In India there are six orthodox schools of philosophy which
recognize the authority
of the Vedas
as divine revelation, and they generally function as pairs—
Nyaya
and Vaishesika, Mimamsa and Vedanta, and
Samkhya and Yoga.
Those who did not recognize this authority
were the Jains, Buddhists, and materialists.
Even in India, where
spiritual ideas dominate the culture, there were some
who were
skeptical of those ideals and held to a materialist view of the
world;
they were called Carvaka, and their doctrine
that
this world is all that exists is called Lokayata.
The materialists did not believe in an afterlife and found
sense perception to be
the only source of knowledge, denying the
validity of inference or general concepts.
They focused on the
senses and the four traditional elements of earth, water, fire,
and air.
Consciousness for the Carvaka is only a modification
of these elements in the body.
The soul is also identified with
the body, and pleasure and pain are the central experiences
of
life, nature being indifferent to good and evil
with virtue and
vice being merely social conventions.
This worldly philosophy naturally ignored the goal of liberation
(moksha)
or simply believed that death as the end of life
and consciousness was a liberation.
However, they also tended
to neglect the value of virtue or justice (dharma),
placing
all of their attention on the worldly aims
of pleasure (kama)
and wealth or power (artha).
Although Carvaka ideas are mentioned in some ancient
writings,
their own ancient writings were lost, and much of what
we know of the early materialists
is based on criticisms of other
schools.
However, a famous, ancient drama called The Rise of
the Moon of Intellect
(Prabodha-candrodaya) reveals
some of the beliefs of this worldly movement.
In this play Passion
is personified and speaks to a materialist and one of his pupils.
Passion laughs at ignorant fools, who imagine that spirit is
different from the body
and reaps a reward in a future existence.
This is like expecting trees to grow in air and produce fruit.
Has anyone seen the soul separate from the body?
Does not life
come from the configuration of the body?
Those who believe otherwise
deceive themselves and others.
Their ancient teacher Brihaspati
affirmed the importance of the senses,
maintaining that sustenance
and love are the objects of human life.
For the materialists the Vedas
are a cheat.
If blessings are obtained through sacrifices and
the victims ascend to heaven,
why do not children sacrifice their
parents?
How can fasting, begging, penance, and exposure to the
elements be compared
to the ravishing embraces of women with large
eyes and prominent breasts?
The pleasures of life are no more
to be avoided because they are mixed with pain
than a prudent
person would throw away unpeeled rice because it has a husk.
Sacrifices,
reciting the Vedas, and penance
are merely ways
that ignorant and weak men contrive to support
themselves.
Yet upon analysis it was often found that the materialists'
theory that no general inferences
can be made contradicted their
own views about the nature of the world.
Nevertheless their hedonistic
philosophy at times gave a humanistic criticism
of the ethical
contradictions of others.
In the great epic Mahabharata
a Carvaka is burned to death for preaching
against the bloodshed
of the great war and condemning Yudhishthira
for killing thousands
to regain his kingdom.
They did criticize sacrifices and valued
the arts as a means of pleasure.
Hell they believed to be the
pain experienced in this world,
but all this ended in death.
Like
Epicureans, they found that pleasure could be maximized and pain
minimized
by detachment (vairagya).
Immortality was only
found in the fame one leaves behind for noble deeds performed.
The Nyaya and Vaishesika schools are primarily analytic and
are therefore
more concerned with logic and epistemology than
ethics.
The word nyaya means that by which the mind is
led to a conclusion.
The Nyaya school formed about the fourth
century BC with the Nyaya Sutras by Gautama.
The
first sentence declares that supreme happiness is attained by
knowledge
of the sixteen categories which are right knowledge,
objects of knowledge, doubt, purpose,
example, tenets, inference,
confutation, ascertainment, discussion, sophistry, cavil, fallacy,
quibble, futile rejoinder, and losing arguments.
Knowledge comes
from perception, inference, comparison, and verbal testimony.
Objects of knowledge are self, body, sense organs, sense objects,
intellect, mind,
activity, defects, rebirth, fruit, pain, and
release.
The soul is distinct from the sense organs and the mind,
which
it uses to make judgments with the aid of memory.
Judgments and
actions are transitory but produce karma,
which causes the union
of the soul with the body,
the soul transmigrating from a dead
body to another birth.
Gautama recognized the soul as the cause
of the body
but also acknowledged parents and food as other causes
as well.
Ethical concerns can be found in the discussion of the defects
and the means of liberation.
Gautama mentioned three categories
of defects as attachment, aversion, and misconception.
Vatsyayana,
who wrote the first commentary on the Nyaya Sutras
in the 4th century CE,
explained that attachment can come from
lust, jealousy, avarice, greed, and covetousness;
aversion from
anger, envy, malice, hatred, and resentment;
and misconception
from wrong apprehension, suspicion, pride, and negligence.
Gautama considered misconception the worst sin because
without
it attachment and aversion do not occur.
By fruit Gautama referred
to what is produced by activity and defects.
These results of
action (karma) may occur immediately or after a long interval.
