Commentary on the Bhagavadgita : 49-4. - Swami Krishnananda.

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Saturday, September 17, 2022. 07:00.
Discourse 49: The Eighteenth Chapter Continues – Types of Understanding, Determination and Happiness-4.

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Yayā dharmam adharmaṁ ca kāryaṁ cākāryam eva ca, ayathāvat prajānāti buddhiḥ sā pārtha rājasī (18.31): 

A rajasic person considers a wrong place as a proper place, a wrong time as a proper time, a wrong circumstance as a proper circumstance, and mixes up the concepts of dharma and adharma. Many people do wrong actions under the impression that they are doing some dharmic activity, because the idea of dharma is not clear in their mind; it is localised, politicised. Geographical, historical, communal, religious and political circumstances may vitiate the very concept of what is good and bad. We cannot decide what is ultimately good and what is ultimately bad as we are involved in these conditioning factors of human society. Such an involved kind of thinking is called rajasic buddhi, because it does not know what is dharma and adharma, what is to be done and what is not to be done, and misconstrues everything. A thing which is injurious is regarded as very good, and that which is harming others is regarded as something contributory to the welfare of people. Such a person is rajasic in nature.

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Adharmaṁ dharmam iti yā manyate tamasāvṛtā, sarvārthān viparītāṁś ca buddhiḥ sā pārtha tāmasī (18.32): 

The worst kind of understanding is tamasic buddhi, which totally misconstrues all things in a topsy-turvy manner. Totally wrong things are regarded as very good things—adharmaṁ dharmam iti yā manyate—on account of a clouding of the intellect. Every kind of objective in life is viewed from a selfish point of view. There is no ability to link the undertaking to the final purpose of life, because that consciousness of the final purpose is completely obliterated from a tamasic buddhi

The ‘determination' that will be taken up for discussion in the coming verses has a connection with understanding. Intellect and will go together. The capacity of our deciding factor—decision, determination, volition—depends much, or perhaps wholly, on understanding. To the extent of our understanding, to that extent also we have the power of will. If the understanding is weak, the will also is weak. In these verses we have been told something about the three types of understanding—sattvic, rajasic or tamasic. Now, three types of determination or volition are mentioned here.

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Dhṛtyā yayā dhārayate manaḥprāṇendriyakriyāḥ, yogenāvyabhicāriṇyā dhṛtiḥ sā pārtha sāttvikī (18.33). 

What is sattvic determination? That exercise of will by which we are able to restrain the mind, the prana and the sense organs with great force of the logical capacity within, being united in a state of yoga inwardly with no distraction in the mind and wholly concentrated on the final aim of life—that kind of decision, determination, or dhṛtiḥ, is sattvic in its nature.

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Yayā tu dharmakāmārthān dhṛtyā dhārayate'rjuna, prasaṅgena phalākāṅkṣī dhṛtiḥ sā pārtha rājasī (18.34): 

Rajasic determination is that which keeps in view the product of one's action, whether it is good or otherwise. Dharma, artha and kama are considered as the primary motives behind any kind of work, and moksha is completely ignored. Where moksha is not at all in the mind of a person, and it is not taken into account in the judgment of values, dharma may look like adharma, and adharma may look like dharma. Kama will ruin a person; and artha, or desire for material goods, will be harmful for the security and welfare of life. Hence, rajasic determination takes into consideration only the secular values. Here dharma is to be understood only in the sense of that kind of behaviour or conduct which will be conducive to the fulfilment of desire and material welfare, and not necessarily of moksha. We have emotional desires and material greed. If these two desires can be fulfilled somehow or the other, and we regard that way of fulfilment as righteousness, and we are always thinking of what will accrue through the undertaking in which we are engaged, that is rajasic understanding.

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To be continued ....

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