The Upanishads (;"Upanishad" . Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary. , , ) are Sanskrit texts of the late Vedic and post-Vedic periods that "document the transition from the archaic ritualism of the Veda into new religious ideas and institutions" and the emergence of the central religious concepts of Hinduism. They are the most recent addition to the Vedas, the oldest scriptures of Hinduism, and deal with meditation, philosophy, consciousness, and ontological knowledge. Earlier parts of the Vedas dealt with mantras, benedictions, rituals, ceremonies, and sacrifices.A Bhattacharya (2006), Hindu Dharma: Introduction to Scriptures and Theology, , pp. 8–14; George M. Williams (2003), Handbook of Hindu Mythology, Oxford University Press, , p. 285Jan Gonda (1975), Vedic Literature: (Saṃhitās and Brāhmaṇas), Otto Harrassowitz Verlag,
While among the most important literature in the history of Indian religions and culture, the Upanishads document a wide variety of "rites, incantations, and esoteric knowledge" departing from Vedic ritualism and interpreted in various ways in the later commentarial traditions. The Upanishads are widely known, and their diverse ideas, interpreted in various ways, informed later traditions of Hinduism. The central concern of all Upanishads is to discover the relations between ritual, cosmic realities (including gods), and the human body/person, postulating Ātman and Brahman as the "summit of the hierarchically arranged and interconnected universe", but various ideas about the relation between Atman and Brahman can be found.
108 Upanishads are known, of which the first dozen or so are the oldest and most important and are referred to as the principal or main (mukhya) Upanishads.E Easwaran (2007), The Upanishads, , pages 298-299 The mukhya Upanishads are found mostly in the concluding part of the Brahmanas and Aranyakas and were, for centuries, memorized by each generation and passed down orally. The mukhya Upanishads predate the Common Era, but there is no scholarly consensus on their date, or even on which ones are pre- or post-Buddhist. The Brihadaranyaka is seen as particularly ancient by modern scholars.Bronkhorst, Johannes (2007). Greater Magadha: Studies in the Culture of Early India, pp. 258-259. BRILL. Of the remainder, 95 Upanishads are part of the Muktikā canon, composed from about the last centuries of 1st-millennium BCE through about 15th-century CE. New Upanishads, beyond the 108 in the Muktika canon, continued to be composed through the early modern and modern era, though often dealing with subjects that are unconnected to the Vedas. The mukhya Upanishads, along with the Bhagavad Gita and the Brahmasutra (known collectively as the Prasthanatrayi), are interpreted in divergent ways in the several later schools of Vedanta.Max Müller, The Upanishads, Part 1, Oxford University Press, page LXXXVI footnote 1
Translations of the Upanishads in the early 19th century started to attract attention from a Western audience. German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer was deeply impressed by the Upanishads and called them "the most profitable and elevating reading which ... is possible in the world." Modern era Indologists have discussed the similarities between the fundamental concepts in the Upanishads and the works of major Western philosophers.;
Etymology The Sanskrit term originally meant “connection” or “equivalence", but came to be understood as "sitting near a teacher," from upa "by" and ni-ṣad "sit down","Upanishad". Online Etymology Dictionary. "sitting down near", referring to the student sitting down near the teacher while receiving spiritual knowledge (Gurumukh). Other dictionary meanings include "esoteric doctrine" and "secret doctrine". Monier-Williams's Sanskrit Dictionary notes – "According to native authorities, Upanishad means setting to rest ignorance by revealing the knowledge of the supreme spirit."
Adi Shankaracharya explains in his commentary on the and Brihadaranyaka Upanishad that the word means Ātmavidyā, that is, "knowledge of the self", or Brahmavidyā "knowledge of Brahman". The word appears in the verses of many Upanishads, such as the fourth verse of the 13th volume in the first chapter of the Chandogya Upanishad. Max Müller as well as Paul Deussen translate the word Upanishad in these verses as "secret doctrine",Max Müller, Chandogya Upanishad 1.13.4, The Upanishads, Part I, Oxford University Press, page 22Paul Deussen, Sixty Upanishads of the Veda, Volume 1, Motilal Banarsidass, , page 85 Robert Hume translates it as "mystic meaning",Robert Hume, Chandogya Upanishad 1.13.4, Oxford University Press, page 190 while Patrick Olivelle translates it as "hidden connections".
