In plain words
so they say. Bharatiyas do not hold this view. It may be said that the Vedas' authority does not depend upon human beings, that they are eternal, and, being made of divine knowledge, that they are self-authoritative. It must be recognized that they were not composed or written by anyone; they existed even before we came to know of them, and they have remained so for all time — they were not created.
Just as creation itself is boundless, eternal, and without beginning or end, so too is Īśvara-vāṇī eternal, boundless, and without beginning or end. The word 'Veda' (from the root vid, 'to know') means knowledge; and it was the great ṛṣis who perceived this knowledge and proclaimed it. They alone are the seers of the mantras, and, properly speaking, the very word 'ṛṣi' means precisely 'seer of the mantras'. One portion of the Veda is the karma-kāṇḍa; the second is the jñāna-kāṇḍa. The first is the domain of ritual activity, in which various rites are specified; the second is the path of supreme Jñāna. Of those rites, the greater portion have been set aside as impractical under present circumstances and the changed course of the times, though some still survive today in one form or another. The principal content of the karma-kāṇḍa — the duties of human life, the duties of the four stages called householder, forest-dweller, renunciate, and celibate student, and the various duties attached to social position — are still visible in the world today, even though they have changed to a greater or lesser extent. These higher, spiritual matters, contained in the second portion, the jñāna-kāṇḍa, are precisely those texts called Vedānta, Vedagra, Vedasara, Veda-paramartha, and Veda-vijnanasara — what we know as the Upanishads.
Whether one is a Dvaitin, a Vishishtadvaitin, an Advaitin, a Shaivite, a Vaishnavite, a Shakta, a follower of Puranic worship, or a Ganapatya — whoever it may be, one must accept the authority of the Veda-Upanishads. Each is free to interpret the meaning of the various Upanishads according to his own understanding; in that respect, everyone has complete freedom. But no one has the freedom to reject their authority altogether. It is for this very reason that, here, in place of the word 'Hindu',