Guest guest Posted February 18, 2000 Report Share Posted February 18, 2000 Arjuna was not a coward in the ordinary sense of the word. None of Devendra Vyas's meanings of cowardice. Never a bhira as Harsha points out. Not even emotionally, as his entire life would bring out. Then what happened to him on that glorious first day of the War? We shall take another parallel in mythological history before we come to Arjuna. The scene is the foot of the chitrakuta hill in Valmiki Ramayana, where Bharata pleads with his elder brother Rama to return to Ayodhya and take the kingship. It is worthwhile recalling briefly the events leading to this scene (though many would know it). Bharata comes back from his uncle's place, having been called from there by Guru Vasishta, who takes over control in the crisis situation created by King Dasaratha's death. Bharata gets to know of all the tragic events that took place in his absence , viz., Rama having been exiled, the aged father no more, Sita and Lakshmana following Rama to the forest. Each piece of news comes to him as a lightning shock, particularly at the key role his mother kaikeyi played in all of this. His anger and disgust at her know no bounds. He rejects everything that she says, proclaims publicly that he is going to bring Rama back from the forest. The whole city marches with him to the forest in this fond hope. Two days of discussions take place at the chitrakuta camp on what is right and wrong. Bharata brings many points. It has always been the eldest son who succeeded to the throne. The father nurtured Rama for the kingship of Ayodhya. The city wants him. Nobody else has the competence. Mother Kaikeyi would only go to Hell for the crime she has done. If protocol requires it Bharata would 'return' the kingdom to Rama. He would even substitute for Rama in the forest … and so on. For all this Rama replies in one sentence: 'Our father and mother have told us to do it this way and neither of us can go against it and change it'. Period. Nobody could refute this argument and the assembly dispersed for the night. The next day Bharata tries to bring in new points and fails. He then simply adamantly insists that somehow Rama should return, come what may. Finally Rama decides to give him a sermon on the philosophical implications of his proposal. (This is a piece, known as Rama-Gita, of 28 verses starting with nAtmanaH-kAma-kArosti in the 104th Sarga of Ayodhya Kanda, of the Chowkhamba edn. 1957 of the Valmiki Ramayana ) It is at these times of crises, says Rama, that Dharma goes through its greatest test. What is the dharma at this point, even from the point of view of Bharata? It does not depend on a debate on whether the father did right or wrong in banishing Rama to the forest. The ultimate question for Bharata is: Am I being concordant with the dharma of the Self in insisting that Rama should disregard the father's promise? What is ultimate? Is it the temporary benefit to the ruler and the ruled of Ayodhya or is it the more fundamental values of each man's evolution towards the Ultimate Supreme? Does the individual self have a freedom to argue from a point of view other than that of the Infinite Self embedded in it? Why are you grieving, says Rama to Bharata, over inessential things -- while your greatest obligation in life, namely, to be in concordance with the Supreme Self, is the summum bonum of all dharmas? Do you think everything depends on you? … and so on it goes. Right in the beginning, he clinches the issue, saying: 'AtmAnam anuSoca tvam kim-anyam anuSocasi' Grieve about your Self; why are you grieving about other things? The only thing that man has to worry about in this transient world is the Self. Any other worry is itself only a passing phase. …. This is the problem of Bharata. Misplaced attachment to the transient. Now let us come back to the Bhagavad-gita. Krishna also tries first to shake Arjuna off from his 'cowardly' proposal to desist from the War. (Verses: 2 and 3 of Ch.2). But Arjuna insists (just as Bharata adamantly insisted on the second day of the discussion) and says that it is perhaps better to live on alms in this world rather than slay these noble masters…. And he throws down his armour and bow. It is only after this insistence that Krishna decides to give him a piece (!) of His mind. And mark it: He uses the same words which Rama used for Bharata. 'aSocyAn-anvaSocastvam ..' (Gita:2-11): You are grieving about something which ought not to be grieved about. Wise Men - he uses the word 'paNDitAH'. paNDA means knowledge - spiritual knowledge, in this context.. Those who have this are paNDitas. Such Wise Men, says Krishna, do not grieve over transient things. The problem of Arjuna is therefore, as Krishna analysed it, a misplaced compassion, arising out of extreme attachment to the transient and the moment of forgetting the supreme Reality of one's Self. In fact Rama Himself fell a victim (did He?) to this spiritual fall. After Sita was kidnapped by Ravana, Rama and Lakshmana go from tree to tree and hill to hill and Rama wails all the time. Once it became so bad that Lakshmana pulls up Rama Himself and uses the words (which echo the above two parallel situations where we were told to grieve over the Self and not on oneself). Lakshmana says: 'mahAtmAnaM kRtAtmAnaM AtmAnaM nAvabudhyase' (Kishkinda-kanda: Sarga 1, verse 125) meaning, Why don't you realise that You are yourself the Glorious Self, the Self Revealed? The purpose of the gita is to tell us, ordinary men, who are always spiritually fallen, to awake to our Self. Very often we say, when we calm down after a sudden burst of anger, Oh, I forgot myself. Yes, we forgot who we are, not in the ordinary english sense of the word, but in the sense, we have fallen from The Self. Even when we are not angry, ours is a constant fall from the Self; In Arjuna's and Bharata's cases it is a moment of fall, a crucial one, however. It is a subtler piece of spiritual 'cowardice'(=fall) as it were, expressing itself as a crucial dilemma between right and wrong. The Gita assumes its importance for the ordinary layman, because we are all daily in the same dilemma as Arjuna, though not on such substantial issues as those confronting Arjuna. Our dilemmas can be traced to our attachment to the transient. In our case the disease is however more crucial because, our attachment to the transient is permanent and continuous; it is not a momentary fall from the Spirit! Regards and praNAms to all advaitins, profvk ===== Prof. V. Krishnamurthy The simplified URL of my website on Science and Spirituality is http://www.geocities.com/profvk/ You can also access my book on Gems from the Ocean of Hindu Thought Vision and Practice from the same address. Talk to your friends online with Messenger. http://im. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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