The Philosophy of the Bhagavadgita : 15.5 - Swami Krishnananda.

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Saturday, 23 Dec 2023 06:30. 

Chapter 15: The Way and the Goal-5.

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“I shall speak to you about the Supreme Goal, the object of knowledge,” says the Teacher. This object of knowledge is not in any particular place. This is the peculiarity of this Great Object. Everything that we know, or anything that we are supposed to know in this world, is in some place and at some time; it is not everywhere. But this Supreme Object is everywhere, and it is not only at some time. It has neither past, nor present, nor future. It is timeless eternity. It is not in one place, because it envelops all things, and in a majestic epic language the verses speak here of the Omnipresent Almighty as having hands and feet and heads and eyes and ears everywhere, grasping everything, knowing everything and comprehending all things through every means, at once, instantaneously, timelessly, here, and now. Undivided, yet appearing to be divided; existing at all times, yet appearing to manifest itself occasionally; free from the shackles of qualities and attributes of every kind, yet animating every quality and character and property. 

Beyond the reach of all things is it, and yet is seated as the self within the hearts of everyone. It is moving and also unmoving. It is the light behind even the Sun itself. The brightness of the Sun is the shadow cast by the Glory of the Absolute. One may wonder where this wondrous Light is. It is inside us, we are carrying it wherever we go, and yet we seem to be groping in darkness holding this lamp of wisdom and eternal brilliance within ourselves. We have here a concise presentation of the characteristics of the Object of knowledge, which is God-existence, expressed in a stimulating diction of poetic power.

We know what is right knowledge and the individual percipient. The relationship between the Knower and the Known is the crux of the whole matter of perceptional psychology. We do not know which influences what, whether the subject influences the object or it is the other way round. In fact, there is no question of one influencing the other, or one standing below or above the other; they are on a par one with the other, because one flows into the other, and the one is impossible without the other. The subject cannot be without the object, and vice versa, because the subject and the object, purusha and prakriti, are the two arms of one uniform Omnipresence. God works through two hands, as it were, the purusha and prakriti of the Samkhya philosophy. And the subject and the object we are speaking of, consciousness and matter, are not two different things, they are the two modes of one seamless being.

Here the Bhagavadgita is going head and shoulders above the dualistic philosophy of Samkhya dogmatism. The purusha, which is pure impersonal consciousness, featureless transparency, works, or rather appears to work, through the medium of prakriti which is constituted of the three gunas, or properties, known as sattva, rajas and tamas. Now, again, we are to mention something about this in the Fourteenth Chapter, which is devoted entirely to a discussion of the nature of these gunas, the strands of prakriti, the Field of action.

Pure equilibrium, harmony, luminosity, are the characteristics of sattva; distraction, activity, dissipation, division are the characteristics of rajas; inertia, stability, fixity, lethargy, sleepiness, are the characteristics of tamas. The individual is a component of all these qualities, sattva, rajas and tamas. We are not free from them at any time. Sometimes the one preponderates; and at other times the other. We pass through various moods in our lives, sometimes dejected and melancholy are we, sometimes we are spirited and active and run about, and sometimes we are sublime and sober and enlightened in our outlook. But we do not maintain this attitude throughout the day and night, inasmuch as, like the spokes of a wheel that moves, which go up and down with the motion of the wheel, the properties of prakriti do not maintain a single position always. They move with the evolutionary process of the cosmos and, with this evolutionary process, we are also dragged as contents of this vast universe. Hence it is that we are not in any particular mood at all times.

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To be continued

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