Tattva-viveka

Dear devotees

We had our eleventh Bhagavad Gita evening last week. Bhrigu, Guru-Nistha, Jani, Kamalaksa and I began the meeting together, and Eija showed up later, after waking up from her afternoon nap.

As you can see in the attached photo we've started a new system of rotating kirtan leaders, so Bhrigu had to give over the red chair to yours truly. Next time it will be Guru-Nistha's turn to impress us with his singing skills.

Bhagavad Gita, chapter eleven: Yoga of theophany

In the beginning of this chapter Arjuna's asking Krishna to show him his universal form. It's a form that can neither be described by words nor paintings, it's a form unimaginable and unbearable for us. Upon seeing it Arjuna first glorifies it, but then asks Krishna to return to his original, human-like form.

People often demand that God should show himself to them, and state that they won't believe in him before they've seen him, but mot of us would probably be quite shocked and terrified if Krishna actually suddenly presented himself to us. In the end of this chapter Krishna reveals that devotion is the only way to attain him and to see him in his sweetest form, Vraja Krishna.

The universal form of Krishna is very foreign for me personally, as it's a frightening, terrible form, devouring living beings. It makes me think of the God of the Christians' Old Testament. In his universal form Krishna tells Arjuna that he should fight, because Krishna actually has already killed everyone on the battlefield.

We had quite a lengthy discussion on the war and violence in Bhagavad Gita. Bhrigu felt that it's necessary to use such a harsh example as war against your own relatives to bring forth the point of the Gita that service to Krishna is our ultimate mission in life. For me it's hard to think of it as a real war, I prefer to think about it as a play where the players really put their souls into the play but at the end of the day go home and wash off the fake blood.

We found that our ideas of war are quite different: when Bhrigu and Kamalaksa think about war the remember their childhood, when they threw pine cones at their friends pretending that they were grenades. The things I associate with war are quite different: I think of the unimaginable cruelties and human rights violations I've read about that still are happening in wars all over this world: soldiers raping women, cutting off children's hands, torturing prisoners and so on. I just can't stand the thought of Krishna encouraging Arjuna to take part in an act as hideous as war. Even if it was a "vedic war" with the soldiers putting down their weapons and sitting down for a civilised chat in the evening there would be soldiers with sword and arrow wounds that would have to be treated in primitive conditions: amputations and other operations would have to be done without anesthetics.

So it seems that I'm imprisoned by my mind in this matter: I can't think of the Kuruksetra war as a real war but as a play and a metaphora of a person's inner struggle with his or her material attachments. Bhrigu pointed out that if Krishna was urging Arjuna to do something nice or just mildly unpleasant it wouldn't be as touching as the scenario of war is, and I completely agree that it's a compelling setting for a discussion philosophy, but still...

I'd like to hear other's comments on this, to see if there would be a way to settle my vivid imagination and enable me to concentrate on the essence of the Gita.

Your stubborn servant

Krsangi

Tattva-viveka

Bhagavad Gita, ch. 11

Krsangi Dasi - December 11, 2004 8:05 pm

Swami - December 11, 2004 9:19 pm

Krsangi Dasi - December 13, 2004 1:52 pm

Swami - December 13, 2004 2:47 pm