Welcome to face to face. Our guest today is Swami Sarvabriyananda. He is an expert scholar, monk of Upanishads and also Astabhavokra Gita.
He has very in-depth knowledge. Many of you might have seen him on YouTube at various conferences and talks and seminars. It's a great privilege. for me to talk to him today and at Harvard Divinity School where currently he is a fellow and a Hindu monk.
We are going to focus on Upanishads, what are its key messages, and of course we'll touch base on Ashtabhag's Gita as well. Swamiji, welcome to our show. Thank you for having me.
And it's a really great honor. I have been a big fan of you and I have read several books you have recommended, including Byron's translation of the Gita. So for those of our audience who may not be very familiar with what Upanishads are, or what is their message, so let's start. What is Upanishad?
Well, that's a very good question. The Upanishads, you can say, are the central texts of Hinduism. If you want to know what is the source of Hindu philosophy and spirituality, you find it in the Upanishads. Hindu scriptures are vast like an ocean.
There are so many texts written over thousands of years, composed over thousands of years. But at the very source lies the Upanishads. The Upanishads are part of the Vedas.
So in the Vedas, you will find two broad divisions. what we now call Karmakanda and Gyanakanda. The portion dealing with rituals and the portion dealing with knowledge, with spiritual and philosophical knowledge.
So, the portion dealing with rituals was concerned with Yagya, the fire ritual, which was the ancient form of Hindu rituals. Nowadays, it's still there, of course, we have Havan in the Hindu temples. But mostly we have replaced it with the modern kind of Puja.
The Upanishads, they constitute the Gyanakanda, the source of spiritual and philosophical knowledge. And they were sometimes found at the end of the Vedic corpus, Vedic text. So, and Anta in that sense.
So, Upanishads came to be known as Vedanta. Of course, that's a very simplistic way of looking at it. A deeper understanding would be Anta means Siddhanta, the final conclusion, the final teaching, the highest teaching of the Vedas. So, you have this vast ancient body of texts.
If you want to know what is the ultimate meaning, what are they trying to say to us finally at this distance of 5000 years when we look back. So, that you find in the Upanishads. So, you can call this is the jist of all the...
Jist and highest teaching. Highest teaching. Okay.
Jist may include the whole thing, but it does not include the whole teaching of the Vedas. There are... teachings related to rituals which are excluded more or less.
But the final teaching of the Vedas, the highest teaching, in that sense, Anta. Anta also means not only end but also highest, final. So, in that sense, Veda Anta. Veda also means knowledge.
So, one professor recently gave a very nice interpretation. He said Anta also means edge. So, like a razor's edge, the sharp edge.
So, you can say Vedanta is the cutting edge of knowledge. It's not that some ancient outdated knowledge, but it's also the cutting edge. Even the...
It's absolutely modern and absolutely relevant today. And how many Upanishads are there? That's a difficult question.
Mostly, if you straight away go and look for books on Upanishads, texts, you will find 10 or 11 Upanishads are mostly discussed. The reason is... About 1400 years ago, by modern historical dating, Adi Shankaracharya, he selected 10 or some say 11 Upanishads.
So, these are the famous 10 Upanishads. And he wrote commentaries on that. Commentaries in Sanskrit, Bhashya.
So, these commentaries and the 10 Upanishads, they became the basis for Advaita Vedanta and the other schools of Vedanta. There are many schools of Vedanta. They all picked up more or less on these Upanishads. And so these ten are...
I keep saying 10 or 11 because there is one Upanishad, the Shwetashwetar Upanishad, which Shankaracharya has written a commentary on, but some scholars doubt whether it is the commentary of the original Shankaracharya or somebody later. So, what are some other Upanishads? The other Upanishads are, in fact, there is a verse in Himalayas. The monks memorize this verse to, you know, give like a syllabus of the Upanishads.
Okay. Isha kenakatha prashna Mundamandukya titiri he aitareyam cha chhandogyaam Brihadaranyakam tathaam So, you have ten Upanishads, whole syllabus. So, these names are all there.
Isha Upanishad, Kena Upanishad, Katha Upanishad, Mundaka, Mandukya Upanishad, Aitareyaya Upanishad, Taitiriya Upanishad, Chhandogya and Brihadaranyaka Upanishad. These are some of the major Upanishads. But this is not an exhaustive list.
So, there is an interesting portion in a story. that Hanuman asks Ramachandra once. And this story you find in one of the Upanishads.
Not in the major Upanishad, but it's called Muktika Upanishad. Hanuman asks Ramachandra that, how does one get Moksha? Those who want spiritual liberation, spiritual freedom, how do we get that? And Sri Ramachandra says, study the Mandukya Upanishad alone.
That's enough. mandukyam ekamevalam mumukshunam dhimukte So, Mandukya Upanishad by itself is sufficient for the liberation of those who desire liberation. But, and Mandukya Upanishad is the smallest one.
