Video 59

59. Bhagavad Gita I Chapter 4 Verse 42 and Chapter 4 Summary I Swami Sarvapriyananda

[Music] guru we were studying the fourth chapter of the bhagavad gita and we are almost we're just at the end if i remember correctly we were we had just the 42nd verse to finish the last one first number 42 yoga therefore o descendant of bharata destroying this doubt born of ignorance of the self and seated in the heart with the sword of knowledge take to yoga and arise so he says this uh ignorance ignorance of what ignorance of our real nature that's at the root of samsara and that's that's in the heart that's in the heart means that's uh that's in our minds our anta karana that is at the root of the undercurrent itself of the mind destroy it with the with the sword of knowledge you cut it with the sword of knowledge knowledge destroys ignorance then yoga matashita take to yoga practice yoga and he says exhorting him utthesta be up and doing so that is the upanishadic original meaning is arise awake approach the masters of iran learn from them you know and become enlightened so i can't adapted it very inspiringly arise awake and stop not till the goal is reached uh here it you can interpret it in two ways one is of course take up the sword of knowledge what knowledge vedantic knowledge self knowledge and destroy the ignorance about the self and that is the practice take to yoga means take to gyani yoga shavonna and be up and doing come to class ut that means come to class and listen carefully and reason it out and then meditate on what you have learned but also let us remember the context the context was arjuna wanted to know this synthesis of karma yoga and ghana yoga what does karma yoga do and what does ghana yoga do how to be enlightened and be in the world at the same time remember krishna told him to become enlightened and told him about karma yoga and then how to practice both of them together in in life in this life itself so there it might mean chitwaynam samshayam this doubt about the practice itself should i do karma yoga should i do gyani yoga should i leave the battlefield give up this doubt practice then yoga mathishta means practice karma yoga convert you you act in life you fight the battle of life convert your activities into spiritual practice that is that is what he means by yoga mates to take to yoga means stick to karma yoga here so that's the second interpretation be up and doing take to action so that is the final verse of the fourth of the fourth chapter 42nd verse he concludes the whole section he starts with tasman therefore therefore means all of what went on before that the 41 verses and which is why i left it to this day to take a look back and revise what we have done so this is something called the um means the example the analogy of a it seems a lion when it's walks royally majestically through the forests as it goes a certain distance it stops and it majestically looks over its shoulder at the distance it has traversed so far so this is called singapore local the lion looking back at the distance traversed so we are now the lion looking back at the distance traversed so far fourth chapter the chapter is called gyana karmas and nyasa yoga karma sannyasa transcendence of action or renunciation of action through knowledge this is called yana karma sannyasi yoga so what's there in this chapter the first thing which strikes us is a very important section at the very beginning which talks about introduces the avatar incarnation of god so here for the first time full-blown krishna admits declares himself to be avatar incarnation of god i'm not just your charioteer i'm not just your friend i'm not just a coward boy from vrindavan i'm not just the king of dwarka but i'm actually the incarnation of of god i am vishnu the lord of the universe come in this human form i am an incarnation which comes from time to time the occasion was when he talked about the yoga which is teaching yoga and karma yoga to arjuna and then he said that i have taught this to ikshwaku i've taught it to to manu i have taught it to viva swan the sun god arjuna says hey wait a minute all of them live thousands tens of thousands maybe millions of years ago how could you teach them you who are teaching me you are my contemporary and then krishna admits that i am but i was also there at that time and i remember all of that all of those births because i am not an uh ajiva sentient being like you or like all of these people i am none other than the um then saguna brahman or ishvara god now we know these definitions it's so important to know these definitions today a young man called from texas and he's desperate i have just one just one question what is that what is the difference between brahmana and ishwara you should come to the vedanta sarah class so i think he's going to come from next class onwards so i am the incarnation of saguna brahmana ishwara and what is that what is an incarnation and sri krishna explains there are few verses some of which are very famous in fact hindus who study the bhagavad-gita they in fact know if they know any verse at all it will probably be one or two of these verses in this book in this chapter what does he say i am different from all of you how am i different avatara and jiva how are they different their sources are different they come from in a different uh from a different source their nature is different and their purpose is different the sources are different means where do we come from we are sentient beings over countless lives we have accumulated karma a lot of karma we have accumulated and a result is that a part of that karma is actualized in each birth and we get a particular body which will live for a particular period of time which will have certain parents certain experiences to have the results of those karmas we are ignorant of our real nature as brahman that i am brahman we don't know that from lifetime to lifetime we are wandering from across lifetimes trying to get satisfaction peace joy and thereby accumulating karma so and being born again and again karma shankaracharya is very powerful phrase of india ignorance we are ignorant of our real nature then calm comes desire for fulfillment and then karma we act for our own fulfillment that leads to results and those results we own those results we own the action and we own the result and therefore we are born again and again to experience the results of those actions and along the way they accumulate fresh karma and so this is an endless chain it goes on our source is ignorance of our real nature just in contrast uh the avatara is fully enlightened avatar is none