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Timeless lessons

THE Bhagavad Gita is Lord Krishna’s sermon to Arjuna just before the start of Kurukshetra war between the Pandava brothers and their Kaurva cousins.

Timeless lessons

Devdutt Pattanaik



Reviewed by  Kuldip Singh Dhir

THE Bhagavad Gita is Lord Krishna’s sermon to Arjuna just before the start of Kurukshetra war between the Pandava brothers and their Kaurva cousins. Split into 18 chapters, it has 700 verses of which 574 are spoken by Krishna, 84 by Arjuna, 41 by Sanjaya and one by Dhritrashtra. The conversational discourse lasts for 90 minutes.

Commentaries on the event started appearing approximately around the same time Islam entered India. One of the world’s oldest mosques was built in the same region of Malabar coast where Adi Shankra, the writer of the first elaborate commentary was born, both events separated by a century. The ideas of one formless god, one holy book and one set of rules in Islam seem to have inspired him to pronounce the Hindu view of god and his relationship with man, touting it as a basic scripture. 

Adi Shankra, Ramanuja and Madhva Acharya, the three earliest commentators between the eighth and 13th century either did not marry or gave up marriage to lead monastic life preaching teachings from Vedas.

The second wave of commentaries involved retellings in regional languages. The European translations and interpretations were coloured with subjectivity due to their grounding in occidental mythology and Christian religious tradition. These were followed by retranslations by Indian nationalists like Gandhi, Tilak, Aurobindo and Radhakrishnan who used it to put forward their philosophy of non-violence and ethical worldview. Twentieth century has seen the Bhagavad Gita being explored in perspectives as varied as management, world peace, leadership, art of winning and what not. Despite the plurality of ideas that have emerged over the centuries, relationship between the self and the other remain a common topic. Pattanaik’s work  too centres around mysteries of you-I relationship.

The Bhagavad Gita is not a linear text. Its ideas are scattered over several chapters. Pattanaik does not opt for sequential verse-by-verse exposition. Instead, he rearranges ideas thematically around you-I paradigm.   

When it comes to The Bhagavad Gita, we actually do not hear what Krishna spoke. We overhear what Sanjay transmitted to the blind Dhritrashtra, having witnessed all that occurred on the distant battlefield, thanks to his telepathic sight. Arjuna listens to these words as a seeker. Dhritrashtra hears these with suspicion and fear. Pattanaik seems to have spent a long time reading multiple commentaries, retellings and translations, mapping diverse patterns to present the quintessence, acknowledging it as purely subjective. The reader can flip through it to redeem his own slice of truth.

Incidentally, the Bhagavad Gita itself values subjectivity. After concluding his counsel, Krishna tells Arjuna to reflect on what he has said and then do as he feels (yatha ichhasi tatha kuru). Even Sanjay concludes with the phrase ‘in my opinion’ (mati mam). Not obsessed at all with the self, My Gita is for the householder dealing with his relationship with others, placing the divine in between, expanding the mind in the process. The relevance of this approach can hardly be denied today when we are increasingly indulging and isolating the self, forgetting that we live in an ecosystem which contains the other. 

My Gita advises us to look beyond the boundaries that separate the self from the other. We need to accept that each of us is different, seeking fulfillment in our own individual way. Empathising with the others in our material, emotional and intellectual pursuits is helpful. It dispels fear, replacing it with mutual trust.

We can do so but our behaviour is ordinarily dictated by three Gunas. Becoming aware of our infirmities born out of these, we can behave more positively. Anger, avarice, jealousy, hatred and conceit can be then controlled. Everybody does his duty as if ordained by god, leaving everything that follows to god. All this sounds so simple. Yet it is so difficult.

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