The Relevance of the Bhagavadgita to Humanity 10-5: Swami Krishnananda.
==================================================================================Sunday 23, March 2025, 11:30.
The Relevance of the Bhagavadgita to Humanity:10-5.
Chapter 10: The Need for Sankhya-4.
The First Six Chapters of the Bhagavadgita:
Swami Krishnananda
(Spoken on Bhagavadgita Jayanti
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Now, what is sankhya? Without going into the metaphysical details of the classical Sankhya system, which is not essential for the present, we see what meaning we can have from the verse of the Bhagavadgita itself. The word 'prakriti' is used in the Bhagavadgita, which is one of the terms that occurs in the Sankhya system. The whole world is made up of prakriti. This prakriti is the substance of the whole world. By 'the world' we do not mean only this little Earth. The entire cosmos, the universe, is an expression of prakriti. This prakriti is constituted of certain forces, and these forces are called sattva, rajas, tamas. Tamas is the inert condition of this force, rajas is the active condition of this force, and sattva is the harmonised condition of this force. In these three conditions the world can exist, and does exist.
Now, inasmuch as everything in the world is made up of these forces only, as a rope which is made up of three strands is identical with the strands, and the strands constitute the rope, similarly, the forces mentioned constitute every person and everything in the world. Everything is just these forces. There are no persons, no things in the world. Everything is just a permutation and combination of these three forces, sattva, rajas, tamas. In some proportion these are mixed. The proportion in which these gunas, or properties of prakriti, are mixed, and the intensity in which they are manifest, will decide the kind of thing that anything is. It may be a body of a living being, or it may be an inanimate substance.
Now, the impulsions within a human being, mental as well as sensory, are also to be attributed to the activity of these gunas. It is not merely the physical body that is a product of these gunas. Gunas mean the properties of prakriti: sattva, rajas, tamas. They are called gunas in Sanskrit. It is not merely the physical body that is made up of the gunas, but even the inner constituents of the human personality, what is called the subtle body, are also products of the gunas. Now, our contact with things, our longing for things and our relationship with things, in any manner whatsoever, is a wondrous dramatic activity of these gunas among themselves. This is a very interesting thing to contemplate.
What is meant by 'relationship'? All life is a kind of relationship of some type or the other. You cannot conceive life without relationship contact. Sensory contact and psychological contact are the principal contacts. Now, these contacts constitute what is called your earthly mortal existence, but these contacts with relationships are a play of the gunas. How do they play? There is a mysterious manner in which the forces of prakriti operate. These forces can become anything and everything.
A juggler's tricks are sometimes brought out as illustrations of the way in which the forces of nature can work. One thing can appear as many things. There are jugglers in India who perform tricks of various types. Some of the tricks are difficult to understand. You will be flabbergasted even to see them. There is one kind of trick called the rope trick, which is not easily performed these days. A magician stands there alone; there is nobody else. He says, “Now a war is taking place in the heavens. I am called there to assist the gods. I am a soldier. I will go there. How will I go? I will go with this rope.” He throws the rope up to the sky. You cannot understand how a rope is thrown like that. He climbs the rope. He goes up, and he tells people around, “Now you see heads falling, and bloodshed. All this indicates a war is taking place.” And after some time, you see heads falling down. You will be wondering what is the matter. From the skies, heads fall. There is blood dropping from all places. War is taking place. And then the man is suddenly found in the same place where he had been standing. There is neither the rope nor the blood nor the heads. These are interesting things. He has become the rope, he has become the heads, he has become the blood, he has become the warrior, and he is the person who is talking to you.
In a similar manner, a magical performance is projected before us, as it were. The miracle of this magic is very dramatically portrayed before us in certain great texts like the Yoga Vasishtha, and also in smaller texts such as the Tripura Rahasya. They are interesting things. You must read the Yoga Vasishtha to know what these mysteries are which make us believe that there is a world outside.
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Continued
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