Bhagavad Gita Ch17 part 05 on 13 November 2021

Full Transcript(Not Corrected)

Om Jananim Sharadam Devim Ramakrishnam Jagadgurum Pada Padme Tayo Shritva Pranamami Mohur Moho Om Vasudevasutam Devam Kamsa Chanuram Ardhanam Devaki Paramanandam Krishnam Vande Jagadgurum Sarvopanishadogavo Dogda Gopalanandanaha Partho Vatsa Sudhirubhokta Dugdham Geetam Ritam Mahat Mokam Karoti Vachalam Pangum Langhayate Girim Yat Kripatamaham Vande Paramananda Madhavam We are studying the 17th chapter of the Bhagavad Gita very aptly and practically titled as Shraddhatraya Vibhaga Yoga Shraddhat knowledge which clearly indicates to us that there are three types of faiths and man is travelling from the lowest type of faith to the next higher one and the next higher one that is from Tamas to Rajas, Rajas to Sattva and the goal is even to go beyond in that context in our last class the Lord has said there are people who perform terrible type of austerities that brings only evil to oneself as well as to others they are called Ghoras, terrible people but it is all the result of Tamoguna so what type of Tapasya one is expected to do the Lord in a most logical manner tells us how this journey of evolution from non-spiritual or little spiritual to complete spiritual can be undertaken we have to bring about changes in four departments of our life the first step is perfect control and usage of the right type of food then right type of worship is the second step then third type of worship is how we are going to distribute to other people then the last step is how to share with others also what we have done through this austerity so food, worship, self-control and sharing these are the four steps and evolution or progress takes place only in that particular order in that context last class we raised the topic of what is a value every age this perception of the values are changing values are eternal, they cannot change a value is not something that we desire but a value is something that is desirable there is a heaven and hell difference between what is desired and what is desirable what is it that we do and what is it we ought to do or what is it that we ought to completely renounce, give up so this Bhagawan is giving in this 17th chapter beautiful suggestions, teachings how we can slowly progress from the external to the internal so in that context I have quoted in my last class a very thoughtful American writer talking about the changing values in American society practically 50 years back in a well-known book The Closing of the American Mind so what is it that he is trying to tell a drastic change in modern man's concept of morality is now taking place it's well known that man has a hierarchy of needs which provide the motivation for his behavior so what is it that this Alan Bloom found that our values, our valuation of a value our perception of a value has totally changed for example he says what used to be considered as an immoral behavior and therefore sinful, therefore that which produces guilt and for the last so many millions of years practically 5 million years this mandate from the scriptures mandate of God in and through the prophets and scriptures have ruled the society of course everything taken to the extreme can be disturbing and can be unnerving can be extremely painful but they have certain values are there even if people given to temptation they used to feel guilt that we should not have done what we are doing or what we have done now the whole Christian church has devised a way and they called it confession as soon as a man starts feeling guilty he should go to the church confess what he has done and take the guidance from the spiritual director and try to change his whole behavior valuing the value system so about the values lots of psychologists, sociologists, anthropologists and students of society have paid a lot of attention recently are still paying and they found out the first thing is a value is something not only desired but more importantly it is desirable that is the goal everybody desires everything, anything but that doesn't become a value or at best it becomes a worldly, temporary, degrading, involutionary value the second is a value is useless until we learn how to value it a value becomes valuable gold becomes valuable diamond becomes valuable only when we learn how to value it and that valuation depends upon many factors including the environment for example South Africa people had plenty of gold they knew about the gold but it had no value until the foreigners came and discovered it so this is the second one we should appreciate a value value it as more precious even than life so these are the two important points but values follow an hierarchical order according to a well-known psychologist Abraham Maslow so these needs or values in the ascending order are biological needs security needs need for love need to love and to be loved need to respect and obtain esteem need for increasing of knowledge need for aesthetic appreciation need for self-actualization and finally need for transcendence so there are certain lower needs are there what are they? physical such as survival and a little bit of comfort food, clothing, shelter etc these are called basic needs simple needs but man as Jesus Christ so aptly says cannot be satisfied only with food his requirement says much much higher man cannot be satisfied with bread alone he requires higher bread so Indian culture if we talk about these what we are talking about values they are called Arthas, Purusha Arthas and they have divided them into four categories the lower Purusha Arthas also called instrumental values and the higher Purusha Artha only one which is to know who one is and our Rishis why is realized soul say? that alone can liberate us so these are as most of us know Dharma, Artha, Kama they are the lower values why are they lower? because they only serve to take us to something else what is that something else? that is called Mukti, Moksha, Liberation and every scripture of every religion practically treats it by whatever name it may call Satori, Samadhi, Nirvana etc so the lower consists of Kama, Artha but they are based upon Dharma or morality so these are called instrumental values so Hindu scriptures clearly state that Artha and Kama should be completely governed by Dharma they must