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Isa or Isavasya Upanishad derives its name from the first word of the first verse of the same Upanishad. The word "Isa" means the Lord of the Universe. the Upanishad begins with the majestic and triumphant declaration that the whole universe is inhabited by God and belongs to Him.
The last three verses of the Upanishad evoke certain pathos as we read them. They deal with death and the departure of the soul from the body. They are chanted during the cremation ceremonies.
The Upanishad gives a very convincing and logically acceptable argument as to why we should live in this world and perform our duties without any attachment. The argument is simple. Since the whole world is inhabited by God and He is the dynamic force in all the dynamics of the universe, nothing belongs to us here and no action can be truly performed by us on our own.
To covet what does not belong to us and to assume the doership of what we really do not do are part of the delusion we all suffer from. Therefore, goes the argument, we should wish to live in this world for a hundred years, performing our duties, but without claiming any rights of ownership of either the deeds or of the things.
The Upanishad belongs to the Vajasaneya Samhita of the Yajur Veda. Mahatma Gandhi extolled the spiritual message contained in the first verse of this Upanishad. Apart from other ideas he found in it, he was particularly impressed by its " message of universal brotherhood- not only brother hood of human beings but of all living things."
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