Brihadaranyaka Upanishad Ch.1.6 Lecture 38 on 31 May 2026

Full Transcript (Not Corrected)

Opening Invocation

ॐ पूर्णमदः पूर्णमिदं पूर्णात् पूर्णमुदच्यते

पूर्णस्य पूर्णमादाय पूर्णमेवावशिष्यते

ॐ शान्तिः शान्तिः शान्तिः

OM PŪRṆAMADAḤ PŪRṆAMIDAM PŪRṆĀT PŪRṆAMUDACYATE PŪRṆASYA PŪRṆAMĀDĀYA PŪRṆAMEVA VAŚIṢYATE OM ŚĀNTI ŚĀNTI ŚĀNTIH

OM That Brahman is infinite, and this universe is also infinite. The infinite proceeds from the infinite. Taking the infinitude of the infinite universe, it remains as the infinite Brahman alone.

OM Peace, Peace, Peace be unto all.

First Chapter, Sixth Section – Uktha Brāhmaṇa

We have almost come to the end of the first chapter. We are in the sixth section of the first chapter of the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad, and herein in this sixth section, the Upaniṣad is really condensing, summarising, giving the very essence of the entire Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad by reducing the whole world into three experiencable components: the names, the forms, and the action – nāma, rūpa and karma.

As we discussed earlier, nāma, rūpa and karma. Nāma means sound – śabda brahma. Rūpa means the material from which every conceivable form can come out, and wherever there is nāma and rūpa, there would be a prayojana, a utility, an action, whether it is by others or by oneself. So we have to take both into consideration. For example, when I see a glass and I feel like drinking water, then I use that glass for this action called filling it up with water and drinking it. Of course, the glass never feels the thirst, but it has a definite purpose, actionable purpose.

As we discussed, this sixth section is also called Uktha Brāhmaṇa. Brāhmaṇa means section, not a person belonging to a particular caste. Here it means a section. Sanskrit words can have many different meanings for the same word. For example, ātman can mean the body, ātman can mean the mind, ātman can mean the egotism, ātman can mean itself or Brahman. So every essence can also be called ātman. Sweetness is the ātman, the very essence of sugar or of any sweet.

So here uktha means origin, that undifferentiated universal substance or material cause from which the whole universe comes out. That is called uktham, and all these three are called uktham. What are these three? Nāma, rūpa and karma. The whole universe is nothing but a combination of these three. That is why I called it a triangle. In a triangle, you cannot remove one. If you remove one angle, the triangle falls down. Remove the nāma from this triangle of nāma-rūpa-karma, the world will vanish. Remove the rūpa (form), the world will vanish with the destruction of one particular aspect. The whole universe will completely disappear.

For example, that you see a tree; let us say it is a mango tree. So you remove the nāma, then what happens? The tree itself will disappear because nāma indicates a particular form, and when there is no nāma (name) and form, there would be no object. Also, then what remains? Don't think it becomes non-existent. No, it remains. It merges back into Brahman. Remove karma from this world. What remains will be? There would be no name, no form, but it is not destruction. It is merging back into its unmanifest form, merging back into its unmanifest form which is Brahman – ātman.

So this section is telling us: wherever you experience anything, and experience will be either the gross physical or the subtle thought – either you experience a thought or you experience some external object – they both must contain nāma, rūpa and karma. So as I said, you experience a person, and if you remove the rūpa, the name will automatically disappear. When form and name disappear, the action also will disappear. This person called Rāma will not be available at all for experience, and these three are in subtle form. And that is what we call a thought. The moment we think "Rāma", the moment we see Rāma, immediately the form of Rāma and the name of Rāma and the character of Rāma, which is called action – the summation of every activity is called character. Is Rāma a good person, generous person, loving person or cruel person, destructive person? So all that is dependent upon karma. What we call our assessment of the whole character is nothing but through the experience of karmas only, and that is how that is called karma. Karma means character; character means our estimate of a person, the idea about that person, and that is called karma.

