उपनिषद् · Rāma-tāpanī Uttara 3.7
॥
देवनागरी
कतमं चास्य स्थानं भवतीति
लिप्यंतरण (IAST)
katamaṃ cāsya sthānaṃ bhavatīti
शब्दशः अर्थ
संस्कृतIASTअर्थ
कतमम् च अस्य स्थानम्katamam ca asya sthānamand which is its place; and what is its abode
भवति इतिbhavati itiis it; does it happen to be
अनुवाद
“And which is its place?”
संस्करण
d4acc9c0985a · प्रकाशित 29 जुल॰ 2026, 5:15:19 am UTC
उपलब्ध भाषाएँRUENश्लोक बदलें इन कुंजियों से
Atri's last question, and it is the most direct: where?
The word katamam — “which of many”. They ask not “is there a place” but which one exactly.
The preparation is finished. The three previous exchanges have stripped from the answer everything that could be taken for geography: Varaṇā and Nāsī proved two acts of purification. It remains to say where these acts take place.
The answer will be named in the next paragraph, and it will point to a spot in the human body.
Note that this whole ladder of questions — from Kurukṣetra to the avimukta, from the avimukta to the rivers, from the rivers to their meaning and finally to the place — has taken eight short paragraphs. So these books work: they do not explain at once; they lead.
Nor could they answer at once. Had Yājñavalkya said from the start “between the brows and the nose”, it would have been the pointing out of a bodily spot and nothing more. But passing through Kurukṣetra, the avimukta and the two rivers, the same spot proves to be everything at once: the battlefield, the holy city, and the place where the past is washed away.