Release is defined as the absolute deliverance from pain.
Release
does not occur though because of debts, afflictions, and activities.
However, when knowledge is attained, wrong notions and defects
disappear,
removing pain and bringing about release.
Since false
concepts are the cause of the chain of events
that leads to pain,
correct knowledge is the solution.
Even hatred of pain and attachment to pleasure can bind one.
The activities of mind, speech, and body must be good and not
bad
but must also be performed without attachment.
Selfishness
is associated with false concepts, and virtuous actions emphasize
the soul
rather than the body and its senses.
True knowledge comes
from meditation, which is prepared for by good deeds.
Gautama
recommended practicing yoga in forests, caves, and on riverbanks.
To attain final release the soul may be embellished by the restraints
and observances
of the internal discipline learned from yoga.
Study and friendly discussion with those learned in knowledge
is also suggested.
The Vaishesika philosophy is considered the oldest of the six
orthodox schools
and may even be pre-Buddhist.
The Vaishesika
Sutras by Kanada were written shortly before Gautama's Nyaya
Sutras.
The word vishesa means particularity, and this
philosophy
emphasizes the significance of individuals.
Vaishesika
recognizes three objects of experience as having real objective
existence,
namely substance, quality, and activity, and three
products of intellectual discrimination
which are generality,
particularity, and combination.
The reality of the soul is inferred from the discernment that
consciousness
cannot be a property of the body, senses, or mind.
However, the life of the soul's knowing, feeling, and willing
is only found where the body is.
Each soul experiences the consequences
of its own actions,
resulting in the differences between individuals,
from which the plurality of souls is inferred.
Even liberated
souls maintain unique characteristics in the Vaishesika philosophy.
The Vaishesika Sutra begins with the idea that virtue
(dharma)
is the means by which prosperity and salvation are
attained,
but it acknowledges the authority of the Vedas
as the word of God that leads to this prosperity and salvation.
As with Nyaya the supreme good results from knowledge, in this
case of the six predicables—
substance, quality, activity, generality,
particularity, and combination.
In addition to the four traditional
elements of earth, water, fire, and air,
they name ether (akasha),
time, space, soul, and mind as the only other substances.
One
need not fall back on the scriptures to know the existence of
the soul,
because the expression of "I" makes its reality
clear.
The qualities are color, taste, smell, touch, numbers,
size, separation,
conjunction and disjunction, priority and posteriority,
understanding,
pleasure and pain, desire and aversion, and volition.
Activity is going up or down, contracting, expanding, and motion.
Action (karma) is opposed by its effect, which is how it
is neutralized.
Individuals are only responsible for voluntary
actions;
actions from organic life are considered involuntary.
Worldly good is attained by ceremonial piety, but spiritual
value is found by insight.
The highest pleasure of the wise is
found in independence from all agencies involving
memory, desire,
and reflection, and this knowledge results from peacefulness of
mind,
contentment, and virtue.
Pleasure and pain result from the
contact between soul, senses, the mind, and objects.
When the
mind becomes steady in the soul through yoga, pain can be prevented.
Liberation (moksha) is not having any conjunction with
the body and no potential
for a body so that rebirth cannot take
place.
The traditional character of this school can be seen from
the actions
recommended for achieving merit.
Ablution, fast, abstinence (brahmacharya), residence in the family of the preceptor,
life of retirement in the forest, sacrifice, gift, oblation, directions, constellations,
seasons, and religious observances conduce to invisible fruit.1
Progress comes from virtue (dharma), but even this has
consequences which neutralize it;
for ultimate release cannot
occur until even virtue is eradicated in selfless insight.
So
long as one is dominated by desire and aversion,
virtue and its
opposite are stored up, preventing liberation.
When one realizes
that all objects that seem either attractive or repulsive are
merely compounds of atoms, their power over one ceases.
True knowledge
of the soul dispels self-interest in universal awareness.
Each
soul reaps the harvest of its deeds in this life or a future one,
but with liberation it becomes absolutely free.
The awareness
of the seer is the vision of perfection which results from virtue.
The Mimamsa philosophy is also very ancient, and the Mimamsa
Sutra by Jaimini
was written about the 4th century BC.
This
text begins with the subject of dharma, which the Vedas consider
the means most conducive
to the highest good.
Dharma transcends sense perception,
because the senses only perceive what exists in the present;
dharma
in the Mimamsa philosophy has a metaphysical reality that carries
into the future.
The soul also transcends the body, senses, and mind, being
omnipresent, eternal, and many.
In Mimamsa the soul is the agent
that causes all movement of the body.
Like in Vaishesika, salvation
occurs when the fruits of all good and bad actions are exhausted,
and the generation of new effects is stopped.
However, in Mimamsa
Vedic prayers, rituals, and sacrifices
are emphasized as the means
of achieving this.
Women as well as men were allowed to perform
sacrifices,
but Sudras were still forbidden.
In the ancient Mimamsa
philosophy the experience
of happiness in heaven was the ultimate
goal.
Mimamsa is based on the revelation in the Vedas,
which are considered as eternal as the world.
