Was verse 3.7.2 of Brihadaranyaka upanishad, a forerunner to Sri Krishna's statement in BG?

Question

The verse 3.7.2 of Brihadaranyaka upanishad says :

He said, 'Vayu, O Gautama, is that Sutra. Through this Sutra or Vayu this and the next life and all beings are held together. Therefore, O Gautama, when a man dies, they say that his limbs have been loosened, for they are held together, O Gautama, by the Sutra or Vayu'.'Quite so, Yajnavalkya. Now describe the Internal Ruler'.

It says vAyu binds all being together indicating vAyu a Cosmic Spirit or God.

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Vayu is called Brahman in Shanti Mantra - Namo brahmane namaste vaayo twameva pratyaksham Brahmaasi.

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Sri Krishna says in BG 7.7 as follows:

मत्त: परतरं नान्यत्किञ्चिदस्ति धनञ्जय | मयि सर्वमिदं प्रोतं सूत्रे मणिगणा इव ||

There is nothing higher than myself, O Arjun. Everything rests in me, as beads strung on a thread.

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My question is whether verse 3.7.2 of Brihadaranyaka upanishad, a forerunner to Sri Krishna's statement in verse 7.7 of BG?

Answer 1

It is unlikely that the Brihadaranyaka verse is the forerunner of the Bhagavad Gita verse. The Bhagavad Gita verse refers to Krishna as Brahman, supporting everything. But the upanishad verse refers to vAyu. In the subsequent verses (3.7.7), the upanishad mentions that vAyu is controlled by the Internal Ruler (antaryAmi). This antaryAmi is Brahman.

Verse 3.7.7:

यो वायौ तिष्ठन्वायोरन्तरः, यं वायुर्न वेद, यस्य वायुः शरीरम्, यो वायुमन्तरो यमयति, एष त आत्मान्तर्याम्यमृतः ॥ ७ ॥

yo vāyau tiṣṭhanvāyorantaraḥ, yaṃ vāyurna veda, yasya vāyuḥ śarīram, yo vāyumantaro yamayati, eṣa ta ātmāntaryāmyamṛtaḥ || 7 ||

7. He who inhabits the air but is within it, whom the air does not know, whose body is the air, and who controls the air from within, is the Internal Ruler, your own immortal self.

Answer 2

The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad is one of the Principal Upanishads and one of the first Upanishadic scriptures of Hinduism.

The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad is estimated to have been composed about 700 BCE, excluding some parts estimated to have been composed after the Chandogya Upanishad. The Sanskrit language text is contained within the Shatapatha Brahmana, which is itself a part of the Shukla Yajur Veda.

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I am quoting one of the answers in this site, below:

According to the introduction to K. K. Shastri's The Jaya-Saṃhitā (The Ur-Mahābhārata) much of the Mahābhārata story we know today including the Bhagavad-gītā is a late addition to the text.

A puzzling problem before us is of godly or super-human characteristics of Kṛṣṇa and Śiva. It is quite easy to find out that wherever such narrations come, they are easily discardable, and their absence is very much helping us in restoring the flow of the narration. They are all inserted at later dates when both of them were established as supreme gods after the expiry of the old Upaniṣadic period.

As for Bhagavad-gītā (23 to 40 adhyāyas in the Bhīṣma-parvan) we are not in a position to include it wholly, or its any part, not only in the Bhārata but perhaps not even in the Mahābhārata.

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According to the introduction to K. K. Shastri's The Jaya-Saṃhitā (P.23), the original version of Mahabharata, ie., Jaya Samhita of Sage Vyasa, contains 8,800 slokas only. And, Bhagavad Gita is not the part of Jaya Samhita.

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Thus, we can infer that verse 3.7.2 of Brihadaranyaka upanishad, is a forerunner to Sri Krishna's statement in verse 7.7 of BG, as BG is itself is a later date addition to Mahabharata.