The Word Speaks to the Faustian Man (Vol. 3)

by Som Raj Gupta

The Chandogya Upanisad: The culture it reflects is remote and archaic, the texture of its ritualistic and contemplative symbolism thick and dense--virtually a closed book for us moderns. A sustained self-submitting attentiveness, however, discloses its language as resonating disturbingly modern notes, focusing our attention on many of our pathologies as well as our possibilities, pathologies and possibilities that have escaped the notice of us moderns. The spirit of quiet hermeneutics that characterizes this study illumines many an opaque spot in this text, solves many an interpretive puzzle, turns many of its `archaic naivetes` into living and compelling profundities. We are made to realize that what some moderns call Gestell is far more primordial than they would envisage it to be, far more ominous and primitive, tragic and persistent. A radical transformation is required, an ontological transformation. Not mere `a masterly exposition` of an ancient text is, therefore, this study, but `an authentic springboard for fresh philosophical thinking fecundating (the) two shores of the human experience: East and West`. The first three (published) Vols. are on (i) Isa, Kena, Katha and Prasna Upanisads; (ii) Mundaka and Mandukya Upanisad with Gaudapada Karika; (iii) Taittiriya and Aitareya Upanisads. Review:- It is the guiding spirit of renuciation that the author has sought to reinterpret and reinstale through his own startingly fresh and original reading of the asic texts embodying that spirit....besides his existentially authentic enactment of that ancient wisdom, he has another weapon he wields with consummate skill-his ability to evoke and yoke the evidence of literature to drive home his points. -Journal of Indian Council of philosophical Research, Vol. 19, No. 2 April-june 2002