SELF, THE FOCUS OF THE BHAGAVADGITA

[Guest guest]

SrIgurubhyo NamaH

 

Self, the focus of the Bhagavadgita

 

Chapter IV: verse 9

 

In the Bhagavadgita, there occurs in the fourth chapter, this verse:

 

Janma karma cha mey divyam evam yo vetti tattvataH

tyaktvA deham puarjanma naiti, mAmeti so'rjuna (9)

 

Whoso knows thus My divine birth and action in truth is not born

again on leaving this body; he comes to Me, O Arjuna.

 

The Lord declared in the 7th and 8th verses that whenever there is a

need to uphold Dharma and the quelling of adharma, then I descend to

accomplish these. Why is this to be done by Me? It is because, the

good, the noble, have to be protected. The Lord is duty-bound to do

this. The evil-doers have to be put down with an iron hand. For

this the power has to come from the All-powerful Lord Himself. By

doing these, the dharma, religion, stands firmly established.

 

Why has Bhagavan to do this? What is the benefit He gets by doing

this? For, has He not said in the third chapter 22nd verse: I have

no duty to perform in all the three worlds. I have nothing to be

gained that I am lacking in. He adds, `yet I engage in action.'

 

Here, in the 9th verse above, we see that the Lord says that His is a

divine birth. His action is also divine. And He gives out a seminal

teaching by saying this. He says the one who knows that the Lord's

birth and action are divine, will attain Liberation. How do we

understand this? How does the knowledge of the Lord's divine birth

and action liberate one who thus knows?

 

What is meant by the Lord is `born'? The Lord said in the 6th verse

of this IV chapter that He is truly `birthless' , ajaH. He is

Imperishable. He is the Lord of all beings. Yet, when He takes a

birth, He does it through His power. He does this, not being over-

powered by His Nature, but by subduing it, by insubordinating it, He

descends. The Bhashya points out that the whole world, the beings,

are overpowered by Maya, the power of the Lord. The embodiment of

the beings is due to their being subject to Maya. But the Lord is

not so subject to Maya. He has full control over Maya and uses this

shakti for a constructive purpose. What is that constructive

purpose? It is the protecting the virtuous and annihilating the

evil. The Lord is giving out an important teaching to mankind. If

your birth in this world, in this body, is to be purposeful, truly

meaningful, then you have to grow above the power of nature that is

now lording over you. You have to be the master of that shakti and

put it to the ennobling purpose of taking you out of samsara. There

will be a lot of obstacles to this. They are the manifestations of

the three gunas of prakriti, nature. Even among the three gunas, the

real trouble is from rajas and tamas. Since sattva is also

available, one has to bring it up with great effort and use the

sattva to gain Self-knowledge. Making sattva predominant is what

sadhana is largely about. To accomplish this is not an easy task.

The Lord makes Himself available as a role model. Keep prakriti

within your control. Know from the teachings that the Pure

Consciousness, the Inmost Atman, is situated beyond the gunas, It

transcends the gunas, whose manifestations are the appendages from

the ego onwards to the entire objective world.

 

In truth, the Self, Atman, cannot be born. It is Eternal, free from

birth and death. There is no embodied state for the Self. Yet we

see that we are born, perform actions, reap the fruits of our

actions, and die, only to be born again. Now, the above teaching of

the Lord says: Know that `My' birth and `My' actions are divine. The

Lord has defined `divine' in the 7th chapter as `daivi Maya'. Again,

in the fourth chapter itself He says `sambhavAmi Atma MaayayA' , I

descend due to My own MaayA. That which brings about the happening of

something that cannot truly happen at all is defined as Maayaa. That

has been said by our Acharya in the Maayaa-panchakam: aghaTita-

ghaTanA-paTiiyasI mAyA.