be sandwiched in between Dharma so this is the values our Hindu scriptures teach to people who have not yet evolved completely and it is for this evolutionary process Bhagavan Krishna is going to talk about these four gradually ascending steps of evolution beginning with all knowledge about food then about worship or higher ideals which I will come very shortly then certain type of self-control which is called austerity and finally sharing with everybody what one has gained through all these three steps and in that order but according to Hinduism or Vedanta there is only one intrinsic Purushartha value this is called Parama Purushartha, supreme value this is called Moksha for those who have gone through the instrumental values enjoyed the world and did not find it satiating in the end in the beginning, yes in the end, no and their understanding depends their intuition has become more natural for such people they developed dispassion as a result of discrimination, discernment so Hindu culture offers the highest value namely Mukti or Moksha taken in a general meaning Mukti means liberation from any type of sorrow or suffering everybody wants it but most people find, seek solutions only in this world it is for them the lower trade Dharma, Artha, Kama are prescribed so until now we discussed about these values so all values can be roughly divided into three classes physical, moral and spiritual let me dwell upon this very briefly physical, what is the first law of life? survival that is why the God or in the form of the Divine Mother the Creatrix has been imagined as having four arms by our wise people on the right side we find what is called Vara, Abhaya Abhaya is the upper hand, right side giving fearlessness, offering fearlessness protection to everybody that is the first law of life do not fear, I am going to protect you not only I created you but I also protect you and once we are more or less assured that we are safe then comes, what do I do with my life? first thing that comes is let me enjoy this world physically, intellectually, morally, aesthetically and morally these are the four values that come so that is the second higher value which is called moral and morality is absolute rock foundation upon which every stable society is founded what is morality? to identify oneself with all the others in whichever society we are living at least immediate society and identifying with them it could be a state, it could be a nation, a country, etc so that everybody's welfare depends upon the unity of everybody and the moment we are talking about a second person that is where caring and sharing and sharing not only food, not only shelter but every type of sharing including sharing of knowledge without any secret without any copyright these are all involved in that concept morality and that society where morality is practiced that society becomes stable, prosperous and it also just diffuses itself explodes itself into science, art and religion but morality has to be supported by a higher need and that is called spiritual need otherwise as Swami Vivekananda puts it why should we share with others if I can be selfish, why should I be unselfish what do I gain by it most often we see that we lose by it and he says that is because no living creature can live without either conscious or unconscious support of each other India's downfall has happened because we never cooperated, learned how to cooperate with each other and that is why when the foreign invasions have taken place if the Kshatriyas remained separate the Shudras remained separate the footmen, the foot soldiers and the archers and those who ride the horses and elephants they all never identified that unless we cooperate with each other everyone has a rightful place for prosperity of the country for defending the country etc and that is where any invasion has become a terrible failure for Indians for anybody even a smallest number can come and kick our heads it is said that only one Muslim ran into the capital and the palace of a Hindu king and all the servants deserted and the king was beheaded and then Muslim rule became this is the story we get in history about one part of what we now call West Bengal so morality has to be supported by spiritual but it is not merely to support morality because there is a teleological urge within everybody to unfold oneself that unfoldment, manifestation of one's true nature like every seed wants to become manifest its own true nature like that every living creature is nothing but pure divinity each soul is potentially divine so Vivekananda's this highest teaching is not to be confined only to human beings even the lowest worm is inching its way up on the evolutionary scale first it has to develop what we call the physical then it has to develop the mental finally it will develop the spiritual so these are the three rough classifications physical, moral and spiritual now further classification values of physical survival even for physical survival we need all these qualities then not only physical survival values of social survival if a society which is based upon certain fundamental values, culture and religion etc these are called values if it has to maintain for the overall welfare of the society and at the same time make further progress it is necessary that one has to value them cooperate with others etc Swami Vivekananda puts it so beautifully why should I think about God? will God give me or will thinking of me about God bring me ginger bread? a child asks the answer is yes not only it will bring ginger bread but it will give you things which even the child has never heard cannot even imagine so values of social survival then this group protection and then cooperation and then sharing now about group protection we have seen the transmission of knowledge and values even bees do it those who know a little bit about this bees some of the bees they are what we call spies they spread out in search of food and when they light upon a source of good food it will come back and then those through dance through such a peculiar type of movement it lets the whole hive know that in what direction at what distance plenty of food is available so that unerringly the whole bee hive it rushes forward and takes advantage of it we know that even wild dogs they all hunt in a