Mandukya Upanishad

   The Mandukya is a short UPANISHAD (12 small stanzas) in the Atharva Veda, one of the most important for the ADVAITA (non-dual) VEDANTA of SHANKARA. Shankara’s guru, GAUDAPADA, wrote a commentary on the Mandukya Upanishad that became important in that tradition.

   In its first stanza the Upanishad establishes the supremacy of the syllable om, equating it to the ultimate BRAHMAN. Stanzas 3 through 7 outline the four STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS. Stanzas 9 through 12 establish that the four parts of om (esoteri-cally understood as a, u, m, and a fourth, which is beyond parts) are identical to the four states of consciousness, thus establishing om as the ATMAN or self.

   Further reading: Patrick Olivelle, trans., The Early Upanishads (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998); S. Radhakrishnan, The Principal Upanishads (Atlantic Highlands, N.J.: Humanities Press, 1994); Thomas E. Wood, The Mandukya Upanisad and the Agamasastra: An Investigation Into the Meaning of the Vedanta (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1990).