 

He who knows that the Lord's birth is not absolutely true and that

His actions are also not so, by virtue of knowing this Truth about

the Lord, comes to the realization that his own Self, he himself, is

also truly free from birth and actions. By thus seeing the identity

between the Lord's absolute state and his own absolute state, he

becomes Self-realized and thereby gains freedom from samsara. This

is the teaching of the Lord. The use of the word `My' by the Lord

holds the key to the aspirant-devotee to take the cue and conduct the

enquiry as to his own true state and come to the realization of the

identity. Thus we see that the Lord is teaching `Tat tvam asi' in

this verse. The Lord also says explicitly: Thus knowing, freed from

rebirth, he attains Me. Again, attaining `Me' is realizing the true

Self as oneself.

 

The commentators like Sri Madhusudana Saraswati and Sri Dhanapati

Suri have explicitly stated that the identity is thus established in

this verse. The latter says: By enquiring into the true nature

of `My' birth and action, the `tvam', that is the jiva, is cleansed

of the superimposed adjuncts. Thus cleansed, he is able to realize

the identity with the `cleansed' Tat. The Lord explicitly taught how

to `cleanse' the Tat by saying that His birth and actions are

maayic. The implicit teaching is: Oh jiva ! your birth and actions

too are maayic.

 

We have in the Kenopanishad the story where the Deva-s appropriated

to themselves the credit for their victory over the asura-s. They

were taught a lesson by the Supreme Being and shown that the power of

Agni, or Vayu or Varuna or Indra was nothing unless blessed by the

power of the Supreme Being. Here we get the lesson that our actions

are `divine' in the sense that a power other than what we think we

are is what is behind the actions. An enquiry into this will reveal

that we have no actions in truth.

 

The next verse, Gita IV 10, teaches the sadhana that is required for

attaining this realization. One has to become free from the clutches

of raga, bhaya and krodha, that is attachment/greed, fear and

anger/hatred. Only such a sadhaka will be able to take to the

teaching of the verse under discussion and attain the liberating

knowledge.

 

Again, in the 3rd chapter 22nd verse `na mey paartha asti kartavyam

triShu lokeShu kinchana, na anavAptayam Aptavyam….' we see that the

Lord says that `I am PurNa, I don't lack in anything. There is

nothing that I have to acquire to make myself full, complete. Yet I

engage in action.' In this verse, too, we get a teaching that

focuses on the Self. The Lord teaches here: Look, Just as I, being

pUrNa, yet engage in action, so too, you, Oh, Jiva, are pUrNa. There

is nothing you need to acquire and become complete. Yet, since you

have taken birth, perform action, unattached. That is the way to

liberation.' What a teaching !! First be informed that you are

pUrNa on the authority of the Scripture. Then, engage in action,

purely to purify your intellect so as to make that information an

actual living experience. The Gita says elsewhere: yoginaH karma

kurvanti sangam tyaktvA Atma-shuddhaye, that is, aspirants after

liberation engage in action bereft of attachment, with the sole

purpose of cleansing the mind.

 

Thus the Lord teaches in the Gita several gems of lessons that are a

direct teaching of the Self to the Self by the Supreme Self. We

shall try to dive deep into the Gita ocean and now and then come up

with these precious teachings.

 

SrIkriShNArpaNamastu

 

Om Tat Sat

subbu

[Guest guest]

advaitin, "subrahmanian_v" <subrahmanian_v

wrote:

 

> Your question is very interesting to me. For, for the past just few

> days i have been thinking of a question almost on the above lines. I

> wanted to post this and seek opinions from members, especially Shri

> Shyam, a man of medicine.

