(Nov 13,2013 ) Spiritual Message for the Day – What does the Bhagavadgita Teach? by Swami Krishnananda

What does the Bhagavadgita Teach?

Divine Life Society Publication: Discourse 1 Commentary on the Bhagavadgita by Swami Krishnananda

 

What does the Gita teach? The commentaries on the Gita say that it teaches karma yoga or raja yoga, bhakti yoga or jnana yoga, a synthesis of yoga, the art of living, and whatnot. But the Gita itself tells us what it teaches by a colophon, which is in three words only: brahma-vidyayam yoga-sastre sri-krishnarjuna-samvade. Actually, these three words mean theory, practice, and realization.

Brahma-vidya is the science of the Absolute – that system of thinking which is able to comprehend within itself at any time the total structure of things. To conceive the Absolute is to at once take into consideration, in our processes of thought, all things connected with the object of thought – not only the inner constituents of the object as such, but also the relations that the object bears to other objects. The reality of a particular thing is not only in itself. It is also in that which determines it, restricts it, influences it, conditions it, defines it, and makes it what it is.

Every individual is an entity by itself; but this ‘being an entity by itself’ is not so simple a matter as it appears on the surface. As human individuals, we appear to be totally isolated persons, and we stand by ourselves unrelated to other things outside. Even if we are alone in our rooms, we do not forget that our individuality is conditioned by the presence of the laws of society, of government, of physical nature, of the thoughts of people in general.

There is a relation of ‘A’ to ‘B’. If ‘A’ is not related to ‘B’, we would not be conscious that ‘A’ is independent of ‘B’. If there is only redness everywhere, we would not be able to perceive the redness of things. There is a distinction in the characteristic of a particular object which is red. That distinction lies in the fact that it is red and it is not what is not red. The not-ness is a negative influence exerted on this object.

The existences that are outside us are not actually outside us. They influence us. Brahma-vidya is the art and the science of educating oneself in the manner of correctly perceiving the world as such, including one’s own self in the totality of relations.

In a total perception of things, we are not in ourselves; we have transcended ourselves. Nor are we in the object; we have transcended the object. We are in the middle as a blend – a blending consciousness which brings about a harmony between the seer and the seen, or between any two faces of reality. In all situations, there are two aspects: the cause – the causative factor – and the effect upon which the cause seems to have an impact. It is very difficult for us to see the relation between cause and effect because mostly we see the cause as one thing, and the effect as another.

Brahma-vidya is an intricate subject. It is not just repeating some words of the Upanishads or the Brahma Sutras or even the Gita. It is the entry of the consciousness into the very import of the teaching. The Total has eyes everywhere, has feet everywhere, has hands everywhere because It is neither a subject, nor an object. In the total perception of things, we are not ourselves, nor are we other than what we are. We are something beyond what we are, and what is other than what we are. This is the final import, as it were, of the Brahma-vidya aspect of the Bhagavadgita.

But, as I mentioned, theoretical physics has to lead to applied physics. What is the use of merely knowing things? This knowledge has to be applied in practical life. In a similar manner, this Brahma-vidya that is the knowledge of the integrality of things has to be put into daily implementation in our angry gestures, in our prejudices, in our desires, in our attractions, in our repulsions; in every situation, this Brahma-vidya has to be there. We have to be total and whole persons always. We cannot be whole only at some time, and a fraction at some other time. We are whole everywhere, but if we behave in different ways at different times and convert ourselves into fractions of human personality, as it were, we are not living a wholesome life. It is not a holistic approach to things.

Brahma-vidya is to be applied in Yoga Shastra, which is the daily application of our consciousness, our minds, our attitudes, to anything in the world in terms of the lesson that we have learnt through Brahma-vidya. What is the purpose of this practice of yoga in terms of the wisdom that we gain through Brahma-vidya? It is sri-krishnarjuna-samvade – the conversation of the soul with the Absolute. Arjuna’s envisaging the mighty Krishna is symbolic of the soul envisaging the Cosmic Being in its daily life.

Who can encounter the Absolute? The wavelength of our individuality and the wavelength of God are in such a contrast that there is no mingling of these two factors. The Yoga Shastra, or the practice of yoga, is nothing but the tuning of the wavelength of our receiving sets to the wavelength of the message that comes from God’s broadcasting station.

The purpose of Yoga Shastra is to contact God directly. There is no use of thinking God and praying to God and feeling God and imagining that one day we will realize God. It is necessary to confront Him every day. In every atom He is vibrating, as the sun is vibrating in the solar system. God is a here and a now, and not an afterwards or a somewhere or a someone. He is without these limitations of the concept of space and time. Contact with God is contact with timelessness, with eternity, with justness, now-ness and here-ness. Such is the import of the final teaching of the Bhagavadgita, where the soul communes with God in its realization of the perfection that it has to achieve finally through the Yoga Shastra. This is the practice of the discipline necessary in this world in the light of the knowledge of Brahma-vidya, which is the theoretical education that we receive of how the world is made, finally.

First we have to know, then we have to do, and then we have to realize. It is not enough if we merely see and know, but we have to enter into it. It is necessary for us to enter into God in our daily life.

