A Brilliant Introduction To The Essence Of Living Hinduism The Thirteen Principal Upanisads, Sanskrit Texts In The Religious Traditions Of The Vedas, Lie At The Heart Of Hinduism. Devoted To Understanding The Inner Meaning Of The Religion, They Explicate Its Crucial Doctrines Rebirth, The Law Of Karma, The Means Of Conquering Death And Of Achieving Detachment, Equilibrium And Spiritual Bliss. They Emphasize The Perennial Search For True Knowledge Especially That Of The Connection Between The Self And The Transcendental Absolute. In This Translation, Marked By Empathy And Erudition, Valerie Roebuck Approaches The Upanisads As Belonging To The Tradition Of 'Sruti', Literature Which Is Heard, As Distinct From 'Smriti', Which Is Remembered. Seeking To Reveal The Intent Of The Authors, She Attempts To Represent What, In Fact, Constitutes The Original Text. Care Is Taken To Exclude Later Accretions Of Commentaries. The Invocations Included Underline The Traditional Recitation Of These Texts, And The Literary Devices Repetitions, Dialogue And Word Combat, Riddles, Paradoxes And Word Play Used By The Sages To Express Their Teachings. This Accurate And Exceptional Rendering, While Making Accessible To The Modern Reader Something Of The Beauty And Variety Of The Original Language, Reaffirms The Place Of The Upanishads As One Of The Most Profound Works Of World Literature. This Authentic And Nuanced Rendering Makes Accessible To The Modern Reader Something Of The Beauty And Variety Of These Ancient And Rich Texts Of Hinduism. The Upanisads Belong To The Tradition Of Literature That Is Heard Rather Than Remembered , And In Her Translation Roebuck Seeks To Reveal The Intent Of The Authors And Arrive At 'The Original' Text.

The Upaniṣads are among the most sacred foundational scriptures in the Hindu religion. Composed from 800 BCE onwards and making up part of the larger Vedic corpus, they offer the reader "knowledge lessons" on life, death, and immortality. While they are essential to understanding Hinduism and Asian religions more generally, their complexities make them almost impenetrable to anyone but serious scholars of Sanskrit and ancient Indian culture. This book is divided into five parts: Composition, authorship, and transmission of the Upaniṣads; The historical, cultural, and religious background of the Upaniṣads; Religion and philosophy in the Upaniṣads; The classical Upaniṣads; The later Upaniṣads. The chapters cover critical issues such as the origins of the Upaniṣads, authorship, and redaction, as well as exploring the broad religious and philosophical themes within the texts. The guide analyzes each of the Upaniṣads separately, unpacking their contextual relevance and explaining difficult terms and concepts. The Upaniṣads: A Complete Guide is a unique and valuable reference source for undergraduate religious studies, history, and philosophy students and researchers who want to learn more about these foundational sacred texts and the religious lessons in the Hindu tradition.

The Upanishads, the earliest of which were composed in Sanskrit between 800 and 400 bce by sages and poets, form part of the Vedas - the sacred and ancient scriptures that are the basis of the Hindu religion. Each Upanishad, or lesson, takes up a theme ranging from the attainment of spiritual bliss to karma and rebirth, and collectively they are meditations on life, death and immortality. The essence of their teachings is that truth can by reached by faith rather than by thought, and that the spirit of God is within each of us - we need not fear death as we carry within us the promise of eternal life. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

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The Upanishads are a group of texts in Hindu sacred literature that are considered to reveal the ultimate truth and whose knowledge is considered to lead to spiritual emancipation. In the Upanishads, we find the finest flowering of the Indian metaphysical and speculative thought. They are utterances of seers who spoke out of the fullness of their illumined experience. Upanishad is derived from upa (near), ni (down) and sad (to sit). Hence, the term implies the pupils, intent on learning, sitting near the teacher to acquire knowledge and truth. There are over 200 Upanishads but the traditional number is 108. Of them, only 10 are the principal Upanishads: Isha, Kena, Katha, Prashan, Mundaka, Mandukya, Tattiriya, Aitareya, Chhandogya and Brihadaranyaka. This book is a forerunner in introducing these primary Upanishads to the uninitiated.