Isavasya 11 Translation Fantasia

vidyāṁ cāvidyāṁ ca yastadvedobhayagṁsaha, 

avidyayā mṛtyuṁ tīrtvā vidyayāmṛtamaśnute. 

विद्याम् – vidyā; च – and; अविद्याम् – avidyā; च – and; यः – who; तत् – that; वेद – known; उभयग्म् – both; सह – together; अविद्यया – by avidyā; मृत्युम् – death; तीर्त्वा – crossing; विद्यया – by vidyā; अमृतम् – immortality; अश्नुते – enjoys, obtains

He, who knows at the same time both vidyā and avidyā, overcomes death by avidyā and obtains immortality by vidyā.

Selfless dedicated work (avidyā) prepares one for contemplation, and through contemplation vidyā is fulfilled in direct apprehension of the Self. Thereafter the perfect one undertakes karma as a sacred satisfying fulfilment of his Realisation and spiritual experience.

Having gained vidyā in this very life, there is a period when we are to live in this world as a liberated soul, a prophet, a God-man. His duty thereafter is not to run away incognito into some secret cave of contemplation, to enjoy the serene joys of his own realisation. On the other hand, he has to fulfil his Self-realisation in and through his activities in the world outside.

~Chinmayananda

He who knows at the same time both Vidya and Avidya, crosses over death by Avidya and attains immortality through Vidya.

In the subsequent verses Vidya and Avidya are used in something the same sense as "faith" and "works" in the Christian Bible; neither alone can lead to the ultimate goal, but when taken together they carry one to the Highest. Work done with unselfish motive purifies the mind and enables man to perceive his undying nature. From this he gains inevitably a knowledge of God, because the Soul and God are one and inseparable; and when he knows himself to be one with the Supreme and Indestructible Whole, he realizes his immortality.

~Paramananda

He who is aware that both knowledge and ignorance should be pursued together, overcomes death through ignorance and obtains immortality through knowledge.

According to verse eleven, it appears that those who harmonize both attain, in the end, the status of a deity and dwell in the heavenly world as long as the cycle lasts, enjoying, as gods, what is called relative immortality.

~Nikhilananda

But one who knows these two together, knowledge and ignorance, crosses death through ignorance and attains life eternal through knowledge.

To understand ignorance means to understand the implications of the meaning of ignorance. And when you have understood that, you are free of death. When you have understood that the Supreme Being which pervades everything, which pervades the entire universe, is no different from your Self, then there is no death for you.

Even a yogi or a rishi who has understood or has taught the Upanishad dies physically. Physical death is there for everyone. But the yogi understands that his inner Self does not die. Therefore, he ‘crosses over death.’ Amrita does not mean ‘to be free from physical death’; it means, ‘to understand that the inner Self or the inner Consciousness does not cease to exist with the demise of the physical body.’

~Sri M

He who knows That as both in one, the Knowledge and the Ignorance, by the Ignorance crosses beyond death and by the Knowledge enjoys Immortality.

Avidya becomes one with Vidya. By Avidya man passes beyond that death, suffering, ignorance, weakness which were the first terms he had to deal with, the first assertions of the One in the birth affirming Himself amid the limitations and divisions of the Multiplicity. By Vidya he enjoys even in the birth the Immortality.

By immortality is meant the consciousness which is beyond birth and death, beyond the chain of cause and effect, beyond all bondage and limitation, free, blissful, self-existent in conscious-being, the consciousness of the Lord, of the supreme Purusha, of Sachchidananda.

~Aurobindo