Namaste, Welcome to SAM-VAD (Together In Conversation), Today I would like to share excerpts from this monumental work by Dr. S. Radhakrishnan (India’s 2nd President), this classic book was first published in 1953.
Also as we begin today ‘let us remember this about ‘Attention’. Our life experience would ultimately amount to whatever we had paid attention to. Attention: is important and most of the times we are so indifferent to it. It is as fundamental as food; and we go blundering about, seeking ways to assuage the craving, instead of learning how to provide ourselves with what we need, sensibly and calmly. We feed the hunger blindly. Once the mechanism is brought to our attention and we begin to study it, it is as if a veil has been stripped off ordinary life, and we become freer in our action and choices.
It still remains in print and you can buy your book from the link below or from any bookstore near you or on-line portal accessible to you:
Excerpts:
Human nature is not altogether unchanging but it does remain sufficiently constant to justify the study of ancient classics. The problems of human life and destiny have not been superseded by the striking achievements of science and technology. The Upanishads, though remote in time from us, are not remote in thought. They disclose the working of the primal impulses of the human soul which rise above the differences of race and of geographical position.
At a time when moral aggression is compelling people to capitulate (yield) to queer (oblique, perverse) ways of life, when vast experiments in social structure and political organization are being made at enormous cost of life and suffering, when we stand perplexed and confused before the future with no clear light to guide our way, the power of the human soul is the only refuge.
The task set to our generation is to reconcile the varying ideals of the converging cultural patterns and help them to sustain and support rather than combat and destroy one another.
The Term ‘UPANISHAD’
The word ‘Upanishad’ is derived from upa (near), ni (down) and shad (to sit), i.e. sitting down near.
Shankara derives the word Upanishad as a substantive from the root sad, ‘to loosen’, ‘to reach’ or ‘to destroy’ with upa and ni as prefixes. If this derivation is accepted, Upanishad means brahma-knowledge by which ignorance is loosened or destroyed. There is a core of certainty which is essentially incommunicable except by a way of life.
Literally, Vedanta means the end of the Veda, vedasya antah, the conclusions as well as the goal of the Vedas. The chief reason why the Upanishads are called the end of the Veda is that they represent the central aim and the meaning of the teaching of the Veda.
The word ‘Veda’, from vid, to know, means knowledge par excellence, sacred wisdom. Science is the knowledge of secondary causes, of the created details; wisdom is the knowledge of primary causes, of the Uncreated Principle.
The Upanishads distinguish between a-para vidya and para vidya. While the former gives us knowledge of the Vedas and the sciences, the latter helps us to gain the knowledge of the Imperishable.
The Principal Upanishads – Dr. S. Radhkrishnan
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