The metaphysics
of this ethics even comes close to replacing God
as the source
of all action that governs the universe.
Essentially everything
is determined by character (dharma) or lack of it
through
the law of karma or action with its consequences.
Not only is
the soul as the agent of action real, but the action itself is
a spiritual reality
that transcends space and time, determining
the nature of the universe.
This unseen force is called apurva,
which means something new, extraordinary, or unknown.
Thus dharma or action (karma) supports the universe.
If it is ethically right, it produces enjoyment; if it is wrong,
then suffering is experienced.
This force (shakti) of dharma
or karma is extraordinary and unseen.
The universe, being eternal,
is not created by this force, but it is shaped by it.
A unity
to this universal force is posited to control
and guide individuals
in a single cosmic harmony.
Yet humans are free and determine their own destiny by their
actions.
The karma from past actions does not limit free choices
but is like capital that can be spent in various ways as it is
resolved.
The soul usually carries a mixture of good and evil
consequences,
and these may cancel each other.
Obligations are
actions which must be performed, or one gets demerit,
though there
is no merit for doing them.
Prohibited actions if done also cause
demerit, but if avoided likewise do not give merit.
Optional actions
may produce merit or demerit according to their consequences.
Focusing primarily on the spiritual effects of rituals,
the Mimamsa
philosophy relies on the Dharma
Sutras
for guidance in worldly ethical questions.
The Vedanta school complements Mimamsa's focus on the Vedas and sacrifices
y illuminating
the knowledge of the Upanishads as the "end of the
Vedas,"
hich is what Vedanta means.
The Vedanta
Sutra, written between the 500 and 200 BC by Badarayana,
is
also called the Brahma Sutra since it discusses
knowledge of Brahman (Spirit)
and sometimes Shariraka
Sutra because it concerns
the embodiment of the unconditioned
self.
The Vedanta Sutra attempts to clarify the
meaning of the Upanishads
and is rather terse,
but it has been made famous by the commentaries
written by the great Vedanta
philosophers of the middle ages—Shankara, Ramanuja, and Madhva.
If the way of action derives from the Mimamsa theory of karma,
Vedanta suggests a way of knowledge by the soul of Spirit.
The
first chapter of the Vedanta Sutra describes Brahman
as the central reality and creator of the world and the individual
souls.
The second chapter answers objections and explains the
world's dependence on God
and its evolution back into Brahman.
The third chapter suggests ways of knowing Brahman,
and the fourth
chapter indicates the rewards or fruits of knowing this Spirit.
Badarayana is traditional in that he believed knowledge comes
from scripture (sruti)
and other authorities (smriti),
though sruti as revelation is identified with perception
and smriti as interpretation with inference.
Scripture
refers to the Vedas and smriti
to the
Bhagavad-Gita, Mahabharata,
and Laws of Manu.
Reason
for Badarayana must conform to the Vedas,
but it is nonetheless subordinate to intuitive knowledge,
which
can come from devotion and meditation.
Brahman as Spirit is considered
the light of the soul, which is also eternal,
though Brahman is
distinguished from the intelligent soul and the unintelligent
material things.
As in Mimamsa individuals are responsible for their own actions
and thus determine their own happiness or suffering.
The soul
is affected by pleasure and pain, but the highest Lord is not.
Injunctions and prohibitions exist because of the connection of
the soul with the body.
Ethical action helps the soul attain a
body fit for knowledge of Brahman,
which then may be attained
through service, renunciation, and meditation.
Meditation on the
highest yields unity with the infinite and knowledge of Spirit
(Brahman),
enabling one to stop producing karma and end the
cycle of karma and reincarnation.
Badarayana combined earlier views of Brahman as indeterminate
intelligence
and a definite personal Lord.
While developing itself
in the universe, Brahman is still transcendent.
Though Brahman
is in individual souls, it is not polluted by their defects.
Human
purpose comes through knowledge of Brahman,
which also results
in bliss and the nullification of works (karma).
To obtain
knowledge one must be calm and in control of the senses.
Works
can be combined with knowledge, but those performing them
must
not be overcome by passion.
Knowledge may also be promoted through
special acts such as prayer, devotion, and fasting.
Meditation,
though, should focus not on symbols of the soul but the reality.
Through immobile meditation, thoughtfulness and concentration
are increased,
and meditation needs to be practiced up to death.
By resolving karma through knowledge, oneness with Brahman is
attained.
At death the liberated soul is released from the body
and does not return to another.
Kapila, the legendary founder of the Samkhya school, is said
to have been an incarnation
of Vishnu or Agni; he probably lived
during the seventh century BC
at the time of the early Upanishads.
Kapila was endowed with virtue, knowledge, renunciation, and supernatural
power,
and taking pity on humanity, he taught the Samkhya doctrine
to the Brahmin Asuri,
who is mentioned in the Satapatha Brahmana
as an expert in sacrificial rituals.
The Samkhya knowledge
of discerning the spirit from nature is explained in the
Shvetashvatara Upanishad.
