The Kena Upanishad (Sanskrit: केनोपनिषद्, IAST: Kenopaniṣad) (also alternatively known as Talavakara Upanishad) is a Vedic Sanskrit text classified as one of the primary or Mukhya Upanishads that is embedded inside the last section of the Talavakara Brahmanam of the Samaveda.[1][2] It is listed as number 2 in the Muktikā, the canon of the 108 Upanishads of Hinduism.

The Kena Upanishad was probably composed sometime around the middle of the 1st millennium BCE. It has an unusual structure where the first 13 are verses composed as a metric poem, followed by 15 prose paragraphs of main text plus 6 prose paragraphs of epilogue.[2] Paul Deussen suggests that the latter prose section of the main text is far more ancient than the poetic first section, and Kena Upanishad bridged the more ancient prose Upanishad era with the metric poetic era of Upanishads that followed.[2]

Kena Upanishad is notable in its discussion of Brahman with attributes and without attributes, and for being a treatise on "purely conceptual knowledge".[2] It asserts that the efficient cause of all the gods, symbolically envisioned as forces of nature, is Brahman.[2] This has made it a foundational scripture to Vedanta school of Hinduism, both the theistic and monistic sub-schools after varying interpretations. The Kena Upanishad is also significant in asserting the idea of "Spiritual Man", "Self is a wonderful being that even gods worship", "Atman (Self) exists", and "knowledge and spirituality are the goals and intense longing of all creatures".[2][3]

Etymology

Kena (Sanskrit: केन) literally means, depending on the object-subject context, "by what, by whom, whence, how, why, from what cause".[4] This root of Kena, in the sense of "by whom" or "from what cause", is found the inquisitive first verse of the Kena Upanishad as follows,

केनेषितं पतति प्रेषितं मनः
केन प्राणः प्रथमः प्रैति युक्तः ।
केनेषितां वाचमिमां वदन्ति
चक्षुः श्रोत्रं क उ देवो युनक्ति ॥ १ ॥[5]

— Kena Upanishad 1.1
Translation:

Sent by whom, flies out thither the mind?
Harnessed by whom, roves thither the first breath?[6]
Who sends out the speech which we speak?
Who is the Deva (deity, god) that harnesses the ears and eyes?

— Translated by Paul Deussen[7]

The Kena Upanishad belongs to the Talavakara Brahmana of Sama Veda, giving the etymological roots of an alternate name of Talavakara Upanishad for it, in ancient and medieval era Indian texts.[2][8]

The Kena Upanishad is also referred to as the Kenopanishad (Sanskrit: केनोपनिषत्, Kenopaniṣat).

Chronology

The chronology of Kena Upanishad, like other Vedic texts, is unclear and contested by scholars.[9] All opinions rest on scanty evidence, an analysis of archaism, style and repetitions across texts, driven by assumptions about likely evolution of ideas, and on presumptions about which philosophy might have influenced which other Indian philosophies.[9][10]

Phillips dates Kena Upanishad as having been composed after Brihadaranyaka, Chandogya, Isha, Taittiriya and Aitareya (pre-6th century BCE), but before Katha, Mundaka, Prasna, Mandukya, Svetasvatara and Maitri Upanishads, as well as before the earliest Buddhist Pali and Jaina canons.[9]

Ranade[11] posits a view similar to Phillips, with slightly different ordering, placing Kena chronological composition in the third group of ancient Upanishads. Paul Deussen considers Kena Upanishad to be bridging a period of prose composition and fusion of poetic creativity with ideas.[12] Winternitz considers the Kena Upanishad as pre-Buddhist, pre-Jaina literature.[12][13]

The text is likely from about the middle of 1st millennium BCE. Many of the ideas found in Kena Upanishads have more ancient roots. For example, the ideas in verse 2 of Kena Upanishad are found in the oldest Brihadaranyaka Upanishad's chapter 4.4, as well as the second oldest Chandogya Upanishad's chapter 8.12.[7]

Structure

Kena Upanishad has three parts: 13 verses in the first part, 15 paragraphs in the second part, and 6 paragraphs in the epilogue. These are distributed in four khaṇḍas (खण्ड, sections or volumes). The first Khanda has 8 verses, the second has 5 verses. The third Khanda has 12 paragraphs, while the fourth khanda has the remaining 9 (3 paragraphs of main text and 6 paragraphs of the epilogue).[2][8]

The first two Khandas of Kena Upanishad are poems, the last two are prose, with one exception. Paragraph 9 is prose and structurally out of place, which has led scholars to state that the paragraph 9 was inserted or is a corrupted version of the original manuscript in a more modern era.[2] Another odd structural feature of Kena Upanishad's poetic Khandas is verse 3, which has 8 lines (typically marked as 3a and 3b), while all other poetic verses in the first two sections are only 4 lines of mathematical metric construction.

There are some differences in the positioning of Kena Upanishad in manuscripts discovered in different parts of India. It is, for example, the ninth chapter of Talavakara Brahmana in south Indian manuscripts and as mentioned in the Bhasya (commentary) by Shankara,[14] while the Burnell manuscript of sections of Sama Veda[15] places it in the tenth Anuvaka of the fourth chapter (inside Jaiminia Brahmana).[16]

The Kena Upanishad is accepted as part of Sama Veda, but it is also found in manuscripts of Atharva collection. The difference between the two versions is minor and structural - in Sama Veda manuscripts, the Kena Upanishad has four sections, while the Atharva manuscripts show no such division into sections.[17]

Contents

Nature of knowledge - First khanda

The Kena Upanishad opens by questioning the nature of man, the origins, the essence and the relationship of him with knowledge and sensory perception.[7] It then asserts that knowledge is of two types - empirical and conceptual. Empirical knowledge can be taught, described and discussed. Conceptual axiomatic knowledge cannot, states Kena Upanishad. Pure, abstract concepts are learnt and realized instead wherein it mentions that the highest reality is Brahman.

— Kena Upanishad 1.3a and 1.3b, Translated by Woodburne[7][18]

In verse 4, Kena Upanishad asserts that Brahman cannot be worshipped, because it has no attributes and is unthinkable, indescribable, eternal, all present reality. That what man worships is neither Atman-Brahman nor the path to Atman-Brahman. Rather, Brahman is that which cannot be perceived as empirical reality. It is that which "hears" the sound in ears, "sees" the view in eyes, "beholds" the words of speech, "smells" the aroma in breath, "comprehends" the meaning in thought. The Atman-Brahman is in man, not that which one worships outside.[7]

Woodburne interprets the first khanda of Kena Upanishad to be describing Brahman in a manner that "faith" is described in Christianity.[18] In contrast, Shankara interprets the first khanda entirely as monistic.[19]