And it must have a specific separation: "This is not Kṛṣṇa. Kṛṣṇa is a very good person, but this person is not so good." So every single experienceable object can be separated from the infinite number of objects in this world completely, but here is one. What is the point? That nāma means śabda that is Brahman. The form (rūpa) is Brahman when it is removed of its specific form. And in this sixth section we get a peculiar name for the uktham of form, for the original cause of every form – that is called cakṣu. So sometimes when we try to read cakṣu means the eye. So eye is from where all the forms arise? No, the cakṣu which we are referring to is a sense organ. Through that we are able to experience forms, but the origin of the forms is not the cakṣu. So according to this section, cakṣu means origin, uktham, the cause from which all forms arise, and all forms can arise only from a formless aspect. Please keep this in mind: from the nameless origin, any name can come out; from śabda, any name can come out; from formlessness, any form can come out.

And what is the origin or uktham of karma? Prāṇa. Prāṇa means energy – the sum total of energy, not individualized energy, but universal energy. That is called Īśvara, Hiraṇyagarbha, Saguṇa Brahma – these are all different names for it.

So what is this whole universe? It is nothing but śabda brahma, rūpa brahma and prāṇa brahma, and they are all unmanifest. Only when Brahman manifests in the form of sound, it becomes names. When Brahman manifests as forms, they all become different forms, experienceable externally and also in the form of thoughts. If you analyse your dream state, everything that you see is nothing but name, form and action. And this prāṇa is not called prāṇa; it is called Brahman only when it manifests through and in a particular instrument; then it will be called prāṇa; otherwise it is called prāṇadevatā, which is another name for Brahman.

So why is this section telling us this? Because it wants to tell what is it that binds us – this nāma, rūpa and karma. We see an object, for example a person. And he has a particular form which can be distinguished from every other person, and he has a particular name to distinguish him. If there are, for example, three Rāmas in the same family, then Rāma number one, Rāma number two, Rāma number three – we have to distinguish. So the function of a name is to distinguish every form from every other form. And about everybody, through the actions, we have an idea of what this object is – every object, not necessarily human beings: "This is a good mango, this is a good dog, that is a dangerous animal," etcetera, etcetera. But if you remove nāma, rūpa and karma – removing means what? Merging them back into their original cause – what remains is pure Brahman.

And as I mentioned earlier, Vidyāraṇya puts it in his Pañcadaśī: What is the world? Sat-Cit-Ānanda plus nāma plus rūpa. What is Brahman? Sat-Cit-Ānanda – the world without nāma and rūpa. Simply Sat-Cit-Ānanda, which is the origin (uktham), that is called Brahman.

So what does it want? Now the Upaniṣad warns us that why this particular explanation in this last section of the first chapter? We are all caught, bound, and this bondage is of two types. Our first bondage will be to the body. Everybody – my body, your body, anybody's body – will have a particular form, a particular shape, a particular colour, height, weight, etcetera. Distinguishable, totally distinguishable from everything else in this world. There will not be two equally same objects. Some difference will be there, as they say, even between a billion hairs – one can clearly distinguish one hair from the other hair. Of course, we require a very subtle instrument for that. When the snow falls, there will be billions of snowflakes. Every snowflake has its own specific signature – nāma rūpa. What a marvelous creation it is. So no two persons' eyes are alike. No two persons' thumb impressions are alike. That is how our thumb impressions are taken to distinguish, and immigration officials they do find out. So everything is unique, and this whole body – our body as a form, as a name – has certain characteristics created by our actions, and actions are possible only because of prāṇa or energy. So these three things form the physical body as well as the sūkṣma śarīra (subtle body).

