• Abstract and Figures
• Public Full-text

BRITISHWHEEL OF YOGA Price STUDY SERIES 2op HOW TO T-]SETHE BHAGAVADI GITA by JEAN HERBERT Foreword by Yivien Worthington A HANDBOOKFOR STUDENTS AND TEACHERS Eorron's Norr-l/e arc grateful to Jcan Hcrbcrt for thc texr of this lccturc uhich hc deliuered at thc European-.IJnbn ol National Federat'ions ol yoga Scminar in Z_inal, Su.itzerland ii 1977, at uhkh gatheting he was gucst Zl honour on the occasion of his cightieth birthday.-His *iowledgc ol India, philosophy pr.obably .is. u.ne.qualled aid his insight iito the natures i1 Ar'juna and rrrtsnna orrganat an.t cnltghtentng. Jean Herbcrt has now retirid lrom a dktineuished academic career. He liues in Geneua where his currcnt intercst is lorwardlng intepral Yopa in Eurore and hc uorks closely. with the E.II.N.F.Y. Jian is Freich, b"orn inFaris, and'ttvdied at.the uniuersities of. Park and Edinbirgh. For sixty 2ears hc uas'a cinlerencc tntcrprercr-, _in.particular -attcnd;ng the Paris conference uthich creat-ed thc 14og* ol Nations and the one in San Francisco uhich ueated the Unitcd Nations. He uas the chicf interpreter at the united Nations in New yorh and prcsidcnt ol the International Alsociation ol Conference Interbreters- Herbcrt Jc.an bccame interestcd in oiiental' religions at'the age ol forty, sp.ccialising in and shinto. He sat at the -Hinduism iect ol all the Tiiniu ,og", of thc first .hall of__this ccntur)t and uas asked by thim to'transtate aiiiuol"ish thc.tr tcachtngs. (Has own gutu ir siri Aurobindo). Hc. translated som; fort| uolumes ond wtote about tienty-fve himself. we ire priailepcd to-oiiiiin'ncic his notes and commcnts on thc Gita.-CHII|RIS UOnbrli. THE BHAGAVAD- GITA _ Tlt" Bhagavad-_Giti,probably the most famous of all sacred books from rne tast' rs a-comparablr short dialogue between a great warrior, Arjuna, one of thc leaders ot a great army, and another great warrior, Krishna, who acts as his charaoteer.As the final decisive battle with the enemy is about to start, Arjuna r-"1y1...n.to fight because he. I sees.among those he'shourd t.y to liil many of hrs retatiyes, teachers, friends whom he respects and loves. Krishna, whom he asks for advice, explains to him what his duty is, ind why. In a nutshell, - the Giti covers the essential te;ets of Hindu philosophy and the basic_spiritualtcachings (yogas) of Hinduism. ,1'.r pamphtet do€s not claim to be one more commentary on the Bhagavad_ Grta;-.^. there lre.atready quite.enough of them. lts only purposl is to facilitite in two lvays an independent study of this sacred text: showing who Krishna Jll !f and Arjuna really are and what they represent; (1] by enabring,the student of the Giti to put togethet deiling with ^. rne same suDlect when they are scattered through many different"ersei chaptersl as is generally the case. i(* @ lean Herbcrt l97B PART ONE THE TWO MAIN CHARACTERS Sufficient rttention hes not been paid to the fact that thc Giti is only a minor scction of thc grcrt Hindu epic, the Mahibhirlta, one of its hundred chapters (parvan), rnd that Krishna and Arjuna both play e very import.nt pert throughout thc cpic. In ordcr to know who they are-which is a "must" if we want to undcr' stand their teaching-mere common sense therefore requircs us to find out what the rcst of thc cpic tells us about them. No schoolboy, asked to explain e passagc in e novel, would be allowed to ignorc its context. To this approach one objection mry bc raised. Mrny \ y'estern scholars, followed by a vcry few of their Hindu colleagues,have held that the Giti-either in part or in toteis a later addition to .n already existing MahibhArata and wes composed quite independently from it. The fact that many references to it arc to be found in other chapters makes this rather unlikely. But even if this werc thc c.s?, carcful reference to the rest of thc epic would still bc necessrry. lf a more recent author wanted to insert en additional dialogue halfway in one of Shakespeare'stragedies, and use the original charecters, he would certainly sec to it that they remain truc to what Shakespearehas made thcm, Thc objection there- fore is not relevant. KRISHNA In the Bhagavad-Giti, Krishne appears, more or less alternately, in thrcc diffcrent guises: as a plain human being, as an Avatar of Vishnu and as thc Purushottama. He clearly speaks as a man and r krhattriya (the caste of warriors) whcn he cxplains to Arjuna, a fellow-kshattriya, the duties which fall to members of their caste, and what the social consequenceswould be if those duties were not fulfilled. Arjuna certainly viewed him as a man since he apologiset ( Xl, 4l ) for having