The Upanishads

trans. F. Max Müller · 1879

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About the book

The volume that opened the Sacred Books of the East: the oldest philosophical dialogues in the world, where sages answer kings and fathers answer sons about the Self behind the self. Müller's translation is the scholarly landmark — «tat tvam asi» arrived in English here.

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Part 1 · Students sitting near a teacher. The first six slides, free.

Students sitting near a teacher

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Picture the oldest classroom there is: no walls, no desks, just a teacher and a few students who have come close enough to hear him speak quietly.

Müller thought the word itself describes that scene. Upa-ni-shad breaks into upa, "near", ni, "down", and shad, "to sit". An Upanishad would be a sitting down near the teacher: pupils gathered at a respectful distance around the one who knows.

He was honest about the weak spot. In every text he had read, the word never once appears meaning a session of pupils. Wherever it turns up, it already means a doctrine, often a secret one. So the classroom is a guess from grammar. It is a good guess, and worth holding exactly that lightly.

Inside the course

20 parts

What an Upanishad is — Müller's introductionFree above
The Chandogya begins: the meditation on the syllable Om
The udgitha, the dogs' chant, and the gods who sang
The fivefold and sevenfold Saman: ritual turned inward
The honey doctrine, and the sun as the honey of the gods
Satyakama, the boy who told the truth about his birth
The doctrine of the five fires
Raikva with the cart, and the teaching of the breath
Shvetaketu and his father: «tat tvam asi», thou art that
The salt in the water: the Self demonstrated
Narada and Sanatkumara: the ladder from name to the infinite
The city of Brahman in the heart, and Prajapati's lesson to Indra
The Talavakara: the god the gods could not impress
«It is not understood by those who understand it»
The Aitareya on the Self as the world's beginning
The Aitareya: the three births of a man, and the self of the sages
The Kaushitaki: the path of the dead, and the dialogue on prana
The Kaushitaki: Ajatashatru teaches a Brahmin where the sleeper goes
The Isha in the Vajasaneyi text: renounce, and enjoy
Reading the oldest philosophy with fresh eyes

Questions

Is The Upanishads free to read in Astra Trainer?

Yes. The full book opens free in the app’s reader, in English, Spanish, German, French, Italian, Polish, Portuguese, and Russian.

What is the short course?

20 short parts that walk through the book’s key ideas in slides, each with a quick quiz. The first six slides are free to try on this page.

Where do I get the app?

Astra Trainer is free on the App Store and Google Play. The Upanishads is waiting in the app’s library.