THE HOLY GITA
CHAPTER NUMBER 09
RAJAVIDYA RAJAGUHYA YOGA OR THE YOGA OF THE SOVEREIGN SCIENCE AND SOVEREIGN SECRET:
VERSE NUMBER 03
Text in Transliteration:
asraddahaanaah purushaa dhrmasyaa ‘sya paramtapa
apraapya maam nivartante mrtyu samsaara vartmani
Text in English:
Men devoid of Sraddha for this dharma do not attain Me, O oppressor of the foes, but return to the path of the mortal world.
COMMENTARY BY SWAMI CHIDBHAVANANDA:
A fish on land, that does not know that there is water within its reach has to suffer necessarily. Men who do not know and who do not care to know of moksha-dharma or the path of deliverance have no alternative to being repeatedly born in this world of transmigration and transitory pleasure. For want of sraddha they suffer as destitutes.
COMMENTARY BY DR.S.RADHAKRISHNAN:
The sovereign knowledge is the identity of Krsna, the Incarnate Lord, with Brahman the source of all. Final illumination will dawn on us if we worship the Incarnate with this knowledge. The direct contemplation of the Absolute is more difficult. Because Arjuna is a man of faith, he is taught this secret. The faithless who do not accept it, do not gain release but return to birth again. The faith demanded is the faith in the reality of saving wisdom and man’s capacity to attain it. The first step to grow into the freedom of the Divine is faith in the Godhead in us, which supports our being and action. When we surrender ourselves to that inner Divine, the practice of yoga becomes easy.
COMMENTARY BY SWAMI SIVANANDA:
Arjuna asks, “O Lord, why do people not attempt to attain this knowledge of the Self when it can be easily attained, when it is the highest of all things, and when it gives the greatest benefits? All should certainly attain this knowledge.” The Lord replies, “O My beloved disciple, people have no faith in this Dharma or knowledge and so return to the path of this world of death. Even if they strive with help of the means of their own imagination they cannot attain Me as they are not endowed with the right means prescribed by the scriptures.”
Dharma means law, religion, knowledge of the Self.
This faith is not mere intellectual belief in the statement of another. It is unshakable firm inner conviction that the knowledge of the Self alone can give one supreme peace, immortality and eternal bliss. It was this strong and unflinching faith of Sri Sankara that goaded him to leave his mother and take shelter under the kind protection of his Guru Sri Govindapada for attaining this knowledge which is the “supreme purifier, intuitional, according to righteousness, very easy to perform, and imperishable”. It was the strong faith of Lord Buddha that induced him to have that iron determination which he expressed in these words, “I will not budge an inch from my seat till I get illumination”. Faith goes hand in hand with fiery determination.
The Lord has eulogised the knowledge of the Self in the first two verses by the positive method (Vidhi Mukhastuti). The benefits of obtaining knowledge of the Self are described in the first and the second verses. This is Vidhi Mukhastuti. The disastrous effects that result from not obtaining the knowledge of the Self are described in the third verse. This is Nishedha Mukhastuti.
The greedy, lustful and sinful persons who are the followers of the philosophy of the flesh, who lead the life of the demons, who worship the body taking it to be the Self, and who have no faith in the knowledge of the Self, do not reach Me. They do not even possess an iota of devotion which is also one of the paths that lead men to Me. They remain in the path of the world of death which leads to hell and the lower births of animals, worms, etc.
Comments by the blogger:
The Lord of Gita addresses Arjuna as Parantapa, which means, O oppressor of the foes or enemies. Here our enemy is a singular lack of shraddha, an abiding faith. This means that Arjuna should slay the lack of faith. I would say the Lord addresses us through Arjuna. For he has enough shraddha right from the moment he surrendered his all at the feet of the Lord and begged Him to show the right way. That happened in the second Discourse itself. Now we are in the ninth Discourse. This Discourse itself is because Arjuna does not cavil and he has accepted the meanings given to his seven doubts or questions put by him at the beginning of the Seventh Discourse. So there is no question of Arjuna’s not having the faith or shraddha.
The Lord speaks to us through Arjuna. He wants us to be like Arjuna who is an oppressor of foes or enemies. The Lord of Gita wants us to oppress and kill the lack of faith in the Dharma He is going to teach presently!
But we are not men devoid of faith. We have full faith in the Lord’s power to deliver.
But we are a bit worldly too. So we will have to return back to earth.
Swami Sivananda says in the concluding paragraph that the greedy, lustful and sinful persons who are the followers of the philosophy of the flesh remain in the path of the world of death which leads to hell and the lower births of animals, worms, etc. And this would be the fate of the rapists of Nirbhaya, the ISI folks, and such animals in the shroud of men and women. We are faithful readers of the Holy Gita and even otherwise we haven’t committed any sins contemplated by the Swamiji in the last paragraph.
We, I mean, the majority of us will return back to earth after spending long years in swarga or Heaven and come back here blessed with births in good families so that we can pick up the Gita thread from where we will have left off. There need be no doubt about this. Obtaining lower births like animals and worms, etc are simply not for us.
But it would be fine if we are not too selfish and too greedy. I am sure none of us is that way.
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