be God overhead he shall destroy his object of love, verily it shall so happen as this man says. Hence it is that we ought to meditate on the Ātman as the only object of desire. For him who worships the Ātman in this way, nothing dear shall ever perish" (S. 12. a). There is a further reason why, according to the same Upanishad, the Self should be regarded as the highest object of desire; because, when one has attained the Self, there are for him no desires left to be fulfilled, and he becomes entirely desireless (S. 12. b). But the Upanishadic doctrine of Self-realisation implies more than that the Ātman is the sole object of desire.