When Dhritarashtra was forced by the modes to support Duryodhana why is he blamed?
Answer Podcast
Transcript
This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Philanthropy question when Dhritarashtra was forced by the modes of material nature to think and act in a particular way which is to support a Duryodhana then why is he considered to be responsible the modes are forcing him to act and why is he considered to be blamed answer the modes impel us they don’t compel us that means the modes push us to act in particular ways but we have the capacity to counter push we even when we are completely in material consciousness even at that time we have choices so the choice may be limited in the sense that we can choose whether to act in goodness or in passion or ignorance even if somebody is totally stupid in ignorance see when a person is a compulsive alcoholic they can’t give up alcohol but they may still be able to choose should I drink whiskey or should I drink beer somebody is a TV addict but still they can choose should I watch this program or should I watch that program somebody may be compulsive eater but should I eat this item or should I eat that item we all have free will now the more we come under the influence of lower modes the scope of our free will decreases that means a person in goodness can choose whether I should drink water or I should drink some herbal tea or I should drink some other healthy beverage so they have they have a wide variety of choices within which they can choose the person in the mode of ignorance the scope of their free will is substantially reduced they cannot choose should I drink whiskey or should I drink beer they can’t choose anything beyond that so our free will is never taken away but if we are repeatedly misused our free will we have repeatedly acted according to lower modes then the scope gets decreased but even within the decreased scope we have choice so the modes impel us that means they push us in particular directions but they don’t compel us we have the capacity to counter push and the more we take shelter of Krishna through studying scripture, through chanting his holy names, through seeking guidance from his devotees, getting inspiration from those devoted to him the more our power to counter push increases that is what it means that we can resist our conditionings with Dhrashtra the modes influence him to think in a particular way but he had so many opportunities to think in another way but he chose not to think in that way and that was his mistake so yes certain choices may come and they may allure us very forcefully just like in a computer sometimes the default program opens up and when it opens up it says do you want to continue yes or no so now normally the option would be say default option is no and we have to go and click yes so that’s why it opens but in some cases the default option is yes and it will open in 15 seconds if you don’t click no so like that when we have repeatedly done certain things then doing that thing again becomes a default option unless we check ourselves it will get done but still we have the capacity to check ourselves and so we always have free will Dhrashtra also had free will the scope might have been limited but he could have used that limited scope of free will properly and then that scope would have expanded because he refused utterly to use his free will properly that’s why he is considered responsible thank you