Character

Bhagavad-Gītā
Chapter 16

Of the Divine and Wicked
TEXTS 1-3
श्री भगवान् उवाच
अभ्यं सत्त्व-संशुद्धिर् ज्ञान-योग-व्यवस्थिथिः
दनं दमश् च यज्ञस् च स्वाध्यायस् तप आर्जवम्
अहिंस सत्यम् अक्रोधास् त्यागः शान्तिर् अपैशुनम्
दया भूतेष्व् अलोलुप्त्वं मार्दवं ह्रीर् अचापलम्

śrī bhagavān uvāca
abhyaṃ sattva-saṃśuddhir jñāna-yoga-vyavasthithiḥ
danaṃ damaś ca yajñas ca svādhyāyas tapa ārjavam
ahiṃsa satyam akrodhās tyāgaḥ śāntir apaiśunam 
dayā bhūteṣv aloluptvaṃ mārdavaṃ hrīr acāpalam
tejaḥ kṣama dhṛtiḥ śaucam adroho nāti māniā 
bhavanti sampadaṃ daivim abhijātasya bhārata

The Lord said,

"Blessed are those who know the soul to be eternal, for they are fearless.

Blessed are those who seek purity in their daily lives.

Blessed are those who walk in the path of divine love.

Those who find wisdom in knowledge are godly

Sacrifice is blessed, as is charity and Vedic study.

Blessed are those who live in harmony and peace:

the austere and simple, the placid and true.

All these are divine qualities.

To forgive is divine.

Blessed are those who are free from anger,

for anger and pride are wicked.

 

Blessed are the renounced and peaceful;

Blessed are those do not find fault with others.

The godly are compassionate. They do not covet.

The righteous are gentle and modest,

steady in purpose, strong in spirit.

Cleanliness is godliness.

 

And blessed are those who are  free from envy, malice and pride."

Arjuna and Krishna

Text 4-9

दैवी सम्पद् विमोक्षाय निबन्धायासुरि मता

मा शुचः सम्पदं दैवीम् अभिजातो ऽस् पाण्डव

द्वौ भूत-सर्गौ लोके ऽस्मिन् दैव आसुर एव च 

दिअव विस्तरशः प्रोक्त आसुरम् पार्थ मे शृणु

प्रवृत्तिं च निवृत्तिं च जन न विदुर् आसुराः

न शौचं नापि चाचरो न सत्यं तेषु विद्यते

असत्यम् अप्रतिष्ठम् ते जगद् आहुर् अनीश्वरम्

अपरस्पर सम्बूतम् किम् अन्यत् काम हैतुकम्

daivī sampad vimokṣāya nibandhāyāsuri matā

mā śucaḥ sampadaṃ daivīm abhijāto 's pāṇḍava

dvau bhūta-sargau loke 'smin daiva āsura eva ca 

diava vistaraśaḥ prokta āsuram pārtha me śṛṇu

pravṛttiṃ ca nivṛttiṃ ca jana na vidur āsurāḥ

na śaucaṃ nāpi cācaro na satyaṃ teṣu vidyate

asatyam apratiṣṭham te jagad āhur anīśvaram

aparaspara sambūtam kim anyat kāma haitukam

The Lord said,

"Proud are the wicked; their sin is pride and arrogance, anger and conceit.

The Lord said, "There is no place for anger, harshness or ignorance in the hearts of great souls.

The are wicked in their ignorance and avoid right action; They do wrong and think it right."

The demonic promote the culture of ignorance.

"Neither purity, nor truth, nor proper behavior is found in them. They say that the world is unreal, without basis, with no God in control, a consequence of lust without moral ground. Their philosophy is voidism and ignorance. "

Atheist logic

Playboy mansion

The Lord said, "Baffled by lust, anger, and greed these lost souls of feeble minds destroy the world with their demonic labors."

