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by Soumen De
The
Bhagavad Gita is perhaps the most famous, and definitely the most
widely-read,
ethical text of ancient India. As an episode in India's great
epic, the Mahabharata, The Bhagavad Gita now ranks as one of the
three principal texts that define and capture the essence of Hinduism; the
other two being the Upanishads and the Brahma Sutras. Though this work
contains much theology, its kernel is ethical and its teaching is set in
the context of an ethical problem. The teaching of The Bhagavad Gita
is summed up in the maxim "your business is with the deed and not
with the result." When Arjuna, the third son of king Pandu (dynasty
name: Pandavas) is about to begin a war that became inevitable once his
one hundred cousins belonging to the Kaurava dynasty refused to return
even a few villages to the five Pandava brothers after their return from
enforced exile, he looks at his cousins, uncles and friends standing on
the other side of the battlefield and wonders whether he is morally
prepared and justified in killing his blood relations even though it was
he, along with his brother Bhima, who had courageously prepared for this
war. Arjuna is certain that he would be victorious in this war since he
has Lord Krishna (one of the ten incarnations of Vishnu) on his side. He
is able to visualize the scene at the end of the battle; the dead bodies
of his cousins lying on the battlefield, motionless and incapable of
vengeance. It is then that he looses his nerve to fight.
The necessity for the arose because the one
hundred cousins of the Panadavas refused to return the kingdom to the
Pandavas as they had originally promised. The eldest of the Pandav
brothers, Yudhisthir, had lost his entire kingdom fourteen years ago to
the crafty Kaurava brothers in a game of dice, and was ordered by his
cousins to go on a fourteen-year exile. The conflict between the Pandavas
and the Kauravas brewed gradually when the Kauravas refused to return the
kingdom to the Panadavas and honor the agreement after the fourteen-year
exile, and escalated to a full scale war when the Kauravas refused to even
grant Yudhisthir's reduced demand for a few villages instead of the entire
kingdom. As the battle is about to begin, Arjuna, himself an acclaimed
warrior, wonders how he could kill his own blood relatives with whom he
had grown up as a child. He puts the battle on hold and begins a
conversation with Krishna, one of the ten but most important incarnations
of the Universal Hindu God, Vishnu. The Bhagavad Gita begins here
and ends with Krishna convincing Arjuna that in the grand scheme of
things, he is only a pawn. The best he could do is do his duty and not
question God's will. It was his duty to fight. In convincing Arjuna, the
Lord Krishna provides a philosophy of life and restores Arjuna's nerve to
begin the battle -- a battle that had been stalled because the protagonist
had lost his nerve and needed time to reexamine his moral values.
Even though The Bhagavad Gita
(hereafter referred to as the Gita) is one of the three principal
texts that define the essence of Hinduism, and since all over the world
Hindus chant from the Gita during most of their religious
ceremonies, strictly speaking the Gita is not one of the Hindu
scriptures. In light of its inseparable links to one of the two great
Hindu epics (Mahabharata and Ramayana) which most Indians hold very dear
to their hearts, and because Krishna, the most venerated and popular of
the incarnations of Lord Vishnu, figures so prominently in it, the Gita
over the years has not only become very popular but has ascended to
spiritual heights that are afforded only to the Vedas (and the subsequent
reinterpretive philosophies that followed them) and the Upanishads in the
ancient Indian literature. The concept and symbol of God were extremely
complicated issues (see below) in the ancient Hindu religious literature
prior to the writing of the Gita. The notion of God and the paths
to salvation are integral parts of all religions. The manner in which
Hinduism originally dealt with these two fundamental issues was very
complex and appeared to be too speculative at times. This was one of the
reasons for which Buddhism branched out as a separate religion. When
Buddhism was beginning to grow in popularity, Hinduism met with its first
challenge: To provide a clear-cut, easy-to-worship symbol of God to its
followers. For a variety of reasons, Lord Krishna was the obvious choice.
Many have even suggested that it was one of the most pivotal choices ever
made by ancient scholars to `humanize' the concept of God in the Hindu
religion. Molded in the original image of Lord Vishnu, Krishna is an
affable Avatar (reincarnation of God) which for the first time provided
concrete guidelines for living to all mortals. The average Hindu might not
know much about Brahma, but every one knows who Lord Krishna is. Mahatma
Gandhi read the Gita often when he was in seclusion and in prison.
