Douglas Harding

[Guest guest]

Thank you very much for answering. It so happens that my occupation is

William Fox, Global Booksearchers for out of print books. Be kind enough to

tell me which translation of the BG you suggest I read. I read this many

years ago because at that time I thought the whole thing was about wars.

Thanks you very much in advance,

Bill Fox

[Guest guest]

Greetings Bill,

 

Yes I did read and enjoy one of Douglas

Hardings books whose title was _The

trial of the man who thought he was God_

(if I remember correctly). As a manual

for living I find nothing more useful

than the Bhagavad Gita (which I

abbreviated to BG in my post and which I

am sure you will have noticed is the

subject of an ongoing slow reading on

this list).

 

Regards,

 

Patrick

[Guest guest]

Hi Bill,

> Be kind enough to

> tell me which translation of the BG

> you suggest I read.

 

Now that you mention it this is a

question that other people on the list

might have

strong feelings about. My personal

favorite is the translation by Antonio

de Nicolas (Nicolas-Hays)

but this is not among the best known

(e.g. Edgerton, Radhakrishnan or

Zaehner). These editions are so

different from other that I am sometimes

astonished at how different people can

read so many different

things into the same text. For example,

Zaehner is probably unsurpassable for

sheer scholarly viruosity

but his Christian-theistic slant leads

him to translate buddhi (intellect,

understanding) as 'soul'

on the flimsiest of pretexts. You might

also want to look at a book called _The

Universal Gita_ by Eric Sharpe

which surveys the bewildering variety of

interpretations that the Gita has

spawned (ranging from Gandhian-pacifist

to

Nazi-Aryan-militarist).

> I read this many

> years ago because at that time I

> thought the whole thing was about

> wars.

 

Indeed one of the features which

distinguishes the Gita from all other

scriptures is that is set on a

battlefield (rather

than, say, a monastery). The entire

weight of the Mahabharata epic (in which

the Gita appears as a very small

interpolation) serves to undergird

Krishna's teaching.

 

Regards,

 

Patrick