Last week the world woke up to pictures of verses from the Upanishads as part of the symbolism of the building of the University of Warsaw Library. On request from the Center for Soft Power, librarian and custodian as she refers to herself, Lilianna Nalewajska went around taking pictures of these beautiful walls which she shared with us. "If you come to Poland, let me know, I will guide you around," she told this author.
Lilianna shared a scan from a leaflet which describes the verse. "It's the Rigveda 3.62.10; Mundaka Upanishad 1.1.4-6; Bhagavad Gita 13.7-11. The work and excerpts were selected and digitally designed by Joanna Jurewicz and the lettering is by Stanisław Michalik. It's not a painting but a copper board," she told us.
The scan she shared is a translation by T H Griffith, Patrick Olivelle and George Thompson which was selected by Joanna Jurewicz (who is an Indologist at the University of Warsaw. She won the Prime Minister's Award for Outstanding Scholarly Achievement (for the book Fire and Cognition in the Rgveda). She is also the author of Fire, Death and Philosophy- A History of Ancient Indian Thinking. The verse means:
"May we attain that excellent glory of Savitar the God: So May he stimulate our prayers. Two types of knowledge a man should learn - those who know brahman tell us - the higher and the lower. The lower of the two consists of the Rgveda, the Yajurveda, the Samaveda, the Atharvaveda, phonetics, the ritual science, grammar, etymology, metrics, and astronomy; whereas the higher is that by which one grasps the imperishable. Knowledge is said to consist in the absence of pride and deceit, of nonviolence and patience and upright honesty, of service to one's teacher, purity, stability, and self-control, dispassion with regard to sense objects, and the absence of an ego-sense. There should also be an accurate perception of the misfortunes that inevitably come with birth and death, and old age and disease and sorrow, the absence of attachment or affection toward a son or a wife or a home, and all the rest; the constant practice of equanimity, whether events are wished for or not wished for, and there should be undeviating devotion, along with yoga focused on me alone, a preference for solitary places, and a distaste for large crowds. Finally, there should be constant attention to knowledge of the self, and a perception of the purpose of the knowledge of reality - all of this is called true knowledge. What differs from this is just ignorance."
Read More at https://www.softpowermag.com/the-types-of-knowledge-a-man-should-learn-upanishadic-wisdom-on-warsaw-university-library-walls
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