Pujyaswami Dayananda Saraswati's Commentary - Gita Chapter 7 Verses 1 and 2

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Namaste:

 

Poojya Swami Dayananda Saraswati, the founder of Arsha Vidya Gurukulam

studied under the guidance of Swami Chinmayanandaji and he is a great

Vedantin. Let me take this opportunity to thank Swamiji for granting

permission to post his Homestudy Gita Notes to the list. The Gita

Homestudy Gita Notes along with chanting of the entire Gita verses are

available at Arshavidyagurukulam.(.http://www.arshavidya.org/)

 

Swamiji uses the elegant approach of using Gita to teach Sankara's

advaita philosophy forcefully. Those who follow his notes carefully

will learn all the basic parameters that are essential for

understanding the subtle messages and resolving the puzzles. Swamiji's

Introduction to Chapter 7 and his commentary on the first two verses

demonstrates his clear understanding of the distinction between jnana

and vijnana. Enjoy and learn!

 

warmest regards,

 

Ram Chandran

 

Note: Please help your brothers and sisters of the list by raising

questions, comments and your insights without any hesitation!

 

 

JNANA AND VIJNANA

INTRODUCTION

The last verse of certain chapters of the Gita can seem out of context

and therefore an interpolation. But if you look at the verse from the

standpoint of what is going to come it proves to be a building block,

a connecting link. In the fifth chapter, for instance, we had a couple

of verses introducing meditation, the topic of the next chapter. In

the sixth chapter, Krsna says in the second last verse; `tasmat yogi

bhava — therefore, be a yogi.' That statement sums up the yoga of

meditation. But another verse follows and in this last verse there is

a building block. It contains a prasna-bija, a seed of a question, but

not an explicit question. Let us look into the verse.

yoginamapi sarvesam madgatenantaratmana

sraddhavanbhajate yo mam sa me yuktatamo matah (6-47)

Here Krsna says, `By the one whose mind is absorbed in Me, the Lord,

madgatena antaratmana, the one who worships Me, he is the most exalted

among the yogis.' This is the seed for two obvious questions.

1. How does the yogi become the one whose mind is absorbed in

Isvara?

2. What is the nature of Krsna, the Lord?

Such a doubt is possible because this has not been explained in detail

so far.

The questions are detected by Bhagavan and he answers them in the

chapters that follow — `idrsam madiyam tattvam, this is the nature of

Myself, this is how one is absorbed in Me.'

UNFOLDMENT TO TAT-PADA BEGINS

In the first six chapters of the Gita, the meaning of the word tvam,

you the jiva, in the mahavakya, tat tvam asi, was unfolded in detail.

Now in the following six chapters, the word tat, the cause of

everything, the Lord, is the predominant topic.

With a desire to unfold this, Sri Bhagavan says:

sribhagavanuvaca

mayyasaktamanah partha yogam yunjan madasrayah

asamsayam samagram mam yatha jnasyasi tacchrnu Verse 1

sribhagavan — Lord Krsna; uvaca — said;partha — O Partha!; mayi — in

Me; asaktamanah — the one whose mind, manah, is asakta, committed;

madasrayah — having surrendered to Me; yogam yunjan — uniting oneself

to yoga (karmayoga); yatha —in which way; asamsayam — without any

doubt; samagram — in totality; mam — Me, Isvara; jnasyasi — you will

know; tat — that way; srnu — please listen

Sri Bhagavan said:

O Partha, please listen to the way in which you will know Me totally,

without any doubt, by taking to yoga, with a mind committed to Me and

having surrendered to Me.

With the word mayi in the verse, Bhagavan introduces himself as the

topic of this and the subsequent chapters. Mayyasaktamanah — mayi, in

Me, asaktamanah, a person whose mind is committed. The one who has

such a commitment is called mayyasaktamanas. Madasrayah — the one

whose asraya, basis, is Me, Paramesvara. He is the one for whom

Paramesvara is the only asraya.

In his commentary, Sankara explains the meaning of madasraya as

follows. A person becomes a desirer with reference to a desired end.

To accomplish it he adopts a means appropriate to that end and that

means is called asraya. A ritual, like daily agnihotra is an asraya

for gaining the punya to go to heaven. So, the person is called

agnihotrasraya.

Now to accomplish moksa which asraya should you have? The Lord says

you should be madasraya, isvarasraya, the one whose asraya is Isvara.

Generally one resorts to Isvara for some other end. But here, the end

he is committed to is Isvara himself which is expressed in the word

mayyasaktamanas. The isvarasraya wants Isvara. In other words, he

wants to be free from being a jiva. That is called moksa.

Paramesvara becomes the very end and also the means. Giving up all

other means, Sankara continues, the one who seeks only Paramesvara as

the asraya, in order to gain Paramesvara, becomes a mayyasaktamanas.

He is the one whose mind is committed only to Me because for him the

means is Myself. I am the means; I am the end. These words are all to

be explained in the chapter.

