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as an epitome of the older Upanishads. Their teaching is less complete and uncompromising, more veiled,
tentative and allusive, and sometimes cumbered by material notions. But it is obviously the precursor of the
Vedanta and the devout Vedantist can justify his system from it.
3
Instead of attempting to summarize the Upanishads it may be well to quote one or two celebrated passages.
One is from the Brihad-Aranyaka[182] and relates how Yajnavalkya, when about to retire to the forest as an
ascetic, wished to divide his property between his two wives, Katyayani "who possessed only such knowledge
as women possess" and Maitreyi "who was conversant with Brahman." The latter asked her husband whether
she would be immortal if she owned the whole world. "No," he replied, "like the life of the rich would be thy
life but there is no hope of immortality." Maitreyi said that she had no need of what would not make her
immortal. Yajnavalkya proceeded to explain to her his doctrine of the Atman, the self or essence, the spirit
present in man as well as in the universe. "Not for the husband's sake is the husband dear but for the sake of
the Atman. Not for the wife's sake is the wife dear but for the sake of the Atman. Not for their own sake are
sons, wealth, Brahmans, warriors, worlds, gods, Vedas and all things dear, but for the sake of the Atman. The
Atman is to be seen, to be heard, to be perceived, to be marked: by him who has seen and known the Atman
all the universe is known.... He who looks for Brahmans, warriors, worlds, gods or Vedas anywhere but in the
Atman, loses them all...."
"As all waters have their meeting place in the sea, all touch in the skin, all tastes in the tongue, all odours in
the nose, all colours in the eye, all sounds in the ear, all percepts in the mind, all knowledge in the heart, all
actions in the hands....As a lump of salt has no inside nor outside and is nothing but taste, so has this Atman
neither inside nor outside and is nothing but knowledge. Having risen from out these elements it (the human
CHAPTER V. ASCETICISM AND KNOWLEDGE 81
Hinduism and Buddhism, Vol I.
soul) vanishes with them. When it has departed (after death) there is no more consciousness." Here Maitreyi
professes herself bewildered but Yajnavalkya continues "I say nothing bewildering. Verily, beloved, that
Atman is imperishable and indestructible. When there is as it were duality, then one sees the other, one tastes
the other, one salutes the other, one hears the other, one touches the other, one knows the other. But when the
Atman only is all this, how should we see, taste, hear, touch or know another? How can we know him by
whose power we know all this? That Atman is to be described by no, no (neti, neti). He is incomprehensible
for he cannot be comprehended, indestructible for he cannot be destroyed, unattached for he does not attach
himself: he knows no bonds, no suffering, no decay. How, O beloved, can one know the knower?" And
having so spoken, Yajnavalkya went away into the forest. In another verse of the same work it is declared that
"This great unborn Atman (or Self) undecaying, undying, immortal, fearless, is indeed Brahman."
It is interesting that this doctrine, evidently regarded as the quintessence of Yajnavalkya's knowledge, should
be imparted to a woman. It is not easy to translate. Atman, of course, means self and is so rendered by Max
Mueller in this passage, but it seems to me that this rendering jars on the English ear for it inevitably suggests
the individual self and selfishness, whereas Atman means the universal spirit which is Self, because it is the
highest (or only) Reality and Being, not definable in terms of anything else. Nothing, says Yajnavalkya, has
any value, meaning, or indeed reality except in relation to this Self[183]. The whole world including the
Vedas and religion is an emanation from him. The passage at which Maitreyi expresses her bewilderment is
obscure, but the reply is more definite. The Self is indestructible but still it is incorrect to speak of the soul
having knowledge and perception after death, for knowledge and perception imply duality, a subject and an
object. But when the human soul and the universal Atman are one, there is no duality and no human
expression can be correctly used about the Atman. Whatever you say of it, the answer must be neti, neti, it is
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