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APPENDIX II 153
elsewhere Vedantavignansuniskitarhah, ‘those who have well understood the object of the knowledge arising from the Vedanta,’ not ‘from the last books of the Veda’, and Svetasvatara-up. VI, 22, vedante paramam guhyam, ‘the highest mystery in the Vedanta’. Afterwards it is used in the plural also, e.g. Kshurikopanishad, 10 (bibl. Ind. p. 210) pundariketi vedantesfau nigadyate, ‘it is called pundarika in the Vedantas’, i.e. in the Khandogya and other Upanishads, as the commentator says, but not in the last books of each Veda.”
More direct evidence on the point is that which is contained in the Gautama Dharma Sutras. In Chapter XIX verse 12 speaks of purification and says [1] :
“The purificatory (texts are), the Upanishads, the Vedantas, the Samhita text of all the Vedas” and so on.
From this it is clear that at the date of Gautama the Upanishads were distinguished from Vedantas and were not acknowledged as a part of the Vedic literature. Hardatta in his commentaries says “those parts of the Aranyakas which are not (Upanishads) are called Vedantas”. This is unimpeachable proof that the Upanishads did not come within the range of the Vedic literature and were outside the cannon.
This view is also supported by the use of the Veda in the Bhagwat Gita. The word Veda is used in the Bhagwat Gita at several places. And according to Mr. Bhat [2] the word is used in a sense which shows that the author did not include the Upanishads in the term.
That the Upanishads were excluded from the cannonical literature of the Vedas is provided by the opposition of the Upanishads to the views preached in the Vedas that the religious observances and sacrifices were the only means of salvation. A few citation from some of the Upanishads will suffice to show their opposition to the Vedas.
The Mundaka Upanishad says:
“Brahma was produced the first among the gods, maker of the universe, the preserver of the world. He revealed to his eldest son Atharva, the science of Brahma, the basis of all knowledge. (2) Atharvan of old declared to Angis this science, which Brahma had unfolded to him; and Angis, in turn, explained it to Satyavaha, descendent of Bharadvaja, who delivered this traditional lore, in succession, to Angiras. (3) Mahasala Saunaka, approaching Angiras with the proper formalities, inquired, ‘What is that, O venerable sage, through the knowledge of which all this (universe) becomes known?’ (4) (Angiras) answered, ‘Two sciences are to be known— this is what the sages versed in sacred knowledge declared— the superior and the inferior. (5) The inferior (consists of) the Rig-veda,
1 Sacred Books of the East Vol. II. p. 275.