Now the Upaniṣad wants to distinguish. In this fifth section, the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad has given a beautiful name for the physical body. It is called satyam, and for the subtle body – our mind – it has given another name: amṛtam (immortality). Now we may be wondering why the Upaniṣad is giving this word satyam. Only Brahman – Saccidānanda – deserves the word satyam jñānam anantam brahma. Because what is our satyam? My satyam, your satyam. If I think you are not satyam, I would not be giving this talk. If you think I am not satyam, you would not be listening to this talk. But for us, the body, the physical body, the physical world are the most – they are the only truth available at this moment. That is why it is called satyam, and we are enormously attached to it. This attachment prevents us from going into our uktham (original cause) and realizing why we should realize our uktham, our original cause. Because our identity with this particular personality is preventing our identity with every object in this world. But if we seek for the truth, every object has got the same form, name, and prāṇa (energy), and so these are the effects. Every effect must have a cause. So these are the manifested effects, and a manifested effect must have an unmanifested cause. But we are caught in it, and this emphasis on separating ourselves from everything else – that is called bondage – that creates a tremendous amount of suffering.

How does it create suffering? If I can identify with my brother, with my sister, with my mother, with my parent – even if I am suffering, but if they are enjoying happiness, then I will be a happy person. Because identity means I cannot say "I identify with you, but I don't experience your happiness, joy." No, the moment I identify, the other person's experience must become my experience. That is why when a mother has a less amount of sweet and she gives it to her children, she is more than happy because as a mother – and that is the meaning of the word "mother" – she is completely identified: "This is me, but I am eating through the body of my child." But they say a mother will not experience it when the neighboring child is eating it. That is the funny thing.

So the Upaniṣad wants to tell: now you practice sādhanā (spiritual practice) and slowly go back to your origin. Surprisingly, you will discover that every name is your name, every form is your form, and every karma is your karma – every object is none other than you. This is so beautifully illustrated in the Bhāgavatam. Śukadeva, the son of Vedavyāsa, as soon as he was born – completely naked, sixteen years old – he started walking away because he was a full jñānī, a brahmin. His father, who was attached, started following his son, calling him, "O my son, O my son." And do you know what miracle took place? Śukadeva was completely unaware that somebody was following him and calling him, because he was absorbed in his nature as Brahman, and Brahman is this world. Therefore, the whole world started responding to Śukadeva: "Yes, father! Yes, father!" – every tree, every creature is telling "Yes, father, yes, father." What a marvelous illustration we get in these beautiful scriptures.

So, O man, after all, what is it you are seeking? You are striving 24 hours a day: "I want to be happy," but you can never be happy – maybe very little happiness for a very short time. But if you can identify yourself with another person, with two people, with a hundred people, with a thousand people, with everybody, then when a tiger succeeds in hunting a deer and then starts enjoying that food and quenching its hunger, there is a peculiar ānanda just like us, and that ānanda will be yours because you are identifying with the tiger. Anybody who is happy, you will be happy, and where there is happiness, there is no place for unhappiness because these two opposite thoughts cannot stay in the mind at the same time. So a person who identifies with the whole universe will be the happiest person in this world, and that is one way of understanding when the Divine Mother showed to Śrī Rāmakṛṣṇa: "Why are you not eating through all these mouths?"

So that is the message: your very unconscious is striving to break this bondage called identity with your individuality and becoming the real you, who is the universal. But you are not able to understand it. So this hint: try to find out every name has the same origin. Like ten separate people are the children of one particular couple – yesterday a small illustration – then all of them feel identity: "We are brothers and sisters. If some harm, some suffering comes to one of us, it is as if all of us are suffering." So that is called true family. So this is the idea, but first of all, trace your identity – the cause from which you have come, which is called uktham in this case.

So another important point we have to remember: you cannot separately, independently merge name into śabda, form into formlessness, and action into prāṇa or Īśvara or Hiraṇyagarbha or Sūtra Brahma. Either all the three will merge, or all the three will be separated, because they are one and the same. Just a small example: suppose there is a small mango fruit, and it is full of flesh, very ripe and very fragrant. So as soon as it is thrown out, then everything will disappear – the flavor, the fragrance, the sweetness, that soft texture – everything will disappear. So we are one in three, three in one. That is the lesson this sixth section wants to tell us.