The
word samkhya means discriminating knowledge
and came to
mean number as an exact form of knowledge.
In Asvaghosha's Life of the Buddha (Buddhacarita),
Siddartha is taught Samkhya ideas during his ascetic phase.
Aradha described nature (prakriti)
as consisting of the five subtle elements, the ego, intellect,
the unmanifest, the external objects of the five senses, the five
senses, the hands, feet, voice,
anus, generative organ, and the
mind.
All of these make up the field which is to be known by the
soul.
Worldly existence is caused by ignorance,
the merits and
demerits of former actions, and desire.
He then explained the
problems of mistakes, egoism, confusion, fluctuation
(thinking
that mind and actions are the same as the "I"),
indiscrimination
(between the illumined and the unwise),
false means (rituals and
sacrifices), inordinate attachment,
and gravitation (possessiveness).
The wise must learn to distinguish the manifested from the unmanifested.
When the prince asked how this is to be accomplished,
Aradha explained
the practice of yoga.
Though an orthodox Hindu school, Samkhya
did criticize
the killing of animals in the sacrifices.
Samkhya ideas also appeared in the Mahabharata
in the portions known as the
Bhagavad-Gita
and the Mokshadharma from book 12.
In the latter the intellect (buddhi) controlled by the spirit (purusha)
evolves
the mind (manas), the senses, and then the gross elements.
The three qualities found in all beings are goodness (sattva),
passion (rajas), and darkness (tamas).
Goodness
brings pleasure, passion pain, and darkness apathy.
The knower
of the field is emphasized as the spirit (purusha) or soul
(atman),
and Samkhya and Yoga are considered two aspects
(knowledge and practice) of the same philosophy.
The standard
25 Samkhya principles are enumerated as the eight material
principles
and the sixteen modifications completed by the all-important
spirit (purusha)
or unmanifest knower of the field.
Ethically the Mokshadharma explains the Samkhya follower as:
Unselfish, without egotism, free from the pairs, having cut off doubts,
he is not angry and does not hate, nor does he speak false words.
When reviled and beaten, because of his kindness he has no bad thought;
he turns away from reprisal in word, action, and thought, all three.
Alike to all beings, he draws near to Brahma (God).
He neither desires, nor is he without desire;
he limits himself to merely sustaining life.
Not covetous, unshaken, self-controlled; not active,
yet not neglecting religious duty; his sense-organs are not drawn to many objects,
his desires are not widely scattered;
he is not harmful to any creature; such a Samkhya-follower is released.2
In meditation the soul may be seen by the yoga of concentration
and the Samkhya yoga
of discriminating reason as well as the yoga
of works.
By knowing all the courses of the world one may turn
away from the senses
so that after leaving the body that one will
be saved, according to the Samkhya view.
Disciplined purity and
compassion to all creatures are important;
the weak may perish,
but the strong get free.
The field-knower governs all the strands
of the material world.
Making thought come to rest by meditation,
perfected in knowledge and calm,
one goes to the immortal place.
The elaborated Samkhya doctrine is attributed to Pancashikha,
but the earliest Samkhya text is the Samkhya Karika
from the second or third century CE by Ishvara Krishna.
According
to this text the three qualities of goodness (sattva),
activity (rajas),
and ignorance (tamas), whose natures
are pleasure, pain, and delusion,
serve the purpose of illumination,
action, and restraint.
The great principle of intellect (buddhi),
which evolves the world,
in its good (sattvic) form has
virtue, wisdom, non-attachment, and lordly powers;
but the reverse
are its dark (tamasic) forms.
Yet it is the will that accomplishes the spirit's experiences
and discriminates
the subtle difference between nature (prakriti)
and spirit (purusha).
Uniting with the all-embracing power
of nature, causes and effects
lead to virtue and ascent to the
higher planes or vice and descent to lower.
Goodness comes from
wisdom, bondage from the opposite.
Attachment and activity lead
to transmigration.
Attainments come from correct reasoning, oral
instruction by a teacher, study,
the suppression of misery, intercourse
with friends, and purity.
Sattva predominates in the worlds
above, tamas in those below,
and rajas in the middle
with the pain of decay and death.
Evolution from the will down to specific elements modifies
nature and emancipates each spirit.
Just as one undertakes action
in the world to release the desire for satisfaction,
so does the
unevolved function for the liberation of the spirit.
Thus spirit
is never really bound or liberated nor does it transmigrate;
only
nature in its manifold forms is bound, migrates, or is liberated.
The pure spirit, resting like a spectator, perceives nature which
has ceased
to be productive and by discriminating knowledge turns
back from the dispositions.
When virtue and other karma cease
to function, the spirit of the individual
remains invested with
the body by past impressions;
but when separation from the body
comes,
its purpose is fulfilled as it attains eternal and absolute
independence.
The practice of yoga in India is very ancient, probably even
pre-Aryan.
Yoga is mentioned in several Upanishads,
and its philosophy is described in the great epics,
particularly
in the Bhagavad-Gita portion of
the Mahabharata.
