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Video Information: 11.07.22

Context:

श्वेतकेतुर्हारुणेयः पञ्चालाना समितिमेयाय त ह प्रवाहणो जैवलिरुवाच कुमारानु त्वाऽशिषत्पितेत्यनु हि भगव इति ॥

Once Svetaketu, the grandson of Aruna, came to the assembly of the Panchalas. Pravahana, the son of Jivala, enquired of him, 'My boy, has your father instructed you?' 'He has indeed, revered sir' Chandogya Upanishad 5.3.1

वेत्थ यदितोऽधि प्रजाः प्रयन्तीति न भगव इति वेत्थ यथा पुनरावर्तन्त इति न भगव इति पत्रोर्देवयानस्य पितृयाणस्य च व्यावर्तना ३ इति न भगव इति

Do you know where created beings go above from here?" No. revered sir. "Do you know the place of parting of the two paths- the path of the gods and the path of the fathers?" "No, revered sir'
Chandogya Upanishad 5.3.2

कथ यथासी लोकी न संपूर्णत ३ इति न भगव इति वेत्थ पत्रा पञ्चम्यामागुतावाः पुरुषवर भवन्तीति नैव भगत इति।

'Do you know why the other world is not filled up?' "No, indeed, revered sir' Do you know how, at the fifth oblation, the liquid oblations (or unseen results of action) come to be designated as man?" "No, indeed, revered sir'
Chandogya Upanishad 5.3.3

अथानु किमनुशिष्ठोऽवोचथा यो हीमानि न विद्यात्कथ सोऽनुशिष्टो ब्रुवीतेति स हाऽऽ ।
यस्तः पितुरर्धमेयाय त होवाचाऽननुशिष्य वाव किल मा भगवानब्रवीदनु त्वाऽशिषमिति॥

Then why did you say, "I have been instructed"? because, how can he who does not know these things say, "I have been instructed"?" He was distressed and came to his father's place and said to him, 'Revered Sir, without having instructed me properly you said, "I have instructed you".
Chandogya Upanishad 5.3.4

पञ्च मा राजन्यबन्धुः प्रश्नानप्राक्षीत्तेषां नैकंचनाशकं विवक्तुमिति स होवाच यथा मा त्वं तदैतानवदो यथाहमेषां नैकंचन वेद यद्यहमिमानवेदिष्यं कथं ते नावक्ष्यमिति ॥

That nominal Kshatriya asked me five questions, and I was not able to answer even one of them'. The father said, 'Even as you have spoken to me about them, so do I not know even one of them. If I had known them, why should I not have told you?
Chandogya Upanishad 5.3.5

स ह गौतमो राज्ञोऽर्थमेयाय तस्मै ह प्राप्तायाहाँचकार स ह प्रातः सभाग उदेयाय त होवाच मानुषस्य भगवन्गौतम वित्तस्य वरं वृणीथा इति स होवाच तवैव राजन्मानुषं वित्तं यामेव कुमारस्यान्ते वाचमभाषथास्तामेव मे ब्रूहीति स ह कृच्छ्री बभूव ॥

Then Gautama went to the king's place. When he arrived, the king made reverential offerings to him. In the morning he presented himself to the king when he was in the assembly.
Chandogya Upanishad 5.3.6

तह चिरं करीत्याज्ञापयांचकार त होवाच यथा मा त्वं गौतमावदो पचेयं न प्राक्त्वतः पुरा दिए ब्राहाणान्यच्छति तस्मादु सर्वेषु लोकेषु क्षत्रस्व प्रशासनमभूदिति तस्मै होचाच