>

> Am I 'one' or 'many'? It is said that the body is made up of

> millions of organisms. There are many types as well. When i say i

> am so and so and identify with my body, is it that i am identifying

> with several 'i's, with several bodies? Is it that i am a

> conglomerate of a number of 'persons', just like a bag of rice or

> wheat? Am I carrying a number of jivas with varied karmas and

> svabhavas in me? For, there are said to be some organisms that do

> good to 'me' and some others that are 'harmful' to me. There are

> both contributing and destructive forces of organisms in me. Am I

> a sort of a microcosmic Hiranyagarbha? Surely for a virus or bacteria

> to find a place in Subbu's body has some karma that brings it and

> stations it here. Just like one jiva is destined to be born in one

> city or village of one continent and another in another. Just like

> this body is a bhoga-aayatanam, a place for experiencing effects of

> my past karma, is it that my body is a place for experiencing the

> past karmas of those organisms that live inside my body? When i take

> food, is it that i benefit from it or is it that there are a million

> mouths inside my body into which the food goes? And finally, when i

> get moksha, the shastra says that the prana of a mukta does not

> transmigrate; it dissolves into pancha bhutas here itself. In that

> case, what is the fate of those millions of organisms (jivas) inside

> my body? Maybe according to their karma, it is just that my body is

> no longer a harbour for them, they have to go on as per what is

> destined for them henceforth.

>

> Any thoughts on these 'silly' questions? I know it is not worth

> spending much time on this.

 

Dear Subbu-ji

Pranams

What wonderful questions/thoughts!

Yes. The human body has billions of microorganisms normally present at

different places - the intestine, and the skin, for example.

These bacteria play extremely vital roles in maintaining our health -

if you eradicate the intestinal bacteria for example completely it

could even be fatal.

In that sense this kshetra of our body is very much a virat!

These microbes make it difficult for microbes alien to our bodies to

attack the body - like our guardian angels!

Every cell in my body is of course made of an identical DNA which

permeates in and through each and every cell of my body.

These microbes do not share in that dna structure. But interestingly

never identify my cells as "foreign" objects to be destroyed.

 

DNA is the basic unit underlying my "I"ness at the physical level -

that is why it is possible for the police to identify the jiva who

perpetrates a crime based on DNA evidence of blood,semen etc at the

scene of the crime. A persons basic DNA structure is unchangeable-

akin to the lines on the forehead or palms.

 

All living beings at their basic core have a specific DNA, with the

sole exception of some ciruses which only have RNA.

WHat is interesting is that even viruses with just a strand of RNA

protein they are composed of, sometimes with no wall to surround it,

have such powerful intelligence, that with all our collective human

intelligence and trillions of research dollars we cannot find a way

at least to date to effectively kill ONE virus - the trouble is you

get one ot two shots - its never effective in killing them all - and

those that die manage to communicate to the survivors the protein

codes of the very medicine used to kill them so that the rest then

immediately alter their protein or genetic structure so the same

medicine is now ineffective against them - a phenom called acquired

resistance by us "frustratedmen of science". What a divine marvel!

Truly is any intelligence absolute intelligence, even at the level of

a submicroscopic virus!

 

And food we take is of course also food for the millions of bacteria

we harbor. And their karma was to be in "Shyam-loka" or "Subbu-loka"

instead od swarga loka!

 

My body's death/destruction in what is millions of years in their life

cycle is like a "mini-pralaya" for these jivas i suppose!

 

What is also interesting is that science does not have a locus for

this individual "I" - it is generally thought to be in the brain -

which is why we have a concept of brain death - but which part, where,

etc are complete unknowns - i can lose either half of my brain and

still of course retain that "I"!

 

 

Hari OM

Shyam

[Guest guest]

advaitin, "shyam_md" <shyam_md wrote:

WHat is interesting is that even viruses with just a strand of RNA

> protein they are composed of, sometimes with no wall to surround it,

> have such powerful intelligence, that with all our collective human

> intelligence and trillions of research dollars we cannot find a way

> at least to date to effectively kill ONE virus - the trouble is you

> get one ot two shots - its never effective in killing them all - and

> those that die manage to communicate to the survivors the protein

> codes of the very medicine used to kill them so that the rest then

> immediately alter their protein or genetic structure so the same

> medicine is now ineffective against them - a phenom called acquired

> resistance by us "frustratedmen of science". What a divine

marvel! Truly is any intelligence absolute intelligence, even at the

level of a submicroscopic virus!

>

 

Pranams.