It's only 12 mantras. But, then he says, suppose this does not work. I have studied Mandukya Upanishad.
I am still not liberated. I am not enlightened. Then what do you do?
And Ramachandra says, then he gives a list of 108 Upanishads. So, there itself we find a list of 108 Upanishads. So, most of them, I think all of them are available.
And there we hear even many more Upanishads which may have been lost over time because some Vedic shakas died out, so the Upanishads disappeared. So, this is the textual basis. Now, actually it is very interesting that you, I am going to read Mandokya Upanishad just for a quick review. Yes, highly recommended.
So, I have also read somewhere that someone asked Mahatma Gandhi that you know what is the future, what might happen to Hinduism and all those things. And he said that, if you take all the Upanishads and all the Indian scriptures and destroy them, and only one sentence of Isha Upanishad is left there, Hinduism will survive. And that was renounce and enjoy.
So, yes, that's a quote attributed to Mahatma Gandhi. And that's really very profound. Isha Upanishad, it's also a very small Upanishad.
And the very first mantra of the Isha Upanishad, Ishaavasyam idam sarvam yatkincha jagattyam jagat tena tyaktena bhunjitha maagrida kasyasviddhanam You have to see the Lord covering or pervading this entire universe. Whatever is moving and unmoving, living and non-living, all of that is pervaded by Brahman, the ultimate reality. By this knowledge alone, by renunciation, he says, tyaktena by renunciation, Renunciation, what is this renunciation?
Knowing that everything is Brahman. Then do we give up everything, become a monk and sit in the Himalayas? He says, no, no, no, be engaged in life. Do whatever you are doing or do something else, but be engaged in life. Bhunjitha, be engaged in life.
Shankaracharya gives a meaning that Bhunjitha, he says, palayatha, that means to protect this knowledge by renunciation. And then do not covet anybody else's wealth. Maa gridha kasyasviddhanath. I think this all-pervading nature of the ultimate reality, that it's transcendent beyond everything and in all living beings. This is what really attracted Mahatma Gandhi and he said this, that if that first sentence of the Isopanishad survives and nothing else of Hinduism is there, all of Hinduism will still be there.
Yes. So now let's talk a little bit more detail about, so what if I ask you. Yes. is, like, I'll give you one example of myself.
Yes. But whenever I read such, you know, Upanishads, it's with your reading and if I understand, I feel very elated. Now, my question to you is that someone like you who has so much in-depth understanding, how you feel about this? Or how you feel about life, about yourself?
Yes, so, first of all, it's very interesting that you said when you read it, you feel elated. Yes. And that's the experience of anybody who has seriously investigated, even started investigating this, reading this and trying to think about it. Why do we feel elated when you read this?
The reason is the Upanishads speak to something very deep within us. There is something within us which responds to these teachings. That you are Brahman, that you are immortal, that you are pure, that there is one reality pervading everything, that the entire universe is one.
These teachings, when we hear them, something deep inside us responds. It feels, this is right, and you feel a kind of joy. One of the Upanishads, Chandogya Upanishad, says, nalpe sukham asti.
There is no real happiness in the limited, in the small, in the petty. Yo vey bhuma tat sukham. That which is infinite and vast, that's real happiness. And from these Upanishads, we get a taste of the infinite. That our nature is infinite.
We don't feel that normally. We feel that I am this limited person. I am separate from everybody else.
I am this body which was born, which is aging, which will die, and that makes me feel very small and helpless and powerless. My desires are many, but my abilities to fulfill the desires are limited. I want to know everything. There are vast libraries, but my time is limited and my mental capacity is limited. We always run up against these limitations.
I want love and want to love everybody, but I find frustration in the world. We continuously run up against these limitations. The Upanishads tell us that this deep intuition you have about your own infinitude, that is correct. If you know yourself as you truly are, you will find that you are right, that you are infinite. And that's why when we hear this, we feel this joy.
Yes. If you ask my own experience, it is true. There is great joy in this.
Vidyaranya Swami, who was a great teacher of Vedanta in... In the Vijayanagar kingdom about 600 years ago, he writes, why does an enlightened person feel so much joy? What is the secret of the joy, the happiness? You see, one thing we see when we see the sages and saints of all religions, those who we consider to be very spiritual, one thing we find is they are very happy people.
They are generally very peaceful, joyful. Not happy in the smiley sense, not laughing, not in the sense of excited, are you excited, not in that sense. Inner. There is a deep unshakable peace and joy about it. So he asks why.
See, just imagine he says, Krita Kritya, a person who has a deep sense that what I have to do in human life, the purpose of life, I have accomplished. That what I have to get in life, I have got it. Praptabhya Praptataya, that means what has to be attained in human life, I have really attained it.
