Bhagavagd Gita - Session 35- Track 3508

But here Sri Krishna says: ‘take all relationships’. So, He is not only a friend, He is your enemy also, even as an enemy He is your friend. He is your Divine, He is your master. Even as your beloved He is your master: in every way. In every form if you see how it becomes, you continue the same activities, you change and put it all in the Divine: ye tu sarvāṇi karmāṇi mayi sannyasya matparāḥ |. Now you can see this is not a description of your Bhakti; sarvāṇi karmāṇi, all actions are to be reposed in the Divine; matparāḥ, your mind also should be constantly engaged in Him, in the Divine. ananyenaiva yogena māṁ dhyāyanta, and constantly contemplate on Me by this incomparable Yoga, which is integral Yoga.

             teṣām ahaṁ samuddhartā, I am the one who gives salvation, samuddhartā, I am the gate of salvation to all of them; mṛtyusaṁsārsāgarāt, they are all rescued from this great ocean of the world which is besieged by death:

             bhavāmi na cirāt pārtha mayy āveśitacetasām ||, to all of them I become samuddhartā, I become the rescuer to all of them.

             It is for this reason…if you attain, if you only approach the relation-less, then relation-less does not relate Himself to you because you are approaching the relation-less: the Immutable is ‘relation-less’. So, ‘relation-less’ only invites you to climb. He does not come down to lift you up. There is no relationship, He is silent, He is incommunicable. It is you who approach Him so the climbing becomes difficult, He is not there available to you because ‘ye atha mam pravardante’, you approach the Divine as ‘silent’ and He remains silent to you. You approach Him as the one who helps you and He is a helper to you. So, “For them I become samuddhartā’ because they take My help, they want My help, they say ‘give me Your hand’, so, I give the hand to him. Therefore this path becomes swifter, easier and much more integral because in every form, in every activity, in every relationship I manifest.”

There is a continuous unity in the Gita. The whole of the Gita is a united, one, great, teaching.

 Question: It is almost like auto-suggestion; whatever you suggest you yourself feel that He is doing.

             You might say auto-suggestion theory itself is a partial understanding of a larger secret. Instead of saying it is like auto-suggestion, auto-suggestion is a theory, is a partial reflection of a larger understanding. Why auto-suggestion works? Because the supreme Divine always has this attitude towards you: as you approach Him, so He approaches you, therefore auto-suggestion succeeds, but auto-suggestion is wrong, defective because it only talks of suggestion, coming out by yourself, but suggestion is not the only power; therefore auto-suggestion is a limited theory and does not explains why auto-suggestion succeeds.

             So, now Sri Krishna says:

             mayy eva mana ādhatsva mayi buddhiṁ niveśaya |
             nivasiṣyasi mayy eva ata ūrdhvaṁ na saṁśayaḥ ||8|| (XII)

              There is no doubt that you will certainly arrive at Me, nivasiṣyasi mayy eva, you will certainly live in Me, delve in Me, mayy eva mana ādhatsva, fixed your mind on Me; niveśaya mayi buddhiṁ, put your Buddhi in Me, then surely you will come to Me and you will live in Me.

             atha cittaṁ samādhātuṁ na śaknoṣi mayi sthiram |
             abhyāsayogena tato mām icchāptuṁ dhanañjaya ||9|| (XII)

             If you find that this is difficult, that your Buddhi is to be fixed in the Supreme, if your mind is to be fixed in the Divine, if this is difficult then I give you an easier path: abhyāsayogena. What is abhyāsayoga? abhyāsayoga is a practise of a method, repetition of an experience; you may not succeed in keeping your mind all the time on the Divine, it does not matter, you repeat your effort, it is broken, repeat again, repeat the same method again and again, repeat the same experience again and again. So, even if you are broken, don’t worry, apply abhyāsayoga.

Question: Somewhat like Japa one by one.

             That is one method: whatever method you are following, you repeat it, not only Japa, there can be many other method, you continue: if you are doing philosophical method, repeat the philosophical method; if you are doing Karma yoga method, do that method, whatever method, you take repeat it.

             (XII, 10) abhyāse ’py asamartho ’si, if you are incapable of that abhyāsa, then I give another more method: matkarmaparamo bhava |, do all actions as if for Me: offer all your actions to Me. So, even the abhyāsayoga is not necessary. Just whatever action you do, you offer to Me.

             madartham api karmāṇi kurvan, if you go on doing those karmāṇi, those works which are meant for Me, then siddhim avāpsyasi, then you attain to the highest realisation.

             athaitad apy aśakto ’si, even if you are not capable of that also,

             athaitad apy aśakto ’si kartuṁ madyogam āśritaḥ |, if you are not able to put your actions all offered to Me, then I give further means:

             sarvakarmaphalatyāgaṁ tataḥ kuru yatātmavān ||11||(XII)

             Then whatever action you do, you don’t need to offer to Me, you just don’t be desirous of the fruits of action; sarva-karma-phala-tyāgaṁ tataḥ kuru yatātmavān, do all your actions, go on, only don’t expect, only don’t desire the fruits and the enjoyments of the fruits of action: sarva-karma-phala-tyāgaṁ.

             All options are given, and now Sri Krishna says which is better of these. He puts a kind of a scale of these four methods:

          (XII, 12) śreyo hi jñānam abhyāsāj. There is a difference between abhyāsa and jñāna: abhyāsa is the repetition of the effort, repetition of the method. Better than that is of course jñāna: jñāna is thought turned luminously towards the object, not only thinking. Thinking which tries to get the meaning of the object and when the meaning of the object becomes luminous, that is jñāna. There must be thought, application of thought on the object and the grasp of that object luminously so that you say: ‘I understand and I know’. So, grasp of the object of knowledge luminously, that is jñānam. So, better than abhyāsa, (repetition of experience or of the effort, or the method), there is jñāna; it is much better.

             dhyānāt karmaphalatyāgas tyāgāc chāntir anantaram ||12|| (XII)

             More than this meditation on that jñāna, ( jñāna is an application of the mind, of the thought), but dhyāna is a process which is higher than thought: dhyāna is a concentration of consciousness on the object. When a consciousness not only applies towards the object to know it, but also to experience it, - that is dhyāna. When you simply try to understand an object by thought, it is jñāna; but when you try to experience that object that is dhyāna.

             So: jñānād dhyānaṁ viśiṣyate, better than jñāna is dhyāna, because in dhyāna there is not only a thought movement but also an experienced element. In jñāna movement the thought is powerful and in thought you get luminously the understanding of the object; but in dhyāna  you get also the experience of it.

 Comment: It is beautifully put.

             Isn’t it?   …jñānād dhyānaṁ viśiṣyate | dhyānāt, more than jñāna, karma-phala-tyāgas, if you just renounce the actions fruits, that is the highest, the excellence path is this because for that tyāgāc chāntir anantaram, by that renunciation you get the supreme Shanti.