The methods and results of this half-philosophical literature will most easily be understood by a few examples. But, before these are given, it will be necessary to emphasize the colloquial and scrappy nature of the teaching. Legend, parable, ritualistic absurdities, belief in gods, denial of gods, belief in heaven, denial of heaven, are all mingled, and for a purpose. For some men are able, and some are unable, to receive the true light of knowledge. But man's fate depends on his knowledge. The wise man becomes hereafter what his knowledge has prepared him to be. Not every spirit is fitted for immortality, but only the spirit of them that have wisely desired it, or, rather, not desired it; for every desire must have been extinguished before one is fitted for this end. Hence, with advancing belief in absorption and pantheism, there still lingers, and not as a mere superfluity, the use of sacrifice and penance. Rites and the paraphernalia of religion are essential till one learns that they are unessential. Desire will be gratified till one learns that the most desirable thing is lack of desire. But so long as one desires even the lack of desire he is still in the fetters of desire. The way is long to the extinction of emotion, but its attainment results in happiness that is greater than delight; in peace that surpasses joy.
In the exposition of this doctrine the old gods are retained as figures. They are not real gods. But they are existent forms of God. They are portions of the absolute, a form of the Eternal, even as man is a form of the same. Absolute being, again, is described as anthropomorphic. 'This is that' under a certain form. Incessantly made is the attempt to explain the identity of the absolute with phenomena. The power brahma, which is originally applied to prayer, is now taken as absolute being, and this, again, must be equated with the personal spirit (ego, self, [=a]tm[=a]). One finds himself back in the age of Vedic speculation when he reads of prayer (or penance) and power as one. For, as was shown above, the Rig Veda already recognizes that prayer is power. There the word for power, brahma, is used only as equivalent of prayer, and Brihaspati or Brahmanaspati is literally the 'god of power,' as he is interpreted by the priests. The significance of the other great word of this period, namely [=a]tm[=a], is not at all uncertain, but to translate it is difficult. It is breath, spirit, self, soul. Yet, since in its original sense it corresponds to spiritus (comparable to athmen), the word spirit, which also signifies the real person, perhaps represents it best. We shall then render brahma and [=a]tm[=a] by the absolute and the ego or spirit, respectively; or leave them, which is perhaps the best way, in their native form. The physical breath, pr[=a]na, is occasionally used just like [=a]tm[=a]. Thus it is said that all the gods are one god, and this is pr[=a]na, identical with brahma (Brihad [=A]ranyaka Upanishad, 3.9.9); or pr[=a]na is so used as to be the same with spirit, though, on the other hand, 'breath is born of spirit' (Praçna Up. 3.3), just as in the Rig Veda (above) it is said that all comes from the breath of God.
One of the most instructive of the older Upanishads is the
Ch[=a]ndogya. A sketch of its doctrines will give a clearer idea of
Upanishad philosophy than a chapter of disconnected excerpts:
All this (universe) is brahma. Man has intelligent force (or will). He, after death, will exist in accordance with his will in life. This spirit in (my) heart is that mind-making, breath-bodied, light-formed, truth-thoughted, ether-spirited One, of whom are all works, all desires, all smells, and all tastes; who comprehends the universe, who speaks not and is not moved; smaller than a rice-corn, smaller than a mustard-seed, … greater than earth, greater than heaven. This (universal being) is my ego, spirit, and is brahma, force (absolute being). After death I shall enter into him (3.14).[8] This all is breath (==spirit in 3.15.4).
After this epitome of pantheism follows a ritualistic bit:
Man is sacrifice. Four and twenty years are the morning libation; the next four and forty, the mid-day libation; the next eight and forty, the evening libation. The son of Itar[=a], knowing this, lived one hundred and sixteen years. He who knows this lives one hundred and sixteen years (3.16).
