THE HOLY GITA
CHAPTER THREE
KARMA YOGA OR THE YOGA OR ACTION OR THE METHOD OF ACTION
VERSE NUMBER 26
Text in Transliteration:
na buddhi bhedam janayed ajnaanaam karma sanginaam
josayet sarva karmaani vidvaan yuktah samaacharan
Text in English:
Let not the wise man unsettle the mind of ignorant people
attached to karma. By doing persistently and precisely let the wise induce the
others in all activities.
COMMENTARY BY CHIDBHAVANANDA:
Doing duty for duty’s sake devoid of desire, is an exaled
stated given to the enlightened only. This philosopby of action is too high for
the common man to understand. He eighther works for results or wants to avoid
exertion on one plea or another. To work for results is far superior to being
given to laziness born of inertia. The indolent man must be roused to ambitions
and exertion leading to pleasures and prosperity. Teaching disinterested
service to him will unsettle his understanding. Then there is the man who
suffers from philosophical indigestion. He is given to an escape-mentality from
actions on the ground that they are all wrought with pain and evil. His creed
is to pose quietism which is a pitfall in Vedanta. Care should be taken that no
confusion is created in the minds of the indolent and the ignorant. Himself
active, the elightened man should induce all toward intense activity.
COMMENTARY BY DR.S.RADHAKRISHNAN:
na buddhibhedam janayet: let him not unsettle the minds. Do
not weaken religious devotion of any kind. The elements of duty, sacrifice and
love seem to be the foundation of every religion. In the lower forms, they may
be barely discernible to the principles which they uphold. These symbols are
vital to those who believe in them. They become intolerable only if they are
imposed on those who believe in them. They become intolerable only if they are
imposed on those who cannot accept them and when they are suggested to be
absolute and final forms of human thought. The absolute character of
theological doctrine is incompatible with the mysterious character of religious
truth. Faith is wider than belief. Again, if we know the better and do not
adopt it, then we commit a wrong.
When the illiterate bow down to forces of nature, we know
that they are bowing to the wrong thing and they are blind to the larger unity
of Godhead. And yet they bow to something which is not their little self. Even
crude views possess someting by which men and women who want to live rightly
are helped to do so. Traditinal forms charged with historical association and
the vehicles of unspoken convictions, though they may not be well understood.
The quality of mind and not the object determines whether the source is religeous
or not. It is true that every one shoul reach the highest level but this can be
attained generally by slow steps and not by sudden jumps. Besieds our views of
religion are not chosen by us. They are determined by our ancestry, upbringring
and general environment. We should not speak contemptuously of them. We must
approach the followers of simple faiths with reverence and not heedlessly
disturb them, for the simple faiths have practical value and spiritual appeal. Modern
anthropologists advise us that we should not, in our anexiety to “uplift” the
aborigines, deprive them of their innocent joys, their song and dances, their
feasts and festivals. Whatever we should like to do for them, we should do with
love and reverence. We must use their restricted apprehensions as steps to the
larger vision.
Adopting the view that we should not throw out dirty water
until we get in fresh, the Hindu pantheon has accommodated divinities
worshipped by the different groups, those of the sky and the sea, the stream
and the grove, the legendeary figures of the distant past and the tutelary gods
and goddesses of villages. In its anxiety to lose nothing in the march of ages,
to harmonize every sincere conviction without renouncing any, it has becoe an
immense synthesis combining within itself varied elements and motives. It is
not surprising that religion is full of superstions, dark and primitive.
COMMENTARY BY SWAMI SIVANANDA:
An ignorant man says to himself, “I shall do this action and
thereby enjoy its fruit”. A wise man should not usettle his belief. On the
contrary he himself should set an example by performing his duties diligently but
without attachment. The wise man should also persuade the ignorant never to
neglect their duties. If need be, he should place before them in vivid colours
the happiness they would enjoy here and hereafter by discharging such duties. When
their hearts get purified in course of time, the wise man could sow the seeds
of karma yoga (selfless service without desire) in them.
Comments of the blogger:
Unsettling in a sin. Nothing short of it.
There is a story about it. In an island three simpleminded Christian
souls were living. Daily they prayed. But simple was the prayer. Their prayer
consisted of, “O God, you are three, we are three. Save us!” upart from that
there was no ceremony no rits and no hymns. Prayer itself was faulty, in the
sens it was in according to the way shown in the Holy Bible.
This distressed a priest living in the nearby island peopled
by many and there were proper churches for prayer and sabattiacal observances. So
in order to “uplift and save the souls of the three ignorant me, the priest
took upon himself the orduous jorney to that particular one to teach them
proper way of praying to the Lord. The three simple souls were much stung with
remors that they had lived so far without knowing the Lords prayer. They egerly
memerized the prayer taught by the priest and at the end of the day, blessing
them, the priest embarked on his backward journey. When he had gone half way on
the ocean in his small craft with satisfaction of having redeamed three souls
for the Lord, the three simple souls ran on water to close the gap and when
they arrived at the craft of the flabbergasted priest and asked to be retaught
the Lord’s Prayer as they had completely forgotten them!
The much chastened priest said, “No my dear three, you are
nearer the Lord than me. So continue with your prayer for nothing wrong in it!
Another thing is elsewhere Lord Krishna say in Gita itself,
that people come to him from different directions. And in another context, in
the Gita Sri Krishna says all persons praying to any god ultimately come only
to Him!
When such is the case we shouldn’t take upon ourselves in
unsettling the unintiateds’ faith. It is a great sin. And a disservice to Lord.
All worshippers would by gradation come to chanting the Lord Krishna’ name in
the end. The wise people, if at all want to teach them, they shoul teach more
by conduct than anything.
Hinduism has given place to vareiou faiths and they have
theie own way of worshipping God. There has been a continuous process of assimilation.
So there should not be harsh way of inculcation. The really great souls set
examples by their conduct only whic will deliver in the ultimate millennial
analysis. Nine day wonders should not be the expectation.
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