So this is the message of the sixth section. What is the tātparya? The essence, the summary of this one. The summary is that we are all one in Brahman. What makes us think we are separate is form, name and action. If we can succeed in merging them, then there is nothing that is there. Take the example of clay. So supposing a hundred pots are made out of clay, and all the hundred pots have to be given a hundred separate names: "This is a glass, this is a plate, this is for cooking (cooking pot), this is a storage pot," etcetera, etcetera. But when we go into the origin, we remember all the three will be there. What is the karma (prāṇa) of this cooking pot? Cooking. What is the karma of the glass pot? It fulfills the function of drinking. What is the function of the plate? That is for keeping food so that we can eat according to our own mix-up. So the name (plate, glass pot, storage pot) – they are different. Their forms are different, their functions are different. Names (nāma), forms (rūpa), functions (karma) – all are different. But if you merge them back – all the three – if you merge the cooking pot, then it becomes clay. As soon as it becomes clay, it loses its particular form, name, function. Apply the same thing to the glass pot, the plate pot, the storage pot – any number of blessed pots. You see, that is how it works.

Take another example: golden ornaments – make any number of ornaments. The names are different, the functions are different. This golden ornament is called earring, meant only to be hung in the ear. This is called nose ring, meant to be hung through the nose. This is a bangle, meant to be kept on the arm. So this is how the functions will be there – each function separate, form separate, name separate. Then you melt one – nāma, rūpa and karma disappear. That is how we have to understand what is the way for us to achieve identity with the universe by removing the attachment to this nāma rūpa. That is called vairāgyam. Vairāgyam means dispassion. What is the dispassion here? Not giving up necessarily, but removing the attachment. So that is called nāhaṃ deham – "I am not the body." The moment you say the form of the body, the name of the body, the function of the body – everything associated with the body – it ceases to affect that particular mind.

So the Upaniṣad, as I mentioned earlier, calls this body consisting of particular formation, particular name, particular function – calls it satyam. Satya means – we should not take it in the ultimate sense. Satyam means here that our satyam, our perception: "This is the only truth, this is the only truth, this is the truth." But the scripture knows this is not the truth, because that which perishes, that which changes, that which is dependent – that is not truth. What is independent, what is not dependent upon anything, and what can never either grow or become less – that is called satyam – trikāla abādhitaṃ satyam. So the form is changing, and according to the form, what do you think? The name also is changing. "This is a child, this is a youth, this is a middle-aged person, this is an old person, and this is a dead person." With every change, the name also changes. The function also changes. Prāṇa also varies. So we suffer from these limitations. How to get out? At least the first stage is: "I am not the body." Then to say "I am not the body" – to say "I am not the annamaya kośa" – I will have to identify with the prāṇamaya kośa next, the subtler form, the cause of anna which is called prāṇamaya kośa. Only then I will say "This is anātman." Anātman means asatya – that is not the truth. That means I am not attached to it. That means it doesn't affect us.

So we have seen this in the Taittirīya Upaniṣad, how Bhṛgu had gradually overcome by identifying with the subtler cause from the effect to the cause, and that becomes the effect in its turn. Find out its cause: the cause of the prāṇa is mind, the cause of the mind is intellect, the cause of the intellect is ānanda, and the cause of ānanda is Brahman. So the Upaniṣad is funnily telling us the mind is called amṛta (immortal). Why? Immortality means – we use this word: the gods always want to drink the nectar of immortality – but the scripture knows very well what it is talking about. So it is relative immortality. That means for a long time you are not going to die; you are going to enjoy. So the duration of the body is very little – every day we are changing – but the duration of the mind is longer. Therefore, if somebody can succeed in identifying oneself with the mind, relatively the person can achieve immortality. That is what this section wants to convey. Detach yourself. When you realize, "I thought this was satyam; now I realize how can that which is changing every millisecond be satyam? But I want satyam. So seek it at a higher level, subtler level" – that is called the mind. And of course, here by "mind" it means until the ānandamaya kośa – all the other four kośas are included. But this immortality of these four kośas is called the mind here – antaḥkaraṇa. You know how long? It only gets destroyed when we get liberation. Until that time, it is not going to happen. So that is what this sixth section wants us to convey: slowly, gradually ascend. That is what St. John of the Cross explained beautifully in the form of a very small poem, The Dark Night of the Soul. Until that time, the soul thought "I am in full light" – until what time? That the person was totally identified with the body. He doesn't have any faith in God; for him, the world. And what is the world? This body is the world.

