The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad

by Swami Krishnananda

Chapter I (Continued)

Fifth Brahmana (Continued): The Threefold Creation

3. 'trīṇy ātmane'kuruta' iti, mano vācaṁ prāṇaṁ, tāny ātmane 'kuruta': anyatra manā abhūvaṁ nādarśaṁ, anyatra manā abhūvaṁ nāśrauṣaṁ iti, manasā hy'eva paśyati, manasā sṛṇoti, kāmaḥ saṁkalpō vicikitsā, śraddhā' śraddhā, dhrtir adhṛtir hrīr dhīr bhīr ity etad sarvam mana eva. tasmād api pṛṣṭhata upaspṛṣṭo manasā vijānāti; yaḥ kaś ca śabdō, vāg eva sā; eṣā hi antam āyattā, eṣā hi na prāṇo'pānovyāna udānaḥ samano'na ity etat sarvaṁ prāṇa eva. etanmayo vā ayam ātmā, vāṅ-mayaḥ mano-mayaḥ, prāṇa-mayaḥ.

The Creator fixed for himself the three kinds of food, namely, the mind, the speech and the vital force. The meaning of these three faculties in the human individual as instruments for the acquisition of food has been explained elsewhere. The mind is the real seer, not the eyes, and the mind is the real sense-organ and not the other well-known ones, because it is observed that when the mind is elsewhere the eyes will not see their objects and the senses do not act in that condition. Thus, it is to be concluded that the mind is the principal medium of knowledge. What are generally known as desire, resolution or determination, doubt, faith, or the absence of it, patience, or impatience, modesty, understanding, fear, are all in fact the mind itself operating in different ways and forms. One can feel a sensation through the mind even if one is touched from the back.

Likewise, all modulations of voice and formations of sound may be said to be comprehended by the principle of speech. While speech can express the character of objects, it cannot express itself. In a similar way, Prāṇa, Apāna, Vyāna, Udāna and Sāmana are different forms of the activity of the central vital force. This central vitality is designated here in this passage as 'Ana', without the prefixes attached to its other forms mentioned.

The entire personality of the individual, the whole body, is composed and consists of these three elements only, namely, mind, speech and Prāṇa (vital force).

4. trayo lokāḥ eta eva, vāg evāyaṁ lokaḥ, mano'ntarikṣa lokaḥ, prāṇo'sau lokāḥ.

The principal functions in our body are speech, mind and Prāṇa, through which we do everything that we can do in this world. The words that we utter, the thoughts that we think, and the energy that we have—these are the constituent factors of our personality through which we deal with others, which we regard as our endowments or faculties of action. These have to be set in tune with the outer world. The three worlds, says this passage, are to be harmonised with the three functions within us. There are three worlds. Trayo lokāḥ: This physical world, the atmospheric world and the celestial world, or the divine paradise, are the three worlds. Vāg evāyaṁ lokaḥ: his world of physical perception is to be identified with everything that words can express through speech, because speech can express only what is sensible, what is visible to the eyes, and this world is what is visible to the eyes. It is an object of the senses, and inasmuch as this world is defined by us as an object of our senses, and the function of speech is only to describe what is an object of the senses, a similarity is to be established between the object-world which is tangible, visible, etc., with the speech which expresses everything that is visible. Speech is, thus, this world. The connection is that speech expresses everything that has a form, everything that can be defined or explained through language which is identified with the world that is visible.

But the mind can think also what is not visible to the eyes. It can infer the existence of certain objects and even worlds which are invisible. The mind is more difficult to understand than the function of speech, because while speech can express only what is tangible, visible, etc., it cannot infer things without the function of the mind. So, the mind has a peculiar advantage of being in a position to deduce things by induction and deduction. The world that is above the physical is such a one. It cannot be visibly perceived; it can only be deduced by inference, and therefore the mind is the only faculty in us which can do this work. Hence the mind is to be identified in meditation with the invisible world which is superior to the physical one and is immediately above it—mano'ntarikṣa lokaḥ.