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Learning
Transcript
00:00So, we have Chandogya Upanishad, we are starting from 5.3.1 and we'll take a few verses thereafter.
00:27So, once Shwetaketu, the grandson of Arun, came to the assembly of the Panchals.
00:42Ravahana, the son of Jaivil, enquired of him, my boy, has your father instructed you?
01:01He said, Shwetaketu that is, Shwetaketu said, he has indeed, sir.
01:12So now, these princes ask him a few questions.
01:18He has come to the royal assembly of the Panchals and now they are testing him with a few questions.
01:29Do you know where the created beings go above from here?
01:34No, revered sir.
01:37Do you know the place of parting of the two paths, the path of the gods and the path of the fathers?
01:44No, revered sir.
01:48Do you know why the other world is not filled up?
01:53No, revered sir.
01:54Do you know how at the fifth oblation, the liquid oblations or the unseen results of action come to be designated as man?
02:05No, indeed, revered sir.
02:09Then why did you say, I have been instructed?
02:12Because how can he who does not know these things say, I have been instructed?
02:18So Shwetaketu was distressed and he came to his father's place and said to him, revered sir, without having instructed me properly, you said, I have instructed you.
02:36That nominal Kshatriya asked me five questions and I was unable to answer even one of them.
02:44The father said, even as you have spoken to me about them, so I do not know even one of them.
02:52Had I known them, why should I have not told you?
02:58So then the father, Gautam, went to the king's place.
03:03When he arrived, the king made reverential offerings to him.
03:08In the morning, he presented himself to the king when he was in the assembly.
03:12The king said to him, poor revered Gautam, please ask for a boon of human wealth.
03:19He replied, O king, let the human wealth remain with you.
03:23Tell me those words which you spoke to my boy.
03:27The king was perturbed.
03:33The king commanded him, stay here for a long time.
03:36At the end of the period, he said to him, even as he told me, O Gautam, prior to you,
03:41this knowledge never went to the Brahmins.
03:45This is why the expounding of this knowledge belonged to the Kshatriyas in earlier times
03:49in all the worlds and then he instructed him.
03:56See what is happening.
03:57Let's try to understand.
04:07In the spiritual domain, in the spiritual literature, you will come across two types.
04:22One is that which contains knowledge of the type that gets old.
04:35Knowledge that gets old and outdated.
04:40So that consists of ideas, principles, concepts, speculations, imaginations.
04:50These are things that are limited by the human condition at a particular place at a particular
04:58time.
04:59You know only so much and what you know is determined by where you are, who you are,
05:05how old you are, who surround you, how you have been educated, what is the level of accumulated
05:11knowledge in your society, those things.
05:15And as time marches on, you find that in general, you are accumulating more knowledge, better
05:21knowledge, more refined knowledge and the stuff that you had in earlier times is no
05:28longer relevant and knowledge of this kind abounds the spiritual books.
05:39That part has to be put in its place.
05:44That part has to be seen as time bound, not timeless, not something that will bring you
05:55to liberation but still of interest because it gives you a peek into the mind of the enquirer
06:12and the conditions of the times when the scripture was composed.
06:23This differentiation is very important.
06:26If this differentiation is not made, if literatures of these two kinds are not seen as fundamentally
06:37different from each other, then there is a lot of problem.
06:43Stuff that is of time bound nature must be of interest to us only to the extent it helps
06:57us know the prevailing conditions of those times.
07:04So there is a historical importance.
07:07You come to know what those people used to believe in, what their concepts were, how
07:14they were limited, how the society was organized and many other interesting things.
07:20Like you study in history or archaeology, museums are important, are they not?
07:31And there is a beauty that you perceive when you visit a museum.
07:37So the time bound parts of scriptures indeed do have beauty but that beauty has only a
07:47historical or you could say archaeological significance.
07:55When I am talking of archaeology, I am talking of it in the subtle sense.
08:00You could say in the psychological sense.
08:04Now there are these questions that Shwetakirtu is asked.
08:10So what are those questions?
08:12Do you know the place of the parting of the two paths, the paths of the gods and the paths
08:16of the fathers?
08:18The fact is that absolutely, truly there are no such two paths.
08:24That these paths exist is the belief of those times.
08:32So importance does not lie at the level of knowledge.
08:40These princes that Shwetakirtu has gone to, they are testing him in knowledge.
08:47Have you been told of the path of gods, of the path of the fathers?
08:52Shwetakirtu says, no, I do not know.
08:55Similarly, they are asking him, do you know why the other world is not filled up?
09:00Now it would be a great mistake if you start thinking that Chandogya Upanishad is about
09:07some other world and it's filling up.
09:12This story is not there to instruct you about the other world or the path of gods or the
09:17path of fathers.
09:18These are mere beliefs of those times.
09:21And these beliefs are not at all central to the Upanishads.
