The Isa Upanishad, in a broad sense, concerns itself with the quest for enlightenment and finding one’s self, or soul. It repeatedly emphasizes the importance of this venture and reiterates the plight of those who choose to remain ignorant, or in “blind darkness”; or even worse, those who delight in learning and find themselves in a “greater darkness”. These themes are also explored in various forms in the other extracts.
In the Heraclitus of Ephesus extract, for example, there are numerous similarities that can be identified. Line one could be an attempt to describe the self, which in reality is impossible to define in terms of worldly concepts and ideas. In line two, Heraclitus is saying that people who rigorously seek knowledge and enlightenment
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It begins on an optimistic note, with the first line signifying the end of the night and the darkness that accompanies it. The extract is a Tagore’s request to the reader to give up their own selfish pursuits for enlightenment, and to instead let the light guide everybody on the same path. Knowledge means nothing if it cannot be shared or experienced with other people. Those who inhabit their “own narrow dark corner” are also the same people “who devote themselves to the knowledge alone”, who condemn themselves into a greater darkness than even the ignorant. The Upanishad also echoes this sentiment in Fragment 6, which says that a man will only be truly wise once other around him can see his soul, and he can see the souls of others around him. However, in the Upanishad, gathering knowledge was a much more secretive affair which was restricted to only the upper classes of society. This is a contrast to Tagore’s petition to make this process universal. Tagore then refers to the sun rising in the East whose light represents the climax of the journey of the pilgrims he speaks of. Thus, once again, it is seen that the morning and sunlight are equated with everything positive and desirable, while the night contains negative connotations of ignorance and