The Upanishads
Vedic Rishis c. 500 BCE
Three of the principal Upanishads, the Isa, Katha, and Kena, ask what the self is and how it relates to everything else. In the Katha, a boy sent to the god of death turns down wealth and long life until Death tells him what happens to us after we die.
28 pages 33 min reading time
- Among the ten principal Upanishads, the closing teachings of the Vedas on which Vedanta, the most influential school of Hindu philosophy, is built.
- The Katha compares the body to a chariot driven by the mind, with the senses as its horses, and calls the steady holding back of the senses "Yoga", one of the earliest uses of the word for that discipline. The Bhagavad Gita repeats its verses on the self that cannot be killed.
- Gandhi said that if every other Hindu scripture were lost and only the Isa's first verse survived, Hinduism would live forever.
- Through a Latin translation of a Persian version, they reached the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, who called them the consolation of his life. T. S. Eliot ended The Waste Land with "Shantih shantih shantih", the formal ending of an Upanishad.
Translated by Swami Paramananda