Being in the Ancient East

The Vedic Worldview  

The Vedas are texts that were developed over hundreds of years and are made up of hymns (samhita), ritualistic interpretations of hymns (Brahmanas), semi-metaphysical inquiries posed by thinkers who had renounced worldly life and lived in the forest (Aranyakas), and metaphysical explanations of rituals (Upanishads) contained in the Rig, Yajur, Sama and Atharva Vedas. 

The poets of Ancient India conducted the first inquiry into the underlying nature of all beings and of reality in the hymns of the Rig Veda (c. 2500-1500 BCE). The hymns (samhita) not only deified the natural elements, but also had them transcend the everyday world of Nature and living beings. Some hymns also explored the nature of existence itself, thus making them among the world’s earliest philosophers of ontology. The ontomystic of the Nasadiya Sukta (or the hymn of creation) found in the Rig Veda may be considered the world’s first inquirer into the nature of Being (sat), non-Being (asat) and the creation of the world.

Later, rituals became the chief means for connecting humans to the gods, and these ritualistic interpretations were given in the Brahmanas. However, the fullest exploration of the metaphysical nature of the rituals was delineated in the Upanishads, which meant either sitting at the feet of a teacher, or the secret teaching itself. Since they represented the highest thinking of the Vedas, the Upanishads are also called the Vedanta, or the end of the Vedas. 

To this day, the Vedas continue to be among the most sacred scriptures of Hinduism (a term given by Western scholars) despite the intervening millennia. Within the Vedic worldview, I will highlight two traditions, the Upanishads and the Shakti, that describe the same Being but assign different meanings to it.

I will start with the Upanishads, which are the main texts within the Vedanta of ancient India. There are at least 108 of them, of which about 12 are commonly regarded as the principal Upanishads. The oldest and most important of the Upanishads are the Brihadaranyaka and the Chandogya, likely to have been composed in the 8th century BCE. While the priests (brahmanas) dominated the philosophical inquiries, many rulers (kshatriyas) are also mentioned. Let us commence by exploring the Brihadaranyaka text.