Bhagavatgita a detailed study-chapter2

[Guest guest]

26. atha cha enam nithya jaatham nithyam vaa manyase mrtham

thaThaaa api thvam mahaabaaho na evam Sochithum arhasi.

 

Even if you identify yourself with the body , even then you should not grieve.

This view is according to those who do not understand the existence of a permanent entity as athman. This is rather a materialistic philosophy told by Krishna perhaps seeing the blank expression on the face of Arjuna who did not quite get at the idea of the eternal self. Krishna says that even if Arjuna thinks that the self is identical with the body and is born, nithyajaatham, and dies, nithyam mrtham, with the body, he should not grieve because,

 

 

27. jaathasay hi Dhruvo mrthyuH dhruvam janma mrthasya cha

thasmaath aparihaarye arThe na thvam sochithum arhasi

 

Death is certain for those who are born and birth is certain for those who die. Hence you should not grieve over the inevitable.

 

Death is inevitable when one is born. And those who die are certain to be born. This is absolutely from the point of view of materialism. It is normally said ,when some one dies, that, when people are born they have to die one day. The death comes only when the life ends. So unless the people have come to the end of their lives and are destined to die they cannot be killed by man or by accident. This we see in everyday life. Whenever there is a disaster, due to natural calamities or accident like plane crash etc., or even killings by men, terrorists or otherwise, there are always some who escape however great the magnitude of the disaster. This means that for them the time of death had not come then. So Krishna says that who dies when and how is not in our hands. So it is no use grieving over death. Those die are not lost forever because they do take birth again whether you believe in an eternal soul or not.

 

An entity which is created is sure to be annihilated but origination and annihilation are only different states of an entity. Clay exists before the pot and pot exists before the potsherds and potsherds again become clay and later originate as another pot. Similarly all beings get annihilated and originate which is a continuous process. Krishna mentions this process as apariharya, inevitable and hence need not be grieved for.

28. avyakthaadheeni bhoothaani vyakthamaDhyaani bhaaratha

avyakthaniDhanaani eva thasya kaa paridhevanaa

 

Nothing is known about the beginning of existence of all beings and only the intermediate existence is known and the end is not also not seen hence why lament about all this?

 

What we perceive as life and the world existed even before we took this particular manifestation. We do not know the beginning nor the end.. When a baby is born, for instance, we do not know what it was before its birth and how many births it has gone through and similarly when a man dies we do not know where he goes and how many more births he had to undergo. So what is visible to us of the whole universe and all beings in the universe is only a small portion compared to the whole existence as such. So Krishna says, why should there be any grief over the loss of lives or entities in this world. No one knows when the creation started and when it is going to end. It is like a flowing stream in the dark out of which we see only a small portion that comes to light which again goes back to darkness.

avaykthaaadheeni bhoothaani- all beings have unmanifest beginning and

 

avyakthaniDhanaani- unknown end or their end is not manifest.

 

vyakthamaDhyaani- they become manifest only for the time they are in this particular embodiment.

 

Pardevanaa- lamenting