The
classic text for what is called the royal (raja) yoga is
Patanjali's Yoga Sutras,
probably
written in the second century BC,
although scholarly estimates
range from the fourth century BC to the fourth century CE.
The
word yoga has the same origin as the English word "yoke"
and means union.
In the Katha Upanishad
the senses are to be controlled as spirited horses are by a yoke.
The raja yoga tersely described by Patanjali as having
eight limbs
is considered the psychological yoga.
The Yoga
Sutras begin with the idea that yoga (union) is the control
of the
modifications of consciousness; this enables the seer to
stand in one's own form
instead of identifying with the modifications.
The five modifications are knowledge (perception, inference, and
testimony),
error (ideas not formed from reality), imagination
(ideas without objects),
sleep, and memory (experienced objects).
These are controlled by practice and detachment.
Practice requires
constant attention for a long time,
and detachment comes from
getting free of the desire for experiences.
Mastery of this comes
from the spirit overcoming the qualities.
Meditation can be reasoning, discriminating, and joyful awareness
of the unity of the universe
and self or cessation by renunciation
and constantly dissolving impressions,
resulting in undifferentiated
existence, bodilessness, absorption in the supreme, or faith,
enthusiasm, memory, and wisdom.
Intense practice brings the best
results, or it may be achieved by surrendering to the Lord.
The
perfect spirit of the Lord is untouched by afflictions, actions,
and their results;
it is the infinite seed of omniscience beyond
time, and its symbol is the sacred word.
Constant practice of
that brings cosmic consciousness and the absence of obstacles.
The obstacles that distract consciousness are disease, laziness,
indecision, apathy, lethargy,
craving sense-pleasure, erroneous
perception, lack of concentration, and unstable attention.
These
distractions are accompanied by sorrow, worry, restlessness, and
irregular breathing.
Cultivating the feelings of friendship, compassion,
joy, and equanimity toward those
who are happy, suffering, worthy,
and unworthy
purifies consciousness, as does breathing in and
out.
Subtle vision modifies the higher consciousness by bringing
the mind stability,
as does the transcendent inner light, the
awareness that controls passions,
the analytical knowledge of
dreams and sleep, and concentration according to choice.
The lessened modifications become transparent and transformed,
and the memory is purified and empty so that objects shine without
thought.
The subtle elements become undefinable nature in the
meditation with seed.
Beyond discrimination the oversoul is blessed
with direct truth,
which is different from verbal inferences.
This impression prevents all other impressions,
and control of
even this controls everything in seedless meditation.
The practice of yoga and meditation is enhanced by discipline,
self-study,
and surrender to the Lord in order to remove obstacles
such as ignorance, egoism,
attachment, aversion, and clinging
to life.
Obstacles result in action patterns that cause suffering
in this life and the next,
as virtue and vice bear the fruits
of pleasure and pain;
but concentration overcomes their effects.
Future suffering can be avoided if the perceiver does not identify
with the perceived.
Discriminating undisturbed intelligence removes
ignorance and suffering
by the absence of identity and the freedom
of the perceiver.
The practice of union proceeds through the eight steps of restraint,
observances, posture,
breath control, sublimation, attention,
concentration, and meditation.
The restraints are not injuring,
lying, stealing, lusting, nor possessing and are called
the universal
great vows we have often seen before.
The second step of observances
involves cleanliness, contentment, discipline, self-study,
and
surrender to the Lord.
Patanjali suggested that destructive instincts
may be overcome by cultivating the opposites
of greed, anger,
or delusion.
In confirming nonviolence the presence of hostility
is relinquished.
Not lying brings work and its fruits; not stealing
brings riches; not lusting brings vigor;
and from not possessing
comes knowledge of past and future lives.
Cleanliness brings protection of one's body; goodness purified
becomes serenity;
and single-mindedness conquers the senses.
Being
content gains happiness.
Discipline perfects the senses and destroys
impurities.
By self-study one may commune with the divine ideal,
and meditation is successfully identifying with the Lord.
Stable and pleasant postures (asanas) release tension
and transform thought.
Regulating the inhalation and exhalation
of the breath (pranayama)
prepares the mind for attention.
By withdrawing consciousness from its own objects,
the senses
are sublimated (pratyahara) and under control.
The last three steps of attention (dharana), concentration
(dhyana),
and meditation (samadhi) are the same
as the last three steps of the Buddha's eightfold path.
Attention
is defined by Patanjali as the original focus of consciousness,
concentration as continuing awareness there, and meditation
as
when that shines light alone in its own empty form.
These three
work as one in inner control leading to wisdom and are the psychological
steps.
As the control of destructive instincts and impressions
evolves,
the flow of consciousness becomes calm by habit, and
oneness arises in meditation.
As this oneness evolves, past and
present become similar in the conscious awareness.
Patanjali then described various psychic abilities
that can
be attained from the practice of yoga.
Supernatural powers may
come from birth, drugs, chanting, discipline, or meditation.
Yet
he warned that worldly powers are obstacles to meditation.
Only
the knowledge of discriminating between goodness and spirit
brings
omnipotence and omniscience, and only from detachment to that
is the seed of bondage destroyed in freedom.