other than god and god is foolish is fully enlightened ishwara knows that i this cosmic person i am none other than nirguna brahman with the power of maya i need gunabram appear as saguna brahman as ishwara and i am the creator preserver and destroyer of this of this cosmos this is clear omniscient omnipotent omnipresent this this uh powers of god the avatar is fully aware of these things is is uh um it's born from knowledge we are born from ignorance we are born helplessly avatar is born out of a choice avatar is born in freedom we are born in slavery we are we are born in with no freedom we are born helplessly so we have no choice nobody asked us do you want to be born do you want to be born in this country do you want to be have these parents do you want to have these experiences no we have no choice in the matter it is a it is action and consequence we have consequences of past actions of many lives avatara has no burden of karma so avatara is born in freedom avatar is born in knowledge we are born no freedom and in ignorance um does the avatar know all this one question might arise the traditional view especially in vaishnava where the avatar theory is most developed in vaishnavism the ten hours of vishnu and many more endless number of avatars that talked about so this avatar are they aware they may know that i am brahmana but are they aware of that they are god and they have past lives and many past avatars all these things are they aware of all the time the traditional idea and vaishnavism is yes from birth itself the avatar is fully aware of all these things only may pretend not to be for the sake of fulfilling their mission in life the drama they play for us and so this is the traditional view and in the among the disciples of sri ramakrishna we see swami ramakrishnan shashi maharaj was very deep the most probably the one pointed devotion to sri rama krishna and sriram krishna alone he had this traditional view he writes about that the avatar is fully aware of his magnificence and glory and divine origin on the other hand swami saradanandaji who wrote the great master he has a unique take on it he says avatar is naradeva is not a human being he's a sentient being like us but also unlike us so deva means divine as well as human it's a paradoxical thing it's not entirely divine it's not entirely a drama of the theatrical performance the avatar may come may be unaware of his or her uh actual source for some time and may come to realize it in the course of the lifetime of the avatar and so it's it's not that the avatar is acting when sudama krishna is crying and weeping for mother kali and wants to realize uh we have a vision of kali he's not pretending so if you look at the the life of sri ramakrishna when he talks about there are two in this body that is the naraday were two sides of of the um many times he behaves like a human being an extraordinary human being but a human being nevertheless and many people around him they don't even think that he's god they might find him strange eccentric mad or extraordinary whatever it is i remember there was professor hawley here from columbia university a few years ago he gave a nice speech on um i think popular hinduism and then we were talking about you know in christianity modern studies of christianity this is a problem because modern biblical studies they say that the gospels in the in the bible the four gospels are there the first three john is a later gospel but the first three they're called synoptic scene together they do not mention the divinity of christ that christ is god or the son of god it all comes later and so modern scholars immediately you know what they will say this was introduced later when he was simply in in palestine in his lifetime he was seen as a simple person he did not think of himself as a son of god and these things were introduced later i said it is a very difficult situation then if you are a believing christian what will you say that christ the son of god but not actually so please see the footnote no you can't do that then i said what is the solution to this i said actually study the life of an avatar who is a recent avatar and look the solution is there in the life of sri ramakrishna sri ramakrishna himself embodies a human aspect in a divine aspect it's quite possible just like sriram krishna would say i am a child of kali i'm a devotee of kali i am the lowest of the law i'm the servant of the servants of god don't don't call me avatar i don't like to be called our guru none of that i'm your servant he would say and at other times he also said he who was rama he who was krishna is in this body rama and krishna he he identified himself with with kali and he said actually in this body dwell too kali and the devotee of kali are the child of kali so these two sides are equally there it's quite possible that jesus really actually said that i'm the son of a carpenter i'm just a simple person i'm i'm i worship our same as you the lord our father and also he would have declared himself as the son of god and both are equally possible for the same jesus you see what i'm what i'm trying to say so his response was no no no i mean his response was completely to displace first of all you don't regard a ramakrishna as an avatar and so we can't take all these lessons from i don't know well have it your way we are too far removed from christ actually to judge these things and my feeling is also i saw this at harvard also my feeling is a lot of the scholarship is done we are applying our academic methods our scholarly tools and our human intellects to something that far exceeds far outstrips our understanding so when we try to pull it down to our understanding we make serious errors say this was interpolated interpolated this is not real that is false it has been imported from some other philosophy no may not be all right so and the avatar one theory is fully aware of his divinity other theories no avatar is divine but for a time being may not be aware of the divinity and that will help in a proper lila the avatars bodies births are actually different from the sentient beings us our bodies are created from our parents bodies and all of these bodies are made of pancha bhuta the five pancha bhuta the five elements again you see how vedanta sara helps the uh agni apa pritivi and sukshma bhuta the five subtle elements comprise our subtle bodies and the five gross elements pancha mahabhuta and see again vedanta sarah what is subtle element what is gross element the exact connection all of these things we know because of vedanta the five gross elements are used to make up our physical body so