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    Mandukya Upanishad

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    The Mandukya Upanishad is one of the shortest yet most important Upanishads containing just 12 verses. It analyzes the three states of consciousness - waking, dreaming, sleeping - to reveal the ultimate truth. It is famous for revealing Brahman as the syllable OM, and contains one of the four Mahavakyas. The Upanishad is divided into four chapters that use logic and scripture to establish the non-dual reality and that the world is illusory like a rotating firebrand. It is unique for its theory of Ajatavada that there is no creation at all.

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    Mandukya Upanishad

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    The Mandukya Upanishad is one of the shortest yet most important Upanishads containing just 12 verses. It analyzes the three states of consciousness - waking, dreaming, sleeping - to reveal the ultimate truth. It is famous for revealing Brahman as the syllable OM, and contains one of the four Mahavakyas. The Upanishad is divided into four chapters that use logic and scripture to establish the non-dual reality and that the world is illusory like a rotating firebrand. It is unique for its theory of Ajatavada that there is no creation at all.

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    The Mandukya Upanishad is one of the shortest yet most important Upanishads containing just 12 verses. It analyzes the three states of consciousness - waking, dreaming, sleeping - to reveal the ultimate truth. It is famous for revealing Brahman as the syllable OM, and contains one of the four Mahavakyas. The Upanishad is divided into four chapters that use logic and scripture to establish the non-dual reality and that the world is illusory like a rotating firebrand. It is unique for its theory of Ajatavada that there is no creation at all.

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    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    1K views2 pages

    Mandukya Upanishad

    Uploaded by

    api-3835100
    The Mandukya Upanishad is one of the shortest yet most important Upanishads containing just 12 verses. It analyzes the three states of consciousness - waking, dreaming, sleeping - to reveal the ultimate truth. It is famous for revealing Brahman as the syllable OM, and contains one of the four Mahavakyas. The Upanishad is divided into four chapters that use logic and scripture to establish the non-dual reality and that the world is illusory like a rotating firebrand. It is unique for its theory of Ajatavada that there is no creation at all.

    Copyright:

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    of 2

    A Brief overview of

    Manduky
    Mandukya Upanishad
    Revelation of the ultimate truth by analyzing the three states

    Mandukya Upanishad is an Upanishad found in the Atharvana Veda. It is basically one


    of the smallest Upanishad containing only 12 mantras, yet it is one of the most respected
    and important Upanishad. Before the advent of Sri Adi Sankara his paramguru Sri
    Gaudapadacharya wrote a commentary called Karika on this Upanishad. This Karika has
    become so important and famous that today it is seen as a part of the Mandukya Upanishad
    itself. Sri Sankara thus wrote his Bhashya on both the Upanishad and Karika shlokas as a
    single text.

    There are two things extremely famous about this Upanishad. One this Upanishad
    reveals the methodology of realizing Brahman as OM. OM is revealed both as the end and
    the means. It is verily a commentary on OM. The viveka which is followed to discern the
    truth is the 'Awastha-traya-viveka' i.e. discrimination based on the three states of
    consciousness. Secondly this Upanishad has in it one of the four Mahavakyas which have
    been chosen from the four Vedas. "Ayam Atma Brahma" i.e. This Atma alone is Brahman.
    In Muktiko Upanishad we have the briefest and yet the most glorious review on Mandukya
    wherein it is said that "Mandukya alone is sufficient for an aspirant to reach liberation"
    (Mandukyam ekam kevalam mumukshunaam vimuktaye).

    The Upanishad along with Karikas (total of 215 shlokas) is divided into four chapters
    called Prakaranas. The Agama Prakarana (has 12 mantras & 29 shlokas of Karika),
    Vaithathya Prakarana (has 38 shlokas), Advaita Prakarana (has 48 shlokas), and the
    Alatshanti Prakarana (has100 shlokas). The first chapter contains all the twelve original
    mantras, and the non-dual reality has been revealed here purely on the basis of the
    scripture. From second prakarana onwards we have an independent commentary on these
    mantras. In the Vaithathya Prakarana we have Sri Gaudapadacharya revealing the world as
    ephemeral. By equating the waking state to the dream state. The approach is purely logical.
    In the third i.e. the Advaita Prakarana we have the teacher revealing the non-dual reality
    again purely on the basis of logic and then also validating it by appropriate scriptural
    statements. In the last chapter called Alata-shanti prakarana, we have not only the
    summarisation of the entire book but also some unique things. In this chapter the Theory of
    Causality is shattered to pieces, the illusory world is compared to a rotating firebrand who
    presents illusions of circles which are not really there, and the Self is thus revealed as the
    one non-dual reality itself, free from all cause-effect relationships.
    One thing which has become a hallmark of this Upanishad is the Theory of Ajatavada.
    Normally some scriptures give some theory of creation, only to later prove the creation to
    be ephemeral, while here Gaudapada appears to be very uncompromising. He doesn’t like
    going the longer way, he declares right from the beginning itself that there is no creation
    whatsoever. He considers the compassionate effort of some to temporarily accept the
    creation as a compromise. He thunders the raw truth uncompromisingly.

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