Upanishad Study Group - Friday PM BV

Summarized by :  Sree Sekhar Palaparthy We started the class with recap of previous class and summarized the introduction to Kathopanishad. As we looked into “why Updanishads” in the previous class, we continued to discuss “how Upanishads” Introduction – “why Upanishads”?  Shastras can only give knowledge, which are pointers to “moksha”, but one must know it  There are 6 forms (Pramāna) of obtaining knowledge: o Pratyaksha (direct experience – ex: Seeing a flower) o Anumāna (inference – ex: There must be a fire in the woods as I see smoke) o Arthapatti (Presumption – ex: The roads are wet, so it must have rained; similar to inference) o Upamāna (Comparison) o Anupalabdhi (non-cognition) o Śabdha (knowledge through communication)  Moksha is not an object -> Śabdha pramāna is the only way to learn  The knowledge obtained can be broadly categorized as o Loukika knowledge -> objective knowledge o Vaidika knowledge -> knowledge obtained from Vedas  The Vaidika ...

Summarized by : Rajesh We started the class with answering the questions from last session. One group covered the 5 koshas and everyone walked through an exercise which we visualized each kosha as we got subtler. The other group covered the differences between Karma, Bhakti & Jnana yogas. 3 Main/key/important texts as per Shankaracharya - Bhagavad Gita, Upanishads  and Brahmasutra 10 major Upanishads that people have written a commentary/Bhashyam There are perhaps 100-120 upanishads, out of which there are only 80-82 remaining. Introduction - Veda means Knowledge - Veda has 3 sections Mantra - extremely limited poems, prayers to the Lord Rituals - vast section, materialistic aspect, performed for some results Spiritual knowledge - mystic literature = Upanishad, which are beyond rituals = Veda Nathan (Jnana) - Upanishad - Subjective Vedic Literature  - Upanishad- literal meaning means sitting near & below a Guru with respect.  This is the way it can be truly unders...