Then, for the abolition of all sacrifice, follows a chapter which explains that man may sacrifice symbolically, so that, for example, gifts to the priests (a necessary adjunct of a real sacrifice) here become penance, liberality, rectitude, non-injury, truth-speaking (ib. 17. 4). There follows then the identification of brahma with mind, sun, breath, cardinal points, ether, etc, even puns being brought into requisition, Ka is Kha and Kha is Ka (4. 10. 5);[9] earth, fire, food, sun, water, stars, man, are brahma, and brahma is the man seen in the moon (4. 12. I). And now comes the identity of the impersonal brahma with the personal spirit. The man seen in the eye is the spirit; this is the immortal, unfearing brahma (4. 15. I = 8. 7. 4). He that knows this goes after death to light, thence to day, thence to the light moon, thence to the season, thence to the year, thence to the sun, thence to the moon, thence to lightning; thus he becomes divine, and enters brahma. They that go on this path of the gods that conducts to brahma do not return to human conditions (ib. 15. 6).
But the Father-god of the Br[=a]hmanas is still a temporary creator, and thus he appears now (ib. 17): The Father-god brooded over[10] the worlds, and from them extracted essences, fire from earth, wind from air, sun from sky. These three divinities (the triad, fire, wind, and sun) he brooded over, and from them extracted essences, the Rig Veda from fire, the Yajur Veda from wind, the S[=a]ma Veda from sun. In the preceding the northern path of them that know the absolute (brahma) has been described, and it was said that they return no more to earth. Now follows the southern path of them that only partly know brahma:
"He that knows the oldest, jye[s.]tham and the best, çretham, becomes the oldest and the best. Now breath is oldest and best" (then follows the famous parable of the senses and breath, 5. 1. I). This (found elsewhere) is evidently regarded as a new doctrine, for, after the deduction has been made that, because a creature can live without senses, and even without mind, but cannot live without breath, therefore the breath is the 'oldest and best,' the text continues, 'if one told this to a dry stick, branches would be produced and leaves put forth' (5. 2. 3).[11] The path of him that partly knows the brahma which is expressed in breath, etc, is as follows: He goes to the moon, and, when his good works are used up, he (ultimately mist) rains down, becoming seed, and begins life over again on earth, to become like the people who eat him (5. 10. 6); they that are good become priests, warriors, or members of the third estate; while the bad become dogs, hogs, or members of the low castes.[12] A story is now told, instructive as illustrating the time. Five great doctors of the law came together to discuss what is Spirit, what is brahma. In the end they are taught by a king that the universal Spirit is one's own spirit (5. 18. 1).
It is interesting to see that, although the Rig Veda distinctly says that 'being was born of not-being' (ásatas sád aj[=a]yata, X. 72. 3),[13] yet not-being is here derived quite as emphatically from being. For in the philosophical explanation of the universe given in 6. 2. 1 ff. one reads: "Being alone existed in the beginning, one, and without a second. Others say 'not-being alone' … but how could being be born of not-being? Being alone existed in the beginning."[14] This being is then represented as sentient. "It saw (and desired), 'may I be many,' and sent forth fire (or heat); fire (or heat) desired and produced water; water, food (earth); with the living spirit the divinity entered fire, water, and earth" (6. 3). As mind comes from food, breath from water, and speech from fire, all that makes a man is thus derived from the (true) being (6. 7. 6); and when one dies his speech is absorbed into mind, his mind into breath, his breath into fire (heat), and heat into the highest godhead (6. 8. 7). This is the subtle spirit, that is the Spirit, that is the True, and this is the spirit of man. Now comes the grand conclusion of the Ch[=a]ndogya. He who knows the ego escapes grief. What is the ego? The Vedas are names, and he that sees brahma in the Vedas is indeed (partly) wise; but speech is better than a name; mind is better than speech; will is better than mind; meditation, better than will; reflection, than meditation; understanding, than reflection; power, than understanding; food, than power; water, than food; heat (fire), than water; ether, than heat; memory, than ether; hope, than memory; breath (=spirit), than hope. In each let one see brahma; ego in All. Who knows this is supreme in knowledge; but more supreme in knowledge is he that knows that in true (being) is the highest being. True being is happiness; true being is ego; ego is all; ego is the absolute.[15]