Philosophy of the Bhagavadgita : 17.4 - Swami Krishnananda.

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Saturday, February 26, 2022. 20:00.

Chapter 17. The Play of the Cosmic Powers-4.

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GITOAPADESAM

The practice of Yoga is not, therefore, a simple affair. It is hard, because we have to move in the midst of two opposing currents of power, and with whatever understanding we have, it is necessary for us to free ourselves from involvement in the outward-going impulses. The effort of consciousness to move in harmony with the inward-going urges, tending towards the Centre which is everywhere, which is what we call God, the Absolute, is Yoga proper.

In a traditional and epic manner, the Sixteenth Chapter of the Gita speaks of these two powers, the demoniacal and the divine, with this philosophical and spiritual background of its message. It is, ordinarily, not easy to go with the current of the inward-moving powers. We are, for all practical purposes, phenomenal individuals, with a little touch of the noumenal reality in us. It may be that everyone in the world is not in the same stage of evolution, and each one of us is a judge for one's own self in discovering as to where we stand in the process of evolution. Our own heart is our judge, and no one else can judge us.

The difficulty in the understanding of the nature of the stage in which one is placed at any given moment of time is great indeed, and towards the end of the chapter, the great Teacher tells us that our guide on this path is the scripture, the revelation, the intuition of the sages. It is not easy for us to understand what is the means of right knowledge. Philosophers have been struggling since ages to discover the means of knowledge or a proper understanding of things as they are in themselves. 

Is it sensory perception? 

Is it logical deduction, inference? 

Is it comparison of one thing with another thing? 

Is it apprehension? Or is it scriptural testimony? 

What is the way of knowledge? 

Religions have held that the authority is scripture and no other thing can be ultimately reliable. By scripture, what is meant is not merely a printed book, but the weight which revelation has. Again, by revelation we mean an intuitional flash whereby the whole truth is revealed to a faculty which rises as the total substance of our personality. One cannot easily reject the authority of the scriptures, for reason is often unbridled and can be susceptible to prejudice.

But a doubt arises in the mind of Arjuna. “Well, sir, it is true that revelation is the supreme authority. But is there any value in faith by which the heart longs for a certain achievement or a meaning, though it is not based on any kind of scriptural revelation?”

To be continued .....

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