Prāṇo'sau lokāḥ: Now, the most inscrutable thing within us is the Prāṇa. It cannot think like the mind; it cannot infer; it cannot do the work of logical induction and deduction. It cannot also perceive things like the eyes, but it is a strange element within us which gives energy even to the mind. If the Prāṇa is not to function, the mind also will not think. The Prāṇa is the general reservoir of energy like a powerhouse, and its functions are beyond conception, over which we have no control. To some extent we may have control over our thoughts, but we cannot control the energy function, or the Prāṇa-Śakti within us. It is superior to everything, in a sense, the sense being that it acts according to its own way. It has its own manner; it is regulated by certain other laws altogether, independent of the laws that we can think of in our minds. We cannot increase or decrease the energy within us. We cannot even direct its course, as we can do with the mind or speech. So, the most subtle realm which is the divine or celestial one, the paradise, is identified with the Prāṇa, the pure energy. Prāṇo'sau lokāḥ: The highest world, which is celestial, is inscrutable beyond conception, cannot be even inferred by the mind, cannot be expressed through speech, and is as unintelligible as the Prāṇa and is the one with which the Prāṇa is to be identified in meditation.

5. trayo vedā eta eva, vāg eva ṛg vedaḥ, mano yajur vedaḥ prāṇah sāma vedaḥ.

These three functions—speech, mind and Prāṇa—are to be identified with certain other important factors also in meditation, namely the Vedas, for instance. Just as there are three worlds with which the three functions have been identified for the purpose of meditation, there are three Vedas, three repositories of knowledge, or wisdom, with which these functions have to be identified. Trayo vedā: There are three Vedas—Ṛg, Yajur and Sāma. Vāg eva ṛg vedaḥ, mano yajur vedaḥ prāṇah sāma vedaḥ: Ṛg Veda is to be identified with all speech because it is the immediate source available of all hymns offered to the gods. An outcome of it, something that is based upon it for the purpose of a further practical performance, is Yajur Veda. The correlation between the Ṛg Veda and the Yajur Veda is something like the correlation between the speech and the mind which work together. So is the case in the application of the Ṛg Veda and the Yajur Veda Mantras in sacrifice. They are correlated in action. Sāma Veda is the essence, the quintessence of the Mantras of the Ṛg Veda. Certain important Mantras from the Ṛg Veda are culled out and set into tune or music, which collection of Mantras is called the Sāma Veda which is chanted in certain intonations. And it, being the last essence and therefore more difficult to understand than the other two Vedas, is identified with that principle within us which is more difficult to understand than the others, namely the Prāṇa. So, the meditation is that the speech-principle may be identified with the Ṛg Veda, the mind with the Yajur Veda and the Prāṇa with the Sāma Veda.

6. devāḥ pitaro manuṣyā eta eva, vāg eva devāḥ, manaḥ pitaraḥ, prāṇo manuṣyāḥ.

Just as there are three worlds, there are three types of denizens in this world. The inhabitants of these worlds are also to be identified with the three functions in meditation. The gods inhabit heaven; the Pitrs, or ancestors, inhabit the atmospheric realm which is midway between earth and heaven; the human beings inhabit this physical world. These three have to be identified in meditation, so that they also become harmonised with our own being. Vāg eva devāḥ, manaḥ pitaraḥ, prāṇo manuṣyāḥ: The speech is to be identified with the celestials, the mind with the Pitrs or ancestors in the atmospheric realm, and the Prāṇa with all created beings here in this physical world. The idea behind this meditation is that everything conceivable should be set in tune with one's own being. The distractions in meditation, the difficulties that we have in meditation are all due to there being certain things external to us. They may be objects; they may be persons or worlds or realms, whatever may be. The existence of these things, which cannot be reconciled with our own being, is the reason why we have distraction in meditation. We have problems with these things, and they cannot be set in harmony with us. We are dissimilar to them in quality and they are dissimilar to us in character. They remain always alien to us as foreign elements. But the very presence of these alien elements disturbs our minds. They come to our thoughts and then begin to tell us that they are there as irreconcilable creations. So, the irreconcilability of our being with something or the other in the world outside is the cause of difficulties in meditation. If everything can be harmonised with what we are, the mind will go straight to its target of meditation without any problem on the way. Every problem is a kind of irreconcilability, and the whole function of these meditations throughout, right from the Fifth Chapter onwards, is to find ways and means of reconciling ourselves with anything and everything.

7. pitā mātā prajā eta eva, mana eva pitā, van mātā, prāṇaḥ prajā.