they are produced like that from the material the five elements which are already available in the universe obviously these materials have originally come from maya but in the case of avatara this is the doctrine that the avatara's body is directly specially produced by maya our taurus body our subtle body these are specially produced by maya these are not part of the usual bhotika panchayati the five elements there's a special doctrine the body of the avatar is special swami vivekananda says that there's even a teaching you should not destroy the body of an avatar which is why they preserved ramanuja's body still they're supposed to be there it's like more than a thousand years old sri ramana just body is preserved in a certain way it looks like a statue actually so swine vivekananda says after the cremation of srama krishna that we have committed a great sin should never destroy the body of an avatar but we had no other way of course of course that's why we keep the relics we keep the licks and worship it swami vivekananda mentions this in um in the inspired talks nature prakriti maya has two kinds of products one is the general product of the universe and g was us and the universe so us means our bodies physical body subtle body causal body tulasha sukshma reader karana sharira these are produced by maya and the physical universe which is there all around this universe these are all the general products of maya and then he goes on to say it has an occasional special it is a special product maya has a special product which is uh the avatar as the you know jesus and krishna and buddha what he means by that the uh the bodies of the avatars the bodies of the physical body and the subtle body of the avatars are special product of maya they are not made of the usual five elements so this is all part of doctrine you may say no no if you do a spectral analysis of the uh or to do an in-depth molecular analysis of the bodies of avatars how will you find something different i have no idea but this is the the doctrine so basically we are all machine made you know the general products and avataras are handcrafted by maya krishna says that in this chapter he says i directly assume my form um prakriti swami washed up here by taking um my using my prakriti directly i manifest myself it may seem that i am born but actually i manifest myself then the big difference lies in the purpose why are we born and why is god born or god appears to be born as an avatar we are born to exhaust the past karma the the karma which has propelled us into this world we work it out in our lives and we go from lifetime to life time birth to birth and to until we become enlightened this cycle goes on our whole purpose is as vivekananda said the goal is to manifest the divinity already within us and it may take us many lifetimes until we become enlightened and free of this helpless way or circling around but avatar is born in freedom the purpose of avatara is set out very nicely by krishna these are the verses which are most famous in this chapter everybody knows this verse number seven and 8. what is the occasion what prompts the navatara to come whenever dharma declines and whenever adharma increases i embody myself forth why would god do that remember one of the functions of god is the stability of the universe srishti's not only producing the universe not only finally dissolving it but in in the meantime for billions of years the universe and the society and all of that should come along nicely which is why i know that the world is not going to end kovid is not the end of the world the lord will take care of it because one of the purposes of god is to maintain this universe to give us an opportunity the sentient beings to work out our karma and work towards spirituality enlightenment what is the purpose [Music] so these threefold purpose one is most important paritranaya sadhunam to save the holy the good people bina second is vinashayat to destroy the wicked and dharmasang stop and are tired to re-establish or to validate dharma what does it mean on the surface of it the saving the sadhu saving the good people it simply means what we read in all the childhood stories of the puranas and rama and muhammad the demons are plaguing the the holy ones and the incarnation comes and shoots the demons you know with arrows so uh saves them from affliction and torment but the real meaning you see the deeper meaning is this we see in the lives of all the incarnations all the time in the world whether there are incarnations or not there will be holy people there will be saintly people they will be spiritual seekers they just need that final help to become enlightened and free so the avatara's first and foremost purpose is to help the devotees really the lord comes because those who love the lord want him to come he comes first for them for his lovers he loves them he is beloved of them and that's why he comes to rescue them from samsara to give them enlightenment moksha that's why he comes that is the real meaning of saving the good saving the good means salvation freedom moksha nirvana whatever you call it he can directly give it and um we say but people attain it anyway yes very few after many lifetimes but when an avatar comes it becomes much easier it becomes much easier with a little bit of effort we most of us we can we can get across the ocean of samsara we can get liberated in this life itself if we want i have told that story earlier also um you know there's a story of swami ranganathan and the 13th president of our order and swami uh nirmuktanandaji the open maharaj who was a very senior monk he was when i'm talking about the story he was nearly hundred years old now both were disciples of swami shivananda i spoke about swamishivan in the last talk on sunday was the second president of our order ranganaratananduji was his disciple and upon marriage also was his disciple open manage we have seen he would go to swami ranganathan he would ask what will become of me so he's in his 90s what will become of me and i heard swami ranganathan she told him straight away this is your last life and it's quite amazing because you have to repeat it clearly he was not all that good of hearings but when upon marriage asked directly heard and understood immediately and said it in english this is your last life i shall come again to do swamiji's work he says he says about himself i shall come again to do swamiji's work but you don't have to come again so these three sentences and i verified it um after swami ranganathans it passed away i had heard this story you know stories sometimes get exaggerated so i saw