The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad

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CHAPTER V

 

Third Brahmana

 

BRAHMAN AS THE HEART

 

1.

esa praja-patir yad hrdayam, etad brahma, etad sarvam, tad etat

try-aksaram; hr-da-yam iti. hr ity ekam aksaram; abhiharanty asmai

svas canye ca, ya evam veda; da ity ekam aksaram, dadatyasmai svas

canye ca ya evam veda; yam, ity ekam aksaram; eti svargam lokam ya

evam veda.

Verse with diacritical marks.

 

'This heart within us is God Himself', thus begins this

passage. Esa praja-patir yad hrdayam. Of all things inside us, the

most inscrutable is the heart. It cannot be understood easily. The

word used here in Sanskrit is Hrdaya, a word with three letters, hr,

da and ya representing together the word heart. The heart is one thing

for the physician, the doctor, the biologist or the biochemist. For

him, the heart is that particular organic part of the body which pumps

blood and supplies energy to the lungs and to the different parts of

the body. This is what is called the heart in ordinary language, but

it is another thing when used in a symbolic sense e.g. 'I cannot

understand your heart'; 'yes, I understand your heart'. When we use

such expressions as these, we do not mean the physicist's or the

biochemist's or the physician's heart. We mean the feelings within,

the deepest motives within, the intentions inside and the spirit of

the person. So, the Upanishad especially takes the spirit into

consideration when it defines Hrdaya or heart as the essence of a person.

 

The heart is an object for meditation. By understanding the

heart you can understand everything because it is in the heart you are

located, you are seated, you are rooted. Your heart is you. What your

heart is, that is your being. Even in ordinary life we seem to

appreciate this point of view. Your heart is superior to every other

faculty of yours. Even the ratiocinating faculty can be subordinated

to the feelings of the heart. The heart has its reasons as they say,

which reason cannot tell. It can overwhelm even a rational conclusion.

You cannot accept rational conclusions which are opposed to the

feelings of the heart, to the conscience. The conscience is the heart

which is the touchstone of Reality and which is the Union Jack or

national flag of the government of God. Here you have the symbolic

representation of the Absolute, embedded in your own being, it being

situated in your own heart. Our heart speaks the language of God, and

so, what the heart speaks can be regarded as an indication from the

above. Here in this verse the literal meaning of the very word Hrdaya

is taken as a symbol for meditation. Hr-da-yam iti hr ity ekam

aksaram: The first letter of the word Hrdaya is Hr, a Sanskrit letter.

Now the teacher of the Upanishad tells us that you can meditate on the

import of this single letter Hr. Do not go to the entire meaning of

the word Hrdaya, or heart, here Hr, the first letter is itself

sufficient. What does it mean? How do you contemplate on the import of

the first letter Hr? Hr ity ekam aksaram: 'Hr is one letter'.

Abhiharanty asmai suds canye ca, ya evam veda: Hr means draw. That is

the grammatical root meaning of the word Hr. Drawing, to attract, to

pull towards oneself, to compel everything to gravitate towards

oneself, to bring everything under one's control, to subjugate

everything, to superintend over all things and to be overlord of

everything - all these meanings are comprehended in the root meaning

of the letter Hr. When you contemplate the heart, bring to your mind

the meaning of the very first letter of the word Hrdaya, that which

draws everything towards itself. And, what is the conclusion? What is

the result that follows by this protracted meditation? Abhiharanty

asmai: 'Everyone gravitates towards that person'. Like the

gravitational pull of the sun exerted upon all the planets that move

in their own orbit and revolve round the sun, so all creatures will

rotate, revolve and gravitate around you if you contemplate, the

capacity that one has, to draw everything towards oneself, as the

Supreme subject. Abhiharanty asmai svas canya ca: 'Everything comes to

you' means - whatever belongs to you, and whatever does not belong to

you also comes to you. People pay tribute to you, not merely people

who love you. 'Even those who are not your friends', even those with

whom you are not personality related, even they shall pay homage to

you. They shall also pay tribute to you. They shall accept the

supremacy of your being. Svas canye ca abhiharanty asmai: This is the

grand result that is proclaimed by mere meditation on the implication

of the root meaning of the letter Hr 'to draw'. Think! I shall also

pull the cosmos towards myself, as the Supreme Consciousness, which is

the Subject of all objects.

 

The other letter is Da. In the word Hr-da-ya, 'Da is the second

letter'. Dadatyasmai svas canye ca ya evam veda: 'Everyone shall give

to you' rather than take anything from you, which means to say,

everything shall become obedient to you, everything shall become

subservient to you. Da connotes the meaning, 'to give' in Sanskrit. So

the meaning of this root syllable here, the etymological significance

of the letter becomes the object of meditation, and when you

contemplate thus as the centre of a force that receives everything

towards itself as an ocean that receives all rivers into itself, 'such

contemplation brings the result of complete acquisition. Everything

shall come to you'.

 

Yam, iti ekam aksaram; iti svargam lokam ya evam veda: The

third letter is Ya of Hr-da-ya. In Sanskrit Ya means 'to go'. You go

to the highest heaven by contemplation on the meaning of the letter Ya

of the word Hrdaya. So contemplate not merely the light in the heart

or the consciousness in the heart or the ether in the heart, but the

linguistic significance of the very word Hrdaya also. Even this can be

a symbol. If you cannot go deep into philosophical and mystical

techniques of contemplation on the heart, can you not at least

understand this much, a mere linguistic meaning, a grammatical

connotation, a literal significance of the word Hrdaya? This too, can

take you to a great glorious achievement.

 

 

The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad

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