The Relevance of the Bhagavadgita to Humanity : 5.4. Swami Krishnananda

-

Monday, June 22, 2020. 8:25.AM.
The First Six Chapters of the Bhagavadgita
Chapter 5: The Udyoga Parva of the Mahabharata - 4

1.
There is a difficulty. We have a difficulty always, and there is not a single moment when we are not in some difficulty because if there is no difficulty of any kind, in any sense of the term, at any place, in any aspect of our life, it would be difficult to imagine that we would be living and doing things in the manner that we do now. There is perpetual motivation in some direction in our life, and our life is a complicated network of involvements and relations. What is meant by ‘our life’? It is a large web of interrelations where everything is connected in some way, in some proportion, in some emphasis of intensity. It is my particular need or necessity felt at this hour, but my need or necessity is not unconnected with the environment in which I am living, and it is not possible to assure myself that I am totally free from any kind of association with my environment outside.


2.
The Bhagavadgita, therefore, goes to the root of human involvements, and conflict is    just this peculiar inability on the part of an involved individual to properly assess the nature of its relation with the environment in which it is involved. I am in a particular environment. Firstly, it is difficult to fully understand what this environment is. Secondly, it is also difficult to understand what my connection with this environment is. A twofold difficulty is there facing us every day. I would not be so foolish as to imagine that I have nothing to do with anything in the world. I seem to have some connection with things, but what are the things with which I am connected? A purely parochial outlook, which emphasises only a blinkered attention of the mind in a given direction, will say that this is the thing in which I am involved, and this is the thing with which I am connected as, for instance, when a person is up in arms against somebody, or against some circumstance.

3.
Very rarely does a human being find it possible to take all the factors involved in the circumstance into consideration, because we have a capacity to be prejudiced, and we are not incapable of that state. We are capable of a prejudice which is motivated by sudden sparks of emotion. We are not always judged by or motivated by an impersonal rationality of approach. It is true that we have reason, and that faculty is a blessing. But there are other forces operating within us, and we find that it is not always possible for us to blend these potentialities within us. I made a reference to this difficulty sometime back. Always we are laying emphasis on one side of the issue. A total picture rarely presents itself before our minds.

To be continued ...


======================================================================

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Teachings of the Bhagavadgita - 8.1. Swami Krishnananda.

-
Image
  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sunday, March 21, 2021. 07:57. AM. Chapter 8: Creation and Life After Death -1. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Bhagavadgita is a moksha-shastra, a scripture on the science of the liberation of the spirit. Thus it follows the course of the return process along the same lines as the evolutionary process of the descent of the soul from the Supreme Being. The first six chapters may be said to be engaged in an exposition of self-discipline from the individual point of view, the integration of the human personality and the preparation of the whole man for the greater task which is yet to come – namely, the at-one-ment of the individual with the set-up of the universe. Some of the interpreters and commentators on the Bhagavadgita hold that the first six chapters have a relevance to the significance of the term 'twam' in the famous Upanishadic p...
Read more

Gita : Ch-3. Slo-43.

-
Image
Srimad Bhagavad-Gita : Chapter-3. ( Karma-yogam ) Slokam-43. ( Thus, knowing the atma to be superior to intelligence, O brave and strong Arjuna, steady the mind by self-realisation and conquer this insatiable enemy, in the form of lust. ) evam  buddheh  param  buddhva  samstabhyatmanamatmana, jahi  satrum  mahabaho  kamarupam  durasadam. mahabaho  =  O,  strong  brave   Arjuna; evam  buddheh  param   =   thus  superior  of  intelligence; atmanam  buddhva  =  knowing  the  atma,  by  atma,  the   intelligence (the  vivekam/discrimination  and  vicharam/ realisation ); atmanam  samstbhya  =  keep  the  atma  steady  without  oscillations;  (controlling  the  mind   from,  vishayas)     kamarupam  du...
Read more

A Study of the Bhagavadgita : 33 - Swami Krishnananda.

-
Image
================================================================================= Saturday 01, June 2024 06:40. Chapter 7: The Entry of the Absolute into the Relative -3. Post-33. ================================================================================= There are endless connections of this type. The relationship of adhyatma and adhibhuta is involved in an infinite variety of degrees of ascent and descent. This imperative of the presence of a consciousness between adhyatma and adhibhuta in various degrees is the reason why you sometimes feel there are many gods. Sometimes the question arises: Are there many gods, or only one God? There is only one God, the Absolute, but inasmuch as it manifests itself as an interconnecting link between subject and object through millions of degrees of ascent and descent, it looks as there are millions of gods. It is as if there are millions of governments merely because there are millions of officials in a centrality of administration. There is...
Read more