addressedhim as friend or comrade. He also calls him twice VArshneya,i.e. membcr of the Vrishni tribe (1,43; lll,36). In many other passagesof the Mahibhiratr K.lt.hl. behaves in ways which we take to be specifically human and not fitting for a Divine being: he can get into a temper, he often fails in what he tried to do, hc is not always adverse to dishonestly deceiving his opponent, sometimes he ctnnot remember what he said on previous occrsions,etc. In the GitA however he appears more often es an Avatar of Vishnu. Arjune addresseshim by many narnes which apply only to him and to Vishnu and which therefore stress his very close relation to the God: Govinda, Hari, Keshinis0dana, {ive times Madhus0dana,six times Hrishikesha,seven times Janirdana. He even oncc calls him plain_Vishn-u (Xl,30). All those names appear veiy frequently' throughout thc epic, which informs us f urther that Garuda, the Divine' bird who ii the "vehicle" of Vishnu stands on Krishnt's banner or even is Krishna's banner. Krishna's nature as an Avstar of vishnu requires some explanation, First of rll it is of course necessaryto know what Vishnu represents. Although..the Mahibhirata does not state it explicitly, it is unanimously admitted in Hinduism that vishnu is one of the three "faces;'(m0rti) of thc onl Jupreme.personrl God, lshvara, and that his special task is to preserve and protect the world in the consciousnessof which we live, and more particularly the'humen race. Whereas of the other two "faces", Brahmi is respilnsible for primordirl creation and Shiva for destruction and re-creation. In.order to discharge . , his duty, vishnu periodically assumesa living terrestrial body' i'e. comes down to Earth as an Avatar. Just as'a mother for hel child, thc "protector". of a."living". entity-and mankind is clearly on€-cannot wish it to remain u_nchangedthroughout life, but wants it to gr6w, develop and improve, such is also the case for vishnu, and the aim of each ine of his suicessive Avatars is to lead the human race one step further in its evolution. The main Avatar of vishnu inimediately before Krishnr was Riimachandra,the hcro of the R6miy.ana, a champion of morility who taught rnir ttr" n-a."-.1j, i... live according the l?1,,." .to highest cthical principles in r well-ordered soiiety. Lomrng atter him, Krishna tries to awaken in men a dormant thirst for spiritualiiy and shows and teaches how in practice that thirst can be quenched That he did in his childhood with the gopis in Vrindivan, and he continues as ? prince in the Mahibhirata, including the Bhagavad-Giti. But in the Giti Krishna also declares himself to be the Purushottama, the "Supreme Being" (XV, l8 and l9), and Arjuna explicitly calls him three times by that name (Vlll, I; X, l5; Xl, 3). The Purushottama is a specifically Hindu concept. Hindu philosophy, with its aversion to being walled in in dualities (or multiplicities) admits that behind the ever-changingworld of multiplicity in the consciousnessof which we live, or rather as its source, there must needs be a static, permanent, unchangeableAbsolute, the One. They call lt Brahman. But even that was not enough, because there still remained one ultimate duality, that of unity and multiplicity, of the ultimate reality (the Absolute, Brahman) and its manifestation (Miyi, time and space, etc.). Ttrerefore Hinduism felt it necessaryto posit a crowning concept which caps both Unity and Multipli- city, both Brahman and Miyi, the Absolute and its manifestation. This concept is precisely the Purushottamar. It is clearly as such that Krishna explains what he is in Chapters Vll, lX and X of the Bhagavad-Giti and appears to Arjuna in Chapter Xl. It must be admitted that in other passageswhen Krishna speaks of "Me", as he often does, it is not always very clear whether he refers'to himself as an Avatar of Vishnu or as the Purushottama, but in such cases the choice does not seem to have great practical importance. ARJUNA Arjuna is a less complex person than Krishna, but he seems to have been totally misundersto-od,or at least misdescribed by practically all commentators. He. has almost been presented as a plain human biing facing God- -uniformly a which is v.ery far indeid from the truth. lusd llke Krishna, Aijuna ii a Divine Avatar, and even more than that. As stressed many hundreds of times in the Mahibhirata, and as explicitly - . referred. to in many verses of the Bhagavad-Giti, Arjuna has a very exceptional connection with the God, Indra, of whom he is an Avatar; he is also his son. And Indra, as we shall see, is no.less a person than "the King of the Gods [in our world]".

Load more

  10

Copy Link