This is a marvelous point: "Oh, there is a world outside" – and how did you know there is a world outside? Only through this body. So, for example, the world consists of five elements – that is sounds, forms, colours, fragrances, pastes, and touches – through five sense organs. We are experiencing these five. Remember always: the world means only five. Svāmī Premēśvarānanda tells: "Five dishes for us to enjoy." Suppose somebody is blind. The world now becomes only consisting of four things, because the world of colours and forms totally disappears. Suppose this person is deaf. His world consists of only three-fifths, only three. Supposing that person loses taste – only two-fifths. Suppose this person loses the ability to smell – one-fifth gone. Suppose this person cannot even experience touch (touch means soft, hard, cold, heat) – then where is the world? External world? Nothing. A person's world – so-called world – is totally dead. Just imagine that when a person is born blind or born deaf, he will never be able to understand. Of course, this is the Western view. Eastern view, Hindu view is: no, in the past lives he was not like that. He had all his five sense organs fully functioning. Therefore, the impressions are remaining in the mind, and therefore he can dream – seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling, touching, etcetera. That is an entirely different subject matter. I am not going into that, but what I am trying to tell is that this body is the instrument through which we guess, assume, infer there is an external world. Minus this body, there is no external world at all. What a marvelous truth it is – a psychological truth. So that is why our whole world is nothing but our body, and that is the greatest bondage.

What is the way? Let us identify not only with this particular body but with everybody. But before we could do that, we must acquire – go back to the origin – and then identify with the origin of these three: śabda, then formlessness (arūpa), and prāṇa or Hiraṇyagarbha or Īśvara – identify with that, because Īśvara represents the origin of these three. Once I identify, then I can enjoy every form, every name and every activity. Then it becomes a līlā. Līlā means what? Because if two people are fighting and one kills the other, there cannot be any killing. Even from the ordinary point of view, which David Attenborough explained so beautifully, death is not permanent non-existence. Death is only going back to the five elements. The body is made up of five elements, and it is only the death of the body. But the other four kośas – all of them are called sūkṣma śarīra, including of course karana śarīra – they all go in search of a new body. Very soon it will get a new body. And so all the five kośas become complete, because without interacting with the world, our experience will not be complete. And without the world, we cannot be bound, we cannot be released. So the world is an absolute necessity for our growth.

Every experience that we get in this world is to be learned. What lesson? "So I loved this person, this person betrayed me." So what is the lesson we have to learn? That that person has not betrayed you. You were expecting that person to be grateful and recompense, pay back. It is your fault. You are free to love. You are not free to expect. So learn the lesson. Don't stop loving, because if you stop loving, you stop being happy. Love and happiness, joy are one and the same thing actually. If you say "I am happy", that is called love. If you say "I love", that means you are happy. Try to understand this very clearly. And we cannot live without happiness. So we have the right to love. Can we be joyful without the other person responding? In fact, we can be more happy, because if I love something, then that gives us the greatest happiness. The greater our love, proportionately greater would be our happiness. You all know that you are very intelligent students, but still I would like to give an illustration.

Supposing you like to read mystery novels – a very common example. And there is your favorite author, and you just love whatever that person writes – a page-turner. You just love that person's writings, and it comes to you in the form of a book. Does the book return your love? Will it tell, "Oh, I also love you"? No, you love, you use the book, you read the book. The book never responds because it is lifeless. But if your love for that type of book is 10%, your happiness is 10%. If you love it 50%, your joy will be 50%. If you love it 100%, then you would like to read it again and again, and your joy will be 100%. So love is equivalent to joy.

