KathaUpanishad

only, and the very fact of its division into two Adhyâyas may show that the compilers of
the Upanishad were still aware of its gradual origin. We have no means, however, of
determining its original form, nor should we even be justified in maintaining that the first
Adhyâya ever existed by itself, and that the second was added at a much later time.
Whatever its component elements may have been before it was an Upanishad, when it
was an Upanishad it consisted of six Vallîs, neither more nor less.
The name of vallî, lit. creeper, as a subdivision of a Vedic work, is important. It occurs
again in the Taittirîya Upanishads. Professor Weber thinks that vallî, creeper, in the
sense of chapter, is based on a modern metaphor, and was primarily intended for a
creeper, attached to the sikhâs or branches of the Veda [History of Indian Literature, p.
93, note; p. 157.]. More likely, however, it was used in the same sense as parvan, a
joint, a shoot, and a branch, i.e. a division.
Various attempts have been made to distinguish the more modern from the more
ancient portions of our Upanishad [Though it would be unfair to hold Professor Weber
responsible for his remarks on this and other questions connected with the Upanishads
published many years ago (Indische Studien, 1853, p. 197), and though I have hardly
ever thought it necessary to criticize them, some of his remarks are not without their
value even now]. No doubt there are peculiarities of meter, grammar, language, and
thought, which indicate the more primitive, or the more modern character of certain
verses. There are repetitions, which offend us, and there are several passages, which
are clearly taken over from other Upanishads, where they seem to have had their
original place. Thirty-five years ago, when I first worked at this Upanishad, I saw no
difficulty in re-establishing what I thought the original text of the Upanishad must have
been. I now feel that we know so little of the time and the circumstances when these
half-prose and half-metrical Upanishads were first put together, that I should hesitate
before expunging even the most modern-sounding lines from the original context of
these Vedântic essays [See Regnaud, Le Pessimisme Brahmanique, Annales du
Musée Guimet, 1880; tom. i, p. 101.]
The mention of Dhâtri, creator, for instance (Kath. Up. II, 20), is certainly startling, and
seems to have given rise to a very early conjectural emendation. But dhâtri and vidhâtri
occur in the hymns of the Rig-veda (X, 82, 2), and in the Upanishads (Maitr. Up. VI, 8);
and Dhâtri, as almost a personal deity, is invoked with Pragâpati in Rig-veda X, 184, I.