Gita 09.25 – Different paths lead to different goals

That Krishna will talk in the next verse, which we will discuss in our future talks. Thank you.

Nārāyaṇāpīyāji, Nāpimāṁ. Here, Krishna is speaking about the principle of reciprocity in a much more expanded sense. He is talking 4.11. That as all people surrender unto me, he rewards accordingly.

And he has also said in the 7th chapter that Mayaivabhihitaanhitaan in 7.22, he stated that when the worshippers of the demigods get some results, those results are also given by him. Krishna reciprocates not only directly in different ways to those who approach him, but he also reciprocates indirectly to the demigods. And that indirect reciprocation is talked about not just in terms of the immediate fruits that they get, but also in terms of the eventual destinations that they attain in this verse.

Yānti devavṛtā devān. Krishna is speaking and he is saying that those who worship the devatās attain the planet of the devatās. Pitraṇ yānti pitravidhahā.

Those who worship the pitras, they attain the pitras. And bhūtāni yānti bhūtejyā. Those who worship the bhūtās, they attain the bhūtās.

Now the word bhūtāni can have multiple meanings. Bhūtāni can mean living beings and bhūtāni can also mean a specific category of living beings, that is disembodied living beings. Bhūtās.

Krishna uses the word bhūtā in both senses. Krishna has said when he says I am the seed-giving father I am the eternal imperishable seed for all living beings. So here Krishna is using the word bhūtā in the sense of living beings, but then in the 17th chapter when Krishna talks about worshipping the three modes, then he says that he uses the word bhūtā along with the word preta.

So those who are in the mode of ignorance, they worship the bhūtās and the pretas. So here Krishna is talking of the word bhūtā in the sense of disembodied living beings. Now in common parlance disembodied living beings are called as ghosts or they're called as spirits.

On this word spirit from a spiritual point, from a philosophical point of view is not accurate because the disembodied beings are not exactly spiritual. In one sense all of us are spiritual and the disembodied beings are not living at a spiritual level of existence. They are living at a spiritual level of existence itself.

But still it's interesting that Krishna talks about worship of ghosts over here. So the ācāryas explain that these three referred broadly to worship in the three modes. Krishna also talks about this later when he says So he says those in goodness worship the devtas, those with passion worship the yakshas and rakshasas.

Those with ignorance worship the ghosts, ghostly beings. So here Krishna is stating that those who worship in goodness worship the devtas, they go to the devtas. Those who worship in passion worship the pitras, they go to the abode of the pitras.

Now it's interesting that the Mahabharata says that Maharaj Pandu when he died, he died thinking of uniting with his wife and being struck by a mortal pain at that time because of the curse of the sage. So because of those circumstances of his death, although he had lived as a virtuous king, he did not attain a very exalted destination. Rather than going to swarga, he actually went to a relatively lower destination and one of the reasons why Mahavir Vishnu performed a sacrifice in Rajasuya Yajna was to get Maharaj Pandu to be elevated from where he had gone which was something like Mithil Loka to Swarga Loka.

So the essential point of this verse is that all paths do not lead to the same goal. If the Bhagavad Gita were advocating an absolute oneness, then this verse would have no meaning. Not only that, not only does this verse refute the idea of the oneness of all paths, but it refutes the idea of the oneness of all worshipable deities also.

According to some schools of thought, the new Vedantists as they are called, they consider that form is something ascribed on the absolute truth by the worshiper for the convenience of worship and such forms are meant to be ultimately transcended. So if that were the case, if forms are just simply ascribed and meant to be transcended, then whichever form one would worship, one would get the same destination. Krishna is telling here that if you worship your ancestors, you will get one destination.

If you worship devatas, you will get another destination. So clearly, this verse is quite categorical in terms of refuting the idea that there is oneness either in the destination or in the path. There are different paths and they lead to different destinations.

A standard impersonalist refutation of this refutation of the oneness of all paths is they say that if you say that different paths lead to different goals and say a train to Mumbai will go to Mumbai, a train to Calcutta will go to Calcutta, you have a very limited conception of the absolute truth. They say the absolute truth is not like Mumbai or Calcutta. The absolute truth is everywhere and that's why whichever path we go, we will attain the absolute truth.

But here we are not talking about the pervasiveness of the absolute truth, but we are talking about the method for accessing the absolute truth. As God is everywhere, God is there. Even an alcoholic's heart cannot perceive the presence of God, whereas a person who is prayerful in meditation can pursue the presence of God.

The time is 10. An attainment of God is essentially a process of increasing perception and that requires purification and purification requires a particular process. So the more steadily one becomes purified, the more one will be able to attain perception, realization, proximity to Krishna.

That's why the important thing is to not confuse the nature of the absolute with the nature of the method for approaching the absolute. The absolute is all-pervading, but that does not mean that every path takes one to the absolute. If that were the case, then everyone is on some path.

And we could say if every path would take us to the absolute, then why do we need any path at all? Because where I am is also there, the absolute is there, why do I need to follow any path at all? So the idea that all paths lead to God ends up saying that ultimately there is no need to do anything to go to God. Of course, this is not what even those who advocate such an idea mean. They also believe that some kind of transformation is required and some sort of purification is required.

So the Bhagavad Gita makes it very categorically that depending on whom you worship, accordingly you will get that destination. And thus one will move onwards and the concluding Krishna has said, that those who worship me will come to me. He has earlier told in the 7th chapter that, his abodes, 7th chapter as well as the 8th chapter, 7th chapter has given a hint that the fruits of the Devi-God worship are temporary, Antavat, but 8th chapter has clearly stated that even the Devi-God's abodes are temporary.

So, he has thus stated that even Brahma's abode will be temporary, what to speak of Indra's abode. So Krishna says, my worshippers will come to me, that means he is stating that they will attain an eternal destination. So the principle of reciprocation is universal, but the destination is not the same in all paths.

We have to choose the right path to get the right destination. Thank you.