And what has to be known, Jnatabhya. What has to be known in life, I have known that. Imagine the peace of that person.
So now, if I ask you like, you know, all these Upanishads, if I ask you to crystallize in five key messages of Upanishads. I know it's difficult to pick five. It's not difficult. It's actually very easy.
Thanks to the great teachers, for example, like Shankaracharya and others. So, Upanishads themselves. They say, I can tell you in five messages.
I can tell you in one letter itself, one word. What is that word? Om. The entire teaching is summarized in Om. You say, Om, I did not understand.
Can you explain a little more? We hear it all the time. We hear it all the time.
But can you explain it a little more? So, alright, we can summarize the entire teaching of the Upanishads in one sentence. What is that?
Tatvamasi. That thou art. In fact, all of Vedanta. Jaya and Bhiyan has been seen as an explanation of one sentence.
Actually, Vedanta is very simple. It tells you, you are that. These are called Mahavakyas. Specific sentences picked from the Upanishads, which summarize the teaching of the entire Upanishads.
So, because there are four Vedas, so four sentences have been picked. Actually, there are more. Mahavakyas, yes. So, what are the four sentences? Yes.
So, what is the definition of a Mahavakya? Brahmaatma Aikya Bodhakam Vakya Mahavakya That which teaches you the identity of the individual and the infinite, Brahman and Atman, that is Mahavakya. So, what are these sentences?
One is the famous Tatvamasi. We hear it again and again. It's from Chandogya Upanishad. So, Tatvamasi means that Thou art, that ultimate reality you are. Another one also is quite famous, Aham Brahmasmi, I am Brahman.
Same meaning. All of these Mahavakyas have the same meaning. Another one is I am Atma Brahma. I am Atma Brahma is from the Mandukya Upanishad.
This very self is Brahma. This very self which we consider to be body, mind, this Sarvapriyananda. No, no, no, you are wrong. If you investigate deeply, you will find that ultimate reality is this very self. Another Mahavakya is Prajnanam Brahma from the Aitariya Upanishad.
It means this consciousness that we are feeling right now, all the time we are feeling. I am aware. If nothing else, I am aware. Even a person who is able to see, I am having the experience of seeing.
If I do not see, I am having the experience of not seeing. But that experiencing is going on all the time. This awareness, we always take it for granted.
Yes, I am aware. So what? This awareness, if you would properly understand it, Raghyanam Brahma.
This awareness itself, this consciousness itself is Brahman when properly understood. So, make us understand properly. Yes.
So, you see these four sentences, but one might already get the feeling that yes, they are all saying the same thing. They have been taken conventionally just to represent each of the four Vedas. Prajnanam Brahma from Aitariya Upanishad, that is from the Rig Veda. The Atattvamasi from the Chandogya Upanishad, which is from Sama Veda.
And then Aham Brahmasmi, which is from Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, which is from the Yajur Veda. And the Ayam Atma Brahma, this very self is Brahman, this is from the Mandukya Upanishad, which is from Atharva Veda. So what does it mean? See, the whole thing has been summarized in Om. Not enough?
Alright. Aham Brahmasmi, Atattvamasi. What does that mean?
So one can look at it this way that I am Brahman or that you are that Brahman. Vedanta says to understand this start with yourself. Start with yourself. Investigate who am I?
What am I? Why? Because when you investigate yourself you will find that Brahman and then you will find that same Brahman is underlying the entire universe. So you become one with the universe.
So realize that you're one with the universe. See, investigate yourself means what? So, there are many techniques.
One is, all you find in the Upanishads and later on Vedantic masters, they developed it from the Upanishads. Dhrigdhrishya Viveka, the distinction between the seer and the seen. What are these?
These are methods of investigation of ourselves. Avastatraya vichara, an investigation into the three states of our mind, waking, dreaming, deep sleep. You are talking about that you are going to read the Mandukya Upanishad. That's what you will find. Sure.
The method of the three states. But why are they talking about those three states? Many people, they misunderstand.
They say, oh, this is an investigation into dream. Vedanta is not interested in our dreaming, not even in our waking, not even in our deep sleep. It's interested in that one which is experiencing these three. By using these three, these are like the doors through which you enter into that reality called Brahman. One sadhu in Haridwar.
So, one of our monks, Dhirishanji used to visit this sadhu. He was called Bhikshu Shankarananda. Many years ago, I never saw him.
But he was said to be an enlightened person. He used to stay in what we call Charpay in India, North India. So, he used to live there.
That was his entire place. So, people used to go to him for advice. Great Vedanta teacher.
So, one day our monk, Dhirishanandaji, asked him, Swami, you are a great Vedanta teacher, but where are your books? We normally think Vedanta teachers will have lot of books. So he said in Hindi, I have books.
I have three books. Which are the three books? I don't see any books. Waking, dreaming, deep sleep.
