Talk:Kena Upanishad

Kena (and other) Upanishads parallels with "Centering"

"The epilogue in Kena Upanishad is contained in the last six paragraphs of the text. It asserts the timelessness and awareness of Brahman to be similar to moments of wondrous "Ah!!" in life, such as the focused exclamation one makes upon witnessing lightning flash in the sky, or the focussed 'Ah!!' recollection of a knowledge in one's mind of a memory from past.[24] The goal of spiritual knowledge, of self awareness, is wonderful, characterized by an 'intense longing' for it in all creatures, states Kena Upanishad.[24] The knowledge of Atman-Brahman is Tadvanam (transcendental happiness, blissfulness).[31]"

The following is from an ancient Indian mystical treatise concerning 112 reflections/methods on achieving enlightenment. Pal Reps appended them to his popular book Zen Flesh, Zen Bones, speculating the work antedates Zen and might serve as a basis for it. As it has always struck me how similar are Zen Buddhism and the Hindu metaphysical school of Advaita Vedanta on a substantive basis, might it have also inspired the sages of the Upanishads, including this one in particular? I've quoted below two of the methods that struck me as very similar to my above quotation from the article that seem to me as most indicative of this possibility. However, if one reads all 112 methods, it strikes me how they seem so either predictive or reflective of the substantive tenor of the Upanishads in general, a question of which came first as it is generally so difficult to accurately date ancient Sanskrit religious and philosophical works as the article mentions.

The common theme between “Centering” and the Upanishads—at least as interpreted by Shankara (an interpretation that I find most obvious and convincing)—of idealism, with the material, phenomenal world being an illusory manifestation of universal consciousness (“Brahman”) which is the fundamental stratum of existence that cannot be further sublated and exists timelessly and eternally like (as an analogy) a Rubik’s cube constantly changing it faces while all the while retaining its basic structural integrity as one, seems striking to me. In “Centering,” a common theme seems to be trying to grasp (enlightenment) the fundamental nature of primal realty at its very transient moments of changing manifestations. (“Just then!”)

Can a mention of “Centering,” pointing out the work’s seeming substantive parallels with this and other Upanishads, be incorporated either here or in another article regarding the Upanishads in general?

Thanks much for anyone’s consideration:

"93 At the start of sneezing, during fright, in anxiety, above a chasm, flying in battle, in extreme curiosity, at the beginning of hunger, at the end of hunger, be uninterruptedly aware.

"94 Let attention be at a place where you are seeing some past happening, and even your form, having lost its present characteristics, is transformed."

https://moon-soup.com/2008/09/13/centering-from-zen-flesh-zen-bones-paul-reps/HistoryBuff14 (talk) 17:56, 27 June 2021 (UTC)