"Driven by ambition, full of hypocrisy and greed, the wicked act with impure resolve to control the universe. These deluded souls are sworn to unclean work with the gratification of their selfish desires their only motive. "

"Controlled by their desires, attracted to the temporary pleasures of this world, they labor to amass wealth. Their god is gold; their religion is sex, money, and power.  

They believe that the goal of human civilization is amusement. 

"Luxury, indulgence, and sensual pleasure is their prime necessity, with no thought for knowledge, sacrifice, or charity. Self-gratification is more important for them than self-realization, and so they turn to darkness."

"Bound by lust, anger, greed, and pride, they use sharp practices to gain advantages and wealth to satisfy their inflamed desires. 

The ungodly think, “I have so much today, but soon I will get more. My plans are invincible."

  Such demons think, "These are my enemies; I shall slay my foes and plot to slay the others who are against me. In this way I rule. I am the master. I am the center of the universe. I am successful, powerful. This is happiness. No one is stronger or happier than I am. I will give some charity to increase me fame, and so everyone will worship me as the king of everything.”

In this way the wicked, filled with ego and charmed by dreams of being proud and powerful fall into the meshes of delusion. Addicted to their own desires and baffled by ego they go down into the darkness of hell.

Self-involved, stubborn in their ignorance, arrogant in their foolishness, the wicked are deluded by ego and wealth, by lust, anger, and greed. They invent religions and sacrifices to go with them to increase their pride. Creating traditions and doctrines they perform all kinds of godless ceremonies without following any principles of purity and knowledge.

So bewildered by ego, they envy the godly. 

"Those who promote the culture of ignorance hate the culture of devotion. Such fallen and malicious souls envy the divine nature. They are envious of Me. They hate God Himself, who dwells in the hearts of all living souls. They become atheists and blaspheme God.

"This human scum, mean and envious, is cast by Me into the depths of the ocean of birth and death. By their wicked deeds they are placed into the unholy wombs of the lowest species.

"Living in corrupted life forms, such souls sink further down into ignoranceIn such darkness they cannot attain me. Know this: Lust, anger, and greed are the three gates of hell, O Arjuna. Abandon these, for they lead to ruin and corruption.

Blessed are those who escape these three gates of hell.

Blessed is the noble soul who acts for the spirit and realizes the highest domain.

The godly qualities lead to the highest form of liberation; a wicked nature leads to bondage in birth and death. Have no fear, Arjuna, for you were born with godly qualities. One who avoids these truths as they are given in scripture and who acts in lust, anger, and pride shall achieve neither perfection, nor happiness, nor the highest domain.

Know therefore, what is right action and what is wrong. Act not from instinct; study what is written in the scriptures, understand their conclusions and perform right action in knowledge.

Cosmic Tree of Life

 Bhagavad-GītāChapter 15

The Cosmic Tree of Life

While in the 14th Chapter we have seen the use of various arcane Sanskrit terms and their definitions, here Kṛṣṇa uses a simple analogy to help us understand the nature of material existence and its relationship with the divine world: the Cosmic Tree of Life.

BG 15.1

श्री भगवान् उवाच

ऊर्ध्व-मुलम् अधः-शाखम् 

अश्वत्थं प्राहुर् अव्ययम् 

छन्दांसि यस्य पर्णानि 

यस् तं वेद स वेद-वित्

śrī bhagavān uvāca

ūrdhva-mulam adhaḥ-śākham 

aśvatthaṃ prāhur avyayam 

chandāṃsi yasya parṇāni 

yas taṃ veda sa veda-vit

The Lord said, "It is written that this material world is like a perennial Banyan tree whose roots face upwards and its branches extend down.  Its leaves are the Vedic hymns. One who knows this tree is the knower of the Vedas."

 The analogy is that of a banyan tree. Anyone who has ever seen a giant banyan will marvel at how tangled it is. The branches descend into roots and the roots grow new branches. It is impossible to know where the original tree trunk is.

