The Eternal Truths of the Bhagavadgita - As Taught by Dr
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The Eternal Truths of the Bhagavadgita - as taught by Dr. Sarvapelli Radhakrishnan - Summarized by Suneel Bakhshi In my continued readings of the Vedanta and the Bhagavad Gita, I realised only recently the link between IMPORTANCE OF THE WORK Rabindranath Tagore, and Dr Sarvapelli Radhakrishnan, who I “ The Bhagavad-Gita is a popular poem which gives have long considered to be one of the greatest Indians, not only utterance to the aspirations of pilgrims of all sects who seek of our time but across the past centuries of recorded history. to tread the inner way to the city of God. We touch reality most Tagore was perhaps Radhakrishnan’s most influential Indian deeply, where men struggle, fail and triumph. Millions of Hindus, mentor, and he appreciated Tagore’s emphasis on aesthetics for centuries, have found comfort in this great book which sets as well as his appeal to intuition. Over some five decades, forth in precise and penetrating words the essential principles starting in 1914, Radhakrishnan had apparently repeatedly of a spiritual religion which are not contingent on ill-founded turned to Tagore’s writings to support his own philosophical facts, unscientific dogmas or arbitrary fancies. ideals. The Gita has exercised an influence that extended in early times to China and to Japan and latterly to the lands of the West. The two chief works of Mahayana Buddhism, “ The Radhakrishnan’s Bhagavad Gita Awakening of Faith in the Mahayana ” and “ The Lotus of the “ All great doctrine, as it is repeated in the course of True Law ” are deeply indebted to the teaching of the Gita. centuries, is coloured by the reflections of the age in which it The Gita bases its message of action on a philosophy of life. appears and bears the imprint of the individual who restates It requires us to know the meaning of life before we engage it. Our times are different; our habits of thought, the mental in action. It does not advocate a devotion to the practical to background to which we relate our experience, are not quite the disparagement of the dignity of thought. Its philosophy the same as those of the classical commentators. The chief of the practical is a derivative from its philosophy of spirit, problem facing us today is the reconciliation of mankind. “ Brahmvidyantargatakarmayogasastra. ” The Bhagavadgita The Gita is especially suited for the purpose, as it attempts is both metaphysics and ethics, “ brahmavidya ” and to reconcile varied and apparently antithetical forms of the “ yogasastra ”, the science of reality and the art of union with religious consciousness, and emphasises the root conceptions reality. Ethical action is derived from metaphysical realisation, of religion which are neither ancient nor modern but eternal, and and Shankaracharya urges us in his commentaries that the belong to the very flesh of humanity, past, present and future. essential purpose of the Gita is to teach us a way out of History poses our problems, and if we restate old principles in bondage and not merely to enjoin action. ” new ways, it is not because we will to do so, but because we must. Such a restatement of the truths of eternity in the accents ULTIMATE REALITY of our times is the only way in which a great scripture can be “ The Gita does not give any arguments in support of of living value to mankind. ” its metaphysical position, as only spiritual experience can From the above point of view, I have personally found Dr provide us with proofs of the existence of Spirit. However, Radhakrishnan’s insights to be not only profoundly enlightening, the Upanishads affirm the reality of a Supreme Brahman, but also, powerful in their expression and in their framing of the one without a second, without attributes or determinations, deep thought underlying the Gita. I believe he had the power to who is identical with the deepest self of man. It is the pure truly deepen ones understanding of the infinite wisdom of the subject whose existence cannot be ejected into the external Bhagavad Gita, and my intent in this article is to try to provide or objective world, and so strictly speaking we cannot give the key extracts of this thinking in his introductory essay to his any description of Brahman. The austerity of silence is the only translation of the Gita. It is worth noting that Dr. Radhakrishnan way in which we can bring out the inadequacy of our halting says in the Preface to his book that “ no translation of the Gita descriptions and imperfect standards. The Brhadaranyaka can bring out the dignity and grace of the original. Its melody Upanishad says : “ Where everything indeed has become the and magic are difficult to recapture in another medium, as one Self itself, whom