These three books I study and they reveal to me that I am right. That's all you need to know. That's all you need to know in the highest spiritual sense.
So another method. So this is Avastatraya vichara. The method of the inquiry of the three states. Another method, there are many methods. Another major method is based on the Taittiriya Upanishad.
It's called Panchakosha Vichara or Panchakosha Viveka. The investigation into the five layers of the human personality. Five layers of human personality means what? Body. It's called Annamaya Kosha.
The sheath made of food, which is derived from food. Then Pranamaya Kosha, if you go inwards, you find The body is pervaded by life, by all sorts of vital functions. That is called Prana Mayakosha.
Prana. In English you might translate it as the vital force. Go deeper. Mind, thoughts, emotions.
So that is called Manomaya Kosha. Go deeper. Deeper I mean, I don't mean physically deeper. If you physically go into the body, you will find more body only. In your experience of yourself.
The most outward experience you have is body. Inner experience is Prana. More inner experience is mind. Inner to that, another function of the mind, which we call buddhi, intellect, which is doing all this thinking. Even that is also not you.
Then you go deeper. If you try to go deeper, if you try to go inwards to the buddhi, you will find a blank. I don't experience anything. What is there?
Just blank. That blankness is indicative of what we call anandamaya kosha. Beyond that is said to be the atma.
So, there is a method of going from one step to the inner step, it's like climbing a ladder with five steps. First you put your foot on the first one, steady there, Annamaya Kosha, body. Then Pranamaya Kosha, the vital sheet.
Then you investigate Manomaya Kosha. Then the Vigyanamaya Kosha, which is Buddhi. Then the Anandamaya Kosha.
And then you are expected, it's like going deeper and deeper into a cave. At the heart of it, you will find the Atman, but you will never find it as an object. See, all of these methods, they are all indirect methods.
They will take you from an outer aspect to the inner and innermost, after which intuitively you are supposed to catch that, yes, there it is, I am it, but not as an object. So now, I mean, I can keep talking to you for I don't know how many hours, but I just want to quick on a few things I wanted to ask you. Yes. Is also, there are lot of interesting stories in Upanishads.
Yes. The stories are so. If you can tell us about couple of stories which are your favorite in India.
Well, one of my favorites is everybody's favorite. The beautiful story of Yama and Nachiketa. So, this little boy, he talks back to his father and his father says, Go to death.
Mithyavetva dadami. I am giving you to death. You know, if somebody curses our world today, might say, go to hell. Something like that.
Now, it is a story. So, the boy goes to... death, Yamaraja.
And then death gives him three boons because you have come here, you are waiting for me, you little boy. So it's a very beautiful allegorical story. Then he asks death, what is beyond death? So only you know, you are death. And then Yama and there are other boons also, first boon, second boon and third boon is this Vedantic question.
What is beyond death? But you see he is asking what am I? If I am the body then it's not dead beyond death, it's dead. If I am the mind, sukshma sharira, remember that at that time they at least they all believed we go through many lives. So when the body is gone, if I am the mind, the sukshma sharira, subtle body, I will go, I'll be born, I will die, new bodies will come and death will come again, birth will come again.
But is there anything more than this? Then Yamar reveals to him that's the doctrine of the Atman, that there is an ultimate reality, existence, consciousness place, which you are and how to realize that? And that is the secret of the entire universe. Not only that you are that Atman, but this whole universe is that Atman.
In that sense, this whole universe is not different from you. And that is the teaching. That's one beautiful story. So, the story is just to give a frame, a background.
In the commentary, Shankaracharya will write, Stuttyartham, to praise the teaching. So, you give a nice frame. When you have a nice picture, you just don't stick it on the wall. You give a nice frame for the stories there.
Another story which is quite famous is Janaka and Yajnavalkya. In the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, in different parts you find the great king Janaka and the sage Yajnavalkya. And they have discussions about Vedanta.
He asks about what is the ultimate reality of the universe, what is my ultimate reality and Yajnavalkya teaches him. Notice here a couple of things that first of all, all these are No where, no where you are being asked to believe in anything. This book says that, so you have to believe.
See often the Upanishad is treated in that way. Upanishad says this and our commentators also say. It comes back to you that you have to find the.
Yes, you have to find it. It's not enough just to believe it. It's like I always say like going to Harvard University if you go to a physics class and your professor who may be a Nobel Prize winner and all is teaching you physics.
and says to you, do you understand? And if the student says, sir, you are great, I believe you. Professor will say, what is this?
I want you to understand. I don't want you to believe me, no matter how great an authority I am. So in the same way, the Upanishads want you to understand this for yourself and realize it yourself.
So the self is the key. Everything keeps coming back to... Right.
And there are always two steps which I always try to emphasize. In the first step, it may seem that you are differentiating yourself from everything else. I am not the body, not the mental intellect, but that's not Vedanta. That's only the first step. Then you find the reality.
