THIRTY MINOR UPANISHA~S THIRTY MINOR UPANISHADS• TRA.NSLATED BY K. NARAYA~ASVAMI AIYAR Translator of Laghu Yoga Vii,~ishtha, Viisut$evamanana &c. &c. &c. MADRAS 1914 .All Rights Reserved j TO THE RSHIS OF INDIA WHO BY TREADING THE PATH OF THE UPANISHADS HAVE PERFEOTED THEMSELVES AND REALISED THE GOAL THIS HUMBLE EFFORT To SPREAD THEIR ANCIENT TEACHINGS IN A MODERN: GARB IS DEDICATED BY ONE WHO LOVES AND "~ORSrrIPS THE~I AND TRIES TO WALK IN THEIR FOOTSTEPS As THEIR HrMBLE AND DEVOTED DISCIPLE CONTENTt; PAGE 1. VEDANTA-UPANISHADS: 1. Muktikopanishad of S'ukla-Yajurveda 1 2. Sarvaeara-Upauishad of Krshna-Yajurveda 13 3. Niralamba- Upanishad of S'ukla- Yajnrve<;la 18 4. Maitreya- Upanishad of Samaveda 24 5. Kaivalya-Upanishad of Krshua- Yajurveda 31 6. Amrtabindu-Upsnished Do. 34 7. .Atmabogha- Upanishad of ~gvega 37 8. Skanda- Upanishad of Krshna- Yajurveda 41 9. Paingala-Upanishad -' of S'ukla-Yajnrveda . 43 j 10. Ac,l.hyatma- U panishad Do. 11. Sabala- U panishad Do. 61 12. Tejobindu- U panishad of Krt>hva,- Yaj urveda 78 13. Brahmopamshad Do. 106 14. Vajrasuchi-Upanishad I of Samaveda 110 II. PHYSIOLOGICAL UPANISHADS: 15. S'ariraka- U panishad of Krshna- Yajurveda 113 16 Garbha-Upanishad Do. 116 , viii PAGE III. MANTRA-UPANISHADS: 17. 'farasara- U panishad of S'ukla- Yaj urveda . 124 18. N arayaJ;la-U panishad of Krshna- Yajurveda 128 19. Kalisantaraua- ITpanishad Do. 130 IV. SllNNYASA-UPANISHADS: 20. Bhikshuku-Ilpnnishad of S'ukla- Yajurveda 132 21. Naradaparivrajaka- Upam shad of Atharvaaaveda 134 V. YOGA-UPANISHADS: 22. S'avdi1ya- Upanishad of Atha.rvauaveda 173 23. Yogatattva- t:panishad of Krshua- Yajnrveda 192 24. Dhyanabindu- Upanishad of Samaveda 202 25. Hamsa-Upanishad of S'nkla- Yajurveda 212 26. Amrtanaq.a- U panishad of Krshna- Yajurveda 216 27. Varaha- Upanishad Do. 220 28. Mandalabrahmana- Upanishad of S'ukla-Yajurvsda 243 29. Nadabindu-Upanishad of ~gveda 254 30. Yogakuudali- Upanishad of K rsh ua-Yajurveda 260 INDEX 273 FOREWORD FOR the first time it is, I believe, that the English translation of so many as 30 Upanishads is being put forth before the pub- lic in a collected form. Among the Hindu Scriptures, the Vedas hold the pre-eminent place. The Upanishads which are culled from the AraI}.yaka-portions of the Veq.as-so-called because they were read in the Araaya (forest) after the learner had given up the life of the world-are regarded as the Vedanta, or the end or final crown of the Vedas. Vec,lanta is also the end of all knowledge, since the word Vedas means according to its derivation C knowledge '. Rightly were the Upanishads so considered, since their knowledge led a person to Atma, the goal of life. The other portion of the Vedas, viz., Samhitas and Brahmanae, conferred upon a man, if he should conform to the requisite conditions, the mastery of the Universe only which is certainly inferior to Atma. It is these Upaniehada that to the western philosopher Schopenhauer were the cc solace of life". There are now extant, in all, 108 U panishads, of which the principal or major 12 Upanishads commented upon by 8'r1 8'an- karacharya and others were translated into Enghsh by Dr. Roer and Raja Rajenq.ra Lal Mitra and re-translated by Max Muller in his" Sacred Books of the East," together with one other Upa- nishad called Maitruyu1)-i. Of the rest, 95 in number, two or three Upanishads have appeared in English up to now, but never so many as are here presented to the public, so far as I am aware. Many years ago, the late Sundara 8'astri, a good Sanscrit Scholar and myself worked together to put into English garb the Upanisbada that had not been attempted before, and 11 succeeded in publishing most of those WhICh are here gathered in the monthly issues of The 'Iheoeophiei, The Karmic agents willed that my late co-worker should abandon his physical gar- ment at a premature age. Then I resolved upon throwing up my worldly business of pleading the cause of clients before the bench for that of pleading the cause of God before the public. The incessant travel in that cause since then £01'over 18 years from place to place in all parts of India left me no leisure until now to republish all the above translauons in a book form. But when this year a httle rest was afforded me, I was able to revise them as well as add a £ew more. I am conscious of the many faults from which this book suffers and have no other hope in it than that it will serve as a piece of pioneer work, which may induce real Y ogms and scholars to come into the field and bring out a better translation. There are many editions of the Upanishads to be found in