The Song of God

    The Bhagavad-Gita is a beautiful poem that can be put to melodious tune and hear the supreme Lord speak about Himself as to ‘Who He Is’, as also, ‘What this Creation Is’, ‘Who these Jivarashi are’, and having come a long way from Him ‘How to Reunite with Him’. There is also a ‘Secret of all secrets’ (guhyatama guhyam) here as ‘the Lord Himself says’! He reveals brahmavidya and yogashastra to us all through Arjuna (a deluded Mind!).The supreme Lord imparts this ‘Adhyatma vidya’, Atmajnyan, so that the earthlings as jivarashi find solace in distress and revert back to their pure and pristine state, a satte of ‘oneness’ with the Lord. This is what this Gita is all about!

   The supreme Lord, takes by His hand all His earnest devotees and leads them Step by step to ‘kaivalya’. He reveals ‘how to get reunited with Him’ through ‘karmasanyasayoga’, bhaktiyoga, jnyanayoga, dhyanayoga, and nirasaktiyoga and total surrender (prapatti)! In fact, He, the Lord, Bhagavan Shree Krishna, makes us realize ‘who we the hapless jivas are’ in the first six chapters of the Gita through imparting ‘atmajnyan’ and ‘brahmavidya’. And then, He describes ‘His true nature of formless, attributeless and eternal, immortal and immutable state’, as also, ‘the diverse manifest forms’(Bhagavad-svarupa) in the next six chapters. Then, He explains ‘how to reunited with Him with the help  of yoga’. It comes thus as a yogashastra in the last six chapters. This is also a treatise on the principle of tattvamasi !

   The beauty of this divine song is that Bhagavan Shree Krishna is narrating ‘Who He Is’! Hence, this may well be treated as An Autobiography of God. This is a unique unwritten scripture handed down to us, albeit, many authors have twisted and narrated the story according to their own understandings. The printed copies are full of alterations and insertions than what Bhagavan said initially! Many authors have used this scripture to promote their own interest as missionaries laying stress on any one of the concepts such as karmayoga, bhaktiyoga, jnyanayoga or dhyanayoga and have established their own schools! It is strange that none of these schools of thought has ever attempted the last secret of muktiyoga for fear of losing their clients! In fact, the importance of the Gita lies in this last Chapter where the supreme Lord insists that “One who is interested in liberation, emancipation, mukti should give up all worldly pursuits, develop vairagya, and return to isolated places for penance or deep meditation, contemplation on brahmn”. There is no salvation for an embedded jiva from metempsychosis, cycle of births and deaths! Once born here in this death knell (mrutyu lok) all jiva are bound to suffer old age, sickness and death. All are afflicted souls. The cause of suffering is ‘desire’ due to ‘avidya’ and the eternal bondage ensues as a result of the actions and reactions and their consequences. The solution lies in the ‘Realization’ of the true nature of the ‘Self’. Bhagavan Shree Krishna stands here as Yogacharya and teaches step by step how to practice yoga, asana, pranayama and attain to ‘samadhi’.

    Ultimately, ‘realization of the Self’ in the state of samadhi is extremely important! However, there is a word of caution here. The Bhagavad-Gita is like a mirror. One sees his own face as an index of his mind! When a school boy or girl who sings Chapter 10 or 11 of the Gita during Gita abhiyan week gets applause is so innocent as to know the meaning and import of what is sung by him/her on the stage! An adult who is in a dilemma as to the right situation may take recourse to Gita and may find a solution to the problem. Not all are interested in nirasakti yoga, or sanyas. Life is to enjoy and there is no problem in enjoyment. However, the problem is one of disillusionment, misery, unhappiness, and disappointments even after attainment of the desired objects! Every jiva is born in ignorance (avidya), lives in ignorance (avidya), and dies in ignorance! This ignorance or avidya i.e. knowledge covered by desire, attachment, ego, and arishadvargas is the problem. This ignorance cannot be removed unless the jiva takes recourse to Shree Krishna’s teachings. Whether one has lived a successful life or suffered and seeks redemption, the Gita is the only answer if one seeks emancipation, mukti from repeated births and deaths. The Gita starts with the revelations of secrets of creation and ends with dissolution. The relevant verses are given in the text.

   There are several intriguing questions about the scripture presented to us, its author, subject matter, meaning and purport of what the Bhagavan said, etc. All these are all taken up for an in-depth analysis as a spiritual inquiry (nidhidhyasana) here. It is indeed a meditation on God, ‘Gitopasana’. The credit of retrieving these God’s own words as an invaluable guide to mankind from the Shanti Parva of the great epic Mahabharata goes to the credit of Sri Shankaracharya. However, the very authorship of the epic is open to question? These words spoken by the Supreme Lord, Bhagavan Shree Krishna, is definitely not of any ordinary person, but of a mahapurusha, an avatara of Mahavishnu. In fact, the Lord is addressed by several names in the Gita as Govinda, Madhusudhana, Achyuta, Ananta, Devesha, etc. In fact, there is a whole lot of a thousand names in the ‘Vishnu sahasranama’ as an adjacent scripture retrieved along with the Bhagavad-Gita! These two scriptures are, indeed, redeeming the jiva from its state of transient existence! The entire scripture is of mythological nature attributed to Sage Veda Vyasa whose very name is an intriguing matter! The relevant verses are quoted here for reference to prove the points. These are matters of esoteric nature and require practice of yoga to understand. The authorship attributed to Sage Veda Vyasa is taken up first and the following picture gives us an idea.