Then you find that everything else is that reality only. So ultimately it's not separating yourself from the universe. Ultimately you realize the oneness of the universe.
So Vivekananda put it this way. Two central themes of Vedanta. The divinity of the human soul, that you are divine and the oneness of all existence. So how this divinity and this one soul concept compares with other religions of the world? Or how, if you can just talk a little bit about that.
Right, context. I believe, and Swami Vivekananda has also believed, and many Vedanta teachers also feel that, Vedanta is basically the science of religion. It's more like a meta-religion.
I believe, this may be shocking to some people, that when you understand Vedanta, you understand what is going on in religion. Not just in Hinduism, but in all religions. If there is truth.
It is this Vedantic truth which is expressed in all religions. I am not saying Vedanta alone is true, everything else is false. No.
What Vedanta is saying, an impersonal truth. Look, nowhere in the Vedanta does it say, you have to be Hindu, you have to believe in this, otherwise you will not get. You are a human being, you must be Atman. Whoever you are.
Wherever you are. Whichever time period in history, you are in India or you are in Middle East or in America, you are in 5000. Christian, Muslim, Buddhist. Anybody.
Atheist. One of the... staunch and famous atheist in this country, Sam Harris, who is no friend of religion, very vocal critic of religion. He writes in his book Waking Up that there are at least two traditions, Advaita Vedanta in Hinduism and the Madhyamaka Buddhism of Tibetan Buddhism, where there is a core of truth which we cannot deny.
Even scientists have to accept this. There may be surrounding many belief systems and many things which we may reject. That one we cannot reject. So notice that it is impersonal. It is rational.
It underlies all religions. So my perspective on different religions as a Vedantist, you may say you are interpreting from Vedanta perspective. Yes, I am. I have every right to do that.
So when I look upon all religions, it allows me to see the core of truth in all religions and how it's realized differently in different climates, different civilizations, in different teachers. In some way it is a knowledge approach like Vedanta, some it's a meditation approach which you find in Sanghya, Yoga or Buddhism. Some where it's a devotional approach which you find mostly in say Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Vaishnavism, Shaktism, Shaivism. But all of them, there's a core of truth to all of them. That is what Vedanta leads you directly towards.
So now, so such a powerful message. Yes. Simple message.
Yes. And I think it is a life-changing message. It is. So my question to you is from your background, like even if you look at India, where, you know, we got so much involved with Ramayana and Mahabharata and other stuff. When and how this key message of Upanishad got lost?
Right. It was never lost, but as... Or a proper importance was not given. Correct.
As Swami Vivekananda said, it became the sole property of some scholars and... monks. What happened was, the same message was given to the masses through these texts Ramayana, Mahabharata, the Bhagavatam, the 18 Puranas.
You will find in all of these texts, there are spiritual teachings and those teachings you can immediately link it back to say Gita and the Upanishads. Bhagavad Gita itself, it comes in the middle of towards the end of Mahabharata. We were discussing Gita at Harvard Divinity School.
And one scholar said, story is going along nicely. Mahabharata, why in the middle of that all this philosophy and all this is introduced? But it's just the opposite.
The story exists because of this philosophy. The Puranas are full of stories. Now, in between there are long stretches of discourses, spiritual philosophical discourses.
You might feel, Story was very nice. Suddenly why this is coming? That teaching is the essence. The story is not the essence.
The story is like a container. And in the container are the jewels. These jewels are the spiritual teachings.
And they come from the Upanishads. But you are right. The study of the Upanishads and Vedanta was for a limited few.
And mass religion became what we today call Puranic religion. Worship of Gods and God-bearing. Same reality, Brahman, with different names and forms and so this is how Hinduism is. Swami Vivekananda said that the Vedanta which was in the mountains and forests in the hands of a few scholars and monks, I shall take it out from the mountains and forests and spread it to the cities of the world. So, it becomes the common property of all beings.
So, now it is very interesting that I think that technology is playing a very important role in the spread. Absolutely. Absolutely.
Because I am glad that I listened to you on YouTube and many people are benefiting. So, again you know, I want your take on this that how the technology or today's world. can really benefit from.
You're right. I was personally quite amazed. It started more or less with IIT Kanpur.
Yeah, I remember that. It's one of the leading technology institutes of India. Sure. And the Vivekananda Samiti there, they invite many speakers.
So they invited me at one time and they gave a talk on the Mandukya Upanishad. They called it Who Am I? Part 1, Part 2. I did not expect that it will be particularly popular.
They put it on YouTube. Yes. Yeah.
It's very deep philosophy, very profound. But it was amazingly popular. I think more than 2 million views or something.
That shows the spiritual hunger that is there. Yeah, absolutely. And you have been in the West for example too.
