Gita verse 23 of chapter 13

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Gita verse 23 of Chapter 13

 

You can find here under the translation and commentary of the above verse by

two great Swamijis 1)Swami Gambiranda and 2)Swami Chinmayananda for a

comparetive study.

 

upadrashhTaanumanta a cha bhartaa bhoktaa maheshvaraH .

paramaatmeti chaapyukto dehe.asminpurushhaH paraH .. 13\.23..

 

23. The Supreme Soul in this body is also called the spectator, the permitter,

the supporter, the enjoyer, the great Lord and the Supreme Self.

 

Sankara Bhashya

(Swami Gambiranda's Translation and Commentary)

23. He who is the Witness, the Permitter, the Sustainer, the Experiencer, the

great Lord, and who is also spoken of as the transcendental Self is the supreme

Person in this body.

 

He who is the upadrasta, Witness, who while staying nearby does not Himself

become involved: As when the priests and the performer of a sacrifice remain

engaged in duties connected with the sacrifice, there is another (called Brahma)

remaining nearby who is unengaged, is versed in the science of sacrifices and

witnesses the merit or demerit of the activities of the priest and the performer

of the sacrifice, similarly, He who is not engaged in the activities of and is

different from the body and organs, who has characteristics other than theirs,

and is the proximate (upa) observer (drasta) of the body and organs engaged in

their duties, is the upa-drasta.

Or: The observers are the body, eyes, mind, intellect and the soul. Of them the

body is the external observer. Proceeding inwards from that (body), the Self is

the inmost as also the proximate observer, compared with which there is no other

higher and inner observer. The Self, because of being the most proximate

observer, is the upadrasta. Or, It is the upadrasta since, like the non-looker

of a sarifice, It witness everything.

And He is the anu-manta, Permitter: Anumananam, approval, means satisfaction

with those performers (viz body and organs) as also their perfomances. The agent

of that (approval) is the anumanta. Or, He is the anumanta since, even though

Himself not engaged in the activities of the body and organs, He appears to be

favourably disposed towards and engaged in them. Or, He is the anumanta because,

when the body and organs are engaged in their own functions, He remains as a

witness and never dissuades them.

It is the bharta, Sustainer: Bharanam means the continuance in their own state

of the body, organs, mind and intellect, which reflect consciousness and have

become aggregated owing to the need of serving the purpose [Viz enjoyment, or

Liberation.- Tr.] of some other entity, viz the conscious Self. And that

(continuance) is verily due to the consciousness that is the Self. In this sense

the Self is said to be the Sustainer.

It is the bhokta, Experiencer: As heat is by fire, similarly, the experiences of

the intellect-in the form of happiness, sorrow and delusion in relation to all

objects-, when born as though permeated by the consciousness that is the Self,

are manifested differently by the Self which is of the nature of eternal

Consciousness. In this sense the Self is said to be the Experiencer.

He is maheswarah, the great God, because, as the Self of all and independent, He

is the great Ruler.

He is paramatma, the transcendental Self, because He is the Self which has the

characteristics of being the supreme Witness etc. of (all) those-beginning from

the body and ending with the intellect-which are imagined through ignorance to

be the indwelling Self. He is api ca, also; uktah, spoken of, referred to, in

the Upanisads; iti, as, with the words; 'He is the indwelling One, the

paramatma, the transcendental Self.' [Ast reads atah in place of antah. So the

translation of the sentence will be: Therefore He is also referred to as the

transcendental Self in the Upanisads.-Tr. ] Where is He? The parah, suprem;

purusah, Person, who is higher than the Unmanifest and who will be spoken of in,

'But different is the supreme Person who is spoken of as the transcendental

Self' (15.17); is asmin, in this; dehe, body.

 

What has been presented in, '....also understand Me to be the Knower of the

field' (2), has been explained and conclude.

 

Swami Chinmayananda' s Translation and Commentary

23. The supreme PURUSHA in this body is also called the Spectator, the

Permitter, the Supporter, the Enjoyer, the great Lord and the Supreme Self.

As a contrast to this deluded sorrowful " Knower-of-the- Field, " Purusha, there

is the Pure Spirit uncontaminated by the " Field. " The moon in the bucket is the

reflected moon and for every reflection that dances with the conditionings of

the reflecting surface, there must be a real object. The reflection is always

conditioned by the reflecting medium while the object reflected is never

contaminated by the changes in the reflecting surface. It is completely

independent of all conditions.

The " Knower-of-the- Field " is " Knowledge " or Conscious-ness conditioned by the

" Field. " Naturally, therefore, there must be a Knowledge, in fact totally

unconditioned, which appears conditioned, when it plays in the realm of its

conditionings.

Thus, in this stanza, Krishna mentions for the purpose of his scientific

analysis and investigation, two Purushas; the LOWER, which has already been

described and indicated as the " Knower-of-the- Field, " and the HIGHER, which is

the Pure Consciousness unconditioned by Prakriti. Both of them function " in this

body. "

This Supreme Self is indicated in tems of what it looks like in Its silent

manifestations when the matter equipments (Prakriti) are weaving their different

patterns. When an individual is completely deluded and totally unconscious of

the Self, in and through him the Infinite Divine expresses Himself as though He

is only an " onlooker " (Upadrashtaa) ; that is to say when a person murders an

innocent victim, the Infinite All-powerful Lord expresses through that

criminal's vehicle only as a silent spectator of it all (Upadrashtaa) . When

proper actions are undertaken, the mind is in a quiet mood. When the individual

actor is not totally forgetful of the Self, in such a being, the Supreme

expresses Himself as a " Permitter " (Anumantaa).

When proper actions are done with full consciousness of the Self and in a spirit

of total surrender to the Lord, the Lord is the " fulfiller " (Bhartaa). Such

actions are filled with success by His grace. He aids, as it were, the

fulfilment of all such activities.

When, with entire dedication unto Him the individual is completely a

Yoga-Yuktah, in his Eternal Conscious nature (Nitya Chaitanya Swaroopa), It

seems to be the very " enjoyer " (Bhoktaa). The stanza concludes by saying that

the great Ishwara, the Lord of Lords (Maheshwara) is the Higher Self in this

very same body.

HOW DOES THE ONE WHO KNOWS THE HIGHER SELF, UNCONDITIONED BY THE " FIELD, " REACT

IN LIFE?