HOLY
GITA
CHAPTER 2
SAMKHYA YOGA –THE YOGA OF KNOWLEDGE
VERSE NUMBER 1:
Text in Transliteration:
Sanjaya uvacha:
tam tathaa dripayaa ‘vishtam asrupoornaakulekshananam
visheedantam idam vaakyam uvaacha madhusoodanah
Text in English:
Sanjaya said:
Madhusudana spoke these words to him who was thus
overwhelmed with compassion and drwoned in distress, and whose eyes were
drenched in tears of despondency.
Comments:
The original commentators, Sri Shankarar, Sri Ramanujar and
Sri Madhvar do not comment on first eight verses of this chapter. But they were
not writing for laymen. Among the later commentators, Dr. S. Radhakrishnan says
that the pity of Arjuna has nothing in common with Divine compassion. It is a
common form of self-indulgence, a shrinking of the nerves from an act which
requies him to hurt his own people.
According to Swamy Chidbhavananda, though the word “krpaa”
is translated as compassion, Arjuna is not really endowed with this divine
quality. He alone who is the master of his mind can extend compassion to the
distressed and seek to allay their sorrows. But now Arjuna himself is in dire
need of redemption from distress: the question, therefore, of his showing mercy
to others does not arise.
A shrinking of the nerves and self-pity indeed! And, while
he himself needs compassion of the Lord, how could Arjuna show the same, a
weakling as he has been reduced to, to others? It is the description of the
onlooker, Sanjaya.
But here is an interesting point that should not be missed
by us. Sanjaya was specially given this faculty to see and witness the war and
duly report whatever happens there. And he reports about the piteous words of
Arjuna, but the blind king has no pity for his own kinsmen, the Pandavas. For,
even now he could have interfered and stopped the war. So his physical
blindness is only a symbol of his mental blindness. Great holocaust and annihilation
could have been averted even at this late stage. But, like his son he too is
avaricious, and his blind love for his son, Duriyodhana blinds him to the
merits of the pandava who is ready to go unarmed and slain by his cousins! The
first and second world wars could have been averted, but for the blindness of
the world leaders. They too were mentally blind like Dhrtarashtra. The ISI is
the product of a blind policy of America and the nations who were privie to
them. It is the avarice for petrol, the liquefied gold, that makes America to
shut the eyes to the stupendous acts done by the fundamental anarchy that
flourishes in Saudi Arabia, which uses its petrol dollars to spread its brand
of fundamentalism in countries like India. Srimati Indira Gandhi’s blind policy
of minority appeasement was at the core of the division that exists between the
Hindus and the other minority communities. But it is to the greatness of our
country that by her vote bank policies, she could not have annihilated all the
good things done by her father, Sri Jawahalal Nehru!
When the head of a family is blind, the family is ruined. And
when the head of a State is blind the country is pushed toward annihilation. And
witness the ludicrous submits where the world leaders converge to prosecute how
best to stitch the ozone holes three or four countries made and bequeathed to
the world and its suffering people. They are blind, ok? They are the cousins of
Dhrtarashtra indeed! The Great epic Mahabharata is a needhi sastra, and the
Gita is a dharma sastra and a yoga sastra. But, more than four thousand years
have passed, according to the roughest of the estimates by the white men and pundits,
since these Needhi sastras and Yoga saastras and Dharma Sastras were brought
into the world. But the blindness of the mind of concerened world leaders have
already ushered in the Third Islamic World War. Then there would be a war
worldwide for the natural resources like pure water, pure air, and pure food. And
these wars would only bequeath to the fated feature generations a cursed world
to live. Avarice and blind pursuit of materialism has always known to have
exterminated many a world civilization. We could be said to be teetering toward
the precipice. The important polluters of the world do not have the manliness
to own up their fault and take corbon responsibility. Where is dharma? We are
indeed at war with the Universal Soul. The present world civilization has
attained a point where because of a handful of fools’ blindness, the whole
world could be turned into a veritable hell! All because of a few Dhrtarashtras
today!
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