The Spiritual Import of the Mahabharata and the Bhagavadgita : Ch-13-1

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Chapter 13: Centring the Mind in the Heart-1

The yoga of the rise of the soul from this world is the main subject of the eighth chapter of the Bhagavadgita.

Usually the soul reverts to this world on account of the pull that the world atmosphere exerts upon it, as the power of gravitation can pull everything towards the earth.

All our desires connected with the world are the forces that drag the soul back to the world, and any kind of impulsion to which the soul gets subjected becomes its bondage.

Liberation of the spirit is freedom from such subjection.



How can this be achieved?

This is answered in a few slokam-s of the eighth chapter.



"Sarva-dvarani samyamya mano hrdi-nirudhya ca, murdhny adhayatmanah pranam asthito yoga-dharanam."

"Om ity ekaksaram brahma-vyaharan mam anusmaran, yah prayati tyajan deham sa yati paramam gatim."

 The whole of the yoga that one has to engage oneself at the time of the departure from this world is described in these two slokam-s.



All the doors of the senses have to be closed; that is the samyama or the restraint of all the gates by which the senses move towards their objects.

It is not easy to shut out the senses from their activity in connection with their objects, because this is not a physical doorway which we can close at our will.

This is an impulse which is hard to restrain, in the way that we cannot control the movement of wind, for instance, by any amount of effort.


Swami Krishnananda
To be continued  ..



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