The mysteries of how the subtle laws of nature interact with life energy in the cosmos are manifold.  A search for the origins of existence and the cosmos naturally lead us into a labyrinthine maze of tangled roots. Is mind the root of matter, or its branch? 

If consciousness is the origin of material nature, how does matter spring forth from spirit? Any discussion of the causal relationship between consciousness and matter baffles the mind, since causes and effects are tangled together like the roots and branches of a banyan tree.

How can a tree be upside down?

Stand at water’s edge.  Notice the reflection of a tree. As you look at the mirror image of the tree, you see it reversed, upside down.

The branches appear to go down while the trunk and roots go up. If it is difficult to trace out the root of a tangled banyan tree, it is even more so when trying to analyze its shadowy reflection in water.  

The reflection is only temporary; it vanishes with the sunset. It may be visible in moonlight, but the shadowy reflection on moonlit water will be more difficult to analyze.  The reflection is only real for awhile; seen and unseen according to the light. The tree itself stands day or night: it is perennial.

 In the same way this material world is a kind of distorted reflection of the real world, the eternal world.  The material world is called prakṛti  where the origin of all worlds is the puruṣa,  the Supreme Person.

The tree of this material world is only a reflection of the real tree of the spiritual world. The water represents the tendency for exploitation. Just as the tree's reflection is situated on water, the perceived world, a reflection of the spiritual world, is situated on desire. One who wants to get out of this material existence may know this tree thoroughly, first through through analytical study, then through transcendental knowledge. Discussion and argument will not be sufficient.

In the mirror image, reflected by moonlight in dark water, the branches of the banyan tree of material existence extend in all directions. The roots tangle into branches and the branches become roots. The labyrinth of roots and branches are nourished by the modes of material nature, purity, mobility, and inertia.  The twigs and branches develop into the objective reality of all the sense objects, colors and forms within the space-time continuum. This banyan tree of material existence is rooted in karma and exploitation.

And yet there is no metacognitive sense that allows us to study the true nature of this mirror image. Captivated in studying the roots and branches of the dark reflection we can find neither end nor beginning to this tree of life. 

The tree is organic: it is living, changing, moving. It is also hard material, objective existence. And yet it is only a reflection of ultimate reality. Its study can yield no fruit. We cannot understand where this dark reflection ends, where it begins, or what its true foundation is, without the light of divine love.

Kṛṣṇa says, 

nirmāna mohā jita saṇga doṣā adhyātma nitya vinivṛtta kāmāḥ

dvandvair vimuktāḥ sukha-duḥkha-saṃjñair 

gacchanty amūḍhāḥ padam avyayaṃ tat

निर्मान मोहा जित सण्ग दोषा अध्यात्म नित्य विनिवृत्त कामाः

द्वन्द्वैर् विमुक्ताः सुख-दुःख-संज्ञैर् गच्छन्त्य् अमूढाः पदम् अव्ययं तत्

"But those who are free from the corruption of vanity, who avoid decadent company and who are dedicated to self-realization attain to the eternal world of divine love. The perennial tree of the world of exploitation derives from the mayic power of the Supreme Being. Illuminated souls surrender themselves to the Lord, Kṛṣṇa and thus achieve his holy abode." BG 15.5

While the 15^th Chapter of Bhagavad-Gītā begins with the analogy of the "Cosmic Tree of Life," Kṛṣṇa gradually leads into the theme of the Supreme Person and the need for dediction in divine love. Therefore this chapter has been titled Purushottama-Yoga, or the “Yoga of the Supreme Person. 

We have already seen the meaning of puruṣa  and prakṛti in “spirit” and “matter” or “god” and “goddess” or “subject” and “object.” The word “uttama” means “ultimate.” Purushotthama means the “Ultimate Person.” Synonyms would be Super-subject, Super-spirit, Super-god.  The chapter is called the “Yoga of the Supreme Person” as it is here argued that the Supreme Person is distinct from the spiritual creation, whether conjoined with the non-spiritual or in its pure state, because He pervades, maintains, and governs the objective universe as the Super-subject.

