VERSES 21 TO 23

VERSE NUMBER 21:

Text in Transliteration:

Hrsheekesam tadaa vaakyam

Idam aaha maheepate

Senayor ubhayor madhye ‘chuta

Translation in English:

Arjuna said:

   Place my chariot, O Achuta, between the two armies so that I may behold the war-minded that stand here, with whom I must wage this war.

Comments:

According to Dr. Radhakrishnan, the term “achyuta” means one who is unmovable.

God is both immovable and unmovable. Immovable in the sense that there is no iota of place here that is not filled by him. Only that thing or being that is present at one place and absent at another, can be moved, so He is immovable, but the term unmovable carries quite a different connotation: He indeed is movable at heart to the point of shedding tears at the devotion shown by a five-year-old child; but He is not subject to the illusion and it’s pulls to which Arjuna is going to become subject to! So the  address and appellation, “achyta” is very apt here.

VERSE NUMBER 22:

Text in Transliteration:

Yaavad etaaan nireekshe ‘ham

Yoddhukaamaan avasthitaan

Kair mayaa saha yoddhavyam

Asmin ranasamudyame

Text in English:

I desire to discern those that throng here to fight, intent on pleasing in battle the evil-minded son of Dhrtarashta.

Comments:

Arjuna’s opening words, “I desire to discern” is very significant. Even though the Lord Himself has become condescended to serve as his chariot, Arjuna can issue any command and He has to obey as the charioteer. That is what we all have in the nature of personal choice; we can do anything; the Delhi rapists desired to rape Nirbhaya. The charioteer in them was and is the Lord only, but he obeyed the commands of the rapists, and became condescending enough to witness them raping the brave girl and the minor rapist to invade her innards with a sharp implement. The charioteer in the girl, Nirbaya was not affected, did not suffer any sorrow or pain, solely because of His absence of any self identification with the body of Nirbhaya, and likewise he did not go through the acts of motion of raping or killing, and did not partake of any pleasure the rapists derived in a maniac like manner either. But he obeyed the orders of the rapists and the suffering of the body only, and not soul, of the victim.

The choice! The Lord has given us the choice, either to become beasts and inhuman and inhumane or to become humane and even become one with Him by losing all our bodily conscious and realising we are pure self, according to the Upanishadic words “tatvamasi” (Thou Art That!). The Lord is the greatest creative writer, as he not only has created various characters in his cosmic drama, but gives and endows individual freedom to them to act this way or that way.

Arjuna “desires to discern” and the charioteer obeys him in full measure, though He knew the consequences, and that soon Arjuna is going to get the state of a crying baby! Too much discernment and knowledge is not good for a man who is not perfected in his soul. For example, our wives and husbands might have been our friends or bore other relationships towards us in our endless previous lives. Our dog in the last incarnation might become our best friend or fiend in this birth, for all we know! Could we go through life with full knowledge of the happenings of our previous births! Too much refinement and too much discerning is for those who deserve the state. For us all, blind faith and devotion is enough.

But Arjuna is not an ordinary self. And he is in the process of becoming a self-knowledgeable person. He is the fittest student, so only when he desires to discern the enemies who have come to give battle with evil in their hearts, he ends up by becoming a model student to the Lord, so He could pronounce the immortal yoga shastra or the eternal principles of yoga to him soon!