Also, just for a historical point of view, when was the first time this Upanishads really came out of India? Right. Some scholars, British scholars, Indologists, British and German Indologists and all, So they studied these when the first manuscripts began to reach the West. The first person who actually got this, a very interesting story, a Frenchman, Anquetil Duperon. He came to India.
He thought that all the religions which we are familiar with in the West, Christianity, Judaism, Islam also which has come from the Middle East. There is some religion which is older than them. That is called Zoroastrianism.
Zoroastrianism, sure. In Iran, you can't find much because it is mostly pervaded by Islam and they have become a very small persecuted minority. But he heard there is a Zoroastrian community in India.
So, he came to India. And at that time, the British and the French were fighting. It was a difficult situation. He came and he found, he took some Zoroastrian texts. Later on, he got hold of, somebody sent it to him.
Dara Shukos, who was Aurangzeb's elder brother. His translation of the Upanishads. Yes.
So that book came to the hands of this Frenchman. He translated it back in France into Latin. And then from there.
He called it Upnikhat. And he published it. And then others began to read it. The great German philosopher Schopenhauer, Arthur Schopenhauer, he read this book. There is a famous quote.
He says, I consider no reading in the world. no study in the world as beneficial as these Upnikas, this one, except perhaps the original. It has been the solace of my life, it will be the solace of my death. Schopenhauer says this in Latin translation, of the Persian translation, of the Sanskrit origin.
Sure, sure, sure. So, this is how first it came to the West and Schopenhauer said such an amazing thing. It seems every day of his life, after he got the book, every day he would… before going to sleep, he would read a little bit of Upanishads. Now, also, another example is this, that your discourses are always full with people, you know, wherever you talk about Upanishads. So, it does show that there is a really growing interest.
Growing interest and there is a deep hunger for this direct spiritual truth. Yes, yes. So, I find audiences here at Harvard or at New York or in California Many of them come from non-Hindu backgrounds.
Many of them have no interest in religion, but spiritual hunger is there. What is the purpose of life? And Upanishads speaks to them.
Vedanta speaks to them directly. One more thing I would like to mention about bringing Upanishads here. Swami Vivekananda was the first Hindu monk to come to the West in the World Parliament of Religions in 1893. And he came here to Harvard.
Here in Boston. Here in Boston and to Harvard University. William James, who was the famous professor of psychology at that time, philosophy and psychology combined at that time. He invited Swami Vivekananda and Swami Vivekananda gave a talk on Vedanta.
The first Vedanta talk in Harvard University was given by Swami Vivekananda in 1895 at Sivir Hall in Harvard Yard. And the Harvard Philosophical Club published that book. It's available in the library.
it's a Harvard University publication, What is Vedanta? Swami Vivekananda. Excellent.
I am going to look for that book. Look for that. Yes.
So now two more things I wanted to talk to you. So I want to come back and end our discussion with Astabha Kri Gita. Yes.
But before that, I just want to know a little bit about you. How you got interested into Vedantic philosophy? And tell us a little bit about you. Your English is generally a monk will speak Sanskrit and all, but your English is fantastic. Your communication skill is super.
And you really tell in a very nice way. So I just want to know a little bit about you. Well, I grew up in a small city.
It's no longer such a small city. All cities in India are growing now. Bhuvaneshwar. Bhuvaneshwar. On the eastern coast of...
In Orissa, right? In Orissa, the capital of Orissa. I grew up there. My dad was a senior bureaucrat in the IAS. And growing up, he was very close to my family.
My mother and my father were very close to the Ramakrishna Mission. So we had Vivekananda's books in the house. So growing up... I read a lot of that.
This was before cable TV, before internet. So, Durdarshan had just come in there. So, I grew up reading those books and I always felt, if this is true, that God actually exists, God can be experienced, that you are Brahman, you're not a body and mind, and the purpose of life is to realize this, then why should I not pursue this?
What is the other option? I look at my father, mother, grandfather, uncles, people around me. If I don't take that path, I'll take this path. And this I'm seeing where it leads.
This is what more is there to see in this. So that was always my feeling as a child. And when I grew up, I started reading these books.
So where did you read your high school? Let's talk about that. I really don't go into too much detail because monks are not supposed to talk about their background.
But yes, I mean, I can always say that. I grew up mostly in Bhubaneswar. For a few years, we were in Calcutta.
But I studied in this school, demonstration multipurpose school. It's an NCRT school in Bhubaneswar. Very good school. In those days, the monthly fees was 5 rupees.
So I grew up there and I studied in a local college. Then I did my MBA at the Zevi Institute of Management. Now it's Zevi University. And I used to go to the local Ramakrishna Mission Ashram.
And I visited other ashrams also, this Kaan temple. So when did you decide that this is what you want to do? Oh well, it goes way back.
I still remember as a kid, I was maybe 10 years old in class 8 or something. Aim of life I would write. Number one, pilot.
