The Philosophy of the Bhagavadgita - 6.8. Swami Krishnananda.
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Friday, September 18, 2020. 10:22. AM.
Chapter 6: The Meaning of Duty -8.
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1.
We have duties, no rights in this world. This is something interesting. These days, people fight for rights and do not think that they have duties. “This I demand, and I owe nothing to you.” This is modern man’s argument. But true human culture says that we have duties, but no rights. One will be wondering what this is all about. “I have no rights?” Dear friends, rights will automatically follow without your asking for them. When you perform your duties, you need not demand your rights, they come spontaneously. “All these things shall be added unto you,” if you “first enter the Kingdom of God and His Righteousness.” Why do you cry for rights? Seek God and His righteousness, and then see if everything follows you or not. But we expect everything to follow us automatically without our doing anything for it. This is unbecoming. This is not going to lead us to success. So, Sri Krishna speaks: “You have a duty towards all things, and you cannot simply throw your bow and arrows and say, ‘I do nothing, I perish.’ You have no right even to perish, you must know that. You cannot hurt others, yes; but you cannot hurt yourself, too. Just as you cannot kill others, you cannot also kill yourself. Just as you cannot attack anything in hatred, you cannot attack yourself. There is sacredness and sanctity present everywhere, and reverence for life is the insignia of true culture.”
2.
Arjuna forgot everything. He was completely down with fear, doubt and weakness of every type. At a particular stage in our spiritual pursuits, we find ourselves in this dark night of the soul, as the mystics speak of this condition. We cannot see anything in front of us. This plight does not befall us in the earlier stages of spiritual life, when everything seems bright as daylight. In the earlier days of spiritual practice, we think that everything is clear to our minds, and we can go ahead. But when we go half way, we see darkness ahead of us. It is all problem, difficulty and diffidence, and we begin to grope in darkness, in which condition Arjuna finds himself in the First Chapter of the Bhagavadgita. Inasmuch as this darkness is a precedent to illumination, a darkness that has risen on account of our persistence in the practice of true spiritual life, this specific condition of being in darkness and doubt is also called a ‘Yoga’. The First Chapter is called “Arjuna-Vishada-Yoga”, the Yoga of the dejection of the spirit of the seeker. This is also a part of ‘Yoga’. And everyone has to pass through this stage. But we should have the strength within us to realise that it is a transitory stage, and it is not going to be an all-in-all; it shall pass away. So, from the first stage of darkness and oblivion, Arjuna is lifted up to the enlightening message of the ‘Samkhya’, to which we shall refer now.
END.
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