Krishnas speech at the Battleground chapter eight

CHAPTER - EIGHT THE BHAGAVADGITA THE WORLD BEYOND DEATH What is the Cosmic Being? What is work? What are the many levels? Arjuna asks these questions? In reply Krishna seems to sum up what he said earlier. Cosmic Being is that which does not wear out. It is all in all. This Cosmic Being becomes the phenomenal world which is impermanent. This is the Being-in-the –world. The Being-in-the-world is many-in-one, unlike the Cosmic Being. Each of the numberless fragments of the Being-in-the-world has a self in it that dons and doffs the body. Thus there are myriads of selves. The selves are nothing but the image of the multitude of selves that are free, wise, pure and eternal, mirrored on the Nature consisting of the three qualities. They are the spiritual selves. These selves are but the one self – the Being. Nature is but the distortion of the Cosmic Being into the illusion of many. The atoms are shot from the primeval fire-ball or the Cosmic Being in all direction and the primeval point multiplies into numerous points of the expanding universe. This expansion and contradiction is work. Seen from one standpoint, this work is illusion. Because the Cosmic Being alone is. The work and everything else are but illusion like the oil-film on oil. Seen from the viewpoint of the absolute or the Cosmic Being there is no work. Seen from the human standpoint the universe is dynamic; everything from the Cosmic Being down to the smallest particle of the earth is giving and taking . The Cosmic Being must give some part of itself to the illusion that is created out of it. So the whole existence is a kind of grand offertory where the smallest particle also participates. Getting and spending is the function of the smallest particle even, participating in the great fiesta of sacrifice of the world. Krishna is the spirit of the offering that takes place in every particle, every being and in the universe. Thus Krishna defines his position in a reality that has many levels. Life is itself a sacrifice. Days in days out men inhale and exhale. Thereby a sacrifice is being enacted. And Krishna is its presiding deity. Krishna is the personal god. If one could remember Krishna at the moment of death one becomes a companion of Krishna; there is no doubt about it. But how could that be? Where is the guarantee that I will not forget Krishna at the moment of death? Surely I went my way through thousands of births and deaths; I have experienced thousands of birth pangs and thousands of cradles. Many a farewell I have taken. I know the heart-breaking hours. But why could I not remember Krishna ? Because, the world seems more sweet than ever, when we are conscripted by Death. The only way out from forgetfulness is to make a habit to chant Krishna’s name with every inhalation and every exlalation of our breath. If we could breathe Krishna’s name as easily as we breathe, if we could identify our chanting of the name with our breathing, our last desire will surely be the name of Krishna. Mahatma Gandhi was the votary of Lord Rama. And it was perhaps no mean achievement on his part when he uttered the name of his Lord when he was shot mortally. Mahatma Gandhi’s last word was “Ram”. That one will be in the company of the Lord Krishna is nothing strange. Krishna says that with whatever in mind one dies, one attains that after one’s death. This is very much like the three wishes that a fairy fulfils. There was a poor man. He met a fairy who granted him three wishes. The man hurried back home. He was very hungry. He forgot to tell his wife about the three wishes. While he was taking the soup, he thought that it would be nice if the soup were pudding. At once the soup turned into pudding. At this sight the wife became excited. The poor man told her about the three wishes. The wife became angry as he had wasted one of the three wishes. So she said that the pudding should be on the head of the man. At once the pudding went up the head of the man. So the third wish was to get rid of the pudding from the head. Thus all the three wishes came to nothing. Krishna grants us one wish only at the time of death. In fact the world that we perceive is the creation of the mind only. In the sky there is no distinction between east and west; people create the distinction; it belongs to the world they perceive. Similarly there is nothing called cause and effect or birth and death. People create such distinctions. All this happens because of their ignorance and delusion. Similarly after-life is also the construct of mind. So mind’s last wishes are always fulfilled. It is the last wishes that lead a man to the next birth. Human wishes always spring from ignorance and greed. The delusion becomes a habit of mind that journeys through numerous lives. Being in delusions, life with them is always grasping and attachment. So they must assume the illusion of pain and suffering. Let, each one of us, in the meantime decide our last wish before death. Because who knows the world may end tonight. So Krishna asks Arjuna and thereby to all the heroes at Kurukshetra to remember Krishna always and fight. If mind and heart are with Krishna, one is sure to attain Krishna in life hereafter. How is that one can fight with Krishna at one’s heart? Let us suppose that a widow works as a house-maid. She