Isha Upanishad: The Practical Guide for Divine Life : ( Part 13)

You may like to read Part 12 here.

Verse 13:

anyadevāhuḥ saṃbhavādanyadāhurasaṃbhavāt | 

iti śuśruma dhīrāṇāṃ ye nastadvicacakṣire || 13 ||

Literal Meaning:

They say one thing results from the Birth and another from the Non-Birth. We have thus heard it stated by wise preceptors who taught us that.

My Personal Understanding:

Many a times, where a text recommends us to avoid something, those verses are always taken by people with certain traditions or people with vested interests to prove their points. Hence, the text tells us that a certain good outcome comes from walking both the paths, and hence, one should not condemn or criticize anyone who follows any path. 

The person who devotes all his time towards the unmanifested and walks towards Non-Birth/Being will reap the benefits that come as a result of walking this path (the enjoyment that comes in the form of samadhi etc).

On the other hand, the person who devotes all his time towards the multiplicity of the Absolute Reality that one sees in front as Birth/ Becoming or the material world will reap the benefits that come as a result of walking this path (the enjoyment that comes from pursuing sense pleasures, emotional enjoyment that comes from living in family and relationships, intellectual enjoyment that comes from pursuing a worldly goal, spiritual pleasures that comes from the attainment of various siddhis, spiritual experiences travelling in various dimensions of consciousness).

Verse 14:

saṃbhūtiṃ ca vināśaṃ ca yastadvedobhayaṃ saha | 

vināśena mṛtyuṃ tīrtvā saṃbhūtyāmṛtamaśnute || 14 ||

Literal Meaning:

He who knows That as both in one, the Birth and the dissolution of Birth, by the dissolution crosses beyond death and by the Birth enjoys Immortality.

My Personal Understanding:

In the previous two verses, the extremes of both paths are cautioned by the sages. Also, the good that comes from walking both paths is also elucidated. But it has been explained that neither of these results is perfect in itself nor the true goal of humanity. Each of them brings its intended portion into the perfect good of the human soul only when it is complemented by the other. Here, in this text, the perfect way and realization of human life is laid out. 

Lord is both Avidya and Vidya, He is the form as well as the formless. He is unmanifested as well as the manifested. He is transcendent as well as immanent . He is the immobile as well as the mobile. As Narayana, he is avyakta(can not be described or comprehended), and as Sri, she is the vyakta( the one that is manifested as the world and its movement). 

This verse layout the highest goal of human life. The first goal of human life is to experientially realize the reality of the true nature as pure consciousness. To realize that He is neither the body nor the mind, to realize the divinity and the essence of his own being, separate from the manifested reality. But it does not end here. This dissolution of the human being from body-mind complex to conscious being makes one understand the oneness of the manifested reality. 

The second goal of human life is to come back to the manifested reality and enjoy the fullness the world provides and see the harmony and the interrelatedness of different elements of the world that have come out of the one reality and help others in the process so that they may also see the oneness in the multiplicity.

The verse declares that by knowing the art of dissolution(disengagement of one’s being from the body-mind complex), one crosses death. He becomes immortal but it is enjoyed by divine beings by becoming the universe again, by coming back and doing divine works and living a divine life with detachment. What can possibly attach and bind a soul, one who knows the transcendental reality of its’ own true nature?

To be Continued….

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