09:25Here it has been mentioned in the passing.
09:30The emphasis of Upanishads is on understanding reality as it is and being liberated from
09:37it.
09:38Upanishads do not stand for cultivating beliefs about this world or the other world.
09:45Similarly, the question, do you know how at the fifth oblation, the liquid oblations come
09:51to be designated as man, fourth oblation, fifth oblation, seventh oblation.
09:58They carry no spiritual significance at all.
10:01Similarly, the liquid oblations do not come to be designated as man.
10:06Even that is either a euphemism, a metaphor of some kind or a mere belief that has been
10:14outdated beyond any kind of acceptability today.
10:27So these questions are asked to him and in some sense, his current knowledge, his general
10:32knowledge is being checked and Shwetaketu honestly says, you know, I do not know any
10:37of these things.
10:39So they say, if you do not know these things, then how come you say that you have been instructed?
10:42So he goes back and he says, father, you have instructed me, I do not know these things.
10:47I went there and I had to face this humiliation.
10:53They asked me these questions.
10:54I had no answers and they said, you claim you are instructed, you do not know anything.
10:58The father says, son, had I known of these things, I would have instructed you and I
11:03do not know of these things.
11:05So then the father goes to the king and says, king, tell me about the stuff that you spoke
11:12to my son.
11:14The king says, well, you can take a lot of wealth.
11:16He says, I do not need your wealth.
11:18You tell me of the stuff that you spoke to my son.
11:23This is what is timeless.
11:26This is what is important.
11:29And you must gather the distinction.
11:31Today, it is of no significance.
11:36All this talk about the path of God's path of father's fifth oblation, liquid oblation,
11:41is that no significance.
11:42All that has gone.
11:44All that has changed.
11:45Nobody has those questions today.
11:48But what is it that has remained unchanged since the Chandogya Upanishad till today?
11:58What is it that has not changed?
12:00Human relationships.
12:05People will have sons and people must know how to raise sons.
12:11And people will have ignorance.
12:13They must know how to deal with their ignorance.
12:16And people will look at the world and the world is full of stuff and people must know
12:20how to deal with that stuff.
12:22So what has not changed is that the human being is always in relationship.
12:28The human being is always related.
12:30The given excerpt here allows us rich insights into at least three kinds of relationships.
12:38The first relationship is between the boy and his father.
12:42The second relationship is between a person and his ignorance.
12:49The third relationship is between a person and worldly wealth.
12:55That's what is to be learned from this.
12:57Those relationships existed then and exist even today.
13:01So that part of the Upanishad is relevant to us.
13:04The other part is outdated and we are not interested.
13:07We do not want to know about the oblations and this and that.
13:11We know where man comes from.
13:13In the material sense, today we know much more about the birth of man, about material
13:20processes, about human anatomy, about the fetus, about the embryo.
13:26We know a lot more than was known in the Vedic times.
13:30So when it comes to worldly knowledge, it's not the Vedas we have to look to.
13:35They will not be able to offer much to us.
13:39However, they offer us tremendously rich stuff when it comes to the internal world.
13:47Are you getting it?
13:49Because the internal world has not changed.
13:50It cannot change.
13:53Every child even today is born at the same place, in the same psychological place.
14:00It was born 3000 years ago.
14:04It is not born in the same worldly place.
14:08When the child is born, it is born in two worlds.
14:10One, the internal world, second, the external world.
14:13The external world has changed beyond recognition.
14:163000 years ago, the child was born and all he sensed around himself was a lot of ignorance,
14:23poverty, this and that.
14:24The economic conditions were different.
14:25The social conditions were different.
14:27Those things were there.
14:28Today, when the child is born, externally he perceives very, very different conditions.
14:34But internally, that child 3000 years back and today are born in the same place, exactly
14:39the same place.
14:40So, it's the internal station that is more important and it is the internal station that
14:46the Upanishads address.
14:48Internal station consists of relationships as well.
14:52That's what is being addressed here.
14:54So, what is it that I find interesting in the excerpt taken today?
14:59First, the fact that the father is also the teacher and the father is made responsible
15:12to educate the kid in stuff that is really important.
15:21So, when he is asked, have you been instructed, he says, yes, by whom, by a father.
15:28It's a father who knows that merely giving physical birth to the child is not enough.
15:34I have to act as someone who educates him well, deeply.
15:43Otherwise, I would have done great injustice.
15:48To give body to the kid and not relieve the kid of bodily identification is kind of cruelty,
16:02is it not?
16:05What have you given the kid?
16:07Bodily identification, a lot of hardships, that's what you have given to the kid by giving
16:13birth to him.
16:15Now, since you have done this, now you are indebted.
16:25You owe to provide liberation to your child.
16:30That's something you owe the child.
16:36Else you have harmed him.
