Kena Upanisad consists of the the four sections of the fourth chapter of the Jaiminiya Brahmana Upanisad of the Samaveda. It begins directly with Brahman as its subject matter and tells us in first two parts how it is impossible to know or attain Brahman by our ordinary senses including mind. To realize Brahman we have to open ourselves to higher intuitive levels of mind. In the third and fourth parts, the Upanisad beautifully speaks about the unknowable Brahman and about the subjective and objective ways of its realization through an allegorical story about Gods led by Indra on one side and Yaksha and Uma Haimvati on the other. Brahman has to be meditated upon and realized as Tad Vanam that most delightful dear one.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Anirvan
Sri Anirvan was born on July 8, 1896 in the town of Mymensingh. At the age of eleven he knew the Astadhyayi of Panini by heart and daily recited a chapter from the Gita, he joined Assam Bangiya Saraswata Math, Kokilamukh near Jorhat in Assam, at the age of sixteen. Meanwhile, he had appeared for the matriculation examination which earned for him a state scholarship. He went for his college studies to Dhaka and later on to Calcutta. His educational career was brilliant and he always secured record marks. After completing his studies, Sri Anirvan took Sanyasa and became Nirvanananda Saraswati. But a few years later he dropped the ochre robes and changed his name to Anirvan, by which name he became known to the world at large. Between 1930 and 1942, he lived with a friend at Allahabad, Lucknow, Delhi and Ranchi and also established an ashram in Kamakhya near Gauhati in Assam. Later on, he moved to Lohaghat in Almora where Madame Lizelle Reymond met him and stayed with him in her My Life with a Brahmin Family (1958) and to Live Within (1971). In 1953-54, Sri Anirvan moved to Shillong in Assam and finally to Calcutta in 1965. He fell ill in July 1971 and passed away on 31 may, 1978, at the age of 82. His first book was a Bengali translation of Sri Aurbindo’s The life Divine which was published in 2 Vols. During 1948-51. But the centre of his studies was the Vedas on which subject he acquired a rare mastery over the years. His great work, Veda Mimamsa, was published in 3 vols. In 1961, 1965 and 1970. Meanwhile several other works on the Upanishads, the Gita, Vedanta and yoga had also been published.
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