What are we talking about? That our problem comes especially with other living human beings: that my love is not requited, not returned. That is our mistake. You have a right only to love. You have no right to expect anything. And you know, the moment we stop expecting, how much joy will come? All the joy that we are likely to derive. For example, you love a person, you meet the person, you talk with that person, and that person also starts showing love for you – the person's talk, person's smile, personality of that person – it enhances your happiness, joy. That's what you think. But because sometimes if he doesn't express or if he reduces that expression, you're upset. So you set up this expectation, and the resultant will be you're upset. But just imagine: "I love this person, but I will not expect anything from that person. Whether that person gives it back, shows love or doesn't show love – it doesn't really matter, because you are your own master." If your love is dependent upon that person's reaction, then your love goes up and down, changes all the time. But if it is completely independent – "I don't care, but I just love" – there is a beautiful quotation from, I think, Swami Vivekananda. He quotes from Mahābhārata (or it is not there actually in Mahābhārata, but it is a wise saying, let us say). Once Yudhiṣṭhira was absorbed in looking at the beautiful sunrise and sunset. Somebody wanted to speak with him. He went there, but Yudhiṣṭhira was so completely absorbed he was not aware of it. After some time, this person found that Yudhiṣṭhira was coming back to consciousness. So he asked him, "Sir, what do you get? I see that you are completely absorbed in it. What profit, what lābha do you get out of it?" And Yudhiṣṭhira was shocked, surprised, and said, "Lābha? Profit? I am not expecting. I love. I enjoy seeing the sunrise, the sunset – any beautiful thing. That is it. It gives me the greatest joy. If I expect something, it will definitely break at some point of time."

Śrī Rāmakṛṣṇa, at the age of seven or eight, was walking in the fields. It was rainy season, the whole sky was covered up with black thick clouds, and there was a flock of swans gracefully flying across, and that sight had made him so joyous, so absorbed, he fell down unconscious. He was unconscious to the world, conscious to the aesthetic beauty of that experience. That's why when people were frightened, he said, "No, my health is perfectly all right. In fact, an unhealthy person cannot experience this – only a perfectly healthy person can experience it."

So what are we talking about? That you go to the origin. Two things happen: then you identify yourself with the entire creation. Second thing: whatever is happening in this universe, everything will be joyful. Somebody is quarreling with somebody or with you – that is a joy. It is like a drama because it is unreal. Somebody is killing somebody – it's an extreme philosophy, hard to understand, digest: somebody is killing somebody, and that person is enjoying it. Just as an illustration, Śrī Rāmakṛṣṇa saw Akṣay passed away in front of his eyes. Everybody was weeping their eyes out. Śrī Rāmakṛṣṇa was laughing because he saw what is the satyam: death is unreal. It is only the body; nothing happened to the soul. The scabbard has been separated from this world; whether something happens to the scabbard or not, it doesn't really matter. So develop that vairāgya. What is vairāgya? Giving up attachment to one individuality and identifying oneself with everything else – that is called true vairāgya, and that is the essence of this one. So, O man, every experience in this world has something to teach you. Learn it well, keep it in mind, reinforce it, try to identify with everybody else, and that is called sarvatra sama darśana.

Closing Prayer

ॐ जननीं शारदां देवीं रामकृष्णं जगद्गुरुम् ।पादपद्मे तयोः श्रित्वा प्रणमामि मुहुर्मुहुः

Om Jānānāṃ Śāradāṃ Devīṃ Rāmakṛṣṇaṃ Jagadgurum Pada Padme Tayo Śṛtvā Praṇamāmi Muhur Muhuh

May Rāmakṛṣṇa, Holy Mother, and Swami Vivekānanda bless us all with Bhakti.

Jai Rāmakṛṣṇa!