16:43Really to just give birth is to just give harm.
16:48So, if you are giving the body to the child, it is extremely important that you do not
16:55fail in your role to give freedom from bodily identification to the child.
17:04And that's the role Shwetaketu's father has taken upon himself.
17:11Then this passage offers valuable insight into the kind of society that is there.
17:19He goes to some place.
17:22They are not really assessing him on his wealth or pedigree or other things.
17:32And he is going to Kshatriya assembly and Kshatriyas are not really supposed to be very
17:37serious about knowledge.
17:38They are supposed to be serious about worldly acquisitions, victories, wealth, power, these
17:43things.
17:46But such was the society that even the royals were more interested in knowledge.
17:56So much so that at one point, the king says there was special knowledge.
18:01It was the privilege of Kshatriyas and never known to Brahmins.
18:04But now that you have come to request, I'll share it with you.
18:08So even the kings were very interested in knowledge.
18:17And that's the lesson that you learn from this passage.
18:20Irrespective of what you do in life, your primary interest, your central love has to
18:26be knowledge.
18:30So he goes there and the sons of the king, they are asking him about what do you know
18:39where do you come from?
18:40They are not inviting him for some fun, frolic, entertainment, come let's go hunt something
18:48or let's talk about riches, you know, now that you have come to us, we'll show you our
18:53beautiful gardens, our magnificent palaces, none of that.
19:02And these are mere boys.
19:05And the boys are discussing top kind of scriptural stuff.
19:18And then they ask him, do you know this, do you know that?
19:21And what do we see Shwet Ketu responding as?
19:27He does not know, he candidly admits, no, I do not know.
19:31No beating about the bush, direct answers, no, I do not know.
19:37And when he does not know, they say, if you have not known, then you must not call yourself
19:42instructed, you need to do better, you need to know more.
19:47The fellow comes back and asks the father, he said, well, you said that you have taught
19:52me, but if you have taught me, why have you not taught me these things?
19:55Father does not say, well, these things still remain.
19:58And when you will be eligible, I'll teach them to you.
20:03Look at the commitment to truth in this relationship.
20:06The father says, I have not taught these things to you because I do not know these things.
20:10Had I known, I would have taught them.
20:14The father is so honest in admitting and then what does the father do?
20:18Now that the son has raised this question, the father cannot let it go lightly.
20:27The father takes it upon himself to learn and the father goes to the king.
20:33What does the king do?
20:34The king says, alright, revered Brahmin, you have come to me, tell me, what in the world
20:40do you need?
20:41Ask me for wealth.
20:42Says, you keep the wealth to yourself.
20:46You tell me of the stuff that you spoke to my boy.
20:50Then deep insight into the mind that leads to the Upanishads.
20:59When you have a mind like this, when you have social conditions like these, that's when
21:05the Upanishads result.
21:09The king is offering money.
21:11The father is saying, I don't need money, I need knowledge.
21:14I'm accountable to my child.
21:16I'm accountable to myself as well because I told my child, when I will know, I will
21:21teach you.
21:22Had I known, I would have taught you.
21:24So my prime responsibility is to know, not to accumulate or gather.
21:34I'm obliged not so much to be rich, but to be knowledgeable.
21:44So this is the process of Vedanta and it is the process that is important.
21:59If you can have that process, then Vedanta is an unending stream.
22:06You will have Upanishads today as well.
22:10And that process must continue even today because the things that you are seeing in
22:16this excerpt fundamentally, internally continue even today.
22:22Don't people have boys today?
22:24If people have boys today, by boys I mean kids, boys and girls both.
22:28If people have kids today, then they are responsible to educate them in the inner sense.
22:41Not just the education the kids get in schools, but real inner life education.
22:49And when you are teaching that stuff to your kids, then you must tell the kids that it
22:58is not the knowledge that I'm giving you is important, but your honesty towards knowledge.
23:09It is a good thing to know, but it is a higher thing to admit when you do not know.
23:18If you know, but you do not know to confess your ignorance when you face it, then all
23:27your knowledge is worthless.
23:31So even if Shwetaketu couldn't answer the questions of the royals, he still didn't miserably
23:40fail.
23:43He passed the test of honesty.
23:46All right, I do not know at the level of knowledge what you're asking me.
23:51But one thing I know for sure, when I do not know, I must admit.
23:57I will admit I do not know and I'll go back to father and ask him, why didn't you teach
24:00me this stuff?
24:02And father says, all right, I couldn't teach you this stuff, but let me at least not fail
24:08in teaching you honesty.
24:12Being the son, if you could admit to the princess that you do not know, being the father, how
24:19can I fail in admitting to you that I do not know?
24:25If Shwetaketu does well, the father does better.
24:29Because it is easier sometimes to acknowledge your ignorance in front of outsiders, but
24:36very difficult to acknowledge your ignorance in front of your own family members, especially