The soul of the discriminating
perceiver is completely detached from emotion and mind
so that
with serene discrimination the consciousness can move toward freedom.
Finally the evolution of transforming qualities fulfills its purpose
and stops,
cognized as a distinct transformation.
Patanjali concluded,
Empty for the sake of spirit the qualities return to nature.
Freedom is established in its own form, or it is aware energy.3
This yoga text has been tremendously influential in India and
beyond,
and is in my opinion a very positive guide to spiritual
liberation
as well as being beneficial to ethical development.
The Bhagavad-Gita, which means
The Song of the Lord, was written
between the second century
BC and the second century CE.
It synthesized many ideas from the
Samkhya philosophy and practice of yoga,
but it is also claimed
by Vedanta and Hindu philosophy in general
as its greatest work
on spirituality.
The text is actually contained in Book 6 of the
epic poem Mahabharata,
which tells the story of the great civil war that may have occurred
in India
as early as about 1400 BC or as late as about 900 BC.
These stories will be discussed in the next chapter,
but the dramatic
context for the dialog between the warrior Arjuna
and his charioteer
Krishna is the beginning of the actual battle
between the rival
ruling families, the Kauruvas and Pandavas.
The Bhagavad-Gita is narrated
by the sage Sanjaya, who clairvoyantly perceives
what is going
on and relates it to the blind King Dhritarashtra.
Krishna is
an uncle and friend of the Pandavas, but remaining neutral
he
allowed one side to use his vassals in battle,
while the Pandava
Arjuna got to have him as charioteer,
although he would not fight
himself.
By the time this was written, Krishna was considered
an incarnation of the god Vishnu,
the preserver, and he teaches
Arjuna several kinds of yoga for achieving union with God.
This
is the earliest work that emphasized the religious worship of
God
through devotion to an avatar or incarnation of God
which
developed into the Vaishnavite faith in medieval Hinduism.
The poem begins with Dhritarashtra asking Sanjaya what is happening
not only on the field
of Kuru but also on the field of dharma
(virtue, duty).
Sanjaya describes how both armies are arrayed
against each other
blowing their conch horns to show their readiness
to fight.
Then Arjuna asks Krishna to position his chariot between
the two armies,
and there he sees many of his relatives on the
other side,
causing him to feel faint and consider not fighting.
Even though the others are killing, Arjuna does not think it
would be worth it to do so,
even for sovereignty of the three
worlds, let alone an earthly kingdom.
Evil would come to him,
he says, if he should kill his relatives.
How could this bring
happiness?
This family destruction is wrong and would destroy
ancient family duties
and bring on lawlessness, which would lead
to corruption of the women and caste mixing.
Why should he kill
for greed of royal pleasures?
It would be greater happiness for
him to be killed unresisting and unarmed.
Thus Arjuna's mind was
overcome by sorrow.
Krishna, who is called the Lord, responds by upbraiding Arjuna
for timidity and cowardice
that would cause disgrace, urging him
to stand up.
Arjuna answers that it would be better to live by
begging than be smeared
with the blood of his noble teachers.
He does not see what would remove this sorrow even if he were
to win
unrivaled prosperity and royal power.
Once again Arjuna
declares that he will not fight.
The Lord now tells Arjuna that he is grieving unnecessarily
even though his words are wise.
As he is eternal, so are the slain,
and all will exist forever.
No one can cause the destruction of
the imperishable;
though the bodies have an end, the infinite
soul is indestructible and eternal.
Like a person abandoning worn-out
clothes takes new ones,
so does the soul enter new bodies.
Therefore
he should not mourn, because death is certain for those born;
but the soul is eternally inviolable.
According to Krishna Arjuna should look to his duty as a Kshatriya
to battle;
to avoid this duty would be evil.
If he is killed,
he will go to heaven; if he conquers, he will enjoy the Earth.
Making pleasure and pain the same, gain and loss, victory and
defeat,
he should fight to avoid evil.
From the perspective of universal ethics I have to criticize
this justification
of the caste system and war mentality.
While
I agree that it is our duty to act courageously and not refuse
to act out of cowardice,
the principles of love, freedom, responsibility,
health, justice, and others guide us
by the all-important principle
of not harming (ahimsa)
which is violated in organized
war to a maximum extent.
The duty of a Kshatriya is to work for
justice and protect lives, not to kill people.
Mahatma Gandhi
and others have shown us that we can stand up to wrong and refuse
to capitulate to it without using violence, which merely multiplies
the wrong and harm.
I think it is especially important to criticize
this error in one of the world's otherwise
wisest books so that
it cannot as easily be used as a justification for this violent
behavior,
which had not been purified out of Aryan culture in
that time.
Krishna explains how to use the unified intuition of the Samkhya
philosophy
and Yoga practice to act without attachment to the
fruits of action.
Following the letter of the scripture and performing
rituals does not avail.
Staying in yoga with unified intuition
and letting go of the fruit of action,
one will be free of misery
and the bondage of birth.
