Prakarana Granthas of Adi Sankara

[Jaldhar H. Vyas]

On Mon, 25 Mar 2002, Vivek Anand Ganesan wrote:

> Namaste Jaldharji and others,
>
>   I have some concerns about the same issue. As you have
> rightly pointed out, many works do claim to be upanishads
> ( even the gItA states that it is an upanishad; nobody
> regards it as such, to the best of my knowledge ).

Actually there was one Bhaskara Mishra who thought that.  He was supposed
to have been a near contemporary of Shankaracharya and taught a variety of
bhedabhedavada.  His ideas didn't go anywhere and his Gita commentary
only exists today as a fragment.  But you're right the Vedantic mainstream
does not treat it as such.

> My  question pertains to how the canonical version of the
> 108 upanishads came about and what were the criteria used
> to form the list?
>
>   Now, regarding the vajrasUchIka Upanishad :
> 1) The advaita vedAnta homepage itself lists it as part of
>    the 108 upanishads accepted by the smArthA tradition
>    ( http://www.advaita-vedanta.org/avhp/upanishad.html )
>      - under the sAmAnya vedAnta category for sAma veda
>

As Ashisha said, this comes from Muktikopanishad.

> 2) I am assuming that brahmashrI upanishad brahmendra, who
>    is said to have commented on all of the 108 upanishad-s
>    would have written one for the vajrasUchika as well.
>    Since his work is accepted as canonical ( atleast the
>    kAnchi maTha does, I think ), why is there a doubt about
>    the authenticity or the canonical status of the
>    vajrasUchIka upanishad?
>
> 3) If I remember correctly, the last time on the same topic
>    you had doubted if the vajrasUchI that was quoted was  the
>    same one mentioned in the list. I request knowledgeable
>    list members to shed more light on this. Did shrI
>    brahmendra or any other scholar comment on the same
>    exact verses which were quoted?
>

Unfortunately I haven't heard anything further from anyone about this
subject since the last time it came up.  What someone ought to do (are you
volunteering? :-) is to find Upanishad Brahmendrajis' commentary, see if
it is the same text as others going by that name and whether his
interpretation of it is the same as what was mentioned.

All I know is the first time this upanishad came to public notice was in
"Principal Upanishads" translated by S. Radhakrishnan.  And whatever his
talents as a politician were, he is totally untrustworthy as a guide to
Sanatana Dharma.

--
Jaldhar H. Vyas <jaldhar at braincells.com>
It's a girl! See the pictures - http://www.braincells.com/shailaja/