Review of Education in the Taittiriya Upanishad Introduction In my search for the Indian systems of education which have dealt with the centrality of education for spiritual development, I found the relevance of the text of the Taittiriya Upanishad, which has a special section (with several chapters) on education titled Śikṣāvalli. In this paper I have tried to study the aspect of education for spiritual development as can be discerned in this section of the Taittiriya Upanishad and draw out those points which are relevant to education for spiritual development in liberal and democratic societies in contemporary times. Backgro

Illumination, Heroism and Harmony Preface The task of preparing teaching-learning material for value oriented education is enormous. There is, first, the idea that value-oriented education should be exploratory rather than prescriptive, and that the teaching-learning material should provide to the learners a growing experience of exploration. Secondly, it is rightly contended that the proper inspiration to turn to value-orientation is provided by biographies, autobiographical accounts, personal anecdotes, epistles, short poems, stories of humour, stories of human interest, brief passages filled with pregnant meanings, reflective short essays written in well-chisell

Taittiriya Upanishad

Note on Illustrations In this book, we have used six illustrations of flowers under which their special spiritual significance is mentioned. The spiritual significance of these flowers was identified by The Mother. She said, "Flowers speak to us when we know how to listen to them. It is a subtle and fragrant language." The names of these flowers and their spiritual significance are as follows: Canna Xgeneralis (Physical Centre), Dendranthema Xgrandiflorum (Life Energy or Vital Energy), Thevetia Peruviana (Mind), Leucaena Leucocephala (Knowledge), Hibiscus Rosa-Sinensis (Ananda). There is also a picture of Anthocephalus Cadamba (Supramental Sun). The rele

Dakshinamurti (Kanchipuram) Introduction I Just as the Kathopanishad belongs to the Krishna (Black) Yajurveda, even so the Taittiriya Upanishad also belongs to the same Veda. Both these Upanishads have internal connection. In particular, the knowledge of the soul, which we find in the Kathopanishad, is confirmed and elucidated in the Taittiriya Upanishad. And it is to this aspect that we may turn at once. The Kathopanishad speaks of three fires and five fires, indicating that the soul that is fire is to be found at three levels, the level of the body, the level of the vital being, and the level of the mental bein

PART FIVE Discovery of the Psychic Entity But even deeper than the subliminal, there is in us an inmost being, which Sri Aurobindo calls psychic entity or soul and which the Katha Upanishad describes as "the Purusha that is no larger than the thumb of a man and who is seated in the midst of our self (angustamātrah puruso madhye atmani tistati)?5 The psychic entity supports the submental, the subconscious, the conscious, and the subliminal. The discovery of the psychic entity is of capital importance in our journey of self-knowledge. It is the source of true individuality, entirely distinct from the ego-sense, and it is that entity which represents in our evolutiona

PART TWO Supramental Vision of the Supreme Reality: Indeterminability of the Absolute Let us first begin with the supramental vision of the ultimate reality. In the supramental realization, the ultimate reality is found to be indeterminable; this indeterminability has two senses; in the first sense, the reality or the absolute is seen to be not limitable or definable by any one determination and by any sum of determinations; in the second sense, the Absolute is seen to be not bound down to an indeterminable vacancy of pure existence. Thus the indeterminable is a source of all determinations, and its indeterminability is a natural and necessary condition b

Preface The most distinctive thesis of the Integral Yoga is that supramental consciousness can, by its descent in Matter transform earthly life into divine life. In other words, Sri Aurobindo and the Mother have discovered the method by which supramental descent on the earth can be brought about and even Matter can manifest supramental consciousness. Sri Aurobindo has, while describing supermind, referred to the Vedic concept of truth-consciousness (rita-chit) and accepted the Vedic description of truth-consciousness as an apt description of the supermind. Both in the Vedas and the Upanishads, we have the evidence that the ancient Rishis had discovered the supramental con

Supermind in the Integral Yoga Problem of Ignorance, Bondage, Liberation and Perfection This book is addressed to all young people who, I urge, will study and respond to the following message of Sri Aurobindo: "It is the young who must be the builders of the new world, — not those who accept the competitive individualism, the capitalism or the materialistic communism of the West as India's future ideal, nor those who are enslaved to old religious formulas and cannot believe in the acceptance and trans