693 



VEDA. 



VEDA. 



691 





An Upanishad of the second class is, for instance, the I's'a-Upanishad, 

 which derives an additional interest from the circumstance that it is 

 the only Upanishad which forms part of a Sanhita itself, namely, of 

 that of the White Yajurveda, and thus strengthens the proofs, which 

 may be alleged for the later recension of this Veda. It runs as follows : 

 " Whatever exists in this world is to be enveloped by (the thought of) 

 God (the Ruler). By renouncing the world, thou shalt save (thy soul). 

 Do not covet the riches of any one. Performing sacred works, let a 

 man desire to live a hundred years. If thou thus (desirest), man, 

 there is no other manner in which thou art not tainted by work. To 

 the godless worlds, covered with gloomy darkness, go all the people, 

 when departing (from this world), who are slayers of their souls. He 

 (the soul) does not move, is swifter than the mind, not the gods (the 

 senses) did obtain him, he was gone before. Standing, he outstrips all 

 the other (gods, senses), how fast they run. Within him the ruler of 

 the atmosphere upholds the vital actions. He moves, he does not 

 move ; he is far and also near ; he is within this all, he is out of this 

 all. Whoever beholds all beings in the soul alone, and the soul in all 

 beings, does hence not look down (on any creature). When a man 

 knowa that all beings are even the soul, when he beholds the unity (oi 

 the soul), then there is no delusion, no grief. He is all-pervadin?, 

 brilliant, without body, invulnerable, without muscles, pure, untainted 

 by sin, he is allwise, the Ruler of the mind, above all beings, and self- 

 existent. He distributed according to their nature the things for 

 everlasting years. Those who worship ignorance, enter into gloomy 

 darkness, into still greater darkness those who are devoted to know- 

 edge. They say, different is the effect of knowledge, different the 

 effect of ignorance; thus we heard from the sages who explained (both) 

 to us. Whoever knows both, knowledge and ignorance together, over- 

 comes death by ignorance, and enjoys immortality by knowledge. 

 Those who worship uncreated nature, enter into gloomy darkness, into 

 still greater darkness those who are devoted to created nature. They 

 say, different is the effect from (worshipping) uncreated nature, different 

 from (worshipping) created nature. This we heard from the gages who 

 explained (both) to us. Whoever knows both, created nature and 

 destruction together, overcomes death by destruction, and enjoys im- 

 mortality by created, nature. To me whose duty ia truth, open, 

 Pushan, the entrance to the truth concealed by the brilliant disk, in 

 order to behold (thee). Pushan, R'ishi thou alone, O dispenser of 

 justice (Yama), O Sun, offspring of Prajapati, disperse thy rays (and) 

 collect thy light ; let me see thy most auspicious fonn ; for the same 

 soul which is in thee, am I. Let my vital spark obtain the immortal 

 air ; then let this body be consumed to ashes. Om. my mind, 

 remember, remember (thy) acts, mind, remember, remember thy 

 acts. Ouide us, O Agni, by the road of bliss to enjoyment ; (guide us), 

 O Qod, who knowest all acts. Destroy our crooked sin, that we offer 

 thee our best salutation." (Ib., vol. xv. p. 71.) 



The principal Aran'yaka and Upanishads connected with each of the 

 fjnir Vedas are the following: to the R'igveda belong, the Aitareya- 

 Aran'yaka and the Kaushltaka-Aranyaka, the third book of which is 

 the Kanshitaky- Upanishad. The Upanishads of the Samaveda are the 

 Chhandogya- and the^ Kena-Upanishad. To the Black Yajurveda 

 belongs the Taittirlya-Aran'yaka, the four last books of which contain 

 two Upanishads, namely, the Taittirlya- and the Narayan'iya-Upanishad ; 

 besides the Swetas'watara-, MaitrAyan'a-, and Kat haka-Upanishad. 

 That the Br'ihad-Ann'yaka is attached to the Brahinan'a of the White 

 Yajurveda, has been stated already. 



