Isavasya Upanishad for Beginners : 2.1.2. Swami Krishnananda
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10/02/2020.
MANTRAM-2.
1. INTRODUCTION-2.
POST-2.
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1.
Now there is another question arising out of this statement. Man’s individual intellect is but a poor one in comparison to what has to be understood. He is after all human, an individual personality filled with desire, anger, jealousy, etc.
How are we to conduct ourselves in life so that we may do all our duties as God’s agent?
Once you concede that isvara is the Supreme Existence you have to offer all duties unto Him as the Supreme Doer. On this statement again arise a number of questions. Life is not easy. It is a very difficult problem. It is not a joke. Jiva’s predominant characteristic is action. The whole life is action, whether it is of the mind, speech or the other limbs of the body. Everything in life is caught in a mesh of action,
In these circumstances, placed as we are, how should we do our duty?
What is that kind of action?
Is there any particular karma?
Is there any particular discipline according to which we should do it?
Or can we do it in any way we can?
What is action?
What is its cause?
What is the effect of that cause?
What form does the effect take?
What is its process?
So on and so forth, such questions arise. Answers to these questions, we get in the second mantram..
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2.
kurvann eveha karmani jijiviset satagm samah,
evam tvayi nanya theto’sti na karma lipyate nare (Mantram-2.)
Karma yoga siddhanta is stated in this second sloka of the Isavasyopanishad. Duty arises so long as we feel we are separate personalities and the notion of an embodied being persists. We feel that we are individuals, there are objects outside us, the world exists, the society exists, and so on.
#Jijivisa means the wish to live.
##As long as this idea that we want to live exists, so long action also exists.
###It is the will of the satta to live;
####it is satta’s characteristic;
#####it is an isvara-bhava to which the jiva adds abhinivesa or its eagerness to cling to the body.
*So the jiva says : “I am not only an individual, also I must live”.
*So long as this desire is the basis of life, there will be the necessity to take care of the body and prevent its destruction, for the body is needed for carrying out our duties.
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3.
You should live doing your karmas as selfless, dedicated ones and without lusting for that which has not been given to you by isvara. This is your duty, which should be performed in this spirit only. This has been told to us in the first sloka itself. Because of the present condition n which you are this placed by isvara, this discipline of karma yoga is laid on you. This is a law that pertains to all individuals who cannot give up the notion that they are individual person. In the circumstance of your being compelled to live in a body, the msantra says na anyatha asti, evam tvayi, for you no other way exists but this and this alone,
#What has been given in an aphoristic form in this mantra, has been elaborately explained in the Bhagavadgita, and what is expounded in the latter in exegesis is given in a condensed form in the former.
There is no other way to do your karma but in a selfless and dedicated way. However, fear not, for karma done in this way, na lipyate, will not bind you. Karma can also liberate you even as it can bind you. It is a double-edged sword which can either cut or save you. Karma liberates you when you base all your actions in isvara. So dedicate them to isvara. And, action unasssociated with individuality and associated with God is liberating karma.
#Actions associated with one’s individual personality and unassociated with God is binding karma. All these explanations can be inferred from the meaning of this short phrase na lipyate. Well, you should understand your present position; you are in a very dangerous position. We, attached to the body as we are, are not siddha purushas who have Divine Consciousness.
If we want to be liberated through karmas, we should understand the precarious position we are in. We should unequivocally and firmly understand that we are in body-consciousness; and that our knowledge of things here is next to nothing. Staying in this body we have to carry out our duties. We are puny individuals before isvara, the virat puru?a. We are embedded in this perishable body. How much ?adhana can we do? Not much. Little is our strength and little is our knowledge. In this state of affairs, how can we refrain from not doing our karmam And if we do karma for the sake of body alone, it lands us in pit-falls.
So now, in the waking consciousness, consider yourself as one of the millions in the creation of isvara and do karma founded on this unselfish idea. You can then save yourself. Hence the sloka assures that duty done on this understanding does not bind one. “When you go to Rome do as Romans do” is the saying. You are now in the world with only the consciousness of being just a human being, an individual, and there is no question of your having anything to do with Divine Consciousness. Beyond this body-consciousness and world-consciousness you see nothing. And yet even in this condition the jiva’s desire to live is natural.
#For, as already explained, this is of the nature of isvara’s satta, the essence of Being. In isvara there is oily pure sat (existence). Unfortunately, to this nature of isvara, jiva adds another clause and changes its own true nature which Sage Patanjali terms as abhinevesam, meaning love of life and fear of death.
#Jiva now gets a desire to live and to go on and on living for ever in this body. This is jivjiset.
##Under these circumstances, karma becomes a duty, an inescapable duty, a law inseparable from life, determining life itself.
##Life is action. Karma and life mean one and the same thing.
##Karma or duty is a kind of force which connects you to the atmosphere and conditions outside and external to you.
###He who wishes to live but does no karma will destroy his own life and will defeat the purpose of the wish to live a long and lasting life.