But, the universal popularity of the Gita
has not detracted Indian scholars from deviating from the fundamental
truth about Hinduism. The Gita is not the Hindu scripture even
though the literal translation of "Bhagavad Gita" is "The
Song of God". The Nobel laureate Indian poet, Rabindra Nath Tagore,
rarely quoted from the Gita in his philosophical writings; instead,
he chose to refer to the Upanishads, to quote from it, and to use its
teachings in his own works. Of course, the teachings of the Upanishads are
included in the Gita; they are visible in multiple chapters of the Gita.
The kinetic concepts of karma and yoga, which appeared for the first time
in the Upanishads (explained below), appear repeatedly in the Gita,
often in disguised forms.
As with almost every religious Indian text,
it is difficult to pinpoint when exactly the Gita was written.
Without a doubt, it was written over a period of centuries by many
writers. From the contents of the Gita, it is abundantly clear that
both the principal teachings of the Upanishads and of early Buddhism were
familiar to the writers of the Gita. So, it has been approximated
that the Gita was written during the period 500-200
BCE. Even though India is one of the few nations which has a
continuous documented history, very few Indian religious texts exists for
which the exact date of publication is established without controversy.
Despite its universal appeal, the Gita
is replete with contradictions both at the fundamental level and at the
highest level of philosophical discourse. To the discerning eye, it would
seem that what has been said in the previous chapter, is contradicted in
the very next chapter. This is the fundamental complaint against the Gita,
and this fact would appear to be ironic given the fact that the Gita
was originally written to reconcile the differences between two of the six
major ancient Indian philosophies (Darshans) that evolved over the early
years of Hinduism and became integral parts of ancient Indian religious
literature. The irony disappears however when one understands what the Gita
purported to achieve at the level of philosophical and religious
discourse. This fact is crucial not only for the understanding of the
principal themes of the Gita but also to locate the essence of the Gita
in the overall picture of ancient Indian doctrines. The Gita
attempted, for the first time, to reconcile the teachings of two very
abstract Indian religious doctrines into one whole. The task was a
formidable one.
The Gita tried to include the
fundamentals of two ancient Indian philosophies into one document and
reconcile the principal differences between them. At the outset, one must
note that the two doctrines (Darshans) were often extremely difficult to
understand. Hence the inevitable contradictions or duality of
interpretation. The Six Darshans of ancient India were actually of
differing origin and purpose, but all were brought into the scheme by
being recognized as viable ways of salvation. They were divided into three
groups of two complementary schools of thought (Darshans) or doctrines:
Nyaya and Vaisesika; Sankhyya and Yoga; and Mimamsha and Vedanta. The
Bhagavad Gita attempted to reconcile the Sankhyya philosophy with
those of the Vedanta doctrine. One must note in passing that the Sankhyya
school of thought led to Buddhism while the Vedanta philosophy is at the
root of modern Hinduism. In this article, we are only going to discuss
briefly the two Darshans -- the Sankhyya and the Vedanta -- the Gita
attempted to reconcile.
The Sankhyya is the oldest of the six
Darshans while the Vedanta is the most important of the six systems. The
various subsystems of the Vedanta doctrine has led to the emergence of
modern intellectual Hinduism. The primary text of the Vedanta system is
the Brahma Sutras, and its doctrines were derived in great part from the
Upanishads, which marked the beginning of Hinduism as is understood and
practiced today. Even though the Vedas are India's ancient sacred texts,
modern Hinduism begins with the Vedanta (end of Vedas) and attains its
zenith with the Brahma Sutras.
The Sankhyya philosophy traces the origins
of everything to the interplay of Prakriti (nature) and Purusha (the Self,
to be differentiated from the concept of the soul in the latter Indian
philosophies). These two separate entities have always existed and their
interplay is at the root of all reality. The concept of God is conspicuous
by its absence. There is no direct mention of God but only a passing
reference as to how one should liberate himself to attain the realization
of Is war (a heavenly entity). A very significant feature of Sankhyya is
the doctrine of the three constituent qualities (gunas), causing virtue (sattva), passion (rajas), and dullness
(tamas). On the other hand, the
Vedanta school of thought deals with the concept of Brahman the ultimate
reality that is beyond all logic and encompasses not only the concepts of
being and non-being but also all the phases in between. It is one of the
most difficult concepts in the entire Indian philosophy. At the highest
level of truth, the entire universe of phenomena, including the gods
themselves, was unreal -- the world was Maya, illusion, a dream, a mirage,
a fragment of the imagination. The only reality is Brahman.