Development
Authorship The authorship of most Upanishads is unknown. Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan states, "almost all the early literature of India was anonymous, we do not know the names of the authors of the Upanishads".S Radhakrishnan, The Principal Upanishads George Allen & Co., 1951, pages 22, Reprinted as The ancient Upanishads are embedded in the Vedas, the oldest of Hinduism's religious scriptures, which some traditionally consider to be apauruṣeya, which means "not of a man, superhuman"Vaman Shivaram Apte, The Practical Sanskrit-English Dictionary , see apauruSeya and "impersonal, authorless".D Sharma, Classical Indian Philosophy: A Reader, Columbia University Press, ISBN, pages 196-197Jan Westerhoff (2009), Nagarjuna's Madhyamaka: A Philosophical Introduction, Oxford University Press, , page 290Warren Lee Todd (2013), The Ethics of Śaṅkara and Śāntideva: A Selfless Response to an Illusory World, , page 128 The Vedic texts assert that they were skillfully created by Rishis (sages), after inspired creativity, just as a carpenter builds a chariot.Hartmut Scharfe (2002), Handbook of Oriental Studies, BRILL Academic, , pages 13-14
The various philosophical theories in the early Upanishads have been attributed to famous sages such as Yajnavalkya, Uddalaka Aruni, Shvetaketu, Shandilya, Aitareya, Balaki, Pippalada, and Sanatkumara. Women, such as Maitreyi and Gargi, participate in the dialogues and are also credited in the early Upanishads.Ellison Findly (1999), Women and the Arahant Issue in Early Pali Literature , Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion, Vol. 15, No. 1, pages 57-76 There are some exceptions to the anonymous tradition of the Upanishads. The Shvetashvatara Upanishad, for example, includes closing credits to sage Shvetashvatara, and he is considered the author of the Upanishad.Paul Deussen, Sixty Upanishads of the Veda, Volume 1, Motilal Banarsidass, , pages 301-304
Many scholars believe that early Upanishads were interpolatedFor example, see: Kaushitaki Upanishad Robert Hume (Translator), Oxford University Press, page 306 footnote 2 and expanded over time. There are differences within manuscripts of the same Upanishad discovered in different parts of South Asia, differences in non-Sanskrit version of the texts that have survived, and differences within each text in terms of meter,Max Müller, , Oxford University Press, page LXXII style, grammar and structure.Patrick Olivelle (1998), Unfaithful Transmitters, Journal of Indian Philosophy, April 1998, Volume 26, Issue 2, pages 173-187;Patrick Olivelle (2014), The Early Upanishads, Oxford University Press, , pages 583-640WD Whitney, The Upanishads and Their Latest Translation, The American Journal of Philology, Vol. 7, No. 1, pages 1-26;F Rusza (2010), The authorlessness of the philosophical sūtras, Acta Orientalia, Volume 63, Number 4, pages 427-442 The existing texts are believed to be the work of many authors.Mark Juergensmeyer et al. (2011), Encyclopedia of Global Religion, SAGE Publications, , page 1122
Chronology Scholars are uncertain about when the Upanishads were composed. The chronology of the early Upanishads is difficult to resolve, states philosopher and Sanskritist Stephen Phillips,Stephen Phillips (2009), Yoga, Karma, and Rebirth: A Brief History and Philosophy, Columbia University Press, , pp. 25-29 and Chapter 1. because all opinions rest on scanty evidence and analysis of archaism, style and repetitions across texts, and are driven by assumptions about likely evolution of ideas, and presumptions about which philosophy might have influenced which other Indian philosophies. Indologist Patrick Olivelle says that "in spite of claims made by some, in reality, any dating of these documents [early Upanishads] that attempts a precision closer than a few centuries is as stable as a house of cards".Patrick Olivelle (2014), The Early Upanishads, Oxford University Press, , pages 12-14.
Some scholars have tried to analyse similarities between Hindu Upanishads and Buddhist literature to establish chronology for the Upanishads. Precise dates are impossible, and most scholars give only broad ranges encompassing various centuries. Gavin Flood states that "the Upanisads are not a homogeneous group of texts. Even the older texts were composed over a wide expanse of time from about 600 to 300 BCE."Flood, Gavin D. (2018). An Introduction to Hinduism, p. 40, Cambridge University Press. Stephen Phillips places the early or "principal" Upanishads in the 800 to 300 BCE range.
Patrick Olivelle, a Sanskrit philologist and indologist, gives the following chronology for the early Upanishads, also called the Principal Upanishads: The Brihadaranyaka and the Chandogya are the two earliest Upanishads. They are edited texts, some of whose sources are much older than others. The two texts are pre-Buddhist; they may be placed in the 7th to 6th centuries BCE, give or take a century or so. The three other early prose Upanishads—Taittiriya, Aitareya, and Kausitaki come next; all are probably pre-Buddhist and can be assigned to the 6th to 5th centuries BCE.Patrick Olivelle (2014), The Early Upanishads, Oxford University Press, , pp. 12-13. The Kena is the oldest of the verse Upanishads followed by probably the Katha, Isa, Svetasvatara, and Mundaka. All these Upanishads were composed probably in the last few centuries BCE. According to Olivelle, "All exhibit strong theistic tendencies and are probably the earliest literary products of the theistic tradition, whose later literature includes the Bhagavad Gita and the Puranas."Patrick Olivelle (2014), The Early Upanishads, Oxford University Press, , p. 13. The two late prose Upanishads, the Prasna and the Mandukya, cannot be much older than the beginning of the common era. Meanwhile, the indologist Johannes Bronkhorst argues for a later date for the Upanishads than has generally been accepted. Bronkhorst places even the oldest of the Upanishads, such as the Brihadaranyaka as possibly still being composed at "a date close to Katyayana and Patañjali [the grammarian]" (i.e., 2nd century BCE).
The later Upanishads, numbering about 95, also called minor Upanishads, are dated from the late 1st-millennium BCE to mid 2nd-millennium CE. Gavin Flood dates many of the twenty Yoga Upanishads to be probably from the 100 BCE to 300 CE period. Patrick Olivelle and other scholars date seven of the twenty Sannyasa Upanishads to likely have been complete sometime between the last centuries of the 1st-millennium BCE to 300 CE. About half of the Sannyasa Upanishads were likely composed in 14th- to 15th-century CE.
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