The entry into God’s existence every day is the living of the divine life, and we should not think that this is a very hard thing. Who can enter into God every day? Where is God? Is He in some unimaginable infinity? It is nothing of the kind. Outside God nothing exists. If that is the case, what is the distance between us and God? Distance is abolished. It is a distance-less, timeless contact. That is possible for us, provided that we open the gates of our personality, open the windows to the sunshine of the Supreme Being that is illuminating us perpetually, and melt our egos which affirm that “I also exist together with God”.

The biblical fall of Satan is nothing but the story of the affirmation of the ego in the presence of God: “If you are there, I am also there.” The devotee says, “God Thou art, but I am also there to contemplate you.” That devotee should not be there at all. Let that devotee melt, and God possesses him; the ocean enters into the rivers, and the world melts into the consciousness which is a now and a here.

The Bhagavadgita is a Brahma-vidya, a Yoga Shastra, sri-krishnarjuna-samvade – theoretical understanding of the structure of the cosmos, practice of yoga, and daily contact with God in our practical affairs, which is true divine life.

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A Colophon of the Bhagavadgita - Discourse 1 Commentary on the Bhagavadgita by Swami Krishnananda
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(June 12,2013) Spiritual Message for the Day – Mind Control is Self Control

Mind Control is Self Control

Divine Life Society Publication: Chapter 21: True Spiritual Living by Swami Krishnananda

Control or restraint, as we understand it, is the exercise of a power upon something which is external to us. The act of control requires a distinction between the controller and the controlled. We are not different from ourselves. How can we influence or control our own selves? What is control and what does the yoga actually mean by saying that there should be self-control, or control of the modifications of the mind?

People speak of control of mind, control of the vrittis etc., as if they are going to control servants or like a boss exerting pressure upon his subordinates, etc. All this is not simple as it appears to be because the modifications, or vrittis, of the mind are not capable of observation, because the observer has identified himself with the modifications themselves. One who has to control the mind has become one with the mind. No distinction exists between us and the mind, though we generally say: “I am thinking”, “this is my idea”, “my thought”, “my feeling”, etc., as if thought, feeling etc. are outside us. They are only ways of expression. Our feeling is us only. The feeling is not outside us, external to us, and different from us. Therefore, we cannot do anything with it, because we cannot do anything with our own selves.

And since the mind does identify with our own personality and vice versa, we cannot deal with the mind as we deal with the body (by asanas) or even with the pranas (by pranayama). If the policeman himself has become the thief, how will he detect the thief? He himself is the culprit, and he is also the policeman. The judge himself has become the client, a very difficult situation indeed.

The consciousness, which is our essential nature, animates the modifications of the mind in such a manner that we cannot know which is the modification of the mind, and which is us. By way of analogy, they give the instance of a heated iron ball or an iron rod. When a ball of iron is heated until it becomes red-hot, we cannot see the iron; we can see only the fire. When we touch a heated iron ball, it may burn us, and we will say, “Oh! This iron ball has burnt me.” What has burnt us is the fire, not the iron ball. But we mix up one with the other. Consciousness cannot be the modifications of the mind, and the modifications of the mind cannot be consciousness, because consciousness has no modifications; It is indivisible eternity. Then, what is it that is modified?

The whole process of yoga is nothing but a series of self-control from the lower stage to the higher in an appropriate manner. The achievement in yoga becomes a sort of awakening rather than an activity. We enter a new world altogether when we wake up from dream or sleep. The achievement called ‘waking up from sleep’ is not the result of an action. This is why Acharya Sankara tirelessly hammers upon the idea that liberation is not an action, and it cannot be achieved by any kind of action. Moksha is nothing but an awakening into a wider reality which is already planted in us and is not external to us. Yoga is a process of awakening, rather than an activity in an empirical sense. It is not a work that we perform. And this awakening is brought about by control of the mind.

All activity is an externalised movement of consciousness towards an object outside. But here the object is ourself, and therefore there cannot be such a movement of our consciousness. The nature of truth requires a purification of the self, which is the means of self-awakening; and this purificatory process is analogous to a gradual rise of the soul from one stage of self-identification to another stage of self-identification.

The whole of life is nothing but an awareness of selfhood. If we properly and deeply think over the matter, we will realise that there is no such thing as an object in this world; there is only a self. There is no such thing as a self getting connected with an object, ultimately speaking, because the moment the self gets connected with an object, it ceases to be an object. It becomes a part of the Self itself. There is no such thing as love of an object, because the moment we love the object, the object ceases to be the object; it becomes the Self. This is why it is said that what we love is the Self only. And when we extend our selfhood, what we are doing is not the action of the love of an object outside, but only another form of the Self. We love the bodily self if we are utterly selfish – only this body. Otherwise, if we are more altruistic and civilised, we become a family self, a social self, a political self, an international self, a human self. We may become even a world self. But, it is after all the Self. There is nothing but that.

Thus, yoga takes us to the root of the whole matter, and wishes to disillusion us of all our prejudices and old notions of things, so that we may know what it is to control the mind, what is meant by all this. To control the mind and to control the self are the same thing. Mind control is self-control. Chitta nirodha is atma vinigrahah; they are identical. Inasmuch as it is difficult to understand what the Self is, what the mind is, what its modifications are, yoga practice becomes difficult; and, therefore, with tenacity of purpose and incisive understanding, we have to take to the various prescriptions given by the Yoga Sastra in a methodical manner.

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Mind Control is Self Control by Swami Krishnananda

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