The largest number of Upanishads, however, has grown up in con- 

 ^nection with the Atharvaveda, which seems to have favoured more than 

 ' the sacrificial Vedas the tendency for mystical reasoning. Among them 

 we name especially the Mun'd'aka-, Pras'na-, Brahma-, and Man'd'ukya- 

 Upanishad, as treating of the nature of the divine and human soul. 

 The JabaU-, Sannyosa-, As'rama-, and Hansa-Upaniahad are some of 

 those which describe the means by which deep meditation or the 

 abstract union with the Supreme Soul can be obtained. A third class, 

 as mentioned above, bus a sectarian character, by identifying the 

 Supreme Soul with Vishn'u or S'iva in their various forms ; among 

 those referring to Vishn'u we notice the NarAyan'a-, and the Nr'isinha- 

 tapaniya-Upanishad ; among those connected with the worship of S'iva 

 we find the S'atarudriya-, Kaivalya-, Skanda-Upanishad, and one called 

 Atharvas'iras. (For a fuller account of this class of works, see Pro- 

 fessor Weber's ' Akademische Vorlesungen iiber Indische Literatur- 

 geschichte.' and his ' Indische Studien.') 



While the Upanishads are the intermediate link between the Vedas 

 and the later systems of Hindu philosophy, the Veddnyot show us how 

 Hcientific research grew up in India from the soil of the sacred texts. 

 If we consider the bulk of literature which is comprised by the Sanhitas 

 and Brahman 'as, and the an.-doiis desire which every Brahmanic believer 

 must have felt to preserve it in its integrity, it is easily understood 

 that in the course of time various means were devised for securing the 

 correctness of the sacred texts, for guarding their sense against erro- 

 neous interpretations, and for maintaining in its purity a proper prac- 

 tice of the rites which were taught in the Brahmau'a. This is the 

 object of the Vedanga works. The Brahman'a of the Samaveda speak 

 of six Vedanga or " Umbs of the Veda," in other words, of six works or 

 fhMM of works which were instrumental in maintaining the integrity 

 'if the Veda. But it is not certain whether this Brahman'a means 

 the same six Vedangas which have come down to us; Yaska, again, 

 ARTS ASD SCI. DIV. VOL. VIIL 



alludes to Yedangas, but does not state that they were six. We must 

 distinguish therefore between categories of works which were called 

 Vedangas, and between certain works which are the surviving repre- 

 sentatives of these categories, but need not have been the first Vedanga 

 works. 



The doctrines comprised under this name are the following: 

 S'iksha, Chhandas, Vyakaran'a, Nirukta, Jyotisfta, and Kalpa. 



S'ikihd is the science of a proper pronunciation. One little treatise 

 only is considered as representing this Vedanga, the S'iksha ascribed 

 to the authorship of the great grammarian Pan'ini. It consists in one 

 recension of thirty-five, in another of fifty-nine verses, and treats of the 

 nature of the letters, of the accents, and the proper mode of sounding 

 them. A chapter of the Taittiriya- Aran'yaka treats likewise of S'iksha ; 

 but though it is possible that Pan'ini's S'iksha may not be the original 

 Vedanga of this class, it is more than doubtful that this chapter of the 

 Aran'yaka was ever considered as such. 



Cfikandas means " metre ;" and the Vedanga which is quoted by this 

 name is referred to the authorship of Pingalanaga. But as the work 

 of the latter treats of Prakrit as well as of Sanskrit metres, it becomes 

 doubtful again whether we possess in it an original Vedanga work. 



Vydkaran'u, signifies "grammar," but literally means " undoing," that 

 is, analysis ; for to the Hindu scholar grammar is linguistic analysis ; 

 his grammar un-doe* words and un-does sentences ; it examines the 

 component parts of a word, and therefore teaches the properties of a 

 base and affix, and all the linguistic phenomena connected with both ; 

 it examines the relation, in sentences, of one word to another, and 

 likewise unfolds all the linguistic phenomena which are inseparable 

 from the meeting of words. The most renowned representative of this 

 science is Pdn'ini, who wrote a work in eight chapters, comprising 

 thirty-two sections and three thousand nine hundred and ninety-six 

 rules, three or four of which, however, probably did not belong to him. 