group because there is protection and there is safety in groups lions also hunt like that similarly the animals which are preyed upon they also moves in groups whether it is buffalo whether it is a deer they all move and even the birds which fly in the sky several of them we call them flocks it is not random movement random flying but they move, they fly in a particular formation and now only the scientists have understood the value the purpose that it reduces the strain and even the weakest bird can fly successfully and the survival of every individual bird in that flock depends upon the protection of the entire group some unwritten rules, regulations are there for them so all these things are values but it is only in the highest manifestation of life which is human life that is why manushyatmam to be born as a human being is considered the result of doing something extremely great and that too to be born in a family with cultural, moral and spiritual background so that it can haze in the process of evolution far beyond the imaginations of anybody in this world that is even more result of several merits that have been accumulating in the past birth and how to really accumulate that merit so that we can move forward towards our real goal that is to know who we are and that is why Lord Krishna divides it so with this background let us briefly dwell upon this 7th shloka the Lord says what is he telling? why is he telling? just to remind ourselves how to progress in life as I mentioned earlier that all progress is from tamas to rajas to sattva and the final progress is to go even beyond all the three gunas and become what is called gunatitha or realization of brahman one's own self or mukti, moksha, etc so even the food that is dear for all is of three kinds likewise are the sacrifices austerities and gifts here now the distinctions between them this is the teaching of Bhagwan Krishna to Arjuna a student apt student what is he telling? there are three types of foods are there and depending upon what type of food a person likes we can infer what type of nature that person has got but as I mentioned earlier that William James had discovered if we can mimic the appropriate actions the corresponding feelings will be developed in the mind usually it is the other way round our actions respond to the emotions we go through in our minds but by deliberately simulating certain actions it will have the same effect that is to say if you take a stick you can shake it at either end of the stick it will have the same effect and as I mentioned earlier that the first hierarchical lowest step is food not only physical food but intellectual food aesthetic food moral food of course finally spiritual food so there are three types of foods and he is going to describe it graphically what type of food is it? there is a food called tamasika food there is no equivalent English translation for tamas, rajas and sattva is the lowest type of personality lower values a lower personality is one who has got the lowest type of values that is all we can say so even we should not compare them to animals because first of all they are not in a position to consciously pursue spiritual goals secondly they are also on the evolutionary scale but at that level of the animosity their goal is to survive to develop certain skills slowly through 5000 5 million years the evolution is bringing about and all evolution in the body and also as well as in the brain and human being is the peak of this biological evolution so mostly this applies to human beings why the lord telling? because by knowing these three types of foods first fact is each one of us like a particular type of food you will be surprised to know that there are people who love even the worst smelling food also sometimes I came to know about something called blue cheese perhaps I don't know even now what it is but it may be what some people most people call evil smelling cheese but some people just love it you mention anything some people love it even dry fish also people love it so by observing what type of food one prefers one can get some idea what type of guna the person is possessed and the person is dominated by what type of guna but that is only for understanding once we understand we diagnose next is a tamasic person should consciously deliberately with will power adapt to the rajasic food and then he becomes slowly in many lifetimes perhaps rajasic person a man endowed with tremendous amount of energy and activity and insatiable greed etc that is from the lower it is a higher step from the sattvika point of view of course it is a lower step and this person this rajasic person by studying the effect of the sattvika food slowly he becomes completely alert highly alert and at the same time his understanding becomes much better and he reacts acts and reacts to the situations in life like a sage and finally after many lives of evolutionary progress he will become free so the purpose is to know what type of food can influence us in which way so that we can deliberately adopt certain types of foods and also at the same time avoid certain types of foods both ways meaning we can develop taste so I am going to tell you and that is the first step once food makes us strong both externally and internally physically and mind mind also becomes very healthy that means it has the capacity to think rationally and it has developed will power also that then higher ideals Igna means worship of God from the root edge this word Igna has come so worship of God means what? worship of higher ideals keeping them in mind Gods are like this they are endowed with tremendous amount nothing but worshipping of Gods is nothing but worshipping of the higher ideals and so by following by worshipping them by thinking of them by meditating upon them by contemplating upon them slowly we also acquire those very qualities as some Vag had said that you tell me what your thoughts are so our thoughts determine what type of guna we are exhibiting by deliberately choosing accepting practicing higher thoughts we can slowly evolve from a lower state to a higher state even in the socially civilized society the person becomes soft mellow and civilized through education through higher ideals so that is what worship of God 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