i saw my open mind sitting on in the temple of the holy mother one afternoon and i took my i saw my chance opportunity and i went and bowed down to him and i asked him i have heard this swami i want to verify it did you go to ranganathan president maharaj and say what will happen to me before i could say anything more he completed the whole thing he said yes i did and then he said to me ranganathanji said to me this is your last life i shall come again to do swamiji's work but you don't have to come again like sort of recited the three life sentences and interesting he saw the glory of ranganathan that he said look at his attitude he does not even care for moksha he wants to serve god he wants to serve swami vivek and i said well let that be but you've got in bengality that means you have you've got like a permanent vacation this is the end game for you he was not particularly impressed he just said look at the calmness and the rational approach of the person he just said yes uh the blessings of mahapurusha mahapurusha is the name for swami shivananda yes the blessing mahapurusha rashid let us see the blessings of mahapurusha but let us see he's looking forward to it but he is not particularly dancing around that now i've got moksha so on a few days later i was taking him on his wheelchair i still remember in front of the main temple of bellurmat and i asked him that what about oh so another thing i asked him so is it really true that swami ranganathanji will come back and he said again look at the rational and calm response he said he said no that depends on god but what is important is look at the attitude of swami ranganathan we are more excited about these esoteric measures somebody is going to be reborn again how do we know he is not interested in that he says what is important is the attitude this is what we got to learn who will be reborn there who knows and that's up to god then i leaned forward and i i sort of whispered in his talk talking in his ears we were going in front of the temple i was behind him wheeling the wheelchair along and i asked him well uh good for you what about the rest of us and i was joking sort of half joking but he took it seriously he pondered for a moment and then he said this time by the grace of the holy mother most will many will cross over the ocean of samsara by the grace of the mother of the divine mother many will cross over samsara didn't even say by the grace of srila krishna he said the grace of the divine mother which shows it is actually vivekanda also says avatar is an avatar of maya this is consciousness plus maya it's a sagun abram so that is the first duty of the avatar to give enlightenment not only to the deserving of course to the reserving but even to the less deserving who might might be world around in this samsara for lifetimes much much shorter maybe this lifetime maybe just one more life and we get uh the big prize that help the avatar extends and we should take it it's a good time to be born spirituality is on the rise again and it is much more effective now for for some time it will work and then second the purpose of avatar is destruction of the wicked of course we know you know from the stories of ramayana and mahabharata and before that the puranas how the different avatars came and killed the demons so they're all exciting stories i think they put to shame modern hollywood movies with special effects i think one day hollywood movies will make movies about these things it's they're so full of action and spectacular things you know but vinash achar descritam the deeper meaning is to change the wicked ultimately the wicked also will become enlightened the wicked will become good and the good will become enlightened that is the the flow so the wicked turned good and the good finally become enlightened [Music] that prayer is there dude [Music] our prayer is let the wicked become good let the good attain to peace let the peaceful attain enlightenment let those enlightened enlighten others but a beautiful prayer you know so that is the real destruction it's not destruction of the wicked the destruction of wickedness destruction of sin and wickedness and degradation today i was reading um swami shivananda said that vivekananda used to say with the coming of sri ramakrishna this is the phrase he used brahma kundalini this is a rare phrase which is a tantric phase kundalini we know the mystic power which is within each of us when we become enlightened that is awakened i mean that is awakened and when it reaches its fruition we become enlightened that's the whole spiritual journey in a tantric paradigm not vedantic but this brahma kundalini is a rare usage it says it's the spirituality of the universe so that happens when an avatar comes somebody asked what does it mean and swami shivananda said that it just means huge changes will occur not only people we can become spiritual that's there of course but huge changes will occur in civilization civilization will go to a different level altogether and this is what has started in the last hundred years massive changes it picks up speed it may seem chaotic it may seem terrible we don't know where it's all going but it's changing very fast a new civilization will come in its place and this will go on it will work itself out till the next avatar comes you say that prove it can you write a paper and publish it and proving it no i can't i can't convince uh academics that this is what has happened all the changes that and all historians will will trace changes back to economic forces social forces and the activities of some people who nobody will trace it back to this poor um insane seeming brahmin mystic induction ishwar uh more than 100 years ago but vivekande said it's because of that and always it happens dharma sangstha establishment of religion religion is always there what is this what is there to establish it is that people lose faith in religion that it's really so and then religion essentials get covered over with with rituals and practices and customs hinduism itself swain vivekananda was harshly critical means the local customs the local rituals they become all of religion i'm a good hindu that means my little temple and my little practices of my family that's that's religion for me have you ever read the upanishads the gita nobody has in the last seven generations so the essentials of religion become covered over with a mass of unnecessary uh or or in uh unessential rituals secondary practices and so that has to be cleansed and religion in its um purity has to be established and demonstrated that it's really so you can attain samadhi you can't have