is as good as a member of the family of her master’s. She looks after the children of the master with such care as if they are her own. She is always only looking after the household of her master. But does she not know that her own children live in a remote village, far away from her work-place? She works here only to earn bread for the little ones. Similarly one can plunge into the battle of life with all care. Still one may have in his heart of hearts a longing for Krishna. Krishna asks over and over again that one must see to that no desire occupies the mind. Because death comes without warning and we must stand up to death with our last wishes. A sailor’s wife was in the habit of putting on her finery everyday. Her neighbours asked her, “for whom did she dress herself in such a fine manner?” because her husband was away in the ship. She said that a sudden gale could bring him any day to the port. So he might be at her doorstep before she knew it better that if he found her attractive than messy. Krishna says that if we could harness the loving mind and engage it in the contemplation of the supreme being, we win the company of the supreme being. How is the supreme being like? He is the poet par excellence. He creates the universe in his own image. He is the law-giver. If we could hear him in our heart, we might be able to sympathise with hopes and fears that the world had not heeded heretofore. The poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world. He is the primordial being. He speaks of the primordial emotions in man. We are living selves. It is a pity that our intellect, plays truant to the self and hugs sense- objects so much against the nature of the self. We are never satisfied with our sense-objects because they are not what we ask for. We do not want any object as such. We want pleasure. We want eternal happiness. And that should determine our quest. Traditionally they say that we want sense objects, the attainment of which gives us pleasure. But Krishna reverses the attitude. He says that it is the seeking after the eternal pleasure that gives fillip to our desires and it is desire which uses the physical body. The desire at the bottom of our hearts is to know our selves. And to that end the body must go through penance. The penance is nothing but resistance to the imposed power over the body by the world external to us – the world of senses. The supreme being who leads us from the forests of worldly life is in us in the finest form. He is smaller than the smallest particle in the universe. The Hindus postulate that every particle of earth has ten finer particles in it of water. Each particle of fire has in it ten particles of air. Each particle of air has ten particles of ether. Each particle of ether has ten particles of the nihil in it. And the supreme being is thus indescribable nothing. It is this smallest of the small, present in everything, which holds everything in its arms. The traditional approach is that the larger is the mass, the greater is its power. But, nowadays, things have been reverse. There came a fairy to a little boy. She was carrying a very box in her hand. The boy asked her to open the box. And she opened it to reveal a larger box in that. The boy asked her to open it also. There was a still larger box in it and so on till the boy found an infinity large box in the small one; the box contained the whole universe in it. Modern science has proved this fairy tale to be real. A small atom has in it the energy of a sun that can burn a whole Troy of the worldly life. One cannot think of the supreme being. Because while thought always belongs to the past, the supreme being is in eternal present. He is as bright as the sun beyond the realm of darkness. This supreme being must be sought within one’s heart. Hence the reins of vital energies must not be let loose in the open field of worldly life. They must be concentrated at the middle of the two eyebrows. A devotion to the eternal pleasure – an aesthetic devotion indeed, should be its controlling power. Only then one realises the supreme being which is joy or ever. No doubt Krishna is this supreme being. He describes himself from a detachment. Those who follow knowledge are tired of words. The signified associated with the signifier is mundane and materialistic. It is ugly through over-use. Hence they are in search of a signifier that is its own meaning. There are men who are tired of joy that results from possession. They want to love something for its own sake. The same quest has led them to observe celibacy. Krishna says that such a man shuts out all the nine doors of the bone- house to the outer world. It needs a special physical feat. For example, the feet should close the penis and anus in a particular sitting posture. The eyes should be closed and so on. Thus the doors of the body being shut to the attack of the outer world, the mind must be imprisoned in the heart. The vital air has to be placed in the head. The intellect should at this hour chant the half-articulate sound Aum, meditating on Krishna. If someone dies in such a state, he surely attains the cradle of bliss forever. Krishna assures that whoever thinks of him ceaselessly without being distracted by the invitation of the outer world is sure to get him. Once someone attains him, one has no fear of ever being born