Thank you very much for that very interesting fact-filled reply. It

is mind-boggling to know that the human body is such a complex

structure. And what to talk of the human brain ! It is really

astonishing that there is so much of 'thinking' going on in our body.

 

Shyam, may i request you to intersperse your posts with titbits from

the world of medicine/science as and when you find that relevant to

all of us. From your above reply i tend to conclude that when i

get 'abhimaanam', identification with my body, actually i am

enveloping that abhimaanam over a number of organisms. What dense

ajnanam from Vedanta point of view!! When a jiva seeks a world of

bhoga, he is asking for a world full of objects, people,

relationships, joys, sorrows, etc. Underlying all this,

fundamentally, when the jiva seeks a body to experience all that

bhoga, he is actually asking for a body full of another huge world of

several beings. Again, what deep ignorance !! There is no choice.

It comes as a package. I am sure medical science has a lot of

lessons on vairagya for a spiritual aspirant.

 

Om Tat Sat

subbu

[Guest guest]

Thanks Shyam garu, Subbu garu and ProfVK garu and other advaitins

 

You provided a lot of pointers for me to study further on this modeling

of Self (Message No 33102). I spent last few days going through the

archives of this group. Needless to say, there is a lot of material of

deep import in this group. I probably will take a life time to master

this. I have started reading from the beginning (Message No 1287 by Sada

Ji on Advaita Vedanta by Shankara Bhagawatpaada is excellent, Thanks

Sada Ji)

 

Further detailing the model here are some more questions I have. I would

like to get an Advaitic perspective for these questions.

 

1. In my previous post (33102) I made an assumption that each Jiva is

born with equal proportions of three gunas. However, the rate of

progress of each of these gunas in this life depends on the previous

life. Is this assumption itself correct? If so, how is that this

momentum of my previous life's effort is getting transmigrated? I can

draw a parallel to this within one life cycle - that is if you break

this life of us into multiple sub-lives, viz. Childhood, Youth, Student,

Family Man so on .. the effort I make in each sub-life determines my

momentum and starting point in next sub-life. However, where I go from

that depends on the effort I put in this sub-life - which in turn

defines the starting point for next sub-life. But I am having a bit of a

problem comprehending this momentum transfer when I stretch the time

line of an Individual Atman from birth to death in one life cycle to

origin of creation to Pralaya. Just like Sub-Lives have a continuity,

these many births have continuity. That is as soon as this body 'dies'

another one comes alive, except for a few who take a detour into Brahma

Loka. Is it like I getting into 'Coma' for a long time and coming back

without any acquired 'experiences' while I am in 'Coma' (assuming there

are no experiences in Coma)

 

2. I also assumed in my original post that 'how I develop my

proportions of gunas in this life depends on my free-will and it is my

choice and my choice only'. By saying this I realized that I have

negated 'Fate' and Gods (God as defined by popular notion) intervention

in my life. It is very interesting to note that just this week, a study

was released here in USA about how people define God. Close to 60% felt

God as either 'Authoritative' or 'Benevolent' indicating that God has a

role in intervening in my life and my decisions. I am sure an

overwhelming majority of religious people who perform rituals and show

devotion to manifested God has this opinion. I want to believe that

there is no intervention. What do the scriptures (Vedas and Upanisads)

say about this.

 

3. Since what I do in this life defines what I will be in my next

cycle - does it mean that the collective effort of all Individual Atmans

put together has no bearing on the my individual Self. I am on my own?

Is this correct?

 

4. I equated Individual "Self"s as Quantum "Jitters", disturbances in

the smooth Space-Time construct. With that I meant The Smooth Space-time

construct and the accompanying "Jitters" is called Iswara - the

manifested Brahman. The appearance of manifestation itself is Maya.

Before the manifestation, the Supreme Self is in 'Potential' state like

a Seed that is going to become a Tree. Shyam garu, as you mentioned, the

Pralaya is dissolution of the manifestation. That means that everything

has to become One - "sarvam khlavidam brahman" and back to Potential

State. There can't be any disturbances any more. That is no more Jivas.

