Bhagavad Gita - Daily - II 2:61 II

April 15, 2009

|| Shree Hari ||

Ram Ram

|| 2-61 ||

taani sarvaani samyamya, yukta aaseeta mat-parah

vashe hi yasyendriyaani, tasya prajna pratisthita

" The Karma Yogi sadhak, having controlled all the senses, devoting heart and

soul to Me, should sit focused on Me. His wisdom is steady whose senses are

under control. "

Comment:

Therefore, for the success in the spiritual path, it is a must to surrender to

God. With the devotion to God, the senses come under control with much ease. The

spiritual aspirant cannot bring the senses fully under control on his own. Once

the senses are fully under control then his wisdom is stable " .

From " Gita Prabodhani " in Hindi, page 59 by Swami Ramsukhdasji

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Chapter 2, Verse 61 is as follows;

Taani = them

SarvaaNi = all

Saiyamya = restrained

Yukta = joined

Aaseeta = should sit / remain

MatparaH = intent on me

Vashe = under control

Hi = indeed

Yasya = whose

IndriyaaNi = senses

Tasya = his

Pradnyaa = wisdom

Prati-Shthitaa = is established

English translation:-

Having brought all the senses under control, the Yogi should remain focused on

Me as the Supreme goal; for he, whose senses are under subjugation, his wisdom

is well established.

" They, whose minds are not disturbed when the sources of disturbances are

present, are truly the brave persons. " …..Poet Kaalidaasa in Kumarsambhava, I,

59.

The only discipline is the Self discipline and it is not the subject matter of

the intellect alone. It is a matter of personal free selection of the path of

`Samyaka Nyaasa' i.e. total renunciation of ego and ego-centric behaviour, which

is coupled with the firmness of character and the indomitable spirit in the

relentless pursuit of the highest vision that ultimately results into the union

with the Self.

As devotion to the Lord increases, the wild vehemence of the impetuous mind gets

tamed down as the mind gradually cools down. Healthy ideas wipe out the

unhealthy ones.

" No thought of any sense-indulgence crops up in the mind, while one is bitterly

bereaved of a dearly loved relative. Similarly, no vulgar thought crops in the

mind of the one devoted to the Divine. The turbulent senses in him become

subdued soon. " …. Shri Ramakrishna Paramahansa.

Lord Krishna, the personification of the Brahman, has used the first person

singular `Me' to mean the Self, the fraction of the Supreme Being that resides

in the hearts of all the beings. Even Jesus Christ, Mohammed Paigambara, Gautam

Buddha and many more prophets have used the first person singular `Me' to mean

the Self. But their followers invariably translate it to mean the very

individual person. These are classic cases of forgetting the real message and

focusing only on the messenger. In the historical perspective, the

misunderstanding of the pronoun `Me' has destroyed the fabric of mutual respect,

peace and harmony amongst various castes, creeds and religions in the world.

The highest spiritual practice of meditation, the scientific technique that has

been perfected over a number of years in India, exhausts all residual desires

and thoughts and finally exposes the real Self to the practitioner of Yoga. An

agitated mind is unfit for meditation. The intellect can only direct a calm and

smoothened mind to focus single-pointedly on the Self. Any repeated attempts of

forcible repressions of the mind may lead to eventual eruptions like a volcano,

which is indeed detrimental to the practitioner of Yoga.

Immoral impulses and unethical instincts bring down a man to the level of a

selfish, brutish and wolfish animal. This is the result of coatings of ignorance

in the form of layers after layers due to innumerable lives spent in prior

manifestations, where the entire life spans have been spent in sensuous

indulgences and acquisitions of material objects and their enjoyments. It is

humanly impossible to remove all these coatings of ignorance in one life cycle.

Therefore, meditation should be considered as an equivalent act of gradual

removal of oxidized film on a brass vessel with the help of a chemical agent

called as `Brasso' in India.

But there is one concern with the Yoga of meditation, the progress in this path

is slower as compared to the other three Yogas - Jnana (Knowledge), Bhakti

(Devotion) or Karma (Action); because these three Yogas are " Karan-nirpeksh "

(using self instead of the mind and the intellect), while meditation method is

using " Karan-sapekesh " (using the mind, intellect etc.) technique. The mind and

intellect are subject to change, so the aspirant has to constantly struggle to

deal with; therefore this method is more difficult.

