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chapter 10 New RelIgIOUS IdeaS

By the 6th Century BC, religious worship in India had become extremely ritualistic and
society was bound by rigid caste rules. Animal sacrifices were performed at every occasion.
Frequent wars among the Mahajanpadas had created an atmosphere of mistrust and political
conflict. Dissatisfied with such conditions, many thinkers went to forests to meditate in
peace and seek enlightenment. Some of them shared their knowledge and philosophical
ideas and won followers. We know about these new ideas from the Upanishads and from the
Buddhist and Jain religious texts.
tHe upanIsHads

The literal meaning of Upanishad is ‘approaching and sitting near’ and the text contain
conversation between teachers and students. Mostly the ideas were presented in form
of simple dialogues to make it easier and appealing to understand. There are about 108
Upanishads. The Upanishads are the chief sources of information about Hindu philosophy.
They explain the relation between matter, soul and God. They deal with the well-known
Hindu principles of Karma, salvation and methods of attainment. The Upanishads assert
that there is only one creator, who is true. The Gods referred to in the Upanishads are—
Agni, the god of fire; Vayu, the God of wind; Indra, the God of destruction; Savitri, the Sun
Goddess; Brahma, the Creator and Vishnu the Preserver.

According to Vedic belief—when a person dies, his atma (soul) is reborn in another living
form. As a result, the atma remains bound to a cycle of repeated deaths and births. The
Upanishads state that the atma can attain moksha (ultimate freedom from the cycle of
death and rebirth), when it unites with Brahma. This can be achieved through the complete
understanding and continuous awareness of Brahma.
The Upanishads are the last section of the Vedic literature. They are also known as the
Vedanta. Usually learned Brahmans participated in philosophical discussions. Women and
lower-caste people rarely participated, but there were some exceptions; for instance—
Gargi a learned and very intelligent lady, impressed even the sages with her questions.
Again, according to one of the Upanishads:
Satyakama Jabala, a great thinker and philosopher was the son of a low-caste woman
named Jabala. He was taught by Rishi Gautama, who being impressed by Satyakama’s
truthfulness about his low birth, accepted him as a student. Rabindranath Tagore’s poem
‘Brahman’, written in the modern period, also describes this episode.
The four Stages of Life : In Upanishadic times, the life of an upper-caste man was divided
into four stages called ashramas. These were:
1. Brahmacharya Ashram – Period of studentship and discipline
2. Grihastha-Ashram – Period of householder
3. Vanaprastha Ashram – Period of retreat and leading a life of forest
4. Sanyas-Ashram – Period of renunciation and period of freeing onself from
all attachment to the world.

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