When in meditation the intuition stands
unmoving, union is attained.
Arjuna asks Krishna what such a person is like.
When one gives
up all desires in the mind and is satisfied in the soul by the
soul,
then one is steady in wisdom.
In pain free of anxiety, in
pleasure free of desire,
the sage departs from passion, fear,
and anger.
Withdrawing from the senses, like a tortoise in its
shell, one should sit unified with the Lord
in the supreme with
senses under control.
From contemplating objects comes attachment,
then desire, anger, delusion,
memory wandering, and loss of intuition
until one perishes.
By eliminating lust and aversion while still
engaging the objects of the senses,
the self-governing attains
tranquillity, clear thoughts, and steady intuition.
The undisciplined
have no intuition, no concentration, and no peace;
but by giving
up desires, longing, and possessiveness one attains the holy state
of peace.
Once again Arjuna asks if intuition is better than action,
why is he being urged to this terrible action.
Krishna teaches
that Samkhya knowledge and yoga action
are to be performed but
without attachment.
To renounce action and then remember the senses
is to be a deluded hypocrite.
Maintaining the body requires action,
and so controlled action is better than inaction.
God-produced
action originates in the imperishable God of the sacrifice.
Observing
what the world needs, one should act free of attachment.
Even
the Lord must act and set an example for others to act, or confusion
would result.
All actions are performed by the qualities of nature;
only
the deluded self thinks the "I" is the doer.
The deluded
are attached to qualified actions,
but the knower of the whole
does not disturb fools.
He should entrust all his actions to the
Lord,
meditating on the supreme soul and not complain.
Even the
wise act according to their own nature,
and it is better to follow
one's own duty than another's, which can be dangerous.
Arjuna asks what compels a person to do harm.
The Lord replies
that desire and anger from the emotional quality are injurious.
These obscure knowledge as smoke does fire.
The senses must be
restrained.
Higher than the senses is the mind; higher than the
mind is the intuition;
and even higher is the soul.
Krishna says that he knows his past lives and that as an avatar
he is born from age to age
to protect the good and destroy evil-doers
in order to establish justice.
By trusting the Lord and being
purified by disciplined knowledge
many have attained the Lord.
The ancient way of action is for liberation.
The enlightened can
see action in inaction and inaction in action.
Independent action
is without hope, possession, and envy.
God is attained by contemplating
the action of God.
Action without desire is consumed in the fire
of knowledge.
Yogis practice sacrifice to the divine by restraining
their senses,
controlling the breath, and regulating food.
Attaining
knowledge works better than sacrificing material possessions.
Krishna does not see Samkhya and yoga as separate,
but either
practiced correctly yields the results of both.
Though renunciation
yoga can lead to the best, the yoga of action is even better.
By putting actions in God, free of attachment, one is not affected
by evil and attains peace.
Unattached to external contacts, the
soul, united to God, enjoys imperishable happiness,
but delights
from contact give birth to pain with a beginning and an end.
Enduring
the agitation brought on by desire and anger,
the united one has
inner happiness and light, attaining oneness with God.
With sins
wiped out and dualities dissolved, the self-controlled,
attaining
nirvana, rejoices in the welfare of all beings.
One should uplift the self by the soul, not lower the soul.
The self may be the friend or enemy of the soul,
depending on
whether the self is mastered by the soul or not.
The self-mastered
is peaceful, steadfast, content with self-knowledge,
detached
from companions, and neutral toward enemies and friends with impartial
intuition.
Krishna recommends disciplined moderation in eating
and sleeping, not either extreme.
Seeing the soul in the soul,
one is not disturbed even by heavy sorrow.
Mastering the senses
with the mind, the intuition may then quiet the mind,
the soul
making it stand still.
When the mind wanders, one should master
it by directing the will in the soul.
The united soul observes
the soul in all beings, seeing the Lord everywhere.
Arjuna confesses that his mind is unstable and hard to hold
back.
Krishna replies that no one doing good suffers misfortune
but improves from life to life toward perfection.
Persevering
in mental control and cleansed of guilt, one goes toward the supreme
goal.
The mind, absorbed in the Lord practicing union, will know
this completely;
but deluded evil-doers, robbed by illusion, do
not.
Practicing union, one goes to the divine Spirit at death.
The light path leads to liberation from rebirth with God,
but
the dark path brings return to reincarnation.
Krishna recommends a path of devotion to him as a way of supreme
liberation
and describes to Arjuna his extraordinary characteristics.
Then Arjuna asks to see his divine form, and he is blessed with
that overwhelming vision.
When Arjuna asks Krishna who has the
best knowledge of union,
he replies that those who worship him
with the greatest faith are most united,
although those who worship
the imperishable, unmanifest, and omnipresent also attain him.
Knowledge is better than practice, meditation superior to knowledge,
and renunciation better than meditation.
The yogi is a friend
of all beings, free of ego, indifferent to pain and pleasure,
patient, self-restrained, and devoted to God.
Those who worship
the immortal justice with faith and devotion are beloved by the
Lord.
Next Krishna differentiates nature and spirit, the field from
the knower of the field.