In the BG: Verses 2-60, Lord Krishna says " turbulent senses, O son of Kunti,

impetuously carry away the mind of even a wise man, striving for perfection " .

Even after subduing the senses if the mind is not brought under control, it will

dwell on objects of the world and bring the fall of the aspirant. The mind and

intellect, unless they are fixed on God, cannot rest stable. That's why Verse

2-61 advises the aspirant to sit for meditation on God, collecting his scattered

mind and devoting himself heart and soul to God. The same advice has been given

description of Dhyan-Yoga in (BG: 6-14). The aspirant who having subdued mind

and senses engages himself in the practice of meditation will soon attain

stability of intellect, once reaching that state, he is considered firmly

established in the Self.

Thanks & Best Regards,

Shrikant Joshi

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|| Shree Hari ||

Ram Ram

All Sadhaks can participate in discussion / clarification of the verses.

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Please feel free to take the lead in any of these areas so that all

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From Gita Talk Moderators

Ram Ram

-----------------------------

April 17, 2009

|| Shree Hari ||Ram Ram

|| Gita 2:61 ||

taani sarvaani samyamya, yukta aaseeta mat-parahvashe hi yasyendriyaani, tasya prajna pratisthita || 61 ||

Having controlled all the senses, a striver should engage in meditation, devoting himself heart and soul to Me. His wisdom (mind) is stable, (constant) whose senses are under control. 61

Comment: —

'Taani sarvaani sarhyamya yukta aaseeta matparah' — By controlling the senses, a striver should devote himself, heart and soul to Me. When a spiritual aspirant controls the senses, then a subtle pride remains within that I have gained control of the senses. That pride does not let a sadhak progress spiritually, and that pride distances him from Bhagwaan. Therefore a sadhak must never have pride of his ability to control the senses, rather he should feel that it was only God's grace, which enabled him to control his senses. In this manner Being engrossed in devotion of God, his spiritual practice is perfected.

Here by using the word "matparah" it means to be endowed with this human body, to have inclination towards spiritual practices, to become engaged in the disciplines and to gain success in the discipline, are all due to God's divine grace. Due to pride, he pays little attention to the divine grace. Generally, in a striver following the Discipline of Action, there is predominance of action and in this path he considers it his self-effort. Therefore, Bhagwaan, by His special divine grace, exhorts the striver to be devoted to Him.

The meaning of becoming engrossed in devotion of Bhagwaan, is that he should devote himself heart and soul to Him, thinking that he is God's and God is his, while he is neither of the world nor is the world his. In this manner, he should infuse a sense of "I-ness" in only God, not in the world, at all.

This section deals with the Discipline of Disinterested Action (Karma Yog) . So, Lord Krsna should have told Arjuna some method of that discipline. But Lord Krsna time and again has laid great emphasis on devotion to Him, and has glorified it very much. So He declares— "Among all Yogis, he who worships Me with faith, his innermost self merged in Me, is considered by Me, to be the best Yogi—most devout (GIta 6/47)."

'Vashe hi yasyendriyaani tasya prajnaa pratisthitaa'—In the fifty-ninth verse, Lord Krsna said, that even with the cessation of sense-objects, a striver does not become a man of steadfast wisdom. But, here he says that the wisdom of the striver who has controlled his senses, is stable. Why? The clarification is that, in 2/59 even at the cessation of the sense-objects the taste (relish) for sense enjoyments persists. But here in this verse, the senses of the striver are controlled and his taste has also disappeared. Thus the striver becomes stable in wisdom, (mind) at the cessation of taste.

Appendix—The Lord exhorts the striver following Karmayoga to devote himself heart and soul to Him by using the term 'matparah'—this is a special feature of devotion because without being devoted to Him, total control over senses is difficult.

In Karmayoga there is renunciation and renunciation leads to peace and happiness. This happiness follows cessation of miseries. This is with a result of attaining something. A Bhaktiyogi attains eternal bliss. Therefore without the bliss attained by devotion (love), senses are not totally controlled. Secondly in Karmayoga only by intense dispassion (detachment), senses are controlled but in devotion (being devoted to God) even by a little dispassion, senses are easily controlled. Therefore the Lord has used the term 'matparah'.

* A man should not be alone with a woman even though she is his mother, sister or daughter because the impetuous senses enslave even a wise man (Manu. /215).From "The Bhagavadgita - Sadhak Sanjivani" in English, page 215-216 by SwamiRamsukhdasji