a vision of god these are real things there's not just something mentioned in ancient half forgotten books the next thing important theme in this chapter is the name of the chapter yana karma sannyasa this requires some explanation we saw what it means the traditional idea okay backing up what is the question here the question here is all right i have heard your vedantic teachings i've heard your teachings about karma yoga now how can i practice them how can i synthesize my practical life and my spiritual life ultimately what is the final the synthesis of these things how do i lead my life from now on that's the big question and the traditional answer was you can become a monk and become a spiritual seeker dedicated one pointed spiritual seeker that's how many traditional religions start the early buddhism the early jainism and i'm sure in early hinduism also monks will attain enlightenment householders will not attain enlightenment i mean for example in the gambara jainism for example the more very uh rigid very austere form of jainism even now enlightenment is reserved for monks theravada buddhism nirvana is reserved for monks you give up all your external activities and you put on there'll be a formal aspect you put on a gerwa in hinduism there are actual rituals you go through where you formally give up all your social and religious obligation even religious obligation you give them up you have no more duties you have no more positions you don't have money you don't have a family you don't have social duties um and so we didn't even vote for example it's only when identity cards became necessary that we began to get voters id cards when when bill would much otherwise we we never voted we never had passports id cards and all now it's compulsory in india monks found it funny why do we need an identity card of course modern society is not designed for wandering monks so you have to have an identity card anyway the idea is you are dedicated in living a solitary or a community monastic life searching for enlightenment you do not pursue any of the goals of worldly life you're not pursuing pleasure family you're not pursuing money success power none of that you should actually desist from all of that and then you sit and meditate and that is spiritual that's called spirituality so that was the idea that was taught and it was very common even now somehow people think spirituality is for for monks if you really want to be spiritual you have to give everything up and go and become a monk that is called sannyasa giving up uh worldly activities karma sannyasa sri krishna you have to appreciate what a brilliant and powerful insight is giving not only for householders but for monks also he is giving a much deeper much more powerful practice which makes it possible for householders people in the world to be as spiritual as the the loneliest hermit sitting in the cave and meditating on god in the midst of community work office work family work responsibilities not only for for householders even monks who are in ashrams or in cave this this is a deeper idea of spirituality than they were used to so what is this idea the transcendence of karma through enlightenment through knowledge what is other way of transcendence is there the actual giving up of karma sannyasam is giving up so actual giving up of karma putting on a ochre robe shaving your head and going up to the mountains and living like that till the end of your life and meditating and there that's the actual giving up you make a separate kind of life but sri krishna says no no no spirituality is not about changing your dress spirituality is not about changing your way of life also it's about changing your whole paradigm your whole attitude to this life brahman is everywhere isn't there brahman in a householder as much as in a sannyasi isn't brahman in the house in the office as much as in the cave of course so what is this insight this insight he gives here in this book swain vivekananda said and same thing right vivekananda put in powerful words he who runs away from life to meditate and die in a himalayan cave he has missed the way he who plunges headlong into the luxuries and vanities of life he too has missed the way and that's strange if you run away from life you've missed the way if you plunge into life you're mister then what is the way there's only two options he says no the way is to divinize life itself it is to see god in those you are who are around you you see god in the husband and the wife and in in the members of your community in all living beings and it is to worship god in that way to see god everywhere inside and sit quietly in meditation you're in the presence of god open your eyes you're in the presence of god all the time whether you are doing the so-called spiritual practices of meditation and prayer there is god or you're doing the so-called secular activities of driving a car and going to the office there is god also or fighting this battle in kurukshetra there is god also so this is called gyana karma samucha how is this possible how is this at all possible that's the trick that's the deep insight so there are these very powerful verses this section from verse number 18 up to verse number 24 is a very powerful section this section itself is what does it mean transcendence of karma through knowledge or through enlightenment doubt might be all right so after enlightenment you can do this no if you have this insight after enlightenment one just becomes a reality but if you have this insight you can practice it even before enlightenment that can be your mode your philosophy of spirituality your justification of what you are doing that i am in the midst of all activities and yet i am just like a monk i am a spiritual seeker you can define yourself as a spiritual seeker it really is a stunning uh insight huge paradigm shift if you compare it to early buddhism therapada buddhism or jainism or say something like sankhya yoga philosophy whether in hinduism buddhism or jainism this is a big big step forward so this is spirituality based on an advaithic insight it's not possible without advaitha so what is the insight verse number 18 karmanya karma of pasheth the one who sees no action in the midst of action an action in the midst of no action that person is wise among all human beings that person is a yogi and that person is a doer of all actions so i will not repeat the um the explanation we went through it in detail it simply means as consciousness as awareness you are like the movie screen on which the movie is playing whatever is happening on the screen none of the action actually belongs