The Vedas and the Upanishads
These are the oldest Hindu texts, and Hindus rank them highest of all. They are not a story. The are hymns and ritual instructions, and the are philosophy. Here is what they teach, where they go wrong, and what the Bible says instead.
The Vedas: what they are about
The are not a story. They are about a thousand hymns and sets of ritual instructions, composed for priests to use in worship. Their center is sacrifice (): offering gifts, usually into a fire, to the gods so that the world keeps running and the people are blessed.
- About a thousand hymns praising gods such as , and . The oldest.
- The words and actions priests use in the sacrifice.
- Melodies for chanting, taken mostly from verses.
- Prayers for everyday needs: health, protection, family and harvest.
- Theme The world is held in an order (). The gods uphold it, and people keep it by sacrifice.
- The problem Being out of step with the gods and the order of the world.
- The way out The right ritual, done correctly.
- The goal Blessing in this life, such as rain, cattle, children and long life, and a place in heaven.
- Many gods, one truth? The says "Truth is one, but the wise speak of it in many ways" ().
- Honest doubt. Its creation hymn () asks who really knows how the world began, and wonders whether even the one who watches from the highest heaven knows.
- Wrongdoing. Some hymns ask the god , the guardian of order, to forgive wrongdoing. But the have no single story of how the world went wrong.
- Not yet in the early . Most scholars find that the full ideas of as a moral law, repeated and appear later, in the . Hindu tradition sees them as already implied earlier.
The Upanishads: what they are about
The are the last layer of the . The name means "sitting near" a teacher. About thirteen are counted as the main ones, composed from roughly 800 to 500 BCE. Most are conversations in which a student asks the biggest questions: who am I, what is ultimate reality, and what happens when we die?
- Theme , the one ultimate reality, and , your true self, are the same.
- The problem Ignorance (): not knowing who you really are.
- The way out Knowledge, usually learned from a teacher.
- The goal Moksha: release from the cycle of .
- "", "That you are" A father teaches his son that his true self is ().
- "", "I am " ().
- and Death A boy asks , the lord of death, what happens after we die ().
- and A sage teaches his wife about the self ().
- Karma and first appear clearly here. What you do shapes what you become, and the next life follows from it. Knowledge is what sets you free.
- Ritual is not enough. The treat the Vedic sacrifices as a lesser path. One compares them to an unsteady boat that cannot carry you across ().
- Not one voice. Some passages describe an impersonal without qualities. Others speak of a personal Lord. This is why , and all claim the as their source.
Where they go wrong
Ask the and five simple questions, and compare their answers with the Bible's. They fail on every one.
No one outside themThey are said to be , made by no one: eternal sounds that seers "heard". There is no author, no date and no witness. The only proof offered for the claim is the claim itself, which is .
Named writers and witnessesMoses, David, Isaiah, Luke, John, Peter and Paul wrote in real places and times. Luke says he "traced the course of all things accurately from the first" (), and Peter says, "we were eyewitnesses of his majesty" ().
NoThe early hymns praise , and as highest, each in turn. Creation is told three different ways, and one hymn admits that even the highest one may not know how the world began (). The then call the Vedic sacrifices an unsteady boat, and they speak of God both as an impersonal and as a personal Lord. Three Hindu schools read them in three opposite ways.
One God, one storyFrom the first page to the last there is one God, who creates, speaks, acts and saves: "I am God, and there is no other" ().
Ritual, or knowledgeThe keep the gods pleased with sacrifice, and a few hymns ask to forgive, but they never say how the world went wrong or how guilt is taken away. The say the real problem is not sin at all, but ignorance of who you are.
Sin, and a sacrifice that ends all sacrificesSin is rebellion against a holy God. The animal sacrifices of the Old Testament pointed forward to one sacrifice: Jesus, who offered Himself "once for all" (). "The blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, cleanses us from all sin" ().
NoIn the , the priest and the ritual do the work. In the , you free yourself through knowledge, usually over many lives.
Yes, God Himself"The Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost" ().
The person disappearsThe goal of the is for the self to merge into , where there is no "you" and no "God" to love. Meanwhile the ages keep turning.
The person is raised and loved foreverGod lives with His people, and "he will wipe away every tear from their eyes" ().
What your friend may sayWhat Hindus often say
- "Every way of knowing starts somewhere." Hindu thinkers say tradition is a valid source of knowledge, like sight or logic, and that the are proven in the experience of those who practise them.
Your strongest answerHow a Christian answers
Agree that every view has starting points. The difference is whether a starting point can be checked from outside. Experience inside a tradition cannot test the tradition. The Bible rests on public events, above all the resurrection of Jesus, and invites anyone to examine them.
What they ask, and what the Bible announces
The Vedas and Upanishads asks
How do we keep the gods and the world in order, and who am I really? They answer with ritual and with knowledge, and leave sin unpaid.
The Bible announces
God has come to rescue rebels and make them His children: "as many as received him, to them he gave the right to become God's children" ().
Three of these problems come back later as full questions: love in "Monism and the personal God", the endless chain in "Karma and the endless chain", and checking the texts in "How the texts are built".
The look for the right words and the right ritual to reach the gods. The look for knowledge to set a person free. The Bible says God did not leave us searching: He "has at the end of these days spoken to us by his Son" ().
The Vedas offer ritual and the Upanishads offer knowledge. No one vouches for them, they contradict themselves, and they leave sin unpaid. The Bible announces a God who came to rescue.
Why the next step followsNext, the Mahabharata, the epic that holds the Gita.The Mahabharata and the Gita →The Upanishads say your deepest problem is ignorance. The Bible says it is sin. Why does that difference matter, and how would you explain it to a Hindu friend?
The Upanishads say your deepest problem is ignorance. The Bible says it is sin. Which do you think is true of you?