Mundaka Upanishad

A Brief overview of

Mundaka Mundaka Upanishad Revealing the entire spectrum of knowledge - the Para & Apara Vidya Almost every Indian must aware of the famous mantra written below the national emblem, Satyameva Jayate, meaning Truth alone wins. But very few are aware that this famous line is from an Upanishad of the Atharva Veda - the Mundaka Upanishad. An unequivocal commitment to the truth. That is what Upanishads are all about. The Upanishad begins with a very famous prayer done simultaneously by the teacher & the taught that 'Bless us O Gods ! That we may always hear good things, see selfless loving acts, with healthy body live our full lives serving the magnanimous objectives of Gods.' The whole Upanishad is a beautiful philosophical dialogue between Angiras Rishi and a student called Shaunak. Shaunak puts forward a question pertaining to quenching the inquisitiveness of man. The thirst for knowledge appears to be unquenchable. The more you know the more you realize how less you know. So the student very humbly asks 'O teacher ! What is it knowing which everything becomes known'. Thus starts a great discourse called Mundaka Upanishad. This Upanishad has in all three sections called mundakas, and each mundaka has two sub-sections each. In all there are 64 mantras in the whole Upanishad. As usual there is a great commentary on the Upanishad by the one & only Bhagwan Sri Adi Sankaracharya. In the beginning we have the brief description of the lineage of the teacher, the approaching of the student to the teacher, his question, and a brief answer of the teacher. In this brief answer we have classification of the entire gamut of knowledge into two categories : the Apara & the Para, the objective & the subjective knowledge, or the knowledge of the changing things and the changeless eternal reality. The teacher reveals that it is by the pursuit of Para Vidya that the quenching of the inquisitiveness of man is ultimately possible. The realm of time & space has come about from the transcendental eternal truth, so one should pursue the para vidya also after apara vidya. It is noteworthy that the teacher also indicates that the role & importance of objective knowledges. Later the Upanishad also reveals the role & limitation of actions as such, the great importance of going to the teacher for realizing the eternal truth, the secret of the creation, nature of the ultimate truth, and various important values for making our mind ready for the final awakening. Of this truthfulness has the highest place.