24:46your sons and daughters.
24:48So the father does that and the father does not stop there.
24:53The father then wants to redress his ignorance.
24:59So he goes to the king and the king is saying, you're a top scholar, you have come to me.
25:09Tell me, how do I serve you?
25:11What goods do you need?
25:12He says, no goods needed, something far more important.
25:17Tell me of the stuff you were speaking to my boy.
25:21And the king says, not that you have asked for it, I'll share it with you, I'll educate
25:27you in that.
25:28Now what the king tells the Brahmin, I repeat, is not of much practical utility today.
25:36But these attitudes are very important.
25:40The process that leads to the generation of true knowledge, that is very important.
25:46And that process cannot change, that process is timeless.
25:49The output of that process might be time dependent, but the process has to be timeless.
25:56Knowledge is not something that can belong to one particular age and gets irrelevant
25:59in another age.
26:04People had to be inquisitive then, people have to be inquisitive today.
26:08And if you're not inquisitive towards your inner condition, you may never come to know
26:13how bad the inner condition really is.
26:17And that is where we are actually doing far worse than the ancients.
26:25The ancients, to be truthful, did not really have great outer and material conditions.
26:32There is no need to glamorize the worldly tangible conditions of those times.
26:40And they cannot be faulted for that.
26:42Because knowledge is an accumulative process, one generation builds upon the knowledge of
26:47the other generation.
26:48Today, if you have so much science and technology, that does not prove that this generation is
26:54especially brilliant or outstanding.
26:57It merely means that this generation stands at the receiving end of hundreds of previous
27:04generations.
27:05You have received all their accumulated knowledge and you are enjoying that.
27:15They were the ones who were not at the receiving end of knowledge generated by several previous
27:21generations.
27:24Man's consciousness was just opening up.
27:27Knowledge was just beginning to be generated, unlike today.
27:31Unlike today, when we are luckily the inheritors of so much that our predecessors have already
27:42done, known and struggled for.
27:48So, they did not really have great material conditions, but they had great internal conditions.
28:04And that great internal condition is what we need to learn from them today because we
28:09have great in terms of material wealth and prosperity and all.
28:17Great external conditions, but pathetic internal condition.
28:22Now, let us not make the blunder of learning external things from them.
28:28There, they really do not have much to teach.
28:31It is a double whammy, where they really have much to teach, there we do not want to learn
28:38from them.
28:39The internal stuff, we do not want to learn from them.
28:43Externally, where they really never had much, there we want to glamorize what they had.
28:58Needlessly, artificially, falsely make things up.
29:07And we want to claim that the new nuclear energy, that they had all kinds of science
29:13and technology.
29:14They had none of that.
29:17If you want to learn science and technology from them, you will fail because they never
29:22had much science and technology to offer.
29:25I am sure that this would hurt a lot of people who want to entertain them with the belief
29:36that all the knowledge was already there with the ancients.
29:40No, it was not.
29:43But they had something, I am saying far, far more important than material knowledge.
29:50And that is what you need to learn from them.
29:52Are we getting it?
29:55Learn the right thing from the right person.
29:59You cannot go to the Vedas and try to learn science and technology.
30:03They were not written to teach you science.
30:06But followers of religious sects take great pride in declaring that all the scientific
30:13knowledge is already contained in our holy book, which is a lot of nonsense.
30:18This claim holds no ground.
30:22But the right scripture has something else.
30:26And that something else will never become outdated.
30:30That something else is the juice of life.
30:33That something else will always remain supremely important.
30:41And that is understanding of the mind, the purpose of life, the right view towards life.
30:58And that is why I find this particular excerpt from Chandogya very meaningful.
31:08If you start getting into the content of the knowledge that the royals had and grilled
31:16Shwet Ketu on, you will not find much there.
31:20Maybe some symbolic meaning can be there.
31:25But even the symbolism you will find too far-fetched.
31:31But the other thing is very important.
31:34Look at the relationship between the father and the son, between the father and the king,
31:39between the individual and knowledge, between the individual and ignorance.
31:44That's what you need to learn from here.
31:46Learn the right things from the Upanishads.
31:50Know what to take from where.
31:57History is to be learned from history books.
32:00If you go to the Upanishads and start looking for history, you will come up with all kinds
32:06of distorted conclusions.
32:12Religion is not something you can learn, for example, from a history book.
32:25A spiritual text is that which concerns itself with self-knowledge.
32:33That is defining characteristic, not all the other things.
32:40The other things can be kept aside.
32:42They may have some relevance, but no spiritual dimension whatsoever.
32:53Yes, questions?

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