At the end of this chapter, Bhaktivedānta Swāmi summarizes as follows:

 “While performing devotional service in the association of pure devotees in full Kṛṣṇa consciousness, there are certain things which require to be vanquished altogether. The most important thing one has to surmount is weakness of the heart. The first falldown is caused by the desire to lord it over material nature. Thus one gives up the transcendental loving service of the Supreme Lord. The second weakness of the heart is that as one increases the propensity of lording it over material nature, he becomes attached to matter and the possession of matter. The problems of material existence are due to these weaknesses of the heart.”

Great souls transmit the transcendental knowledge by which we become illuminated and achieve freedom from the tangled forest of this material world.

Purpose, movement, inertia

Bhagavad-Gītā
14th Chapter Continued

In summary, then, our involvement with these different qualities or modes of nature colors and conditions our experience in the material world. 

The evolution from complete spiritual awareness to hazy consciousness to embodied soul takes place with the mediation of these elemental forces or laws of nature, called sattva, raja, and tama.

 No value is judgment is made about the “good” or “evil” of these modes. They are simply universal elements influencing consciousness, a kind of color theory of light and shadow. By themselves the so-called “modes” are neither good nor bad. They do not provoke action any more than a powerful drug like opium forces someone to become addicted. But once under the influence of a particular mode consciousness becomes further bewildered. The “modes” are inherent aspects of prakṛti  elemental in the devolution of consciousness from aware spiritual energy to conditioned embodied soul, according to the Vedic analysis.

While the modes are not “causal,” attachment with them provokes certain effects. Attachment in sattva conditions one to happiness, raja conditions one to the fruits of action, and tamas to madness. From sattva, real knowledge develops; from raja, grief develops; and from the tama, foolishness, madness and illusion. In Sattva-guna, a man becomes attached to happiness and knowledge. Raja increases libido and sexual desire, and binds through attachment. Tama binds through inertia.

While the 3 qualities, sattva, raja, and tama  are inherent in prakṛti  conjoined with atma,  they  interact according to karmic conditions, gradually producing a myriad variety of shapes, forms, colors, and qualities.

The Vedic universe is not an empty time-space continuum constructed from atoms and a void: it is an organic cosmos where puruṣa and prakṛti  combine in an endless dance of evolutionary character. The interplay between positive and negative forces include not only quantum particles of matter, but of conscious energy as well. The cosmic principles known as “gunas” are the substratum or background of the physical universe, responsible in their turn for the material elements of earth, water, fire, air, and ether, according to how they are balanced.

Normally we think of the mind-body problem as a kind of “ghost in a machine.” Since we can’t find the ghost in the machine, we decide to study only the machine. But our obsession with analyzing the mechanics of the physical world forces us, as a kind of scientific discipline, to wall off the organic cosmos as incapable of analysis. 

It’s difficult to locate life or its source and we ignore it entirely as a philosophical problem in the name of scientific integrity. Since only concrete matter bears scrutiny, we focus our studies on its physical properties and are satisfied when this bears fruit in the form of technology.

And yet this emphasis lacks integrity since it ignores the organic cosmos. The Vedic philosophy takes a different view: the organic world matters.   

A true analysis of reality must take prakṛti  and puruṣa  into consideration. The relationship between consciousness, intelligence, mind, and the physical universe is essential and cannot be ignored.

One may define sattva, rajas, and tama  as “purpose, movement, and inertia.” These different qualities of material nature are rarely found in pure, distilled, isolation: purpose, movement, and inertia combine as do all natural elements of the physical universe.

Krishna explains that where movement and inertia are weak, purpose may be strong. Where purpose  is weak, movement  or inertia  may predominate. One may see the relative dominance of sattva, raja, or tama  by analyzing their effects.

For example, when knowledge is present sattva predominates. When action and sensuality, rajas.  When ignorance and inertia are present, then tamas  predominates.