to the screen the screen is not driving a car or exploding in a vulcan or coming as a tsunami wave or whatever is happening in the movie none of it is happening to the screen and yet the screen makes it possible similarly you are satchi all actions of the body and the mind activities of the body thoughts and feelings in the mind can go on they are not your actions this insight frees you from the effect of actions that is seeing no action even when action is going on and then the ignorant person who is sitting and thinks that i am not acting i i have given up karma i've given up all worldly activities i said quietly in yoga posture and meditate that is also action why because restraining yourself from a particular kind of activity is an activity as long as i'm identified with the body and the mind as long as i think i am this then anything that i do or do not do is action is karma and i will get the result of that this is the great insight which enables a person to be in the midst of the world to accomplish all activities and yet be free of it it may not be formally a sannyasi but is a gyana karma sannyasi sannyasa sannyasi by virtue of knowledge of advaithic knowledge actual enlightenment of course but even before that one can take up this philosophy and practice in this this paradigm take up the paradigm this and the next few verses show that this applies equally to sannyasis monks can apply this and householders can also apply this and actually our whole ramakrishna mission is possible because of this otherwise why are you monks running hospitals and schools and relief centers and you should meditate if there's an earthquake or a famine or a flood you run to help people why are you not meditating so that is the old idea of being a monk and so on vivekananda to face it swami akandaranam had to face it brahmadas mitra who was a great scholar in banaras he writes strong letters you know criticizing vivekananda starting all these schools colleges hospitals and you know activities to do good to society he says this does not benefit you you are monks you beg for your food you sit and meditate and at the most you can teach others but this is not the work of a monk you know taking care of poor people sick people teaching children so vivekananda he he gave fiery replies it says even according to your advaith advaitha atman is ever free so why are you doing any sadhana for the freedom of the atman and if if that can lead you to freedom this also can lead you to freedom but you need the philosophy behind it the philosophy is this one guyana karma-sanyasa and then it ends on the 24th verse with a grand conclusion again a very famous verse of bhagavad-gita brahmarpanam brahma [Music] so the paradigm is of a vedic fire sacrifice the ladle by which you offer the offerings in the fire that is brahman the fire itself is brahman the one who is offering is brahman the offering which you put in there is brahman and if one converts one all activities that you see brahman in every action not only the action itself the one who is performing the action the instruments with which you perform the action the objects with which you perform the action those for you whom you perform the action whatever action it is if you see god everywhere in this way if you connect god to all aspects of action you will realize god brahma you will attain to god attain to brahman means you will actually technically it means you will get self-realization ahamram has me in fact this is a term brahma-karma-samadhi it means the person the person who sees in this way who has accepted this format totally applicable to a person who's working say in a job or having a family completely so remember who is teaching to whom krishna householder is teaching to arjuna a householder in the middle of the battlefield is not the slightest sign of the himalayas or the ashram or vedanta society they are nothing in the midst of tremendous action then in the next few verses he gives a series of other practices he uses the same format of a vedic fire sacrifice yagya a lot of other practices [Music] the traditional fire sacrifice itself dava meva yagyam the knowledge sacrifice which you just mentioned your brahmara param is a knowledge sacrifice it's a practice of seeing god everywhere but also other other interesting practices for example control of the senses another kind of uh sacrifice or a fire sacrifice a fire sacrifice is just a format paradigm um then considering the senses themselves to be the fire fire into which you are putting off rings so eyes are a kind of fire into which you have pouring offerings of forms ears of the fire into which you're pouring offerings of sound a tongue is the fire into which you're pouring offerings of food so you convert all of it into a ritual then pranayama control of the front of the breath control pranayama that's one kind of um sacrifice giving in charity um this chanting of the vedas the study of the scriptures these are all practices for having vows like fasting not speaking for some time all these kinds of vows all of these he mentions things a list of 12 and then finally he says the whole point of all of these practices is is that practice brahma panam brahma the knowledge practice the advaithic paradigm that is the point of all of these practices ultimately all karma yoga all bhakti yoga all dhyana yoga they all must culminate in enlightenment gyani yoga yani yoga is the final thing which leads you to enlightenment of course i'm taking the advaita paradigm the same thing might will be explained by a bhakti teacher in just the opposite way as a devotional paradigm right so let me just take the questions or let's see the activity in the chat journey to joy oh all right some of you were in that other program organized by princeton a pretty big program i think we had about six nearly 500 600 people attending and more will be there tomorrow actually this time is early morning in india so somebody said the sun is just rising so tomorrow i think we'll have many more participants radha swami who is a very well-known teacher in this contradiction he has got a book which is very beautiful long journey home he's going to speak tomorrow i'm sure there'll be huge turnout they had more than nearly a thousand people registering for that event it was big i mean you had yale university and tufts university their chaplains offices of religious life good poonamji creation of man from the head of god brahman etc does this also relate to the prakriti of a person not that jayathi as described by krishna in the 13th chapter yes these are qualities of the person not the by birth um caste which has