and by what should one think ? By what can can render the thought, but cannot fully convey the spirit. One we know the universal knower ? ” We can only speak of It as cannot evoke in the reader the mood in which the thought was the non-dual, advaita, that which is known when all dualities born and induce in him the ecstasy of the seer and the vision he are resolved in the Supreme Identity. beholds. ” I can indeed vouch for this point too, as I continue The impersonality of the Absolute is not its whole to have the great continuing blessing of learning the Bhagavad significance. The Upanishads support Divine activity and Gita in Sanskrit from my teacher, Swami Nityasuddhananda participation in nature and give us a God who exceeds the of the Ramakrishna Mission in Kankhal, Haridwar, and can mere infinite and the mere finite. The seers of the Upanishads compare this experience with otherwise dry readings of the look upon the world as meaningful. In the words of the Taittiriya Gita in English. I add this point to suggest to readers that they Upanishad, the Supreme is that “ from which these beings should continue, should they have genuine interest in this field, are born, that by which they live and that into which, when to organise their affairs so they can learn the great language departing, they enter. ” In the Svetasvatara Upanishad, “ He, of Sanskrit. who is one and without any colour, by the manifold wielding of His power, ordains many colours with a concealed purpose and into whom, in the beginning and the end, the universe dissolves, Extract from “ The Bhagavadgita, Introductory Essay, ” by Dr. He is the God. May he endow us with an understanding which Radhakrishnan leads to good actions. ” Again, “ Thou are the woman, thou art the man; thou art the youth and also the maiden ; thou as an old man totterest with a stick, being born. Thou art facing all directions. ” And again, “ His form is not capable of being seen; with the eye no one sees Him. They who know Him thus 52 Anjali www.batj.org The Eternal Truths of the Bhagavadgita with the heart, with the mind, as abiding in the heart, become and controls the cosmic becoming. He is also the Purusottama, immortal. “ He is a universal God who Himself is the universe the Supreme Person, whose dual nature is manifested in which he includes within his own being. He is the light within the evolution of the cosmos. He fills our being, illumines our us, “ hrdyaantar jyotih. ” He is the Supreme whose shadow is understanding and sets in motion its hidden springs. He puts life and death. forth his active nature ( svam prakrtim ) and controls the souls The Eternal Reality therefore not only supports existence who work out their destinies determined by their own natures. but is also the active power in the world. God is both While all this is done by the Supreme through his native power transcendent, dwelling in light inaccessible, and yet, “ more exercised in this changing world, He has another aspect intimate to the soul than the soul to itself. ” The Supreme is at untouched by it all. He is the impersonal Absolute as well as the once the transcendental, the cosmic, and the individual reality. immanent will ; He is the uncaused cause, the unmoved creator. In its transcendental aspect, It is the pure self unaffected by any While dwelling in man and nature, the Supreme is greater than action or experience, detached, unconcerned. In Its dynamic both. The boundless universe in an endless space and time cosmic aspect, It not only supports but governs the whole rests in Him and not He in it. The God of the Gita cannot be cosmic action and this very Self which is one in all and above identified with the cosmic process for He extends beyond it. all, is present in the individual. While there is one reality that is ultimately perfect, everything that is concrete and actual is not equally perfect. ” If the universe consists of active choosing individuals who can be influenced but not controlled, for God is not a dictator, conflict is inevitable. To hold that the world consists of free KRISHNA, THE TEACHER spirits means that evil is possible and probable. The alternative “ The book is called Bhagavadgita because Krishna to a mechanical world is a world of risk and adventure. If all is known in the Bhagavata religion as Sri Bhagavan. The tendencies to error, ugliness and evil are to be excluded, there doctrine which he preaches is the Bhagavata creed. In the can be no seeking of the true, the beautiful, and the good. If Gita, Krishna says that he is not expressing any new view but there is to be an active willing of these ideals of truth, beauty is only repeating what has been preached to hm by Vivasvan and goodness, then their opposites of error, ugliness and evil and by Vivasvan to Manu and by Manu to Iksvaku.