God’s Many Songs

The Bhagavad Gita occupies the position of a canonical Hindu text. Unlike voluminous vedas or epics, the Gita can be packaged as a handbook, and functions as an icon. Remember Bollywood movies where a witness takes an oath on a copy of the Gita? “Main Gita par haath rakh ke kasam khaata hoon.” While this is neither an actual requirement nor practice in Indian courts, it exists in our cultural imagination, and re-enters reality as a symbolic act of Hindu religious beliefs.

After all, ‘Bhagavad Gita’—means God’s Song, and Krishna, the divine figure and speaker of Gita, is the Hindu deity, Bhagavan Krishna, who declares himself the supreme reality. Even the 8th century philosopher and proponent of Advaita Vedanta, Adi Shankaracharya, wrote a commentary on the Gita, and so have numerous other philosophers and religious leaders.

Increasingly, the Gita finds novel religious ritual applications. It is chanted before or during Hindu cremations, at Gita-havans, or lately, even marathon Gita-paath events involving a collective reading aloud of the entire Gita. It is not surprising then that those who have only read the Gita in a cursory manner think that it must be the epitome of orthodox Hinduism. And this is where perception and reality diverge.

The context of the Bhagavad Gita is Arjuna’s refusal to participate in a war. Although born in a kshatriya (warrior) lineage and poised to enter a battle to restore dharma, Arjuna has qualms, and explains his reasons to Krishna. If we do not pay attention to these stanzas, we may conclude—mistakenly—that at this moment in the story of the Mahabharata, Arjuna is either a pacifist, or feels empathy towards those on the other side of the enemy line.

In fact, Arjuna’s reasons are based on rigid beliefs and deep-seated fears. It is crucial to understand what these beliefs and fears are because the message of the Gita is its response, and rejoinder.

In chapter one, Arjuna explains how killing one’s own family members causes erosion or destruction of the family. In turn, destruction of the family causes the ancient dharmas of the family to be lost, and lawlessness takes over the entire family.

When lawlessness reigns, the women of the family will be violated and that gives rise to a confusion of varnas. As a result, the family and the destroyers of the family will surely go to hell, their ancestors will be deprived of their ritual dues. Due to the faults of those who destroy the family, and the mixing of varnas, the caste duties and eternal family dharmas do not get done. People whose family dharmas have been dropped live forever in hell.

In short, Arjuna is concerned that killing family members will cause anarchy and a spiralling of destruction in the community. Women will be violated and then children born into inter-caste unions will not be able to observe ancestral rituals. Arjuna’s concerns also help us understand the social context— the identities and divisions of varnas and religious rituals that had to be performed in the society of that time and place. After Arjuna expresses his concerns, his charioteer, the divine Krishna, responds with a perspective that is radical, not only by Arjuna’s orthodox beliefs but also (as you shall see) by any standards.

Krishna’s first counterargument is that the atman (self, true self, higher self) is indestructible, and if Arjuna backs out now, he will be seen as a wimp among warriors. The material world—the world of karma—is governed by three innate qualities (sattva, rajas and tamas). The Gita proposes a method for how to break free from such karmic bondage. A one-line summary: unselfish actions, devotion and
knowledge/wisdom help a person attain liberation.

Krishna says he created the four varnas according to their qualities and division of responsibilities. However, he also elaborates on how one may transform innate qualities through discipline and diet. Importantly, anyone can attain union with the divine, and brahmanirvana—ultimate joy, peace and liberation.

The Gita emphasises an outlook it calls samadarshana. The divine is in everyone and that one must regard everyone the same as oneself. The ability to rejoice in the welfare of all beings is a prerequisite to liberation. The person who is disciplined by yoga regards everyone equally, sees oneself in all beings, and all beings in oneself. Krishna says he is in all beings, and is the same in all beings.

The Gita painstakingly defines a “pundit” as one whose activities are without greedy motives and that are primed in the fire of knowledge. A pundit regards all as the same — whether it is a priest endowed with learning and humility, or a cow, or an elephant, or a shvapaaka. A shvapaaka was a person born to mixed varna parentage, such people had menial occupations.

Take a moment to linger on the import of such a statement. To Arjuna—who lives in a society full of divisions and self-consciousness about varnas and lineages—Krishna is proposing that a wise person will see no difference between a priest and a dog.

