Anil Kumar.R
The Isavasya Upanishad had always fascinated many great minds of Indian thought. From Sankara to Gandhiji it was an immeasurable treasure of Indian Philosophy. Dr.S.Radhakrishnan as well as Aurobindo Ghosh had given varied explanations for the inscrutable verses of this Upanishad
The Shanti Mantra( the verses invoking Peace) of this Upanishad is a famous one.
In Sanskrit
"Om poornamadah poornamidam
Poornat Poornam udachyathe
Poornasya poornamadaya
Poornam eva avashissyate
Om Shanti shanti Shanti"
The literal meaning is like this:
That is complete. This is also Complete. Completeness arises from Completeness. If we take completeness from completeness then completeness remains. Let there be peace.
Quite astounding and puzzling. Is it not?
A plausible explanation can be as follows:
“This” means our mind which is the embodiment of jeevatma (The Life soul). “That “means the universe, the physical world and is represented in Upanishads as “Paramatma”(The Universal Soul). We conceive the existence and the properties of the physical world in our mind. Also our mind which is a functional part of our material body arises from this physical world. Thus we can say that one arises from the other. Even if we close our eyes and try to get aloof from the physical world by rejecting all our sensory perceptions, still we are filled with images and feelings about the physical world, thus the mind is complete in itself. Similarly even if our mind does not exist, it does not affect the existence of physical world and which also complete in itself. Thus both are independent and at the same time dependent also. Even if we remove one from the other they both exists and we can say that each one is complete in its own terms.
In my mind it has often made connotations on the concept of Infinite sets proposed by George Cantor.
As we know a system which is complete in itself, in physics what we call a closed system, is the universe in its entirety which can be considered as infinite.Those which are complete are infinite also. In this aspect if we view the snippet a whole range of meanings will bubble through our minds
Canter has told about comparison of Infinite sets and different kind of infinities. If we have to compare the number of elements in the infinite sets then we have to make an one to one correspondence between the elements of these sets. Like taking one stone from one basket and one stone from another and grouping them till the entire all the stones can be grouped and we can say that both baskets contain equal number of stones. If we are able to make one to one correspondence between all of the elements then the sets are equal in size.
Consider the infinite series of natural numbers 1, 2, 3…., the infinite series of odd numbers 1,3,5… and infinite series of even numbers 2,4,6 .…. The set of natural numbers is an infinite set. The set odd numbers is an infinite set and the set of even numbers is also an infinite set. All the three sets are of equal size based on the above concept since we can group the elements based on one to one correspondence.
So the set of natural numbers is an infinite set, the set of odd numbers is originated from the set of natural numbers which also an infinite set and of equal size. Once we take out the set of odd numbers from the set of natural numbers then the set of even numbers remains. That is also an infinite set and equal in size to the original set. It is an idea which emphasize that if we take an infinite set from another infinite set then still an infinite set of equal size remains. It is a similar concept as told in the Upanishad.