Prashna Upanishad
The Prashna Upanishad is an ancient Sanskrit text, embedded inside Atharva Veda, ascribed to Pippalada sakha of Vedic scholars. It is a Mukhya Upanishad, and is listed as number 4 in the Muktika canon of 108 Upanishads of Hinduism.
The Prashna Upanishad contains six Prashna, with each chapter discussing the answers. The chapters end with the phrase, prasnaprativakanam, which literally means, "thus ends the answer to the question". In some manuscripts discovered in India, the Upanishad is divided into three Adhyayas with a total of six Kandikas.
The first three questions are profound metaphysical questions but, states Eduard Roer, do not contain any defined, philosophical answers, are mostly embellished mythology and symbolism. The first question gives a detailed philosophical and logical idea about the origin of life on earth and the description is one of the earliest concepts on Matter and energy. The fourth section, in contrast, contains substantial philosophy. The last two sections discuss the symbol Om and concept of Moksha. Roer as well as Weber suggest that the last two Prashnas may be spurious, later age insertion into the original Upanishad.
Prashna Upanishad is notable for its structure and sociological insights into the education process in ancient India. In some historic Indian literature and commentaries, it is also called Shat Prasna Upanishad.
Etymology
Prashna literally means, in modern usage, "question, query, inquiry". In ancient and medieval era Indian texts, the word had two additional context-dependent meanings: "task, lesson" and "short section or paragraph", with former common in Vedic recitations. In Prashna Upanishad, all these contextual roots are relevant. The text consists of questions with lessons or answers, and the sections within the Upanishad are also called prashna.Chronology
The Prashna Upanishad was probably composed in the second half of 1st millennium BCE, likely after other Atharva Veda texts such as the Mundaka Upanishad, but the precise chronology of Prasna Upanishad is unclear and contested. The Mundaka Upanishad, for example, writes Patrick Olivelle, is rather later era ancient Upanishad and is, in all probability, post-Buddhist. The chronology of Prasna Upanishad, and other ancient India texts, is difficult to resolve because all opinions rest on scanty evidence, an analysis of archaism, style and repetitions across texts, driven by assumptions about likely evolution of ideas, and on presumptions about which philosophy might have influenced which other Indian philosophies.Olivelle states Prashna Upanishad "cannot be much older than the beginning of the common era". Mahony suggests an earlier date, placing Prashna along with Maitri and Mandukya Upanishads, as texts that probably emerged about early fourth century BCE. Phillips dates Prashna Upanishad as having been composed after Brihadaranyaka, Chandogya, Isha, Taittiriya and Aitareya, Kena Katha and Mundaka, but before Mandukya, Svetasvatara and Maitri Upanishads. Ranade posits a view similar to Phillips, with a slightly different ordering, placing the Prashna Upanishad's chronological composition in the fifth group of ancient Upanishads, but after the Svetasvatara Upanishad.
Structure
The Prashna Upanishad consists of six questions and their answers. Except the first and the last Prashna, all other sections ask multiple questions. The pupils credited with the six questions are respectively Kabandhin Katyayana, Bhargava Vaidarbhi, Kausalya Asvalayana, Sauryayanin Gargya, Saibya Satyakama and Sukesan Bharadvaja. Sage Pippalada is credited with giving the answers.The questions are not randomly arranged, but have an embedded structure. They begin with macrocosmic questions and then proceed to increasing details of microcosmic, thus covering both universals and particulars. The six questions are about the origin, prana, origin of mind, meditation and spiritual states, nature of the syllable "Om", and the nature of the Supreme Being.
Contents
Ethics before education in ancient schools
The opening verses of Prashna Upanishad describe students who arrive at a school seeking knowledge about highest Brahman. They ask sage Pippalada to explain this knowledge. He does not start providing answers for their education, but demands that they live with him ethically first, as follows:This preface is significant, states Johnston, as it reflects the Vedic era belief that a student's nature and mind must first show a commitment, aspiration, and moral purity before knowledge is shared. Secondly, the method of first question by the student and then answer is significant, according to Johnston, as it reflects an interactive style where the student has worked out the question for himself before he is provided an answer, in contrast to a lecture style where the teacher provides the questions and answers regardless of whether the student understands either. The three ethical precepts emphasized in this verse of Prashna Upanishad are Tapas, Brahmacharya and Sraddha.
