Masonic, Occult and Esoteric Online Library
The Upanishads, Part 1
By Max Müller
II, 1, 2
SECOND KHANDA.
1. People say: 'Uktha, uktha,' hymns, hymns! (without knowing what uktha, hymn 3, means.) The hymn is truly (to be considered as) the earth, for from it all whatsoever exists arises.
2. The object of its praise is Agni (fire), and the eighty verses (of the hymn) are food, for by means of food one obtains everything.
3. The hymn is truly the sky, for the birds fly along the sky, and men drive following the sky. The object of its praise is Vâyu (air), and the eighty verses (of the hymn) are food, for by means of food one obtains everything.
4. The hymn is truly the heaven, for from its gift (rain) all whatsoever exists arises. The object of its praise is Âditya (the sun), and the eighty verses are food, for by means of food one obtains everything.
5. So much with reference to the gods (mythological); now with reference to man (physiological).
6. The hymn is truly man. He is great, he is Pragâpati. Let him think, I am the hymn.
7. The hymn is his mouth, as before in the case of the earth.
8. The object of its praise is speech, and the eighty verses (of the hymn) are food, for by means of food he obtains everything.
9. The hymn is the nostrils, as before in the case of the sky.
10. The object of its praise is breath, and the eighty verses (of the hymn) are food, for by means of food he obtains everything.
11. The slight bent (at the root) of the nose is, as it were, the place of the brilliant (Âditya, the sun).
12. The hymn is the forehead, as before in the case of heaven. The object of its praise is the eye, and the eighty verses (of the hymn) are food, for by means of food he obtains everything.
13. The eighty verses (of the hymn) are alike food with reference to the gods as well as with reference to man. For all these beings breathe and live by means of food indeed. By food (given in alms, &c.) he conquers this world, by food (given in sacrifice) he conquers the other. Therefore the eighty verses (of the hymn) are alike food, with reference to the gods as well as with reference to man.
14. All this that is food, and all this that consumes food, is only the earth, for from the earth arises all whatever there is.
115. And all that goes hence (dies on earth), heaven consumes it all; and all that goes thence (returns from heaven to a new life) the earth consumes it all.
16. That earth is thus both food and consumer.
He also (the true worshipper who meditates on himself as being the uktha) is both consumer and consumed (subject and object 1). No one possesses that which he does not eat, or the things which do not eat him 2.
Footnotes
202:3 The Comm. explains uktha as that from whence the favour of the gods arises, uttishthaty anena devatâprasâda iti vyutpatteh. p. 203 The object is now to show that the uktha or hymn used at the Mahâvrata ceremony has a deeper meaning than it seems to have, and that its highest aim is Brahman; not, however, the highest Brahman, but Brahman considered as life (prâna).
204:1 As a master who lives by his servants, while his servants live by him. Comm.
204:2 I have translated these paragraphs, as much as possible, according to the commentator. I doubt whether, either in the original or in the interpretation of the commentator, they yield any very definite sense. They are vague speculations, vague, at least, to us, though intended by the Brahmans to give a deeper meaning to certain ceremonial observances connected with the Mahâvrata. The uktha, or hymn, which is to be meditated on, as connected with the sacrifice, is part of the Mahâvrata, an important ceremony, to be p. 205 performed on the last day but one (the twenty-fourth) of the Gavâmayana sacrifice. That sacrifice lasts a whole year, and its performance has been fully described in the Brâhmanas and Âranyakas. But while the ordinary performer of the Mahâvrata has simply to recite the uktha or nishkevalya-sastra, consisting of eighty verses (trika) in the Gâyatrî, Brihatî, and Ushnih metres, the more advanced worshipper (or priest) is to know that this uktha has a deeper meaning, and is to meditate on it as being the earth, sky, heaven, also as the human body, mouth, nostrils, and forehead. The worshipper is in fact to identify himself by meditation with the uktha in all its senses, and thus to become the universal spirit or Hiranyagarbha. By this process he becomes the consumer and consumed, the subject and object, of everything, while another sacrificer, not knowing this, remains in his limited individual sphere, or, as the text expresses it, does not possess what he cannot eat (perceive), or what cannot eat him (perceive him). The last sentence is explained differently by the commentator, but in connexion with the whole passage it seems to me to become more intelligible, if interpreted as I have proposed to interpret it.
