A Study of the Bhagavadgita : 13 : Swami Krishnananda.

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Sunday 18 Feb 2024 06:50.

Chapter 5: The Karma Yoga Principle of the Bhagavadgita-2.

Post-13.

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Chapter 5: The Karma Yoga Principle of the Bhagavadgita - 2.

So duty as an action incumbent upon people is based on the consciousness of one's own being in relation to the circumstances of existence in this world. That is to say, Karma Yoga is based on Buddhi Yoga, as told in the language of the Bhagavadgita. When karma is based not on buddhi, proper understanding, then karma, action, becomes a meandering movement with no proper direction. You can move anywhere, in any direction, and do whatever you like, but that cannot be called right action.

The philosophy of the Bhagavadgita is actually the science of right activity. That which is proper on your part is right action. But what is it that is proper on your part? The propriety of your behaviour and your action depends upon the extent to which you fit in a state of harmony to the atmosphere of creation as a whole. This is the reason why it became necessary for us to go into the details of the cosmological creative process as adumbrated in the Sankhya philosophy.

In what manner are you connected to this world? That is the manner which will decide how you have to act. Are you on the surface of the Earth? Are you on a hilltop? Are you in the desert? Are you on the sea? Are you in the midst of friends, or otherwise? What is also happening to you internally, at the same time?

The internal and external setup of things in the context of the existence of a person or an individual is explained in the cosmology of the Sankhya. We went into great detail about it already so that you will have some idea as to where you are actually sitting at this moment. You are not sitting on any particular isolated location at all. In this great cosmological scheme of which you are one single evolute, you seem to be connected to everything. The entire space-time and the stars, the whole of creation, Prakriti and Purusha, whatever it is, are all strung, as it were, on your own body and, conversely, you are strung on the body of this Universal Being. Hence, you are not an ordinary individual.

“Arjuna, you are not a single body or son of Pandu. You are not sitting on the field of Kurukshetra as a geographical location. You are not facing the Kuru family as people connected with you. There is something else altogether behind the entire situation in which you are placed just now.” Even if you are going to Rishikesh market or the railway station here, it is not a small action that is initiated by you. It is a cosmological incident. The whole world knows what you are doing. Going to purchase a ticket from the station to go to Delhi or some place looks like a silly action, but it is nothing of the kind. The whole world knows that you are purchasing the ticket – not just the whole world, but the whole creation up to Purusha and Prakriti knows it, just as the tiniest movement of a little finger is known by the whole body. The finger cannot say the body does not know what it is doing, that it is just moving independently. It does not move independently. The entire system of the physical organism is aware of every little scratch, touch or movement.

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Continued

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