However, Shyam Ji, you mentioned that some rare Jivas reside in 'Brahma

Loka'. I know we discussed a lot about Brahma Loka in this group. I am

combing through the posts to read about Braha Loka. But at Pralaya, what

is this conept of Brahma Loka and some 'Rare Jivas' residing there?

Aren't these Disturbances?

 

5. I can already see some fundamental flaw in my model. Since this

dissolution occurs when all the disturbances subside, and as long as I,

this Jiva, do not transcend the three Gunas I will not attain Moksha -

stay disturbed, that is - and whether to transcend or not is depending

on my free will. I can choose to not to attain Moksha thus avoiding

Pralaya for the 'Whole'. Since scriptures talk about Pralaya and Moksha,

the Supreme Reality will force the Pralaya and all these disturbances.

That means that there is no 'My' free will - its all Fate. I know it is

a ridiculous and circular argument. I know that 'Maya' has a great deal

for this confusion.

 

I realize that I am arguing like an Atheist, please - that is not the

intent. I have taken that first step of having faith in 'Advaita'. But I

am having trouble in going further with these questions. I appreciate

some guidance.

 

PraNamams to all advaitins

 

Sudesh

[Guest guest]

advaitin, "Sudesh Pillutla"

<sudeshpillutla wrote:

>

>

> Thanks Shyam garu, Subbu garu and ProfVK garu and other advaitins

>

> You provided a lot of pointers for me to study further on this

modeling

> of Self (Message No 33102). I spent last few days going through the

> archives of this group. > However, Shyam Ji, you mentioned that

some rare Jivas reside in 'Brahma

> Loka'. I know we discussed a lot about Brahma Loka in this group.

I am

> combing through the posts to read about Braha Loka. But at

Pralaya, what

> is this conept of Brahma Loka and some 'Rare Jivas' residing there?

> Aren't these Disturbances?

>

>

 

 

Namaste Sudesh-ji

 

Regarding BrahmaLoka please go to

 

advaitin/message/32823?threaded=1&l=1

 

advaitin/message/32924?threaded=1&l=1

 

advaitin/message/32974?threaded=1&l=1

 

 

You will find an authentic account by the Kanchi Mahaswamigal.

 

I will come back later, if at all, to your other points.

 

PraNAms to all advaitins

profvk

[Guest guest]

Dear Sudesh-ji

Pranams

It is nice to hear from you again.

 

In the absence of a response from more learned members

I shall try to provide you with what I understand

 

Individuals are not born with a equal proportion of

gunas.

In this life itself with your selfeffort you can alter

your own guna composition.

As you come to vedanta foe example with adequate

effort, you can increase your own sattva guna

proportion, thereby becoming more and more sattvic.

Only humans have this capacity being endowed with free

will.

Other lokas like Swargaloka are more like vacations,

instead of detours. You can live there based on how

many "punya" points you have accumulated(not unlike

visa reward points) and as soon as those points are

exhausted, you will be sent to the next locus to

exhaust more of your karmaphala - either good or bad.

If you are very lucky, and hit the one-in-a-billion

jackpot, you may beget a human birth, where there is

again a one-in-a-million chance for emancipation or

moksha (and how we misuse this birth!!!)

Brahmaloka is not a detour. Prof-ji has given you the

links for brahmaloka, which should be explanatory.

 

Fate vs free will.....fate is nothing but the coming

to fruituion of your previous free will. There is a

certain order to the manifest srshti which is perfect.

Its laws are perfect. If an apple falls of a branch,

it will come hurtling down at a given speed. The

apples "fate" is decided - it has no choice. To a

large extent, the actions we performed by exercising

our free will in a prior human birth have to bear

fruit, based on Ishwaras laws - the laws themselves

are Ishwara!

