The Relevance of the Bhagavadgita to Humanity 7-4: Swami Krishnananda.

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Tuesday 27, Aug. 2024, 06:40.
The Relevance of the Bhagavadgita to Humanity :7.4
Chapter 7: Can War Ever be Justified? - 4.
The First Six Chapters of the Bhagavadgita: 
Swami Krishnananda
(Spoken on Bhagavadgita Jayanti

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But for reasons which are obvious to students of natural history and evolution, this is not possible. The cow will certainly wish that the tiger should not pounce on it. Why should they not be friends? But the tiger is unable to think in that manner, for reasons which are not entirely in its hands. A condition will not prevail in the world where there will be a uniform way of thinking in all living beings; therefore, it is the opinion of certain thinkers that war cannot be avoided as long as the world exists in the way it exists. Then, if that is the case, a most unjustifiable thing has to be accommodated with every circumstance in one's life. 

If there is at least one person in the world who cannot believe that war is not justifiable, it becomes an unavoidable circumstance. It may not become a justifiable thing; it becomes an unavoidable thing. If it is unavoidable, what should be our duty under that condition? What should the cow do when the tiger says, “I will not listen to you”? This is a great question: Shall I offer myself? Shall I pursue the principle of war and battle being unjustifiable? Even my spirit of retaliation may be unjustifiable, because to retaliate is to engage oneself in war, so I have already accepted that it is unjustifiable. So if I am to pursue a principle of the unjustifiability of war, I should not retaliate if there is aggression upon me.

These are questions which are not easily answered. There are some people who pursue a very extreme view of the philosophy of ahimsa. I read a passage of Bertrand Russell, who wrote something on it. He was a philosopher of every kind of thought. You will find him thinking different systems of thought at different levels of his life. In one place he says it has to be accepted that non-aggression is the law of life. Then what would be the consequence? He gives an illustration of a country being invaded by another country if the country is to pursue the principle of nonaggression to the hilt. 

Mahatma Gandhi did not believe in that kind of extreme ahimsa, though he is said to be one of the protagonists of it. Many questions were put to him. I myself was one who put a question to one of his great leaders, his right hand. He was not saying that aggression can be tolerated. Then I said, “Then, what is your principle? You have diluted your principle of nonaggression by saying that it cannot be tolerated.” He was giving some sort of explanation which is difficult to understand.

However, one of the extreme types of policy of nonaggression is: Truth must triumph always, and the triumph of truth need not necessarily mean its material triumph. This is a very hard thing for a materially bound mind to accept. It implies the acceptance of the justice of God and the retribution which God will mete out to a man who does the right thing – if not in this world, in another world. Even death is considered by these people as an acceptable thing, provided it is met by a person in the pursuit of truth. 

There are others who say: You are not supposed to die. Life is sacred. Suicide and a deliberately entering into the field of dying, where dying has become a certainty, may not be considered as wisdom. In all circumstances you should protect your life, because the last value in existence is existence itself. You have to exist first for any other value to be meaningful. If the final value, which is existence, is itself to be threatened, then every other value falls. So under every circumstance, life has to be protected, and you cannot sacrifice it under any circumstance.

In the Mahabharata itself there is one section called Appadharma. Appadharma means 'your attitude under critical moments'. 'Critical moments' means 'threats to life'. When life itself is at stake, what will you do? There, the usual norms of behaviour get transformed. The rigidity of social mandate gets relaxed, and you are permitted to behave in certain ways, which permission will not be granted under normal conditions.

There is a little story in the Chhandogya Upanishad. There was a poor, learned Brahman, almost starving to the point of dying. He was going to attend a sacrifice, or a yajna, that was being performed by the king or the ruler of that country, expecting to receive some presents in that great performance. Utter poverty is the only word that can explain his condition. On the way he met an elephant driver, a person who was considered a low-caste man, from whose hands nothing can be accepted by a high-caste Brahmin. That elephant driver was eating some beans, and he had eaten half. Firstly, one cannot eat from that man's hand. Secondly, half-eaten stuff is the worst thing. It cannot even be touched.

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Continued

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