Also, you identify yourself with the family members. Do not have any kind of tension with them. You have a father; you have a mother; you have children in the family. Now, you set your mind in tune with these in meditation—the mind as the father, speech as the mother and the Prāṇas as the children, because they come out of the union of speech and mind. So, you have here symbols for meditation which take into consideration whatever is immediately present in the family, whatever is the object of your learning the Vedas, whatever is regarded by you as the entire creation, the three realms of being, the three worlds mentioned here and the inhabitants of all the three worlds. Nothing is left out; everything is brought into consideration. All beings have become friendly with you; they have been set in tune with you; they are objects of your meditation. And the purpose of the meditation is to enable you to identify your being with all these beings. It is not a meditation on some external object merely for the purpose of apprehending its outer character. The meditation, whatever be the nature of that meditation, has its final aim in communion with the object, so that the object ceases to be an object and becomes a part of you. The intention of meditation is to abolish the existence of the object and affirm the existence of the subject only, which remains there as an enhanced existence because it has become larger than the original form it assumed as an individual subject isolated from the object. Now it has become a more magnified subject because it has already absorbed into its being the object also. Every object is, thus, absorbed into the subject so that you are a very large subject; a magnified form of your own being.

This is the central intention of this Upaniṣhad meditation, an enhancement of the magnitude of the subject, which is achieved by the absorption of the object into the subject, here meaning anything which the mind thinks as existing, so that they may not come and interfere with the meditation. Even the gods should not place an obstacle before you in meditation, because they too are brought and made subjects or converted into such objects of meditation. Neither should you have trouble from people in this world, nor from the world outside, nor from gods in heaven. Nothing should be an obstacle to you in your great objective of spiritual contemplation. That is why you set yourself in tune with all things in the beginning itself.

8. vijñātaṁ vijijñāsyam avijñātam eta eva; yat kiṁ ca vijñātam, vācas tad rūpam, vāgg hi vijñātā, vāg enaṁ tad bhūtvāvati.

Vijñātaṁ vijijñāsyam avijñātam eta eva: There are three types of objects—known objects, objects which are to be known, and the objects which have not been known. All these three types have to be identified with speech, mind and Prāṇa. Yat kiṁ ca vijñātam, vācas tad rūpam: Whatever is known already may be identified with the realm of speech. As has been mentioned earlier, speech is nothing but a means of expressing by way of definition anything that is visible to the eyes, the tangible world of sense. Whatever is known alone can be expressed by speech. What is unknown or intended to be known cannot be expressed by speech. Speech, which is language, is employed for the purpose of defining, expressing things which are already known. And, therefore, identify the realm of speech with everything that is known. Yat kiṁ ca vijñātam, vācas tad rūpam, vāgg hi vijñātā, vāg enaṁ tad bhūtvāvati: If you are able to identify your aspect of being which is superintended over by the speech principle with everything that is known, what happens? What is the result that follows from this meditation? You become that very visible thing, the entire visible realm within you, upon which you have been meditating, and that ceases from obstructing you in any way. The visible word shall not be an obstacle to you afterwards. It shall protect you, take care of you, help you onwards, rather than put an obstacle before you. The world shall not obstruct you. It shall only help you, on the other hand, in your onward march, on account of this kind of meditation where your aspect of expression through language and speech is identified with the whole known world. That which is not known completely, but can be known by inference, etc., has to be identified with the mind because this is the function of the mind. The mind can imagine by inference what is not known, but can be known by deduction, etc.

9. yat kiṁ ca vijijñāsyaṁ, manasas tad rūpam; mano hi vijñāsyam, mana enaṁ tad bhūtvāvati.

Yat kiṁ ca vijijñāsyaṁ, manasas tad rūpam; mano hi vijñāsyam: While speech can express things clearly, the mind is of a different nature altogether. It cannot express things so clearly as speech does. You cannot understand your own mind so clearly as you can understand what you have spoken through words. Your expressions through speech are clearer than the thoughts in the mind, which are more complicated. So, the mind is something to be known, not already known clearly. Such a thing which the mind is, has to be identified with everything that is capable of being known, but not yet known—the worlds that are not clearly visible, but can be inferred by deduction, etc.

Continued