The three modes are present in all human beings, though in different degrees. No one is free from them and in each soul one or the other predominates at any given moment. We may be sāttvika, rājasa, or tāmasa  according to the mode which prevails. In traditional medicine before the 20th century, scientists took quite seriously the theory of the “humours” of physiology.

The Four "Humours of the Body"

Metabolisms were sanguine, bilious,  lymphatic or nervous, according to the balance of four humours. Where the “humours” were an attempt by ancient medical science at explaining certain physiological conditions, the “modes” attempt to take spiritual, conscious, or psychic characteristics nto account. A sāttvika  nature aims at light and knowledge;



 the rājasa  nature wants action, sense-gratification.



The tāmasa nature is inert; a tamasic being lives in ignorance, reacting only to the world around it.

Kṛṣṇa says (BG 14.10), “Sometimes purpose stands over action and inertia; O son of Bharata, sometimes action defeats purpose, and at other times inertia overcomes both purpose and action. There is a constant dynamic between purpose, action and inertia, or goodness, passion and ignorance.

When raja increases the symptoms are attachment, desire, hankering, and action. As for the time of death: When one dies in sattva, he attains the pure higher worlds. One who dies in raja, is born again within the world of karma; and when he dies in ignorance, he takes birth in the animal kingdom.

The fruit of sattvik action is purity. Rajasik karma brings pain, where the fruit of laziness and inertia is ignorance.

The psychological effects of the three modes are as follows: from goodness arises knowledge and from passion greed; negligence and error arise from dullness, as also ignorance.  Those who are established in goodness rise upwards; the passionate remain in the karmic world of struggle the dull sink downwards. In this way the soul evolves through various stages, rising from dull inertia and subjection to ignorance through the struggle for material enjoyments within various biological frameworks to the pursuit of divine knowledge and eternal happiness.

As long as the living being is attached, even to noble objects, we are limited and conditioned. Tamas  and rajas so integrally saturate the experience of the mundane world it is difficult to end their influence entirely.  Transcending the world of inertia, karmic energy, and mundane knowledge should be the goal of the conditioned living entity.

Kṛṣṇa says that one who transcends material knowledge sees that the organic cosmos is  a fusion of these elemental forces, sattva, rajas, and tamas. An enlightened soul perceives that apart from these modes of nature there is no cause of action. He knows that the Supreme is transcendental.  Such a great soul can know the true spiritual nature and understand his personal relationship with God Himself.  When the embodied being is able to transcend these three modes, he can become free from birth, death, old age and their distresses and can enjoy the sweet exilir of divine love even in this life.

Arjuna said: O Lord, what are the symptoms of such a great soul who is transcendental to these three modes? How does he act? And how does he transcend the modes of nature?

The Lord replies:

“A realized soul understands the influences of the modes of nature. He knows that their influences come and go. And so he doesn’t resent purpose, action or inertia. He knows that illumination and attachment come and go. Desire and illusion are constants as are understanding. The wise man neither treasures these when they are present, nor does he long for them for them when they are absent.

"He is indifferent to the actions and reactions of purpose, activity and inertia. The modal effects bring happiness and distress, but the enlightened man knows these effects are impermanent and fugitive. He sees a lump of coal a diamond, and a piece of gold equally.

"To a wise man, praise and blame, honor and dishonor are the same. He treats friend and foe alike, for he has no enemies.

"An enlightened soul who has abandoned all karmic endeavors has transcended the · modes of nature.  One who engages in full devotional service to Me in my form of Shyamasundara the Lord of Vṛṇdāvana, free from the tendencies for exploitation and renunciation at once transcends the modes of material nature and thus comes to the level of spiritual realization o his internal divine identity. And I am the basis of the undivided Divinity, the inexhaustible nectar, the timeless pastimes and the sweetness of the ambrosia of profound love divine; this  is the constitutional position of ultimate happiness, immortal, imperishable and eternal.”