again in this waste land. The birth and death cycle is the law of the existence. Not only that man journeys through one body to another, but everything whatever in this existence dies is born again to die again. Even the sun and the moon and the sky the heaven, totter to their fall to be rebuilt again. The universe itself is destroyed to be renewed from time to time. The present earthly existence of man is the result of the previous ones. It is said that after a long sojourn through sub-human bodies for 8.4 million births one is born a man. Similarly the present earth is the result of the previous earths; the present solar system is the result of the previous ones. There are myriads of infinite universes in this existence. At the centre of each universe, its creator is seated. It is from the creator that the universe expands as the flower gradually blooms. The aim of the expanded universe is to realise its presiding deity or the creator which sits at its heart. Once this realisation is complete the expanded universe is contracted into the point from which it sprang. After a time the point also vanishes to be reborn in a different plane. This is just like that of a blue star becoming smaller and smaller and red. Soon the mass in it is drawn inwards. The star is dead. But nothing dies. The mass travels through short cut straight road avoiding the road along the curved space only to be a new-born star in its lived flame. The space that the mass avoids in its expedition to be born again is made up by time. Hence what is born just now, seems to have been born long time back. What Krishna asks us to do is to become black holes, withdrawing all our energy inward to be born again in the deathless firmament of Krishna’s mind. There was a king who had two wives. He loved the younger wife very much. So the other wife was neglected. The latter had a child in Dhruba. Once the king was caressing his child Dhruva. Right at that time, his younger wife came. Scared of her the dropped the child Dhruva from his arms. The little child was touched to the quick. He left his palace for the woods and sought eternal happiness. His journey into the woods symbolised his withdrawal of energies inward. At once eternal joy appeared to him in the form of Krishna. And he remained ever close to Krishna’s heart, being permanently fixed in the starry cope of Krishna’s mind. Hindu mythology observes that Dhruva died to be born as the Pole-Star – the star that remains ever fixed in the north. Krishna says that one thousand four ages on earth, (each four ages consists of 4320000 solar years) make one day time for the creator. With the day-break of the creator, the unmanifest becomes manifest. With the sundown the manifest becomes unmanifest again. In that indeterminate night the multitude of the show of things is converted again to their primal cause which is but one. And Krishna the primordial self lies stretched on the boundless deep of the primordial cause lost in deep sleep. The thousand hooded snake that supports the world spreads its head to cradle the self-of-all-selves, Krishna. With the day-break again the creation shoots forth. The innumerable selves are irradiated at once like countless light particles from a fountain of light. Every self is not, however, born to undergo births and deaths in the world. There are some sages like Narada who are always free as soon as born. They need not pass through the pangs of endless births on earth, or anywhere else in the world. But Krishna says that there is a world beyond this world. It is beyond the powers of change. Mortal eyes cannot see it. it is eternally unmanifest and it is the supreme goal of everyone. Once the self attains it, it need not come back to the universe to ride the merry-go-round of birth and death. Krishna says that this world beyond the world is his home. Thus the more we hear the speeches of Krishna referring to himself again and again like a poem referring to itself again and again, we are drawn to Krishna the more to know him for its own sake just as we often read a poem for the sake of it. And it becomes imperative to know Krishna. He is not surely the man that stands in front of the assembly of heroes at the battle-field of Kurukshetra. He is not merely the man who speaks to Arjuna. What is he then? In every human heart there is a lake of milk. There Krishna reclines on the hoods of a hydra-headed snake. The hoods of the snake represent the bevy of desires lurking in the caves of the unconscious. There is a sea at the heart of each universe. It is the causal sea from which the universe arose. Krishna lies down there stretching himself on the distended skull of the snake. There is no one universe. There are countless universes. There are as many universes as the pores in a human body. All these universes float on a lake which is at their heart. This is the causal lake where Krishna lies on the hoods of the snake. This is the causal lake where Krishna lies on the hoods of the snake. When one crosses the lake there is another universe. But if we seek to describe it in spatial terms we must invoke ancient cosmography to our aid. The ancients say that the land and the salt sea that we call the earth is only a part of the real earth. There are six more such domains across the salt seas, studded with hills and rivers. While our earth