The second interesting part of the answer is the implicit admission by the teacher with "if we know", that he may not know the answer, and thus acknowledging a sense of skepticism and humility into the process of learning.
How did life begin? - First Prashna
A year later, sage Pippalada is asked the first question, "whence are living beings created?" In verse 1.4 of Prashna Upanishad, the sage's answer is stated: Prajapati performed Tapas and created two principles, Rayi, and Prana, thinking that "these together will couple to produce for me creatures in many ways". The sun is the spirit, matter is the moon. The sun ascends to the highest, alone in splendor, warming us and serving as the spirit of all creatures. He is Aditya, illuminates everything, as stated in the first Prashna, and has two paths - the northern and the southern. Those who desire offspring follow the guidance of sun's southern path, while those who seek the Self take the northern path, one of knowledge, brahmacharya, tapas and sraddha.The first chapter includes several symbolic mythological assertions. For example, it states that the sun is ultimately the giver of rain and races in sky in the "chariot with seven wheels and six spokes". This symbolism is also found in more ancient Vedic literature, and the seven wheels represents half years, seasons, months, half months, days, nights, and muhurtas. The six spoke symbolism refers to the Vedic practice of describing sun as having six seasons, in contrast to five seasons for earth.
The first section ends with verses 1.15 and 1.16 asserting that ethical living is necessary to realize the Atman-Brahman: Satya, Brahmacharya, Tapas, no Anrta no Jihma, and no Maya.
What is a living being? - Second Prashna
The second Prashna starts with three questions, "how many Deva uphold a living being? how many manifest their power thus? and who is the best?".The question is significant because it explicitly expresses gods to be residing in each living being and in nature, to support life. This is widely interpreted by scholars, given the context of answer that follows, to reflect the extant belief that deities express themselves in human beings and creatures through sensory organs and capabilities. The second significant aspect of the question is its structural construct, wherein the teacher is called Bhagavan, reflecting the Vedic culture of veneration and respect for teachers. The Upanishad thus suggests multiple contextual meanings of the word Bhagavan. Such use of the term Bhagavan for teacher is repeated elsewhere, such as in the opening lines and verse 4.1 of the Prashna Upanishad, as well as in other Upanishads such as in verse 1.1.3 of the Mundaka Upanishad.
Sage Pippalada opens the answers to the three questions by listing five gross elements, five senses and five organs of action as expression of deities. In verses 2.3 and 2.4, the Prashna Upanishad states that Prana is the most essential and powerful of all, because without it all other deities cannot survive in a creature, they exist only when Prana is present. The deities manifest their power because of and in honor of Prana. The spirit manifests itself in nature as well as life, as Agni, as sun, as air, as space, as wind, as that which has form and as that which does not have form.
What is the nature of man, and how is it so? - Third Prashna
The third Prashna of the Upanishad asks six questions: Whence is life born? when born, how does it come into the body? when it has entered the body, how does it abide? how does it go out of the body? how does life interface its relation with nature and senses? how does life interface with Self?Sage Pippalada states that these questions are difficult, and given the student's past curiosities about Brahman, he explains it as follows,
Life enters the body, states the Prashna Upanishad, by the act of mind. It governs the body by delegating work to other organs, sage Pippalada continues in verse 3.4, each specialized to do its own work independent of the other powers, just like a king commands his ministers to govern functions in the villages in his kingdom. The Upanishad then enumerates a theory of human body that is found in older Vedic literature, such as the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad hymn II.1.19. It asserts, for example, that human body has a heart as the principal organ of Self, from where arise 101 major arteries, each major artery divides into a hundred times, which in turn subdivide into 72,000 smaller arteries, giving a total of 727,210,201 small and large arteries, and that these arteries diffuse air throughout the body. It is this life-breath which interfaces Self to all organs and life in human body, states the Upanishad.
The third Prashna uses symbolic phrases, relying on more ancient texts. It states, in verse 3.5 for example, that "seven lights" depend on air circulated by arteries in order to function, which is a phrase which means "two eyes, two ears, two nostrils and mouth". Its answers to metaphysical questions are physiological, rather than philosophical.