Isopanishad Invocation of Peace (Ajay Sardesai)

7/24/2019 Isopanishad Invocation of Peace (Ajay Sardesai)

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II II

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II II

Ishopanishad Invocation of peace

: , II

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= " " ,that , =" " ,this , = , , emerges or ar ises

, = / remove/substract , also taking along ,

= , remains .
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English Translation :

Thatis complete (Whole without any deficiencies ), Thisis Complete (Whole without anydeficiencies ). From the (That) complete (Whole) , arises or emerges the (This) complete

(Whole) . If (this) Complete (Whole) is removed from or added to (that) Complete (Whole ).

What remains , still is Complete (Whole). Let there be peace , peace , peace .

Discussion :

This peace invocation ( shanti mantra ) is a little intriguing in the sense that the That &

This in this mantra are not clearly defined .So naturally there have been numerous

interpretations & opinions regarding these twosome. I feel that in the above shanti mantra

Thatmeans The Bramhamwhile Thismeans The Atman . It is stated above that both

That & This are complete in their wholeness and hence their meaning should be derived &

analysed from this point of view .

That That means or indicates The Bramhamshould not have any second thoughts .That

is a neuter gender and is deliberately used to show that That is neither masculine or feminine .The Bramham is also neither masculine or feminine , if it had been either of the only one then itcould not have been complete in its wholeness .Since The Bramham is both masculine &

feminine simultaneously , the neuter gender That is used to represent it .

That The Bramham is complete in its wholeness cannot be denied or falsified .Whatever is from

yonder to yonder , seen & unseen , visible & invisible ,moving & unmoving , micro & macro is

nothing but The Bramham. It is everywhere , nothing exists outside of The Bramham. So inthe mantra Thatmeans The Bramham.


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Now lets turn our attention to This in the mantra . What was the Rishis (Sages) intention

when he said This? What did he mean when he said This is Complete(Whole without

any deficiencies ).

If we deduce that This means our World , then by our World we generally mean the Earth .So

did the sage mean Earth when he saidThis

? Then it means that the Earth is Complete ! But tosay this would be wrong .As we know that the Earth is totally dependent on the Sun for its

functioning and is only a part of the Suns planetary system .Without the Sun the Earth would

certainly perish . How can a dependant and perishable thing which is just a part of somethingbigger be considered complete ? So the sage certainly didnt mean the Earth (World) .

Lets read the mantra again and see what we can primarily conclude .

1. The word This in the mantra indicates that there appears to be thissomething which is

different from The Bramham .

2. That This isnear to us . How can we conclude that This is near to us ? Because the

mantra doesnt say That and Thatbut it says Thatand This . That is used to refer

to something which is farther(at a great distance) to us while Thisis used to refer somethingwhich is very near to us .

So from the above what is that thing which appears (only appear different due to circumstances)

to be different from The Bramham , which is also near to us and at the same time is also

Complete?

There is of course only one such thing which meets all these conditions . It is The Principle ofLife ,Feeling ,Thought and Action in humans , regarded as a distinct entity separate from the

body , and commonly held to be separable in existence from the body .We call this Principle The

Atman .Hence it is The Atmanwhich is indicated in the mantra by This.

Is the Atman Complete(Whole without any deficiencies ) in its nature ? Yes it certainly is , Asit arises or emerges from The Bramham itself which is Complete. The Atman is not bornout

of The Bramhamrather it arises or emerges from The Bramham.

For The Atman thereis never birth nor death .Nor having once been does it cease to be .It is

unborn ,eternal , ever-existing, undying and primeval .It is not slain when the body is slain

(Bhagvat Geeta Chapter 2 , Verse 20 ).

In fact it would not be wrong to say that What we call The Bramham has actually risen or

emerged from the One Supereme Atman of all the Atmans in the beginning .They called itSingularity (Advaita).This Singularity exploded (Dvaita) with a big bang and is ever expanding

ever since .From this Singularity was born the Universe with its unlimited galaxies , stars within

the galaxies , planetary systems of the stars . satellite systems of the planets and life distinct withits support systems all interdependent .This ever expanding expanse is what we refer to as The


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Bramham and so does the sage of this mantra . The Bramhamis the ParamAtmanitself .It is

,was and will always be Complete(Whole without any deficiencies ). Therefore The Atman

referred to by This in the mantra is also as Complete(Whole without any deficiencies )as The

Bramham .

Hence

The Bramham is complete ,So The Atman is Complete. As from the Complete (Whole) ,arises or emerges the Complete (Whole).

Now moving further we come across the line which says

If Complete is removed from or added to the Complete , What remains still is Complete. This

seems to be absurd in the view of our general Mathematics. If something is added to another itshould increase and if subtracted or removed in that case it should decrease. That is the rule per

say. But here in the mantra the sage says that nothing changes .Complete remains Complete

.How can that be possible? We have to see how?

Consider us . We are born out of conjugation of a sperm and an egg as a single placental cell.

Both the sperm and the egg are complete in terms of their functionality ,they must be .For ifeither of them is incomplete they will not combine to form a single living placental cell. So here

we see that when two Complete(wholes) are brought/added together what remains is

Complete(whole) single entity .This placental cell later undergoes cell division ( mitosis &

meiosis )to form 2 cells from the original placental cell & goes on dividing to form 2, 4, 16 cells and so on to form an embryo. Here we again see that when from one Complete(whole) cell

another Complete(whole)cell is removed/emerges , What then remains is Complete(whole)one

single entity. The human body is made up of trillions of such cells but yet it is one

Complete(whole) entity.

Thus we see that the 2nd

statement in the mantra

If Complete is removed from or added to the Complete , What remains still is Complete also

holds true .

Let there be Peace , Peace ,Peace .

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Inspired by the book by Dr. P . V. Vartak

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Isopanishad Invocation of Peace (Ajay Sardesai)