“The Upanishads, beingvehicles of illumination and not of instruction, composed for seekers who hadalready a general familiarity with the ideas of the Vedic and Vedantic seersand even some personal experience of the truths on which they were founded,dispense in their style with expressed transitions of thought and thedevelopment of implied or subordinate notions”(CWSA 17:13)

Sri Aurobindo describedthe Upanishads; the fountainhead of Vedanta, as ‘vehicles of illumination’which the seers had designed based upon their own style and technique ofimparting the higher wisdom so that the seekers too would gain an entry into thekingdom of the Bramhan, that is beyond the realm of mental logic and reason.The ways very many but the destination was the same. The Kathapanishadprodded the readers to raise their consciousness through the story ofNachiketas choosing what was right -shreyas over what was dear-preyas.The Ishavasyopanishad introduced the seekers to the Bramhan fromwithin and without by inviting them to move beyond the dualities ofmanifestation and dissolution, knowledge and ignorance and so on. The Kenopanishadbegan with the metaphysical question of how and why the descent of thedivine consciousness took place whereas the Mandukya in just 12 shortverses speaks about the fourth and hidden dimension of consciousness that canbe understood by a complete realization of the metaphysical and primordialsyllable – Om. In the Muktika Upanishad, where Sri Rama parts the way ofMukti to Hanuman, it is said a complete understanding of the MandukyaUpanishad is sufficient to attain moksha. While a canonical list of 108Upanishads classified 13 Upanishads as Mukhya or of main, many scholars pushthe number to over 200. Sadly, many have either been lost or been ignored inthe passage of time.

There is no fixed formatfor a work to be classified to be an Upanishad. Rather it is the Bramha vidyathat is contained in it that makes the text a vehicle of raising theconsciousness. It bodes us well to look at what may very well the newestUpanishad that the world received; a collection of untitled Sanskrit verseswritten by Sri Aurobindo in his initial years of stay in Pondicherry between1910-1914. While Sri Aurobindo himself did not translate his Sanskrit work nordid he give it a title, in 1978 that Pt. Jagannath Vedalankar, a renownedSanskrit scholar at the Sri Aurobindo Ashram, translated the text into English andthe same was published by the Sanskrit karyalaya of the Ashram under an apttitle, Sri Aurobindopanishad.

While an in-depthanalysis is beyond our scope, we will have a prefatory look at the text for itis truly the kernel of Sri Aurobindo’s vedanta- the high philosophy of IntegralYoga.  

The First Movement: ThePrinciple of Brahmic consciousness

In the first, the truthof the Brahman is lain bare. The Bramhan to transcend the limitations of time,space and form with the words “Jagadapi Brahma, Satyam na mithya” declaringquite explicitly that this truth is present in the mortal realm too.

The Brahman is theomnipresent existence, formed and formless, both at the same time, dwelling inand transcending the dimensions time and space, permeating the entire cosmosand found in all the entities, living or non-living whatsoever, whose worldlypresence for matters of human perception can be termed as –Chit - or pureconsciousness.

The Second Movement: TheSun of Truth

Sri Aurobindo prods us inthe second movement which begins with the triple mantra – Om tat Sat, to seebeyond the physical sun to what lies yonder. This is where the transition intothe kingdom of Bramha vidya begins. We are invited to look at the spiritual sunwhose consciousness manifests as the physical sun. Tosimplify the phenomenon of the Brahman, Sri Aurobindo brings to us the imageryof the physical sun and its reflection in the water. The beautiful sun and itsimage are reflected in the waters. When there are no ripples on the surface, thereflection is singular. When the water is disturbed, multiple reflections ofthe same sun can be found in the water. What we see when we are awake is not anillusion or a dream but very much a real experience that is perceived throughour senses by us.

The Third Movement:Ananda & Nirananda, A Game of Light & Shadow

In the third movement,the mode of functioning of the Brahman; who conceals His own strength by a garbof weakness, His own light of knowledge with a veil of darkness, is described.Sri Aurobindo asks us to look beyond this veil and tells us that weakness isbut a ploy where strength is concealed by itself. Sorrow is but happinesshiding its own self with a mask of sadness. Darkness too is naught but lighthiding itself in its own shadow. The Jiva- life form that is present insideeach individual is in a constant state of bliss, even though the outerindividual goes through the experiences of sorrow, pain and suffering due tothe various outer torments and tortures it has to experience in the game of thePrakriti.

The Fourth Movement: TheCelestial Adesh: Collective Moksha

The final movement concludeswith the divine message and instruction of Sri Aurobindo to all seekers. It isnot very often that we see Sri Aurobindo giving a direct order to sadhaksinvoking his divine experiences. Here we see, the both the aim of Integral Yogaand also the path to raise our consciousness; by becoming instruments of thedivine manifestation that is underway

“This world is naught butHis play divine

His Lela, created toenjoy all that is fine 158

O Children divine, inthis joyous play partake

The bliss of creation;enjoy, experience and take

Unite with Him, seeingHim in all become one

Celebrate this blisshighest, that is comparable to none.

Under the commandcelestial, I verily pronounce

The way to the blissfulconsciousness, I thus announce164”

“O Children of bliss,harbingers of His celestial light

Removing darkness, WithHis bliss divine, Set the world alight!”166

Thus, if we look at theflow of the Sanskrit text “Sri Aurobindopanishad”, we can see through fourdistinct movements how the master introduces the world to the foundation of theVedantic path of Purna Yoga. Right from the recognition of the phantom Bramhanembedded in the consciousness of matter, to the divine light that illumines thephysical sun and the way to extricate oneself from the trap of prakriti’s mayato the way forward to experience the Leela of Krishna in the universe and ofcourse, the final Yogic adesha to dispel the darkness of ignorance bycelebrating a life divine. While the complete works of Sri Aurobindo areexhaustive in themselves, conveying secrets of the ancient divine morns and theluminous noons to come, this beautiful untitled Sanskrit text of Sri Aurobindoin a nutshell describes the way forward for sadhaks to become divine instruments.This is of great significance as it is only the divine instruments who canbecome harbingers of the much awaited phenomenon of the  supramentalization of humanity.  Yes, there may be debates and arguments onwhether or not this text should be called an Upanishad, but in the darkness ofsuch pointless arguments, may no one forget the luminous message conveyed in itfor it is unarguably of prime importance for posterity.