Two Kinds of Knowledge, Two Birds, and Satyameva Jayate

The Mundaka Upanishad comes from the Atharvaveda. This knowledge passed from Lord Brahma to Atharva, from Atharva to Angir, then to Bharadvaja Satyavaha, and from him to the sage Angiras. One day the great householder Shaunaka approached Angiras in the proper way and asked: 'Revered one, what is that which, once known, makes all this known?'

Angiras said: there are two kinds of knowledge to be known, the apara and the para. The four Vedas (Rig, Yajur, Sama, Atharva) along with phonetics, ritual, grammar, etymology, metre and astronomy are all the lower knowledge, apara. The higher knowledge, para, is that by which the Imperishable is known. Imagine: even the Vedas counted as 'lower'! The point is that all information stays incomplete until we know our own Self.

What is the Imperishable like? The sage gave lovely examples: as a spider spins out its web and draws it back, as plants spring from the earth, as hair grows on a living body, so this world comes out of the Imperishable. Later comes another picture: Om is the bow, the Self is the arrow, and Brahman is the target. Aim with full attention and become one with the target, like the arrow.

Then comes the most famous image in the Upanishads: the two birds. Two beautiful birds, inseparable friends, sit on the same tree. One eats the tree's fruits, sweet and bitter. The other eats nothing and simply watches, calm. The first bird is us: tasting the fruits of joy and sorrow, getting tangled up and troubled. The second bird is the witnessing Self within us.

When the fruit-eating bird, worn out by sorrow, looks towards the other, peaceful bird and recognises its glory, all its grief falls away. This same Upanishad contains the verse that is India's national motto today: 'Satyameva Jayate', truth alone triumphs, not falsehood. These words are written beneath India's national emblem.