Summary
- Vedic scriptures are amongst the oldest literature available in the world. These are divided into two parts. Vedas constitute the primary literature and all the rest constitute the secondary literature. Collectively, they are the foundation of Hindu ethics, religions, theologies, philosophies, and sciences. Please refer to the following figure to get a view of their vastness. To put it in context, Christianity and Islam have only one only holy book, namely Bible and Koran.
- Scriptures are called sastram in Sanskrit. Sas means ‘to teach’ and Tra means to ‘to protect’. Thus, that which teaches and protects (help) the human being is sastram. The subject of teaching is human goals. All the human goals can be categorized into four types – a) artha (wealth); b) kama (pleasure); c) dharma (morality); and d) moksa (liberation).
- Primary vedic scriptures (vedas) – the term veda comes from the root ‘vid’, which means ‘to know’- the word veda means knowledge. There are four vedas: rig veda, yajur veda, sama veda, and atharva veda. Each veda consists of four parts (division of the vedas into four parts is to suit the four stages in a man’s life): mantra-samhitas – are hymns in praise of the vedic God for attaining material prosperity here and happiness hereafter; brahmanas – portions that guide people to perform sacrificial rites; aranyakas – are the forest books, the mystical sylvan texts which give philosophical interpretations of the rituals; upanisads – are the most important portion of the vedas. The upanisads contain the essence or the knowledge portion of the vedas. There are ten principle upanisads which form the foundation of advaita vedanta philosophy. They are distributed amongst the four vedas as follows: rig veda – aitareya upanisad; yajur veda – katha and taittiriya, isa and brhadaranyaka upanisads; sama veda – kena and chandogya upanisads; atharva veda – prasna, mundaka, and mandukya upanisads. The topics covered in upanisads include: brahman – the basic cause of the universe, the cause of all causes, is called ‘brahman” by the upanisads. atman – identifies the pervasiveness aspect of brahman (limitlessness aspect); creation – of jiva and jagat; bondage and liberation – of jiva; eschatology – what happens to a person who dies without realizing the atman/brahman; vidyas or upasanas – path for liberation.
- Secondary vedic scriptures – to support and elaborate the four vedas, many secondary scriptures are available. They are not intuitions (revelations). They are written by great acharyas (teachers). We will describe four important categories of secondary scriptures – The sutras, smritis, puranas, and itihasas. They contain the systematized and expanded concepts, theories, and principles of vedas. The common aim is to enable man to annihilate his ignorance and attain perfection, freedom, immortality, and eternal bliss through knowledge of the eternal (brahman). The final aim is to make man realize his identity with brahman.
- Post vedic scriptures – written by acharyas include: bhasya – is an elaborate exposition, a commentary on the sutras, with word by word meaning of the aphoristic precepts, their running translation, together with the individual views of the commentator or the bhasyakara; vritti – is a short gloss explaining the aphorisms in a more elaborate way, but not as extensively as a bhasya; varttika – is a work where a critical study is made of that which is said and left unsaid or imperfectly said in a bhasya, and the ways of making it perfect by supplying the omissions therein, are given; vyakhyana or tika – is a running explanation in an easier language of what is said in the original, with little elucidations here and there; tippani – is just like a vritti but is less orthodox than the vritti. It is an explanation of difficult words or phrases occurring in the original; prakaranam – many people may not have access to these three original texts, and the texts being voluminous also, people may not be able to study them completely. Therefore, to help such people, acaryas condensed the prasthana trayam and wrote simpler and smaller works.
- Advaita vedanta post vedic scriptures – there are three periods of Advaita – Pre Sankara, Sankara, and Post Sankara. This covers the period from 800 AD to 2000 AD. The advaita philosophy has been further clarified, expanded, and systematized (CAS) during this period.
This document is fourth part of the five parts of the introduction to the study of advaita vedanta
I – Why should I study and practice the advaita vedanta philosophy
II – How should I study of advaita vedanta philosophy
III – Indian schools of philosophy
IV– Vedic scriptures
V – Advaita vedanta philosophy
Relevance
Overview of vedic scriptures is important for the study of advaita vedanta because of following reasons:
- This situates advaita vedanta in the background of vast knowledge base extending over a period from 500 BC to 2000 AD.
- Overview of three foundational scriptures – ten principal upanisads, brahma-sutra, and gita provides the necessary base knowledge for advaita study.
- Overview of post vedic literature provides the list of supplemental resources for advaita study