Gita 15.15 The purpose of perceiving the spiritual through the material is to perceive the spiritual in its own right

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
thank you this is Bhagavad Gita 15.15 Krishna is concluding the section of Jnana Chakshu or rather of learning to see the role of the spiritual at the material level in 15.10 and 11 he had said that only with the eyes of knowledge can one see the soul what if the people don’t have that eyes of knowledge then 15.12 to 15 talk about how in the functioning of the material we can see the role of the spiritual so he is talking about how the sun light comes from him how the fire is him how he sustains the earth so the cosmological, the terrestrial and the physiological realms of material existence are all sustained by Krishna now Krishna comes to the psychological level in this verse he states that what we remember and what we forget that also is ultimately not possible without the sanction of the indwelling super soul how we sometimes remember things and sometimes forget things is at one level a mystery some of us are gifted with phenomenal memories some of us with ordinary memories but overall we all need to work to improve our particular situations and it’s not only in our control our memory sometimes some simple fact which we have known throughout our life slips out of our mind sometimes something is remembered by us effortlessly some people can just remember mathematics tables which they have learnt in childhood so at one level the capacity of memory is due to our diligence in remembering but at another level it is also due to our efforts our past life karma because of which the supreme lord sanctions as per our desires so some of the greatest breakthroughs in most fields happen because of inspiration and during inspiration the answer comes ready to the person as if preformed where does it come from it comes from the supreme source of intelligence situated in our own hearts Krishna Krishna reciprocates with our desires we strongly desire to remember something he will give us remembrance and if we desire to forget he will give us forgetfulness if we wish to enjoy sensuality Krishna will give us desires that will perpetuate our sensual enjoyment and we will forget about the consequences of that enjoyment but if we desire to grow spiritually then Krishna will give us remembrance of spiritual truths and he will give us forgetfulness of the worldly distractions thus Krishna is sustainer of our psychological life also and the most important knowledge about the purpose of living comes from the Vedas Krishna says that he is the source of the Vedas also so the purpose of appreciating the spiritual in the material is to ultimately appreciate the spiritual in its own right the Vedas give various forms of material knowledge till they culminate in Krishna that he is the ultimate object to be known he is existence’s ultimate purpose and knowledge’s ultimate purpose he is Vedanta the ultimate end of Vedic knowledge although he may not be directly or frequently talked about in the Vedas Krishna has said in 2.44 that we need to go beyond the Vedas 2.45 to know transcendence Krishna is the ultimate transcendental reality but Krishna is the ultimate purpose of all Vedic knowledge and the Vedic knowledge is a progressive body of knowledge all meant to gradually elevate people’s consciousness towards supreme spiritual reality and that he is the Vedanta Vedanta krut Vedavid evachaham somebody may ask how does Krishna know that all the Vedas went towards him he says Vedanta krut I myself am the compiler of the Vedas and Vedavid evachaham now he is referring to here the manifestation of Vyasadev who wrote the Vedanta sutra Vedanta krut and Vedavid he knows what the Vedas are essentially about so Krishna is the knower the writer and goal of the Vedas that means the knowledge of the material is whether it is got through observation of the natural world or whether it is got through study of scripture is all meant to ultimately help us come closer to Krishna and attain him that ultimate attainment of Krishna is the central purpose talked about in this section this verse marks the transition between the previous section where how to see the spiritual and the material is talked about in the next section we will talk about what is the essence of the Vedas when Krishna says he is Vedavid he knows what the Vedas are what their essential goal is so that will be mentioned in the next verse which next three verses are sometimes called the Trishloki Gita they summarize the Gita’s essence and the last verse in that section describes how all of existence culminates in Krishna reiterates this verse’s import 15.15’s import is reiterated in 15.18 where here it says and there it says that thus the supreme reality is emphatically stated to be Krishna in this chapter of the Gita and of course ultimately throughout the Gita Krishna is the goal of all Vedic knowledge and of course he is the speaker in the goal of the Gita’s knowledge and he is the ultimate object of all knowledge in general