One can see quite clearly the sources for
the Gita's contradictions. It was dealing with not only two
widely-differing Darshans but also with two of the most abstract
philosophical systems. We know that the Gita was written long after
the emergence of modern Hinduism. So it was able to draw on a wide variety
of philosophical themes -- both ancient and relatively modern by
comparison, and often opposing -- still present in modern Hinduism. Yet,
to consolidate the two schools of thoughts proved to be an extremely
difficult task -- a fact which the lyricism of the Gita, in the
words of Lord Krishna himself, could not camaflouge. Any serious reader
would arrive at the conclusion that even though the Gita mentions
the Sankhyya, it more or less elaborates on ideas that originated with the
Upanishads.
The fundamental tenets of Hinduism took
shape during the period 800-500
BCE. They were set down in a series of treaties called the Upanishads.
The Upanishads arise at the end of the Vedas, which earns it the name
Veda-anta, which literally means "end (anta) of the Vedas."
Almost all philosophy and religion in India rests upon the wealth of
speculation contained in these works. The Upanishads center on the inner
realms of the spirit. Encompassing the meaning of spiritual unity, the
Upanishads point directly to the Divine Unity which pervades all of nature
and is identical to the self.
There are four "kinetic ideas" --
ideas that involve action or motion -- that represent the core of Indian
spirituality. The ultimate objective is control of the passions and to
realize a state of void -- a concept very similar to that of Buddhism. The
four kinetic ideas are "karma, maya, nirvana, and yoga" and they
appear in the Gita. But one must remember that they appeared for
the first time in the Upanishads. A brief summary of the four ideas are
provided below.
Karma: The law of universal causality, which
connects man with the cosmos and condemns him to transmigrate -- to move
from one body to another after death -- indefinitely. In the Gita,
Krishna makes an allusion to the eternal soul that moves from body to
body as it ascends or descends the ladder of a given hierarchy,
conditioned on the nature of one's own karma -- work of life or life
deeds.
Maya: refers to cosmic illusion; the
mysterious process that gives rise to phenomena and maintains the
cosmos. According to this idea, the world is not simply what is seems to
the human senses -- a view with which the 20th century western
scientists wholly agree. Absolute reality, situated somewhere beyond the
cosmic illusion woven by maya and beyond human experience as conditioned
by karma. Both Tagore, the renowned Indian poet and Albert Einstein, the
famous scientist, agreed on this conclusion. Absolute reality, in their
minds, was beyond human perception.
Nirvana: The state of absolute
blessedness, characterized by release from the cycle of reincarnations;
freedom from the pain and care of the external world; bliss. Union with
God or Atman. Hindus call such mystical union with ultimate reality as
Samandhi or Moksha.
Yoga: implies integration; bringing all
the faculties of the psyche under the control of the self. Essentially,
the object of various types of yoga is mind control, and the system lays
down the effectual techniques of gaining liberation and achieving divine
union. The word yoga is loosely applied to any program or technique
which leads toward the union with God or Atman. There are five principal
kinds of yoga: Hatha(physical), jnana (the way of knowledge), bhakti
(the way of love), karma (the way of work), and rajah (mystical
experience).
The Western world's interest in The
Bhagavad Gita began around the end of the eighteenth century when the
first English translation of the Gita was published. All religious
texts of ancient India were written in Sanskrit. In November 1784, the
first direct translation of a Sanskrit work into English was completed by
Charles Wilkins. The book that was translated was The Bhagavad Gita.
Friedreich Max Mueller (1823-1900), the German Sanskritist who spent most
of his working life as Professor of Comparative Philology at Oxford
University, served as the chief editor of the Sacred Books of the East.
(Oxford University Press). The Gita was included in this famous
collection. Since then, the Gita has become one of the most
widely-read texts of the world. True, there are unexplained contradictions
and paradoxes in this brief book, but its wide-ranging implications based
on the two ancient Darshans of India and its allegorical meanings are
still being examined and reinterpreted.
Suggested Further Reading
| Copyright ©
1996. Soumen De. This
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