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The Panchagni-Vidya from Chadogya Upanishad
Chandogya Upanishad - Text, Slokas, Translation, Summary, Quotes, Tat Tvam Asi - Upanishads in English, Upanishads Quotes, Upanishads PDF, Upanishads in Telugu, Upanishads in Tamil, Upanishads in Sanskrit, Isavasya, Mundaka, Mandukya, Katha, Kena, Aiterey Hindu Spiritual Articles and Videos
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The Upanishads are mainly meditations intended to act as correctives to the binding effects that are produced by the phenomena of natural processes. While what we call a natural process subjects us to its own laws, these laws can be overcome and their imposition upon the individual can be counteracted by techniques of meditation. The philosophy of the Upanishads is that it is an ignorance of the way in which the Universe works that binds the individual to samsara - the series of births and deaths. Our sorrows are, in a way, created by our own selves, because they follow as a consequence of our not abiding by the law of the universe. The affirmation of a reality independent of what really is, is called the ego. That is the centre of personality. This affirmation of individuality, jivatva, personality, or something separate from the organic structure of creation, is the cause of the sorrow or the suffering of the jiva, the individual manifested due to the affirmation of the ego. Births and deaths are the punishments, as it were, meted out to the individual in order that it may be reformed in the field of experience of the world for the purpose of enabling it to return to the normal state of consciousness which is universality of being, of which it is deprived at present due to the ignorance of its connection with the universe and a false notion that it has about its own self that it has an independence of its own.
The sections of the Chandogya Upanishad, which we are going to study, are a gradational ascent of knowledge for the purpose of meditations which lift us above the phenomena of ordinary experience, such as birth and death and bondage of every kind, and point to the methods of transcending all sorrow, whatever be its nature, and regaining the originality of being. The various sections that follow are a systematic teaching on what we may call Adhyatma-Vidya, or Atma-Vidya, a knowledge of the ultimate Self, which is the only remedy for the malady of empirical existence.
This section which we are about to commence, is a treatise on a particular method of meditation called Panchagni-Vidya, the knowledge of the Five Fires, by which the Upanishad means the various processes of manifestation, or, we may say, evolution, it being one's bondage and the way in which the cycle of transmigration revolves. There is a coming and going, descending and ascending in this samsara-chakra, or the revolving wheel of bondage. How it happens, and how one can be free from it, what are the methods to be employed for the purpose of freeing oneself from the clutches of this involuntary law that imposes itself upon us and binds us to its own mandate so that we do not seem to have any say in the matter of births and deaths or even the experiences that we have to pass through - these are our themes. The law of the universe is so vastly spread in its magnitude that it weighs heavy upon us when it is not followed. This question of the bondage of the soul brought about by its own ignorance, and the various remedies therefore, are discussed in the various sections.
While the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad is more transcendent in its approach and provides techniques of meditation which are mostly above the reaches of the ordinary mind, the Chandogya Upanishad takes us along the path of ordinary experience, and then, finally, lifts us above into the empyrean of supreme transcendence. Often, scholars have held the opinion that the Brihadaranyaka is aprapancha in its view and the Chandogya is saprapancha, which means to say that the Brihadaranyaka concerns itself with the ultimate Absolute and every solution is from the point of view of the Absolute only. So, it has taken the final step in setting about finding a remedy for the problems of life, while the normal man has also been taken into consideration in the Chandogya, though the ultimate aim is the same, here also. Thus, the Brihadaranyaka and the Chandogya form, in a way, complementary aspects of a single study.
Source: http://www.swami-krishnananda.org/chhand/ch_1.html
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