Mukhya Upanishads
The Mukhya Upanishads are the ten oldest Upanishads , dating from the 5th century BC. BC to the 4th century and were then commented on in the 9th century by the Indian scholar Shankara (788 to 820).
etymology
The Sanskrit word मुख्य - mukhya means leading, prior, main or outstanding .
description
The Mukhya Upanishads, which lead the Muktika canon from 108 Upanishads, are also known as Dashopanishads (ten Upanishads). They were probably all created before the birth of Christ. They are accepted as Shruti (revelation writings) by all Hindus .
In the following list they are listed together with the abbreviation, the associated Veda ( Rigveda RV, Samaveda SV, Yajurveda YV, White Yajurveda ŚYV, Black Yajurveda KYV and Atharvaveda AV) and a subtitle:
| N ° | Upanishad | abbreviation | Veda | subtitle |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | Isha Upanishad | (IsUp) | ŚYV | The inner rule |
| 2. | Kena Upanishad | (KeUp) | SV | What is moving the world? |
| 3. | Katha Upanishad | (KaUp) | YV | Death as a teacher |
| 4th | Prashna Upanishad | (PrUp) | AV | Breath of life |
| 5. | Mundaka Upanishad | (MuUp) | AV | The different types of knowledge |
| 6th | Mandukhya Upanishad | (MaUp) | AV | The stages of consciousness |
| 7th | Taittiriya Upanishad | (TaiUp) | KYV | From food to enjoyment |
| 8th. | Aitareya Upanishad | (AiUp) | RV | The microcosm of man |
| 9. | Chandogya Upanishad | (ChhUp) | SV | Song and sacrifice |
| 10. | Brihadaranyaka Upanishad | (BrUp) | ŚYV | ? |
Note: The subtitles for the individual Upanishads come from the Hindu writer Eknath Easwaran .
Nikhilananda (1963) counts the Svetasvatara Upanishad (ŚvetUp) as the 11th Upanishad among the Mukhya Upanishads. Hume (1921) listed 13 Principal Upanishads , including the Svetasvatara Upanishad as well as the Kaushitaki Upanishad and the Maitri Upanishad . In his contribution The Main Upanishads (1953) Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan provides the text and the English translation of a total of 18 Upanishads. These include the 13 works already cited by Hume and also the Subāla, Jābāla, Paiṅgala, Kaivalya and Vajrasūcikā Upanishad (Muktika numbers 30, 13, 59, 12 and 36).
Dating
Linguistically, the oldest Mukhya Upanishads are the Brihadaranyaka and the Chandogya Upanishad. These both belong to the Brahmana period of Vedic Sanskrit and date back to before the Indian grammarian Panini (520 to 460 BC) (ie before the 5th century BC ). More recent Upanishads like the Katha-Upanishad were written during Panini's lifetime and belong to the sutra period of late Vedic Sanskrit. The most recent Upanishads are already written in early, classical Sanskrit and are roughly at the same time as the Bhagavad Gita , which originated during the Maurya dynasty (320 to 180 BC).
See also
Individual evidence
- ↑ Eknath Easwaran: The Upanishads . Nilgiri Press (Classics of Indian Spirituality), New Delhi 2007, ISBN 978-1-58638-021-2 .
- ↑ Swami Nikhilananda: The Principle Upanishads . Courier Dover Publications, New York 2003, ISBN 0-486-42717-X .
- ^ Robert Ernest Hume: The Thirteen Principal Upanishads . Oxford University Press, 1992, ISBN 0-19-563743-7 .
- ↑ Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan: The Principle Upanishads . Harper Collins Publishers India, New Delhi 1994, ISBN 81-7223-124-5 .