floats on the salt seas, the six other earths respectively float on the waves of sugar-cane, wine, honey, milk and nectar. The seven earths or the seven domains together make the real earth. Around the seventh domain is the sea of nectar. Once we cross it, we shall find the vast sands of gold particles. Beyond that there is a high mountain. It is so high that the skies and stars are below it. that mountain is the end of a universe. It floats on a sea from which it sprang. One finds Krishna lying on this causal water. Multitudes of such universes are there. They together float on a larger causal ocean. And Krishna can be found there also lying on the waves. Once we cross the larger causal ocean we are in a vast world beyond the grasp of time and space. This has also many layers. In its innermost expanse there is a region spread infinitely which is ever the same. Here space is infinite, because times policing is absent. It is here that Krishna is ever engaged in erotic enjoyment with multitudinous women; the sovereign powers of time do not apply here ; time also is present at the echoing green lorded over by Krishna. Time is there a minion of Krishna, changing the seasons and changing the hours of the day at Krishna’s will. Krishna is here eternally sporting with his myriads of lovers in never-waning ecstasy. Our human bodies have finer bodies hidden inside. When we die, we put off our fleshly body only. The finer body still imprisons our self. Once we get rid of that finer body, there is the causal body that covers our self. Thus the self puts on three bodies, one over another. Unless we unrobe ourselves we cannot take part in the cosmic merriment of Krishna. When Krishna in his speeches to Arjuna promises to give any devoted self eternal company, he only means that the aspirant self will be given passport to his charmed abode. Krishna there possesses the trousseaus of his sweet-hearts; he will not let them go back to the world where births and deaths, creation and destruction are the rule. Gods are never ashamed of being naked. One must not be naked before one’s friend. The myth of Krishna sporting eternally in his garden has been told in the male way. But actually, once we put off our fleshly garments we are neither males, nor female. The self is neither male nor female. It is the self of the self in Krishna that sports with the multitudinous selves in his garden. This eternal sport of Krishna with his women is at the heart of the dynamic universe. It is the essence of the ceaseless work being done in the universe. The sporting Krishna is the presiding deity of all work or sacrificial rites ceaselessly being done in the universe. The earth, the air, the trees and the plants everything of the charmed garden of Krishna emanated from him only. The legion of lovers around him in their aureoles is but manifestations of Krishna. The love game among them is not what it is like on the earth. Once we get rid of the three bodies, we forget all mundane emotions. The joy in that promised land is one of intellect. Just as traditional vocabulary of physics fails to describe the sub-microscopic universe so do we falter to set forth the world beyond time and space. Krishna says that the supreme has the whole universe in it. it pervades the whole universe. Once someone seeks this supreme soul to sport with, one must seek it with love and devotion. So long Krishna has dwelled on where one should seek to go after death. To this end the timing of death is important. The devotees, who have Krishna at their heart, should die during the six months when the sun traverses the northern hemisphere. White hot fire is alight at that time. The days are long. Death in that case will lead the self entranced with the cosmic self to the cosmic self only. When the sun sets out for the southern hemisphere, the night becomes longer and darkness becomes thick. The world looks dim. Death during this season leads one to the land of Moon. There from the self has to come back on earth. These are but the vision of a meditating self. If the meditating self gets at the vision of the sun in the northern hemisphere he unites with the Cosmic Being. If the sun in the southern hemisphere flashes upon his inward eye, he will have a short while to rest in the paradise of the Moon; then he has to come back upon earth to continue his efforts for the union with the supreme. It all depends with what mind Arjuna will go forth in the battle- field. If he takes it for a sacrifice where the holy fire is alight in the sun he is sure to unite with the supreme. If he still cherishes the human scruples, he must come back to the world to wage further battles to absolve himself of the earthiness of the earth. Light and darkness are the two eternal paths. One who chooses light reaches the world of everlasting joy. The other path leads one back to life on earth along a vicious circle. There is an archetypal struggle between the forces of darkness and light to conquer our minds. Our life is at the cross-road of these two paths. Krishna says that one who knows the secret of these two roads will no longer be confused with life. He will no longer waver between to do or not to do. Lot of studies and activities, or charity and penance cannot reveal what such effort to unite with the supreme being can bestow upon one. Click here to Reply