Number two, find God or search for God. As I grew up, little more pilot disappeared. But search for God, that became the central goal. I found out more about monasticism that if you want to dedicate your whole life to search for God and do nothing else, you can be a monk. And so I decided that.
By the time I was in college, I had met… I never told anybody. I was a very shy kid. So mentally I decided that I am going to, after finish my studies, I am going to become a monk. Actually, there was my next question that… You know, did you talk about this to your college friends?
No, no, no. I generally didn't. A few friends knew.
A few friends knew. One of my friends, Manish Singhal, he is a very spiritual man. He is a professor at XLRI Jamshedpur, the XLRI management, very well-known management institute.
He is also a very spiritual person and a very philosophical thinker. I told him. He knew about it.
So, what was his reaction? He supported me. Supported.
Yes. And the moment I left everything. Finishing my studies, a few of my friends knew and they saw me off at the Bhuvaneshwar radio station.
Your parents? They were furious. They were furious, okay. But finally, my dad passed away several years ago. But my mother is fully supportive now.
She is very, very happy. And that I see in the lives of young people who become monks. At first, the parents are very much against it.
And after five years, ten years, they will say, you did the right thing. No, but if you look at the impact. You are changing people's life like your discourses and the message.
Not me. Through me. The message.
Whatever. But at least, you know, to me it is coming through you. One beautiful thing about Vedanta is it's very impersonal. You don't have to catch hold of a person.
Our tendency is, it's a human weakness. We want to catch hold of a person. But you notice the nature of Vedanta. It puts the whole responsibility back on you. You are that reality.
And you discover. And the teacher, the guru. And the scriptures, Vedanta texts, they all help you. So what I want is when people are interested, I always tell them now look at the original sources and start some spiritual practice yourself. Many people have a practice already.
I find another interesting thing is people come to listen to Ashtavakra and Upanishads and Vedanta who may not have been at all interested in religion. Then, they start a particular practice. There may be various kinds.
Somebody starts a little pooja, somebody meditation, somebody something. And a faith develops. So many people have found faith in their own religious tradition.
I find people who are Vaishnavas, Shakhtars, worshippers of Rama, Muslims, Christians, who had lost interest in their religion. Now they have found some interest that, yes, there is a core of truth. Now, let's come towards the end and talk about Ashtavakra Gita.
Ashtavakra always should be at the end, the final. Yes, sure. Well, I'm glad you like Ashtavakra and a lot of people like it.
But I must be very honest. Once I heard you and you recommended to read the translation by Bairam, I got the book, started to read, and I said, what the hell I'm reading? But more I read, more I read, more I understood.
And today I think that Ashtavakra Gita is one of the best. Phenomenal books. Correct, correct.
You are right. In fact, there are, if you look at the texts in Vedanta, original texts are Upanishads. They are Shruti. There are many other texts which are called Prakaranas. Prakaranas means texts which deal with specific aspects of Vedanta philosophy.
Some of these Prakaranas are introductory like Vivek Chudamani, like Vedanta Sara. If you traditionally learn Vedanta, they will start with Vedanta Sara. Some of these are commentaries. So, Shankara's commentaries on Upanishads, Anandagiri's commentaries on Shankara's commentaries, like that. Some of them are dialectical.
They are called Vada Granthas. Very tough, very dense philosophy with entirely logic based. Advaita Siddhi, Khandana Khanda Khandiya, Jitsuki, very difficult texts.
But they are packed with very, very sharp, very subtle reasoning. Then there are texts, a very few texts, which are, you might call them Nididhyasana, Dhyana texts, texts for meditation. There, Ashtavakra is one. Another one exactly like that, similar it is, the Avadhuta Gita. So, you, in these texts, there is no argumentation, there is no attempt at giving any philosophy, argumentation, there is no storytelling.
What is there? Only one thing. essential truth that the word I am Brahman, aham Brahmasmi, that thing is told to you again and again and again.
Somebody called it a grand monotony. The highest truth told to you a hundred times, two hundred times in different ways. There is no attempt at flowery language.
There is no attempt at logical argumentation. You say this, then I will say that. None of that. All that is assumed is done. You have finished all that.
Notice, If you first come to it, Ashtavakra, without coming to anything else, you will find an unusual attraction but also puzzlement. As you said, I am attracted to it. It is a fantastic thing. But also, what is this?
What is it trying to tell? That's exactly what I meant. Right.
But the more you learn about Vedanta, then you come back to Ashtavakra, then you realize, it is sort of encapsulating the entire teaching. What the Upanishads have told you, what the commentaries of Shankaracharya have told you, what Vivek Chudamani and Advaita Siddhi and Khandanaka, all of that what has been done. with entire ocean of texts. Ultimately, you say, just the essence of it is the Tashravakram. You can, I have given the talk for more than two hours on one verse.