Calcutta, Bombay, Poona, South India and other places. But we found that the South Indian editions, which were nearly the same in Telugu or Grantha characters, were in many cases ful- ler and more intelligible and sigmficant. Hence we adopted £or our translation South Indian editions. The edition o£ the 108 U panishads which the late Tukaram Tatya of Bombay has pub- lished in Devanagari characters approaches the South Indian edition. As the South Indian edition of the U panishads is not available £01' the study of all, I intend to have the recensions of that edition printed in Devanagari characters, so that even those that have a little knowledge of Sanscrit may be able to follow the original with the help of this translation. Transliteration In the transliteration of Sanscrit letters into the English alphabet certain difficulties present themselves. Let me take first the letter st, There are three letters in Sanecrit ~, ~, and !;f. They are differently pronounced and one should not be con- founded with another. For the first letter we have the English equivalent S and for the last Sh. But for the second one we III have none whatsoever. The prominent writers in the field of Theosophy have been transliterating this letter into Sh. Hence in writing the word ~ they made it Kashi m the English language. They utter it also in the same manner. To a South Indian ear, it is rather grating. The mantras espe- cially depend for their efficacy upon proper pronunciation, When we therefore utter the words wrongly, there is committed according to Sanscrit writers, Varna-Hatya-Dosha or the sin of the murder of letters or words. In my translation I have represented the letter ~ by fir and not by Sh, since I con- sider the latter to be a mistake. Other transliterations are:- ~ arr~~'lI;~3feo~G1lT(f~~\:T05 . _ It would be well if our a i 11~ N NTThDDh~TThT)-OhL leaders of thought conferred together and came to some agree- ment upon the question of transliteration. The Order of the Upanisharj,s The Upanishads translated have been classified under the headmgs of (1) Veganta, (2) Physiology, (3) Mantra, (4) San- nyasa and (5) Yoga. But these are not hard and fast divisions. For instance in the Sannyasa and Yoga U panishads, mantras also are given. But in the Mantric Upanishads, Mantras alone are given. Ver!anta and Yoga Upanishaif,s The Upanishads that come nnder the headings of Vedanta and Yoga are the most important, But it is the latter Upani- shags that are most occult in their character, since It IS they that give clues to the mysterious forces located in nature and man, as well as to the ways by which they may be conquered. With reference to Veganta, the ancient teachers thereof have rightly ordained that none has the right to enter upon a study of it, unless he has mastered to a slight degree at least the Sag.hana-Chatushtaya, or four means of salvation. He should not only be couvinced in theory of the fact that Atma iv is the only Reality, and all else are but the ephemeral things of the world, but he should also have outgrown in practice the craving for such transitory worldly things: besides he should have developed a fair mastery over the body and the mmd. A non-compliance with these precedent conditions leads men into many anomahes. The orthodox and the clever without any practice are placed in a bad predicament through a study of these U panishads. In such Upanishads as Maifreya and others, pilgrimages to holy places, the rituals of the Hindus, ceremonial impurities at the time of birth and death, Mantras, etc., are made light of. '1'0 the orthodox that are blind and strict observers of rites and ceremonies, statements like these give a rude shock. Hence Upanishads are not meant for persons of this stamp. Nor are they intended for mere intellectual people who have no knowledge of practice about them, and are immersed in the things of the world. Some of us are aware of the manner in which men with brains alone have made a travesty of the doctrine of Maya. Not a few clever but unprincipled persons actually endeavour to justIfy arguments of all kinds of dis- sipations and wrong conduct by the assertion that it is all Maya. The old Rshis were fully aware of the fact that Veqanta would be desecrated by those that had not complied with its precedent conditions. Only when the desires and the self are overcome and the heart is made pure, or as Upanishadic writers put it, the heart-knot is broken, only then the Atma in the heart will be truly realised: and then it is that the Atma in all uni- verse is realised also, the universe being then seen as Maya.