उपनिषद् · Kaṭha 6.12
॥
देवनागरी
नैव वाचा न मनसा प्राप्तुं शक्यो न चक्षुषा ।
अस्तीति ब्रुवतो ऽन्यत्र कथं तद् उपलभ्यते
लिप्यंतरण (IAST)
naiva vācā na manasā prāptuṃ śakyo na cakṣuṣā /
astīti bruvato 'nyatra kathaṃ tad upalabhyate
शब्दशः अर्थ
संस्कृतIASTअर्थ
नnanot; no
एवevaindeed; quite
वाचाvācāwith speech; by words
नnanot; no
मनसाmanasāwith the mind; with thought
प्राप्तुम्prāptumto attain (infinitive of pra-√āp); to gain; to reach
शक्यःśakyaḥis possible (śakya — 'attainable'); is reachable; is comprehensible
नnanot; no
चक्षुषाcakṣuṣāwith the eye; with sight
अस्तिastiam; exists
इतिitithus; how
ब्रुवतःbruvataḥfrom one who speaks (from √brū); [otherwise than from] one who proclaims; the utterer
अन्यत्रanyatraotherwise; in another
कथम्kathamhow; in what manner
तत्tatthat; it
उपलभ्यतेupalabhyateis apprehended (upa-√labh — 'to perceive'); is won; is caught
अनुवाद
Neither by speech, nor by mind, nor by the eye can He be attained. How is He to be apprehended otherwise than from one who says: "He is"?
संस्करण
9c7ba7ad843a · प्रकाशित 26 जुल॰ 2026, 9:13:03 pm UTC
उपलब्ध भाषाएँRUENश्लोक बदलें इन कुंजियों से
naiva vācā na manasā prāptuṁ śakyo na cakṣuṣā — "neither by speech, nor by mind, nor by the eye is He attainable": the three great instruments — to say, to think, to see — are laid down at His threshold for the last time. By what, then? The Upaniṣad's answer is disarmingly simple: astīti bruvato 'nyatra kathaṁ tad upalabhyate — "how is He to be apprehended otherwise than from one who says: 'He is'?"
Everything begins with the word asti — "He is" — received from one who says it not by hearsay. Not with experience but before experience; not with proof but instead of proof: with trust in a witness. So one comes to know not theorems but persons: of a man you have never met you first hear from those who have — and on the strength of your trust in them you go to be introduced. Faith, so much slandered as "blindness", is in fact seeing with another's — a seeing — eyes until one's own are opened.
Here the Kaṭha joins its beginning to its end: with what did the story begin? Naciketas asked whether there is a man beyond death or not (verse 20), and Yama alone could say "there is". The whole Upaniṣad is that very asti from the lips of the Knower; and every reader of it stands where Naciketas stood: before a witness's word, from which — if he accepts it — his own road to "he is" begins.