become the caste system in india now srinivas says lord rama did not know itself till yoga vashishta happened you know when you can see it that way i said two views of an avatar an avatar is fully enlightened anyway or avatar does not know it's not enlightened and he goes through the practices and then becomes enlightened and to show us that it's possible the bible is the john the baptist in the river he would baptize people by dunking them in the river jordan and he said that somebody is going to come after me who will baptize you with fire someday somebody is going to come after me that one that one is coming whose shoelaces i am not fit to die they didn't know what he's talking about he was the greatest saint in that area and one day in the long queue of people who are waiting to be baptized jesus is standing there of course people don't recognize him they know he's just the son of a carpenter john the baptist looks at him and immediately recognizes what this is son of god it's god and he says lord i am not fit to baptize you you should baptize me and then jesus says that let it be so let the traditions be fulfilled which means he he agrees with john the baptist he knows so in that sense he knows who he is girish says swamiji since you're a student of wittgenstein how would you interpret the segment that where of we cannot speak therefore we must remain silent okay difficult books and books have been written about this easiest for me would be to give up vedantic reply but to that would be like too easy you know this the ultimate reality is beyond words and beyond conceptions so we cannot speak of it we remain silent about it this is references to wittgenstein's logical tractators philosophical tectatus logical philosophicals um the last statement in that book but what does it actually mean for wittgenstein for that i think it requires a separate lecture i have to change gears we'll just leave it at that my own understanding is you have to see wittgenstein's worldview the early wittgenstein's worldview and then from that world view you have to see why there are certain things which cannot be said is worldview about atomic facts and these things and then there are certain things which cannot be expressed what is the link between atomic facts and language and therefore what is it that cannot be said and so you must talk about remain in silence so is that no connection with vedanta no that also i will not say you can it has nice implications for without that leave it in that new jerry says swamiji does maya and vedantic went to prakriti exactly the prakriti of sankhya was absorbed into purusa by vedanta subaranta calls it brahman and maya maya is nothing apart from brahman nothing can be apart from brahman brahman is existence itself if something is apart from brahman it will become non-existent you see logically so prakriti in sankhya prakriti and purusha consciousness and matter they exist consciousness and nature they exist independently they interact but the existence of one does not depend on the existence of the other the purposes of the of one depends on the other but the existence does not depend on the other but in the case of maya maya's existence is brahman there is no separate existence of maya it's like brahman absorbing prakriti and calling it maya that's advaita vedante what would god say about the avatar you would smile no not scornfully of course he would recognize the avatar there are there's a nice thing about ramachandra facing some rishis in the forest they recognized who is they bowed down to him and they said we know who you are but for us you are the son of tasharat you are the prince of ayodhya that's it no more and ramachandra smiled he was not annoyed that they refused to accept him as avatar their power was shanta bhava the peaceful attitude that is the advaithic non-dual attitude and ramachandra blessed them he said be it so rama says yeah but you remember guardapada's verses in the fourth chapter upash nashvito uh dharma he talks about those who are are dualistic by nature he calls them kripana worthy of pity who are stuck in the dualistic mode of worship so one has to if avatara helps you to come to non-duality that's it that's the purpose of avatar for god apart it's good if not avatar says i am the avatar and worship me and take refuge in me girl father will be no no no that's not the way rama swamiji avataras are being being born out of freedom not of karma why is there suffering their lives suramar krishna suffering from throat cancer one is teaching how to transcend suffering teaching us everything that the avatar does is lokashiksha is an indication of a deeper spiritual truth to be taught to us you see dharma establishment of religion it's being done by the life not only by the teachings swami vivekananda said more important is the life of um surah krishna he lived these teachings that's the establishment of religion so even that also one more reason is sram krishna himself said davatara comes to absorb the sins of others how does the avatar set us free it cannot wipe out the debts so avatar even avatara cannot but what david can do is take it upon himself or herself and they suffer in our place which is kind of sad for us we shouldn't we should be careful avatar shouldn't take on our burden and then suffer for us so suramar krishna navatar he he said it is because of such and such sins of those people i helped that's why this has come to me is it true rodriko says maharishi begu scarce is the reason of vishnu savatharas well there's the stories in the puranas i haven't forgotten exactly what story you're referring to only a vague memory rodrigo says john the baptist or son of a barren woman but blessed and then he was born yeah by the by by an angel's blessings right as far as i remember from the bible dmitry had a question uh yes uh good evening uh you mentioned in the earlier lectures about attention and uh so i wonder if you could a little bit explore like elaborate on this what is attention from the vedantic perspective and like what controls the direction uh of attention and uh how does that can be relevant to the work from the vedantic yes from the pedantic perspective i use vedante in a general sense there i specifically mentioned yoga patanjali yoga so attention is see we have a series of british in the mind the mind is constantly churning away what is attention what are those about what are the thoughts in my mind about i have a thought about a pen never thought about the time i haven't thought about the cloth i have the talk about the computer then thought time computer cloth these are the objects of my