Vedanta

Vedanta is the highest teaching of the Vedas, (veda means knowledge), the ancient Sanskrit scriptures of India. There are four Vedas: the Rig-Veda, the Yajur-Veda, the Sama-Veda, and the Artharva-Veda, which are comprised of hymns, ritual texts, and philosophical treaties that are regarded as divine revelation. Vedanta is considered one of the six darshanas (viewpoints) of orthodox Hinduism. However, it is not simply a formal instruction but a revelatory experience of transcendental consciousness.

In 1893, Swami Vivekananda appeared "like an Eastern comet in the Western spiritual sky" and made a startling appearance at the Parliament of Religions at the Chicago World's Fair. With him, he brought news of yoga and Vedanta; since then, yoga has taken solid root in the Western soil, with an estimated 2 million participants outside India. Vedanta, on the other hand, has remained relatively unknown.

The Vedas, completed between 1500-500 B.C.E, were originally an oral tradition, later codified in scriptures called the Upanishads (meaning nearness to wisdom). Of the 108 Upanishads, created between 900-500 B.C.E., some ten out of twelve books are regarded as the principle ones. The Vedanta, like the New Testament of the Bible, not only serves as the end of the Upanishads but the culmination of the scriptures.

Hindu scriptures differ from the sacred writings of other religions as they go beyond faith in particular deities (regarded as legal fictions, useful only at certain stages in life) to awareness of an Absolute, beyond time, space and causality. It is said the Vedanta's two main themes are humanity's true nature as divine, and this divinity as the aim of human life. The ideas of the Vedanta also introduce and reflect the traditional yogic paths.

There are three perspectives of Vedanta: One is dualistic (dvaita ), the second is nondualistic (advaita ), while the third is qualified nondualistic (vishishtadvaita ). The advaita perspective proclaims there are no individual souls, but all are unified. It is called nondualistic because "it acknowledge[s] only one Spirit, a single underlying reality beyond which nothing else could possibly exist."

Sources:

Advaita Vedanta. http://www.advaita-vedanta.org/. March 1, 2000.

Introduction to Vedanta. http://www.geocities.com/RodeoDrive/1415/veda.html. March 30, 2000.

Johnsen, Linda. "Tantra & Classical Yoga." Yoga International (September 1997): 22-29.

Nikhilananda, Swami. The Upanishads. 4 vols. London: Phoenix House, 1951-59; New York: Ramakrishna-Vivekananda Center, 1975-1979.

Torwesten, Hans. Vedanta: Heart of Hinduism. New York: Grove Weidenfield, 1985.