Bhagavad Gita: Introduction & Synopsis of Chapter One

THE BHAGAVAD GITA

Invocation

Swami Shivananda:

"O Krishna, thou art my sweet companion now. Thou hast a soft corner for me in thy heart. Let me be frank with thee, O Krishna, because thou are the indweller of my heart and the witness of my mind. I cannot hide anything from thee, because thou directly witness all the thoughts that emanate from my mind. Thou art my friend now. O Lord of my breath, accept my humble prayer. Teach me the Gita."

SYNOPSIS OF CHAPTER ONE

ARJUNA'S PAIN

"On the battlefield of Kurukshetra, Arjuna's chariot comes to the front. His banner is presided over by Hanuman. In the deafening noise set up by the several conches and the war drums and trumpets Arjuna, taking up his Gandiva (bow) in his hand, says: 'Krishna, set my chariot right in the midst of the two contending armies. I want to see all the heroes who are so eager for battle. I want to see with whom I have to fight in this war. I want to see all the many heroes who are so eager to please Duryodhana.'

The chariot rumbles a few yards ahead and Krishna places it just where Arjuna wants it: in front of Bheeshma, Drona and the others. Krishna exclaims: 'Look, Arjuna! Look at this great army with Bheeshma and Drona leading it. Look at all the Kauravas assembled here to die at your hands.' Arjuna casts his eyes on the great spectacle. He sees the heroes ready for battle, and he sees there all those who are dear to him. They are his grandfathers, teachers, cousins, uncles, nephews, dear friends, and comrades. He looks again and again at them and all of a sudden he is overcome with pity for all of them. His voice shakes with grief and he says: 'Krishna, I feel an awful weakness stealing over me. My mouth has gone dry all of a sudden and I am trembling all over. Krishna, my head is reeling and I feel faint. My limbs refuse to bear me up. My form burns as if with fever and my Gandiva is slipping from my grasp. I look at all these who are my kinsmen and I feel that I cannot fight with them. Look on all these omens, Krishna. They do not bode any good to anyone. I do not think there is any good in killing my kinsmen.

I do not want to win this war. I do not want any kingdoms nor do I want the pleasures of this world. I do not see any use for them. These great heroes all mean so much to me and they are there, ready to fight. I will never kill them: not for lordship of the three worlds. For the passing pleasure of ruling this world why should I kill the sons of Dhritarashtra? They have been greedy, evil, avaricious, and covetous. I grant all that. But the fact remains that they are my cousins and it is a sin to kill one's own kinsmen. I would rather turn away from the war. It will even be better if I am killed by Duryodhana. I do not want to fight.' Arjuna collapses in the seat of his chariot. He throws away his bow and arrows and his heart is filled with pain." [From The Mahabharata, translated and condensed by Kamala Subramaniam.]

Ram Dass:

"Arjuna is confronting a situation in which his rational mind is not helping him, a situation in which surrender is the only way through. There are states of consciousness that are always available to us if we have not veiled ourselves from them through our attachments. Krishna is going to say to Arjuna: 'What matters here isn't your feelings towards those people on the other side. There's something bigger at stake here. You have to act out of what your Karma demands. It's your Karmic predicament to have been born a Kshatriya at this particular moment and in this particular place, where it is your responsibility to uphold the Dharma by fighting this war. And so that's your way through at this moment.' Arjuna might not feel that he asked for this role, but there it is. Now it's his Dharma to fulfill it.

In studying the Gita, you may not have thought you were asking to confront tough questions about your own life and about what it all means, but here you are. This is the battlefield of Kurukshetra within yourself. Though you may think you didn't ask for it, yet, on another level, just like Arjuna, you are getting your just deserts. You are getting the benefit of all the work you've ever done up until now, which has put you in the place where you are about to absorb a teaching about a topic that most of the population couldn't care less about. Whatever Karma brought you to this point, it's now your Dharma to work with it."

Eckhard Tolle:

“There are situations where all answers and explanations fail. Life does not make sense anymore. Or someone in distress comes to you for help, and you don’t know what to do or say.

When you fully accept that you don’t know, you give up struggling to find answers with the limited thinking mind, and that is when a greater intelligence can operate through you. And even thought can then benefit from that, since the greater intelligence can flow into it and inspire it.

Sometimes surrender means giving up trying to figure things out and becoming comfortable with not knowing.”

[For when we admit that we don’t know the answer to a question, and can feel comfortable in that state of limbo, we become open to the higher power to shed its light within us and help us to find our way.]

