A Spiritual Journey

Over my professional life, I have had the opportunity to conduct many classes, from two hour executive sessions to week long all-day classes. As an instructor, one thing I learnt was to practice the adage “tell them what you are going to tell them, tell them, and then tell them what you told them”. So it is no surprise that the material I am covering on Bhagavad Gita start with what the Gita says. Each author starts with an introduction setting the context of the Gita and stating the essence of the teachings in Gita. While all of them speak to the significance of Gita’s teachings to one’s life, there are subtle but distinct differences. It appears that what they write is a combination of what they themselves may have gotten from the Gita and what they think their reader ought to grasp.

Swami Dayananda Saraswati in the Gita Home Study  starts with describing human pursuit –अर्थ artha (security), काम kāma (pleasure), धर्म dharma (nature/ duty/ service) and ultimately मोक्ष mokṣa (liberation from the desire for the other three pursuits). He goes on to say that this lack of security, pleasure etc. is a problem within oneself, and not the problem of the world outside. The problem is not that one lacks something, but is one of not recognizing that one does not lack anything. This recognition comes with knowledge which is sought and acquired. The vedas and the upaniṣads contain such knowledge and one can study them. The Gita also contains the essence of this knowledge and this is what the student of Bhagavad Gita learns.

The words in parenthesis in the paragraph above are my words as I understood what I was reading. You can tell that some of the words have fuzzy meaning because it is the best I can do at the moment. Hence it is apparent that I need to develop my own dictionary of key Sanskrit words and phrases that I will encounter in this journey and improve this dictionary as I go along. I will report on this as and when I make progress.

Swami Paramatmanada introductory lecture also starts with describing human pursuits – except he identifies peace, security and happiness as what everyone seeks. He quotes veda to say that relief from this pursuit is only found within oneself and to seek that outside is futile. However to discover this Self-that-is-without-any-wants requires that one uncovers the three layers that hide this truth – मलम् malam (impurities), विक्षेप: vikṣepa: (restlessness caused by extrovertedness) and अज्ञान ajñāna (ignorance). Removal of each of these layers require specific practices and that the vedas and the upaniṣads contain the knowledge of these practices. He too points out that the Bhagavad Gita is the essence of such knowledge and that is what can be expected from the study of Geetha.

Bhagavad Gita.As It Is stresses the fact that Gita is essentially Krishna’s teachings. In order for the message to be understood, it is essential that the Divine nature of the teaching be accepted and the reader take up Bhagavad Gita in a spirit of devotion. Gita’s purpose is to deliver mankind from the nescience of material existence. Swami Prabhupadha goes on to say that the instructions in Gita are to awaken our pure consciousness. A significant portion of his introduction is aimed at making it clear that the reader needs to submit to God in order to understand Gita, and once understood such submission will also guide one’s life.

When a style of writing is not unlike a lot of what we have read, we can understand the matter as we read it. When the style is new, or unfamiliar we find that we need to read it more than once. I found Eknath Easwaran’s introduction very comfortable to read. There is a flow to it where it feels like he wrote it just for you. He introduces terminology from vedas and the upaniṣads explaining that we need that background in order to understand the verses in Bhagavad Gita as Krishna’s message assumes that you know that language. He talks to some of the terms I mentioned above and introduces more and explains them in words that I could follow. In his words, “The Gita does not present a system of philosophy. It offers something to every seeker … it is a handbook for Self-realizaation and a guide to action.” He ultimately concludes that the Gita makes it clear “we shape ourselves and our world by what we believe and act on, whether for good or for ill. In this sense The Gita opens not on Kurukshetra but on dharmakshetra, the field of dharma”.

I started this post talking about classes that I used to teach. One such class was a day long workshop on Target Costing that a colleague.and I were teaching which had attendees from multiple companies. Given a large and complex scope of subject, and our limited time, we asked what each student wanted out of the day, so that we do our best to meet their needs. There was a man whose job it was to coordinate next iteration of product design and had a definite purpose in attending. There was another who was auditing the class to see if their organization should hold that class for its members. You can guess the difference in the amount of energy the two men put into the workshop as we went through the lecture and exercises. At the end of the day each student rated our performance according to their expectations. Now, I am doing this self study of the Bhagavad Gita based on materials that I have selected. So without a clear expectation of what I hope to get out of the studies, I can neither be a good student, nor be good in selecting the instructional material. Remember, I started this whole journey with nothing specific in mind other than that the journey be spiritual. Before I proceed therefore, I must have a better idea of what I want of the Gita.

Sri Aurobindo’s Essays on the Gita came to my rescue. His first chapter is titled “Our Demand and Need from the Gita”. His writing requires that I read each paragraph twice slowly and then read the whole thing again a couple of more times. Each long and complex sentence is packed with crisp words and clear thought that leaves no doubt as to what he means. He talks to the long history of Indian thought into the psychological being of man in its highest flights and widest rangings of divine knowledge. The synthesis of such thought is found in the Vedas and Upanishads. He goes on to say that the Gita starts from this Vedantic synthesis and upon the bases of its essential ideas builds another harmony of the the three great means and powers, Love, Knowledge and Works, through which the soul of man can directly approach and cast itself into the eternal. Finally,

Our object, then, in studying the Gita will not be a scholastic or academical scrutiny of its thought, nor to place its philosophy in the history of metaphysical speculation, nor shall we deal with it in the manner of the analytical dialectician. We approach it for help and light and our aim must be to distinguish its essential and living message, that in it on which humanity has to seize for its perfection and its highest spiritual welfare.

It is this last sentence that resonated with me – I should be looking for that I can seize from the Gita to practice during the course of the rest of my life.