[jelliclesfarm]

No, they are not. Upanishads are the later chapters of the Vedas. There are four vedas and ten principal upanishads.

Hindu philosophy aims to be accessible and useful to everyone. In that, Upanishads offer a way for people who are unable to follow Vedic standards.

An alternative is not opposition. It’s available choice. Upanishads are not against the Vedas. They just form the latter portions of Vedas.

Eg: consider chicken eaters. Veganism is an alternative dietary choice. Veganism existed before it was considered an ‘opposition’ to consuming meat. They are all part of ‘food’ and ‘eating’. Some vegans decided that it’s position against meat eating, but that’s not it’s origin. It’s a choice And a latter interpretation that it’s opposed to meat eating. But it doesn’t mean that veganism emerged due to an opposition to meat eating to compete with it.

[danans]

> Upanishads are the later chapters of the Vedas.

They are not a single coherent work of literature. They likely have dozens of authors and were composed over the span of over 1500 years. You can only describe them as "chapters" in the sense of "chapters of history", but not like "chapters" of a novel or series.

In that sense they are like the Torah and the New Testament of the Bible, which are also not books in the modern sense.

[jelliclesfarm]

Right then. But that doesn’t have anything to do with what I said.

And no, they are not ‘like the Torah’ or New Testament.

[danans]

> But that doesn’t have anything to do with what I said.

My comment was narrowly addressing the use of the term "chapters" as used in literature being applied to the texts under discussion.

I made no comment about the spiritual functional claims you made about Hinduism.

> And no, they are not ‘like the Torah’ or New Testament

Yes they are like the Torah in the New Testament in that they are texts that developed over thousands of years predominantly in the ancient period, and only later were canonized. This is a relatively uncontroversial comparison between the historical development of ancient religious texts.

I made no claim about the similarity of their content, if that's what you are taking issue with.

[jelliclesfarm]

Again. What is the relevance?

[danans]

You said:

> Upanishads are the later chapters of the Vedas.

They are not later chapters of the Vedas. They are entirely distinct works of literature.

[jelliclesfarm]

This is laughably wrong. Upanishads are part of the Vedas in context and as part of a larger contextual work..then expounded separately by several authors...no one knows who or how many people wrote the Vedas.

There is literally no proof either way. Just like no one can prove the authorship of vedas or Upanishads, there is no way to prove that they are ‘entirely distinct works of literature’.

Upanishads are not fungible and are married to specific related Veda. What you say doesn’t even make basic sense.

For example: Brihadaranyaka Upanishad is related to Yajur Veda and so it’s distinctly expounding upon Shukla YajurVeda. It makes no sense with Rig or Atharva or Sama Veda. So it is part of Yajur Veda.

The Vedas were orally transmitted as the language of the Brahmins and then written down much much later.

You can’t date or confer authorship on Vedas or Upanishads, but the commentaries and exposition are codified wrt the four vedas and each Upanishads is assigned to one of the four.

There is literally no basis for you to assert that ‘they are distinct works of literature’.

However: Without Vedas, Upanishads are not stand alone works. Vedas, otoh are relevant and understood without the Upanishads.