Isavasya Upanishad for Beginners : 1.1 Swami Krishnananda

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07/07/2019
Isavasya Upanishad for Beginners : 1.1
Mantram-1
Post - 1.
om īśāvāsyam idaṁ sarvam yat kiṁ ca jagatyāṁ jagat,
tena tyaktena bhuñjitha, ma gṛdhaḥ kasyasvid dhanam (1)

The Upaniṣad begins with the word īśāvāsyam, and so goes by the name of Īśāvāsyopaniṣad. There are other such examples of this tradition. Kenopaniṣad, for instance, is so named because the very first word of it is kena.

Iśāvāsyam : Īśvara is 1st person singular. So, īśāvāsyam means īśvara resides. Sankaracarya says that the root is it (eit) meaning īṭ; and īṭ means God. So īśāvāsyam can also mean through īṭ. Or, the compound word is split thus: īśā + āvāsyam – āvāsyam means, that alone which is fit to bear or cover, that is (it is), īśvara’s temple, the fit place for Him. Another mean­ing is that which is fit to be enveloped by īśvara. Many meanings can be given according to whether it is īśā + vāsyam or īśā + āvāsyam—vāsyam fit for īśvara to stay; āvāsyam—that which envelopes the world. Again, īśena + āvāsyam can mean filled with or dwelt in by īśvara like salt in salt-waters.

We have already said that idam means this world, the whole of creation which is manifest before us. All this is covered by, or filled with God. Whatever is seen or unseen, gross or subtle, effect or cause, the sentient or the insentient, everything is covered by īśvara. He exists as the sattā.

How does He exist as sattā?
Is it as water present in a wet cloth?
Is the world covered by Him as a cloth over it? Or is it like the pot of the potter?

We can interpret the phrase as suits our intellectual way of thinking, or our philosophy. If īśvara is only a causal or a nimitta kāraṇa, then He is outside the world like the potter who remains separate from the pot he makes. The clay is the instrumental or upāddāna kāraṇa, and the potter is only nimitta for the pot and these two are separate factors; also the potter is separate from the pot which is an effect. This is the view of naiyayika and schools belonging to that system of thought. Īśvara is both nimitta and upāddāna kāraṇa.

To be continued ..


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