IN SEEKING PARAMESVARA THE END AND THE MEANS ARE THE SAME

Here he is seeking knowledge, knowledge of the whole. This seeking is

very peculiar because you can gain the whole by a means which is other

than the whole. Since the whole is always whole, the only means of

gaining it is to know that I am the whole. There is no other way.

Therefore, the end and the means, in the final analysis, become one

and the same.

If the means is separate from the end, the end is going to be a

limited one, appropriate to the means. If the whole is the end, the

only means will be the whole; it cannot be less than that. Therefore,

there are no means and end here. That is why it is said that the wise

man's track leaves no footprints. We want to follow the track of a

wise man, a man who has followed a path and reached the end, wisdom.

It is said that following the track of a wise man is like following

the footprints of a bird in the sky. What footprints does the bird

leave behind as it flies? Such are the footprints left behind by the

wise man. The idea is that the means and the end are one and the same.

There is no track between time and the timeless, between finite and

infinite, between the part and the whole, between jiva and Isvara.

Having defined the seeker as one who is totally committed to the

pursuit of Paramesvara, Krsna continues. Asamsayam samagram mam yatha

jnasyasi tacchrnu. Yatha – in which way, jnasyasi – you will know, mam

– Me, Isvara, samagram – in totality, asamsayam – without any doubt,

as a whole, as the one who is everything, the one who is endowed with

all glories like strength, power, overlordship etc., tat – about that

way in which you will know Me, srnu – please listen. By what means,

following which trail of thinking you will recognise Me in totality,

to that means, please listen.

This verse introduces what is going to come, not only in this chapter

but in those to follow. These second six chapters deal primarily with

Paramesvara. And there is one more verse of introduction here.

ªÉVYÉÉinÉÉxªÉVYÉÉjnanam te'ham savijnanamidam vaksyamyasesatah

yajjnatva neha bhuyo'nyajjnatavyamavasisyate Verse 2

idam jnanam — this knowledge; savijnanam — along with knowledge that

is immediate; te — to you; aham vaksyami — I will tell; asesatah —

without anything being omitted; yat jnatva — knowing which; iha — in

this world (or in the sastra); bhuyah anyat — any other thing that is

more than this; jnatavyam — to be known; na avasisyate — does not

remain

I will teach you without any omission, this knowledge, along with

immediate knowledge, knowing which, there is nothing more than this

remaining here to be known.

VIJNANA IS DISTINGUISHED FROM JNANA

Idam savijnanam, this immediate knowledge, knowledge for which the

subject matter is Me, Paramesvara, the cause of everything, and who is

everything, te, to you, vaksyami, I will tell, asesatah, without

anything being omitted.

What kind of knowledge is this? When jnana and vijnana are mentioned

together, it means that vijnana is something a little different from

jnana. Jnana can mean immediate knowledge but because he says jnana

with vijnana, the jnana is a little less than vijnana. Here, vi means

visesa, distinctive. Therefore, vijnana is immediate knowledge and

jnana is indirect knowledge.

Krsna says, `I will give you this jnana with vijnana. For me it is a

reality and therefore, what I teach you is something that I see. It is

not merely what I have heard. This is what I see and what I see I am

teaching you.' Because of that these words have pramanya, the capacity

to produce the same knowledge, the same vision in you. Once you see,

you have vijnana and you are left with no doubt, no vagueness. This is

one meaning.

Another meaning would be, `I will teach you this knowledge in a manner

that will make it immediate for you, not indirect.' Again we

understand that this knowledge is something to be gained only as

immediate, direct, knowledge, not as indirect knowledge. Generally

knowledge of Paramesvara is understood to be indirect. We tend to

think of Paramesvara as someone unknown. One devotee said, `yadrsosi

mahadeva tadrsaya namo namah — O Bhagavan, I don't know how you are,

what you are, where you are. So, in whichever form you are, I salute

you again and again.' This person has a feeling, a sense, that there

is a God. But how he is, what he is, he doesn't want to conclude. It

is a prayer which has some faith but at the same time, a certain

vagueness and doubt. Perhaps that is the right prayer. We tend to make

conclusions about Isvara. He plays it safe. In effect he asks Isvara,

`Please fill in all the qualifications you require to define

yourself.' It is like addressing a letter, `To Whom it May Concern.'

The one who receives the letter has to think, `It is addressed to me.'

Here, however, it is just the opposite. Krsna says, isvara-jnana need

not be paroksa, indirect. It can be aparoksa. Only aparoksa-jnana of

Isvara is moksa. Paroksa-jnana is useful for offering prayers etc. But

the final result of the prayer is this aparoksa-jnana, the immediate

knowledge of Paramesvara. With any other understanding you will be

omitting yourself from Paramesvara and thereby editing him. Minus you

Paramesvara is only another anatma, not atma. And if he is other than

you, he becomes located somewhere. So, there is someone called jiva in

the heart and another person called Isvara out there somewhere in the

vast space. This is duality. Anything other than me is anatma and

since only atma is conscious, anatma is inert. It cannot reveal itself

to me, the conscious being. If Isvara is other than me, he is inert —

and still we say he is sarvajna. It is all lip service. But here Krsna

says, I will teach this immediate knowledge in its entirety without

anything being left out.