 And so great was the renown of this wonderful labour, which may be 

 placed at the side of the best grammatical works of any nation and any 

 age, that Pan'ini was looked upon as a R'ishi who had received it, by 

 inspiration, from the god S'iva himself. Pan'ini, it is true, quotes in 

 his work various grammarians who preceded him, but Vyakaran'a is 

 typified by the grammar of Pan'ini, which has remained, up to this 

 day, the standard for Sanskrit speech. We may add, that his work 

 was criticised and amplified by Katyayana, who in his turn was criti- 

 cised by Patanjali, a grammarian who lived in the middle of the second 

 century before Christ ; and that these three grammarians are con- 

 sidered to be the greatest authorities in the science they taught. But 

 Pan'ini only can be held to be the representative of the Vedanga we 

 are speaking of. Nor should the Vyakaran'a be confounded with a 

 class of works which apparently stands in a closer relation than itself to 

 the Veda-Sanhitas with the Pratis'akhya works ; for though the latter 

 are concerned in Vaidik language alone, whereas Pan'ini's work is even 

 more engaged in teaching the classical than the Vaidik dialect, their 

 aim and their contents materially differ from those of the Vyakaran'a. 

 Their object is merely the ready-made word, or base, in the condition 

 in which it is fit to enter into a sentence or into composition with 

 another base. They are nowise concerned in analysing or explaining 

 the nature of a word or base ; they take them such as they are, and 

 teach the changes which they undergo when they become part of a 

 spoken hymn. Whether there existed at one period other Prdtis'akhyas 

 than those which have survived, it is not easy to say in the present 

 condition of Sanskrit philology ; but it has been proved that the pre- 

 sent Pratis'akhyas are even more recent than Pan'ini's work. (Gold- 

 stiicker, ' Pan'int,' p. 183, ff.) 



Vtruito, or " explanation," is represented by the Nlrutla of Y&ila, 

 which is the oldest attempt, known to us, of an explanation of obscure 

 passages of the Vaidik Sanhitas. " It is important, however," says 

 Professor Muller (' Anc. Sansk. Lit.,' p. 154), " not to confound Yaska's 

 Nirukta with Yaska's Commentary on the Nirukta, although it has 

 become usual, after the fashion of modern manuscripts, to call that 

 commentary Nirukta, and to distinguish the text of the Nirukta by 

 the name of Nighan't'u. The original Niruktas that formed an integral 

 part of the Vedanga literature, known to Yaska himself, can have con- 

 sisted only of lists of words arranged according to their meaning, like 



that upon which Yaska's Commentary is based Sayaua gives 



the following account of this matter: 'Nirukta is a work where a 

 number of words is given, without any intention to connect them in a 



sentence The first part (of the Nirukta) is the Naif/hunt' uka, 



the second the Naiyama, and the third the Daivata The word 



Niyltantu applies to works where, for the most part, synonymous 

 words are taught. Therefore, the first part of this work also has been 

 called Naighant'uka, because synonymous words are taught there. In 

 this part there are three lectures : in the first, we have words connected 

 with things of time and space in this and the other worlds ; in the 

 second, we have words connected with men and human affairs ; and in 

 ;he third, words expressing qualities of the preceding objects, such as 

 .hinucas multitude, shortness, &c. Nigama means Veda. As Ydska 

 las quoted many passages from the Veda, which he usually introduces 

 by the words, " For this there is also a Nigama; " and as in the second 

 part, consisting of the fourth Adhyaya, words are taught which usually 

 occur in the Veda only, this part is called Naigama. Why the third 

 part, consisting of the fifth Adhyaya, is called Dimata, is clear. The 

 whole work, consisting of five Adhyayas and three parts, is called 



04 