So my envirnment, my parenting, my qualities, major

life events in my lifetime, my lifeline, my spouse, my

poverty or richness, etc - much of this is "fate"

looking at it one way, or a fruition of my previously

exercised free will. looking at it in another way.

Hence how i use my free will today is of vital

importance, as my fate for the next hundreds of births

is critically and crucuially dependendent on it.

Prayer, etc can and does certainly alter this fate,

but again, this is not arbitraty - it is part of the

same operational laws. I can choose to pray or not to

pray. Ishwara or God is not a person sitting and

deciding whose prayer he wants to choose to answer,

who he wants to punish today - the absolute perfection

you see immanent through every micron of manifest

creation is Ishwara. When you pray or do a ritual, you

tap into that perfection and obtain the fruits of what

that perfection can do for you, based on the what the

order will allow. How much you can tap, depends on

your faith, or on the faith of your near and dear ones

- this is what we see as miracles (cancers getting

cured, etc). More the faith, more you tap. If you

call, He has to answer - He is quite powerless in that

regard as He himself has set the rules this way!

Other jivas can impact your fate - for example, your

fate is dragging you to a different country for a job,

and a terrorist uses his free will to blow your plane

up - this has cut short your opportunity to exhaust

your prarabdha, and again the very perfect laws will

take over and ensure that you have another birth very

soon to enable you to exhaust your new prarabdha.

Similairly your mothers prayers for you when you were

undergoing a najor illness, etc etc can all to a

limited extent alter the composition of your fate. In

our rituals in HIndusim, it is said that a wife

automatically accumulates 50% of the punya that comes

with the right performance of a ritual, and none of

the papa that accumulates from its wrong performance

or nonperformance.

At pralaya, everything does not *become* brahman,

everything is always brahman - in fact brahman alone

is.

What happens in pralaya is that manifest becomes seed

only to remanifest again. Pralaya at a certain

date/time is inevitable - it does not depend on jivas

attaining moksha or anything like that - we have

already been through 3 minipralayas at the end of each

yuga and there will be a mahapralaya at the end of

this cycle of manifestation. AT that time none of the

jivas would have attained moksha - not one(except for

the few brahmaloka residents). It is this fact alone

that plants the seeds for the next manifest creation.

After all, if everyone has attained moksha and there

is no more prarabdha left for anyone then there is

nothing to impel further manifestation.

In fact the yoga vashishta describes that most

recurring cycles of manifestation are eerily similair

to each other - in every vreation there is a

Mahabharata with a different Krishna and a different

Arjuna playing the same roles again and again - like a

remake of a old movie. The Rudra of one manifest

creation becomes a Vishnu in the next one, and the

Brahma in that one can hold Rudra's portfolio in the

next one. So all these devas, and divinities are only

role players, with assigned portfolios.

 

Bhagwan does not force "pralaya" - just like the death

of a individual cell is built in to it, and it will

die by apoptosis, this manifest srshti will end at

some point - it is already programmed to end on the

date of expiry. That results in the death of time and

space itself. So really you cannot then think of it as

being the next cycle or the previous cycle - because

next and previous are properties of time, which

itself(along with its corollary space) gets absorbed

into the seed state at the time of mahapralaya.

Hence it is said that this is beginingless - not

really in the sense that it is so ancient that we cant

say when it began, but in the sense that it is beyond

time.

 

Hope this clarifies.

Having doubts in religion is not atheism, it is what

spiritual enquiry is all about - do not curb it, but

encourage it.

 

Hari OM

Shri Gurubhyo namah

Shyam

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

> That means that there is no 'My' free will - its all

> Fate. I know it is

> a ridiculous and circular argument. I know that

> 'Maya' has a great deal

> for this confusion.

>

> I realize that I am arguing like an Atheist, please

> - that is not the

> intent. I have taken that first step of having faith

> in 'Advaita'. But I

> am having trouble in going further with these

> questions. I appreciate

> some guidance.

>

> PraNamams to all advaitins

>

> Sudesh

>

>

>

> [Non-text portions of this message have been

> removed]

>

>