The field is composed of the elements,
ego, intuition, the senses and their objects,
desire, aversion,
pleasure, pain, and consciousness.
Spirit is the cause situated
in nature which experiences the qualities born of nature.
Attachment
to those qualities is what brings about birth.
The supreme spirit in this body is also said to be the observer, allower, supporter,
experiencer, the great Lord and the supreme soul.
Whoever thus knows spirit and nature together with the qualities,
even in any stage of existence, this one is not born again.4
Whoever perceives the same supreme Lord in all beings
that
never perishes goes to the supreme goal.
The imperishable soul
dwelling in the body free of qualities
does not act and is not
stained.
Krishna explains that the quality of goodness is bound by attachment
to happiness and knowledge, the quality of emotion by attachment
to desire and action,
and the dark quality by ignorance, confusion,
neglect, and laziness.
Goodness works by knowledge, emotion by
greed, effort, action, restlessness, and lust,
and darkness by
negligence and confusion.
By transcending all three qualities
the observer perceives
and knows the highest and attains immortality.
Arjuna asks how this may be accomplished.
The Lord answers
that by sitting impartially one is not disturbed by the qualities;
standing firm one does not waver, the same in pain and pleasure,
self-reliant,
equal to blame and praise, to friend and foe.
In
devotional union these qualities are transcended, making one fit
for God realization.
The endowment of the divine comes from fearlessness,
purity,
perseverance in knowledge of union, charity, restraint,
sacrifice, spiritual study, austerity,
straightforwardness, nonviolence,
truth, no anger, renunciation, peace, no slander,
compassion for
creatures, no greed, kindness, modesty, no fickleness,
vigor,
patience, courage, no hatred, and no excessive pride.
Hypocrisy, arrogance, conceit, anger, harshness, and ignorance
lead to the demonic,
who are untruthful, unstable, and godless.
Attached to desire and accepting false notions, clinging to anxiety
ending in death,
with gratification of desire their highest aim,
convinced that this is all
and using the unjust means of wealth,
they acquire property and slay enemies;
but they are wrapped in
a net of delusion, attached to desires, and fall into an unclean
hell.
Clinging to ego, force, insolence, desire, and anger the
envious hate the soul in other bodies,
and entering a demonic
womb, are deluded in birth after birth.
One should renounce desire,
anger, and greed as the threefold gate of hell.
An example of the practical experience of the three qualities
is how they are related to food.
Promoting life, goodness, strength, health, happiness, and satisfaction,
flavorful, juicy, substantial, and hearty foods are liked by the good.
Pungent, sour, salty, hot, spicy, dry, burnt foods are wanted by the emotional,
causing pain, misery, and sickness.
Spoiled, tasteless, putrid, stale, and what is rejected
as well as the unclean is the food liked by the ignorant.5
The austerity of the good is pure, virtuous, and nonviolent;
the austerity of the emotional is hypocritical for honor and respect
on Earth;
and that of the dark is for the purpose of destroying
another.
The good gift is given freely at the proper time and
place to a worthy person;
the gift given for a reward or unwillingly
is emotional;
and the dark gift is given at the wrong place and
time to the unworthy with contempt.
Action according to the three qualities is also described.
Liberated from attachment, not egotistical, accompanied by courage and resolution,
unperturbed in success or failure, the actor is called good.
Passionate, wishing to obtain the fruit of action, greedy, violent-natured, impure,
accompanied by joy and sorrow, the actor is proclaimed to be emotional.
Undisciplined, vulgar, stubborn, deceitful, dishonest, lazy, depressed,
and procrastinating, the actor is called dark.6
Finally Krishna summarizes his teachings for attaining perfection
and God,
the highest state of knowledge.
United with cleansed intuition, controlling the self with will, and relinquishing,
starting with sound, sense objects, and rejecting passion and hatred, living isolated,
eating lightly, controlling speech, body, and mind, constantly intent on union meditation,
relying on detachment, releasing ego, force, pride, desire, anger, possessiveness;
unselfish, peaceful, one is fit for oneness with God.
Becoming God, soul serene, one does not grieve nor desire,
the same among all creatures, one attains supreme devotion to me.
By devotion to me one realizes who and what I am in truth;
then knowing me in truth one enters immediately.
Performing all actions always trusting in me, one attains by my grace
the imperishable eternal home.
Surrendering consciously all actions in me, intent on me,
constantly be conscious of me relying on intuitive action.7
Thus Krishna offers himself as a refuge and guide toward liberation
through knowledge
and detachment from the fruits of action in
one of the wisest
and most inspiring books ever written.
1. Vaishesika Sutra tr. Nandalal Sinha, 6:2:2.
2. Mokshadharma in Mahabharata 12:295:33-36 quoted
in Larson, G.
J., Classical Samkhya, p. 128.
3. Patanjali, Yoga Sutras (author's version), 4:34.
4. Bhagavad Gita (author's version), 13:22-23.
5. Ibid. 17:8-10.
6. Ibid. 18:26-28.
7. Ibid. 18:51-57.
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