 Commentary on the Kena Upanishad–by Swami Nirmalananda Giri
 The Blessed
“Blessed is the man who while he yet lives realizes Brahman. The man who realizes him not suffers his greatest loss. When they depart this life, the wise, who have realized Brahman as the Self in all beings, become immortal.”
Swami Nikhilananda renders this verse: “If a man knows Atman here, he then attains the true goal of life. If he does not know It here, a great destruction awaits him. Having realized the Self in every being, the wise relinquish the world and become immortal.”
Here and now
It is affirmed over and over in the upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita that perfect realization and liberation is possible even here in the world. This is one of the glories of Sanatana Dharma. It does not hold out some vague “bye and bye” hope to be realized only after death–a sure trait of fraudulent religion. The truth of the Eternal Religion–including Yoga–can be proven at every moment of our life, just as advances in science, especially in physics and astronomy, reveal the truths intuited by the sages of India thousands of years ago.
We need to hold firmly to the fact that we can overcome ignorance and bondage in this very lifetime, that we need not think it will take many incarnations to come to enlightenment. The Bhagavad Gita, particularly, emphasizes the immediacy of our spiritual potential. “Faith”–another trait of false religion–is not needed, either. Our practice of yoga and the resulting maturation of consciousness will enable us to see, experience, and demonstrate the great truths of the upanishads.
What about doubts? They mean nothing, any more than blind beliefs. In some instances, a negative rejection of truth on the subconscious level masquerades as doubts and can hinder our progress. But honest doubts cannot. I could cite for you many instances in which I not only doubted something, I denied its possibility, but still I came to see for myself the truth of what I had not believed. My practice of yoga kept pushing the frontiers of my insight into areas that I had ignorantly thought were superstition or silly. And my doubt and denial did not delay even for a moment my coming to understand the truth I had disbelieved.
This is why no scripture of India is considered to be the “word of God,” the supreme and final authority. Scriptures, like spiritual teachers, can only point the way, but they cannot definitively state “the truth.” Yet through interior development there is nothing that can elude the yogi in his quest for reality. This is why Krishna speaks of Abhyasa Yoga–the Yoga of Practice–as the foundation for those who wish to really know.
The great loss
Those who do not realize God suffer the greatest loss, for they “lose” themselves and God. What, then, is left for them? Nothing. Desolate they wander in the desert of their own barren minds and hearts. Shankara says that the mahati vinashtih, the great destruction, is interminable birth and death in the material world with all is attendant pains, sorrows, and fears.
The great gain
On the other hand, the wise whose consciousness is steadfastly fixed in God, turn away from the world–or more exactly, from the bonds and blandishments of the world–and become immortal (amritam bhavanti) by entering forever into Immortal Brahman.
Blessed are those who live their lives in the perspective of this single verse. Realization and attainment shall be theirs. For them immortality shall be their assured and eternal future.
1) Kena Upanishad 2:5 [Go back]
2) “What shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?” (Mark 8:36) [Go back]
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