Mantra 11

Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration, Word-for-word and English translation of Īśa-upaniṣad mantra 11:

विद्यां चाविद्यां च यस्तद्वेदोभयं सह ।
अविद्यया मृत्युं तीर्त्वा विद्ययामृतमश्नुते ॥ ११ ॥

vidyāṃ cāvidyāṃ ca yastadvedobhayaṃ saha |
avidyayā mṛtyuṃ tīrtvā vidyayāmṛtamaśnute || 11 ||

vidyām—vidyā, knowledge, wisdom; Theoretical knowlege of religious truths; The meditation on Brahman; The right knowledge of Viṣṇu; ca—and; avidyām—non-knowledge; Correcting and condemning false knowledge; The Karmas which are a necessary part of and lead to knowledge; ca—and; yaḥ—who; tat—that; veda—knows; The correlation of these two; the principal and subordinate nature of these two—the necessity of both; ubhayam—both; saha—at the same time, together; avidyayā—through not-knowledge (by Karmas ordained as auxiliaries of knowledge); mṛtyum—death, mental impurity as result of forgetting one’s true self; The past karmas, like virtuous and evil deeds; the Destiny; Evils like grief, ignorance, etc; tīrtvā—having overcome, crossed over; vidyayā—through knowledge; amṛtam—immortality; one-ness with Devas only; aśnute—enjoys, obtains, reaches.

11. Of these two, Vidyā and Avidyā, by a knowledge of Avidyā alone death is overcome; but knowing, both these together, by a knowledge of Vidyā also, he obtains liberation.

Commentary: The Bhāṣya of Madhva (Madhvācārya):

(English translation of Madhva’s 13th-century commentary called the Īśāvāsyopaniṣadbhāṣya or Īśopaniṣadbhāṣya)

These mantras are thus explained in the Kūrma Purāṇa:—“Undoubtedly the worshippers of other deities than Viṣṇu go to blinding darkness, but undoubtedly to greater darkness they go who do not censure and condemn such persons (and fail to??????????? their mistakes). Therefore those, who know the Lord Narayana, in His true form as free from all evils and who also condemn the worshippers of false deities, are truly the good people.

Such persons by condemning the falsehood, whose nature is grief and ignorance, cross over grief and ignorance, and by knowing the truth, whose nature is joy and knowledge, attain such joy and knowledge.