Introduction to the Bhagavad Gita

Introduction

The setting of The Bhagavad Gita is ancient India about 5,000 years ago. This is before the record of human history, so there is a legitimate question about how much of it really happened. Is it myth or some combination of “fact” and myth? “Fact” is put in quotation marks because the word itself, in association with the word “myth” implies that in some way a myth is not true. A myth is true; it expresses timeless human values. “Use of the term by scholars implies neither the truth nor the falseness of the narrative.” (Wikipedia)

At the outset of The Bhagavad Gita, a civil war is about to commence. Members of families are arrayed on each side of the battlefield. One of the two main characters is Arjuna, a virtuous soldier, highly skilled with the bow and arrow, perhaps the most skillful archer of his time. The other main character is Krishna, whom the Hindus call an Avatar. An Avatar represents the manifestation of God incarnate in human flesh. The Avatar incarnates to teach us mortals that we have a spark of immortality within us; and if we fan this tiny flame, we may find peace amidst the storms of life and be free from suffering once and for all.

Krishna the form represents this state of consciousness free from the suffering that life ordinarily brings. It is the state and not the physical form that is important. Krishna is peace and that peace is inside of us waiting to bloom and pervade our lives in a steady way if we are able to supply the suitable, inner conditions for this flowering. There is much conditioning from the past that gets in the way of our progress on this path, and this is where practice comes in.

Arjuna finds himself in a dilemma as the war is about to start. He knows it’s his duty as a soldier to fight, but it’s his family on the other side and he can’t bring himself to fight with them. It’s an example of what happens when we face a difficult decision in life where the pros and the cons even out. The thinking mind is no longer any help in this situation and we need to dig deeper to discover our true path.

Krishna is Arjuna’s charioteer, and he is there to help Arjuna do the deep digging so that he will know how to proceed. Krishna is there to help Arjuna get in touch with that still, quiet place inside from which promptings arise that guide us intuitively and optimally. If we can learn how to break our attachment to the outer chatter and focus within, we can come into touch with this source of steady wisdom.

Eckhard Tolle (Toe Lay), a contemporary teacher of universal principles, writes some things in the introduction to one of his books (Stillness Speaks, pp. ix-xii) which apply to the book he has written, and they also apply to Krishna’s teachings in the Gita:

"A true spiritual teacher does not have anything to teach in the conventional sense of the word (‘teacher’), such as new information. The function of such a teacher is to help you remove that which separates you from the truth of who you already are and what you already know in the depth of your being. The spiritual teacher is there to uncover and reveal to you that dimension of inner depth that is also peace.

If you come to a spiritual teacher...or these teachings...looking for stimulating ideas, theories, beliefs, or intellectual discussions, there will be a danger of missing the essence of the teachings, which is not in the words but within yourself. It is good to remember that and feel it as you absorb the teachings. The words are signposts. That to which they point is not to be found within the realm of thought, but rather a dimension within yourself that is deeper and infinitely vaster than thought. A vibrantly alive peace is one of the characteristics of that dimension, so whenever you feel inner peace arising as you are in the act of absorbing, the teachings are doing their work and fulfilling their functions as your teacher. They are reminding you of your divine heritage and are pointing the way back home. They have come out of a state of consciousness we may call stillness.

These teachings use words that in the act of reading become thoughts in your mind. But these are not ordinary thoughts...repetitive, noisy, self-serving, and clamoring for attention. Just like every true spiritual teacher, the teachings don't say, 'Look at me,' but 'Look beyond me.' Because the teachings came out of stillness, they have power...the power to take you back into the same stillness from which they arose. That stillness is also inner peace, and that stillness and peace are your essence. It is inner stillness that will save and transform the world."

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Random additional thoughts/notes from Lalita:

The Bhagavad Gita teaches "advaita," or "not two." This is the teaching of nonduality, or oneness and sacredness of all life. It is simlar to the teachings of the Mahavakyas in Indian sacred literature, which teach us, for example, that "That Art Thou" (tat tvam asi), or as Meher Baba said, "You and I are not 'we'; you and I are One."

The Bhagavad Gita offers teachings of wisdom, devotion, service, and love that help people of all ages and times to deepen their relationships in life: relationship to self, to friends/family, to strangers or other people, to animals/plants/Earth, and to God.

Whether literal or not, it is also a beautiful metaphor for the choice to journey into the depths of one's interior life. As we tread this path, we discover more and more that God resides deep within our being and also within everything in the world of forms, and beyond.

We offer these posts to you all, in hopes that you enjoy them and find them transformational in your own lives, as they have been in ours. Please God, may they be as free as possible of our own ignorance or vanity, inspired only by our joy for the Divine and for this incredible sacred text.

Yours in love through service, Lalita and Krishna