thought now what attention does is it makes sure that the thoughts are about the same object i am studying a book now my attention is on the book it is natural for it to flicker as other impulses inputs come in from my senses or thoughts emerge from my memories from inside something may emerge or some outside some inputs may come in and the mind flickers and it's always flickering now the job of attention will be the job of will will be to bring it back to the object is it an intellect in the vedantic paradigm that sort of and this reflected consciousness in the mind intellect helps but the the ego has to do it the agent i will now think about this i will not think about the other thing that katrina to that agentship must be there so in meditation you stay in the bhagavad-gita and very interestingly i found in focus daniel goleman's book there is a section where he talks about the stages of meditation and the neural correlates of that and he says there are actual networks of neurons which would correspond to each of the stages what is the what are the stages first i say i will focus on this maybe the breath or on a mantra and there's something some part of the brain which lights up when you do that and then comes a distraction some other thought comes up and there's another part where nearby which lights up when that happens and then comes following the distraction uh unknowing i mean sort of half consciously we slip away into the distraction whatever has come up we start thinking about that and related things then comes noticing that we have been distracted oh it all happens in a less than a second a fraction of a second noticing we have been distracted oh this has happened another part of the brain apparently lights up there this noticing is a there's a is a function of a set of neurons and then he says bringing the attention back to the original objective attention that means i will think about this only and holding it there of another set of neurons biased so he talks about four different sets of neurons which keep lighting up in the four different functions for different stages of meditation meditation distraction noticing the distraction coming back again four stages and those four stages i was amazed to find when i read it daniel goldman is saying i immediately rushed and picked out sixth chapter of the bhagavad-gita talks exactly about the four stages meditate wandering mind notice the wondering bring it back and repeat and then does it also mean that the attention is essentially this uh keep like is a approximation of brahman so to say right like because like uh our ability to notice things our ability to see and inquire and sort of climb bugs and let the ladder of like like i'm not the body i'm not the mind i'm not the thoughts and this ability of attention to [Music] you know to notice that the mind has changed and the mind is running off with you know different train of thoughts and then return back is that the i don't know how to express it is that kind of the gateway or a seed to the brahman it is the source for all kinds of meditation including vedantic meditation i'll make a very subtle distinction a very important distinction it is a form of meditation it is the the structure of meditation whether it is your mindfulness meditation or vedantic meditation or meditation on a deity it is always the structure will be this now this involves mind and intellect and ego all of these are involved already memory all of these are involved in meditation in fact a very ancient saying is quoted actually by vyasa the the commentator on the yoga sutras of patanjali there is a commentary by vyasa the traditional commentary on the yoga sutras patanjali is called at the very beginning he says there is a cycle things come up when you're sitting quietly in meditation you're not looking anywhere not trying to hear anywhere good environment but then things will bubble up from within immediately thoughts feelings ideas desires frustrations anxieties they'll bubble up from within so he says samskaras keep bubbling up there are these deep vasanas conditionings within us and they emerge as vitti from their their samskaras conditioning and they emerge as with these thoughts in the mind now um whatever you hold on to in the mind that will color the subconscious it will color the store house of samskaras it will go back and become a samskara again or strengthen existing samskaras now what do you do he says this cycle the wheel of samskara and vritti rotates day and night he says this is a quote this is the state of our minds now what does meditation do we have we have to change the samskaras but we have no direct access to them the only access you have is your conscious thought right now and that also for a fleeting moment of you know like daniel goleman would say notice what's going on a little window of opportunities there as the samskaras become thoughts bubbles coming up you notice is this useful is this the mantra or something else no it's something else reject it put the mantra in its place hold on to the mantra and keep doing it this mantra again will go back and will influence the samskaras and over time you'll see it will get easier because the samskaras themselves are changing yeah this is what attention does in meditation but of course attention is being studied a lot nowadays and for various purposes and it's the most important thing i'm just thinking i forgot to mention to vinnie in the you know princeton where they are they had the the and they still have so the richest concentration of scientific manpower uh scientific human resources that in institute of advanced uh studies ias and princeton university at one time they had einstein and uh godel and von neumann and others so i was reading von neumann he um he was one of the youngest members of the faculty at institute of advanced studies i was reading that he was used to be mistaken for a graduate student he was convinced in his biography that he was convinced that he could solve any problem by the sheer power of his focus of his concentration he had extraordinary powers of concentration it really shows vivekananda so long ago he said the difference between an ordinary person and a great person lies at the degree of concentration and here's neumann from his own experiences he says that it is i credit all my extraordinary mental powers extraordinary unmatched is i credit it all to my power of concentration now attention is the real wealth that's why when our silicon valley and all attention economy what they're trying to grab is our attention yes so thank you very much let's just end with the chant foreign