Arjuna already knows that greed and power have led the family to the brink of war. Krishna urges Arjuna to take an equal view of happiness and sadness, or pleasure and pain, loss and gain, and victory and defeat, and recommends radical measures—the control of senses, equanimity and unselfish action as ways to transcend opposites. But how does anyone as restricted or conditioned as Arjuna, gain the ability to be equanimous and unselfish, and become wise? How is he to gain control of the senses?

Repression is not the solution. Those who control and repress sense organs while their minds remember pleasure are called fools. Fakery will not work, and to achieve genuine detachment, there are ways including unselfish action, and devotion.

Religious and ritual observances are given their place in the world of duties, but they are also put in their place. There is a wonderful analogy; “As much purpose as there is in a well when there’s water flooding everywhere, that much purpose is in all the vedas for a brahman who knows.” While we think of yajna as a complex ritual with prescribed offerings, mantras and procedures, the Gita redefines yajna in multiple ways. Material things, austerities, yoga, self-study and knowledge are all offerings, and why, the very act of conscious living and breathing is a yajna. These are all effective in removing faults.

Even the concept of sanyasa is redefined by the Gita. After Krishna has first explained the necessity of transcending karma, Arjuna assumes Krishna is asking him to refrain from activity and gets confused. Krishna then explains; “Doing nothing does not mean you are free from karma, and sanyasa does not mean you achieve perfection or enlightenment (siddhi).” Krishna explains sanyasa as renunciation of self-interest; thus, it has nothing to do with social conventions of wearing a garb in a designated colour (orange, or otherwise). Even householders are sanyasis if they have renounced self-interest.

This is radically different from the classical model of the four stages of life: brahmacarya (student life), grihastha (household life), vanaprastha (retired life) and sanyasa (renunciation). One may remain in the world of action in a detached manner, taking a broader view of things, be a sanyasi anytime, and anyone can do so (no gender or caste restrictions)—and achieve liberation (no less).

A large chunk of the Gita elaborates how devotion transcends hierarchies and flamboyant displays of religiosity. All it takes to win Krishna over is a leaf, flower, fruit, or some water offered in devotion. Devotion will also redeem those who have gone on the wrong path, for they quickly become virtuous. And anyone—women, vaishyas (merchants) and shudras (peasants)—can achieve liberation when they take refuge in Krishna. (Again, this line gives us the clues to the socio-historical context— women are singled out in this listing as if a separate group, suggesting that all women are inferior to kshatriya and Brahmin men. But if anyone’s birth-status is less than superior, no problem, the simplest and fastest qualification for liberation is devotion.

In numerous stanzas, Krishna describes the qualities of a yogi as one whose actions are not driven by selfish interests and who has equanimity. But this responsibility—of raising oneself to this level—is one’s own. As stanzas 6.5-6.6 note, uplift yourself by yourself — you are your own friend, you are your own enemy. These are remarkable stanzas, containing a message so timeless it is always contemporary.

The Gita is clear that the desire for spiritual progress is a choice. Those who insist on staying entangled in karmic bondage should be left alone to enjoy their way. Stanza 3.26 says; “The wise person who is on the path of yoga/self-control must not dissect the minds of those who are entangled in karma, who are without knowledge. In fact, let them enjoy their activities. Towards the end of the 18th chapter, Krishna tells Arjuna: “This knowledge, secret of secrets, has been explained to you by me. Thinking over all of this, do as you wish.”

Against a backdrop of ritual injunctions and rigid rule-based religiosity, the Bhagavad Gita arrives with a sense of freedom. Krishna takes responsibility for the world, but also says he personally intervenes when there is a rise of adharma. There are practical tips to help rise above one’s limitations— from one’s sense organs to one’s inclinations.

It is not surprising then that people who saw themselves as reformers and activists—whether to transform themselves or the world—were attracted to the Bhagavad Gita. In India, both MK Gandhi and Bal Gangadhar Tilak drew inspiration from the Gita. Whereas Gandhi saw the main lesson of the Gita as detachment, which would automatically lead to non-violence, Tilak took a different lesson from it—that of fighting against injustice. Gandhi’s assassin, Nathuram Godse, who also saw himself as a reformer, quoted from the Bhagavad Gita during his deposition. Isn’t it ironic that such a liberal text is today a religious emblem, and an icon of piety? Those who don the Gita’s religious mantle before they read and absorb its radical message, may just have let in a Trojan horse.

Arjun-KrishnaBhagavad GitadissentMahabharat