Mandukya Upanishad (Gaudapa Karika and Shankara Bhashya)
by Swami Nikhilananda | 1949 | 115,575 words | ISBN-13: 9788175050228
This is the English translation of the Mandukya Karika by Gaudapada, which is a commentary on the Mandukya Upanishad. The school of philosophy this book attempts to expose is ‘Advaita Vedanta’, a non-dualistic path to spiritual realization of the self. Many of the verses from the Karika attempt to illustrate the identification of the Atman (self) ...
Note
“The unique feature of Māṇḍūkya lies in this that while all the other Upaniṣads deal with the several phases of Vedānta, such as Religion, Theology, Scholasticism, Mysticism, Science, Metaphysics and Philosophy, Māṇḍūkya deals exclusively with Philosophy, as defined by the most modern authorities.
The three fundamental problems of philosophy, according to this special treatise are,
- the nature of the external (material) and the internal (mental) worlds;
- the nature of consciousness;
- and the meaning of causality.
Each of these subjects is dealt with in a chapter. The first chapter sums up the whole at the very commencement. There is nothing more for philosophy to do. While it shows how the most advanced modern sciences and modern philosophies are approaching its conclusions, it gives to the world of our own times its central doctrine that partial data give partial truth, whereas the totality of data alone gives perfect truth. The ‘Totality’ of data we have only when the three states of waking, dream and deep-sleep are co-ordinated for investigation. Endless will be the systems of philosophy, if based on the waking state only. Above all inasmuch as this philosophy holds that mere ‘satisfaction’ is no criterion of truth, the best preparation for a study of Vedānta Philosophy is.a training in scientific method, but with a determination to get at he very end: ‘To stop not till the goal (of Truth) is reached.’”
V. S. I.