The two important strands attached to the Vedic corpus, the six Vedangas (auxiliary disciplines needed to study and recite the Vedas) and the Upanishads (the philosophical conclusion of the Vedas, called Vedanta).
- The six Vedangas are: Shiksha (phonetics and pronunciation), Kalpa (ritual procedure), Vyakarana (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Chhanda (metre or prosody) and Jyotisha (astronomy and timekeeping for rituals).
- The Vedangas are smriti (remembered, human-composed), unlike the Vedas which are shruti (heard, revealed); they form the practical scaffolding for using the Vedas.
- The Upanishads (about 108, of which around a dozen are principal, such as the Isha, Kena, Katha, Mundaka, Chandogya and Brihadaranyaka) form the jnana-kanda (knowledge portion) and explore Brahman (ultimate reality) and Atman (the self).
- The national motto "Satyameva Jayate" (truth alone triumphs) is taken from the Mundaka Upanishad; the great sayings (mahavakyas) such as "Aham Brahmasmi" and "Tat Tvam Asi" come from the Upanishads.
- The Upanishads are the textual basis of the Vedanta school of philosophy, including Shankara's Advaita.
The six Vedangas in order, the shruti versus smriti distinction, the principal Upanishads, and the Mundaka Upanishad as the source of "Satyameva Jayate" are clean static culture facts.
The Vedangas (auxiliary sciences) are smriti and distinct from the Vedas themselves (shruti); the Upanishads are the philosophical end of the Veda (Vedanta or jnana-kanda), not a ritual text like the Brahmanas (karma-kanda).
Six Vedangas (Shiksha, Kalpa, Vyakarana, Nirukta, Chhanda, Jyotisha) and the Upanishads (Vedanta), source of "Satyameva Jayate".