You can do that. Just one verse. One verse. You can find it, I think it was in Raleigh, North Carolina. So, two and half hours.
One verse. Each word packs in the entire philosophy of Advaita Vedanta. So, it's... So, some of our viewers who may not be familiar with Ashtavakra Gita, if you can put some context, what is Ashtavakra Gita?
Well, the story, there are so many stories about it. We really do not know what is the timing of the source. But it's an ancient book. And the story goes that Ashtavakra, the sage, bakra means twist or turn.
So, he had eight bends or twists in his body. And he was an enlightened being. It seems that when the story is that when he was in his mother's womb, his father was reciting the scriptures and making a mistake.
From the mother's womb itself, he corrected his father. And his father cursed him that his baby, when he was born, it should have these deformities because he dared to correct me. So many stories are there. But Ashtavakra Gita is a conversation between… It is a conversation, yeah. So, when you come to the text itself, you find the great sage Ashtavakra who is sort of almost a mythological figure.
legendary figure in Advaita Vedanta. He is teaching his student. Janaka. So, Janaka often you find emperor and he is the student learning Vedanta. So, Yajnavalke and Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, the teacher Janaka is the student.
Here Janaka is the student almost like a friend. They have a conversation. And Ashtavakra gives him the essence of Advaita Vedanta.
Janaka puts one or two questions. And Janaka talks about his own experiences also. And we find Janaka is also enlightened.
So, this is the background. But it's universal. I have seen people who have no connection with Hinduism, with no background in Vedantic philosophy, but they feel a strong pull to it. So, if I ask you to pick one sloka from Astral of the Gita, what it will be?
Well, I like this… We don't have two hours, but maybe in two minutes. Two minutes. But I have given… I never really taught the text separately. But once in a while, I would feel inspired that let's take up the highest teaching. talk about it today.
Leave everything else alone. So one or two times, you'll find on YouTube a few of these talks are there. I pick up two, and once I picked up four verses, another one I picked up one verse.
Like that. So give us one just insight, quick insight. Alright, I'll just there's a sequence of three verses which I like very much.
I'll just recite it and give you the gist of it. Sure. Mayananda Mahambodho Vishwapota itastata, brahmati svantavatena, namam astya sahisnuta In me the infinite ocean of existence. This entire universe is like a little boat. Boat in the ocean.
It is moving by its own logic. Antavata means by its own wind. That's the law of causality, karma. So it's moving. That boat is my life basically.
I am the entire ocean. So the boat is sometimes going this way, sometimes going that way, sometimes in trouble, sometimes sailing nicely. What is my attitude? What is the attitude of the ocean towards the boat?
Na mamasti asahishnuta. I am not impatient. I watch serenely.
This is only the beginning. It's very powerful. Very powerful.
Only the beginning. Deeper, second verse. Same theme.
I am the infinite ocean, but deeper understanding. May ananta maham bodho vishwa vichiswa bhavata. Udetu vastamayatu name vriddhi navakshati In me, the infinite ocean of existence.
The universe comes up as a wave. Notice, boat is different. Boat is a tiny thing compared to the ocean, but it's different from the ocean.
But the wave is not different from the ocean. Wave is just a tiny manifestation of the ocean. You are the infinite ocean of existence and in you the entire universe has come up as a little wave.
Udedu vastamayatu. Let it rise, let it fall. Name vriddhi navakshati. The ocean is not increased. When there are big waves, even tsunami waves, does the ocean increase?
No. Same ocean only appearing like that. When the wave subsides, calm ocean. Has the ocean decreased?
No. Same ocean. Similarly, let life come. Let birth come.
Let death come. Old age come. Sickness come, let success come, failure come, ups and downs.
I am the infinite ocean. In me, this little bubble has come up and then it will disappear also. I neither gain when it comes nor do I lose anything.
It's incredible. Incredible. Such an experience. Even deeper, third level.
Eta deva hama sthita In me, the infinite ocean of existence, this universe is an imagination. Not a boat. Boat is still there.
Not even a wave. Wave is something is happening. But an imagination only.
Ocean remains unchanged completely. Not even wave is there. Ati shanto niragha.
Shanta is peaceful. When there is disturbance, you get peace. But Atishanta is forever peaceful.
It is peace itself. In Mandukya Upanishad you will find in the seventh mantra, your name is peace. Shantam.
Shevam Advaitam it will say. Atma, you the self, your name is peace. It is not that you are peaceful. Sometimes the mind is peaceful, sometimes it is not.
Sometimes body is healthy, sometimes it is sick. But you the self, you are by your nature peace itself. Shantam. Atishantam.
Nirakara, formless. And... Eta Deva Hamastita In this way from eternity to eternity I exist. Excellent.
What an amazing... Wonderful. Thank you.
Well, thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it. And it was a wonderful talk.