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To be continued ....
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10/02/2020.
MANTRAM-2.
1. INTRODUCTION-2.
POST-2.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1.
Now there is another question arising out of this statement. Man’s individual intellect is but a poor one in comparison to what has to be understood. He is after all human, an individual personality filled with desire, anger, jealousy, etc.
How are we to conduct ourselves in life so that we may do all our duties as God’s agent?
Once you concede that isvara is the Supreme Existence you have to offer all duties unto Him as the Supreme Doer. On this statement again arise a number of questions. Life is not easy. It is a very difficult problem. It is not a joke. Jiva’s predominant characteristic is action. The whole life is action, whether it is of the mind, speech or the other limbs of the body. Everything in life is caught in a mesh of action,
In these circumstances, placed as we are, how should we do our duty?
What is that kind of action?
Is there any particular karma?
Is there any particular discipline according to which we should do it?
Or can we do it in any way we can?
What is action?
What is its cause?
What is the effect of that cause?
What form does the effect take?
What is its process?
So on and so forth, such questions arise. Answers to these questions, we get in the second mantram..
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2.
kurvann eveha karmani jijiviset satagm samah,
evam tvayi nanya theto’sti na karma lipyate nare (Mantram-2.)
Karma yoga siddhanta is stated in this second sloka of the Isavasyopanishad. Duty arises so long as we feel we are separate personalities and the notion of an embodied being persists. We feel that we are individuals, there are objects outside us, the world exists, the society exists, and so on.
#Jijivisa means the wish to live.
##As long as this idea that we want to live exists, so long action also exists.
###It is the will of the satta to live;
####it is satta’s characteristic;
#####it is an isvara-bhava to which the jiva adds abhinivesa or its eagerness to cling to the body.
*So the jiva says : “I am not only an individual, also I must live”.
*So long as this desire is the basis of life, there will be the necessity to take care of the body and prevent its destruction, for the body is needed for carrying out our duties.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
3.
You should live doing your karmas as selfless, dedicated ones and without lusting for that which has not been given to you by isvara. This is your duty, which should be performed in this spirit only. This has been told to us in the first sloka itself. Because of the present condition n which you are this placed by isvara, this discipline of karma yoga is laid on you. This is a law that pertains to all individuals who cannot give up the notion that they are individual person. In the circumstance of your being compelled to live in a body, the msantra says na anyatha asti, evam tvayi, for you no other way exists but this and this alone,
#What has been given in an aphoristic form in this mantra, has been elaborately explained in the Bhagavadgita, and what is expounded in the latter in exegesis is given in a condensed form in the former.
There is no other way to do your karma but in a selfless and dedicated way. However, fear not, for karma done in this way, na lipyate, will not bind you. Karma can also liberate you even as it can bind you. It is a double-edged sword which can either cut or save you. Karma liberates you when you base all your actions in isvara. So dedicate them to isvara. And, action unasssociated with individuality and associated with God is liberating karma.
#Actions associated with one’s individual personality and unassociated with God is binding karma. All these explanations can be inferred from the meaning of this short phrase na lipyate. Well, you should understand your present position; you are in a very dangerous position. We, attached to the body as we are, are not siddha purushas who have Divine Consciousness.
If we want to be liberated through karmas, we should understand the precarious position we are in. We should unequivocally and firmly understand that we are in body-consciousness; and that our knowledge of things here is next to nothing. Staying in this body we have to carry out our duties. We are puny individuals before isvara, the virat puru?a. We are embedded in this perishable body. How much ?adhana can we do? Not much. Little is our strength and little is our knowledge. In this state of affairs, how can we refrain from not doing our karmam And if we do karma for the sake of body alone, it lands us in pit-falls.
So now, in the waking consciousness, consider yourself as one of the millions in the creation of isvara and do karma founded on this unselfish idea. You can then save yourself. Hence the sloka assures that duty done on this understanding does not bind one. “When you go to Rome do as Romans do” is the saying. You are now in the world with only the consciousness of being just a human being, an individual, and there is no question of your having anything to do with Divine Consciousness. Beyond this body-consciousness and world-consciousness you see nothing. And yet even in this condition the jiva’s desire to live is natural.
#For, as already explained, this is of the nature of isvara’s satta, the essence of Being. In isvara there is oily pure sat (existence). Unfortunately, to this nature of isvara, jiva adds another clause and changes its own true nature which Sage Patanjali terms as abhinevesam, meaning love of life and fear of death.
#Jiva now gets a desire to live and to go on and on living for ever in this body. This is jivjiset.
##Under these circumstances, karma becomes a duty, an inescapable duty, a law inseparable from life, determining life itself.
##Life is action. Karma and life mean one and the same thing.
##Karma or duty is a kind of force which connects you to the atmosphere and conditions outside and external to you.
###He who wishes to live but does no karma will destroy his own life and will defeat the purpose of the wish to live a long and lasting life.
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To be continued ....
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