Gita 17.03 The relationship between our existence and our faith is causal constitutional and consequential

Transcript

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Bhagavad Gita 17.3 Krishna is now answering Arjuna’s question He is telling that actually everybody is determined by their faith the previous verse Krishna said that the faiths are of three types in goodness, passion and ignorance and he had also said that Svabhavaja Trividhā bhavati śrapta Dehināṁ sa svabhāvaja Svabhāvaja, Krishna that is born of one’s nature Krishna is elaborating that theme over here in this verse and he states here that Sattva Sattva refers to existence Sattvānūrūpā sarvasvam śraddhā bhavati pārata so one according to one’s existence one’s faith is shaped bhavati, that kind of faith one gets and śraddhā mayo’yaṁ puruṣo indeed people are made of their faith the ātmā is said to be ānandmaya that means it is filled with ānanda Chinmaya, it’s full of consciousness so śraddhā mayo’yaṁ that means that we are made of our faith and yo’ya śraddhā sa eva saha and as is our faith so we become so Krishna is talking about a very intimate relationship between us and our faith which is both causal, constitutional and consequential causal means that the way we live shapes our faith somebody might be nominally or by affiliation a religious person but if they are living materialistically pursuing worldly pleasures and doing their religion just as a formality then their operational faith is much more in their worldly activities in their earning money, power, prestige they think that those things will give them happiness their operational faith is much more in that than in anything else and in that case whatever they do they are materialists their faith is in matter and material things according to their existence their faith becomes so even if somebody is nominally religious but if their existence is materialistic then their faith will become materialistic conversely if somebody is living amidst a materialist society and is more or less materialistic but if somehow they come in the association of spiritualists and start practicing spirituality start adopting a spiritual lifestyle then gradually their faith will also become stricter this is how the practice of sadhana bhakti gradually increases our faith in Krishna so so so our existence is causal to our faith our existence molds our faith according to the way we live then we are made of our faith so in that sense you could say our faith is constitutional to us that is what is our constitution that is what constitution here means what we are constituted of so that’s what we are made of because ultimately how do we know a person it is not by their dress it is not even by their desires because all of us get different kinds of desires which may be at significant variance with the way we live a person who lives virtuously may also sometimes get impious desires but as long as they don’t indulge in those desires as long as they don’t chase those desires they are well situated so similarly we too can be well situated as long as we don’t become materialistic as long as we don’t indulge materially so desires are like predators which come into our consciousness and they come and they go if we don’t take them very seriously if we don’t indulge in them we don’t have faith in them so we are not made of them that is not our defining faith or disposition so for a person who is overall pious that means they have faith that the pious way of living is the best way of living then sensual desires especially gross or wanton sensual desires they are more of intrusions rather than reflective of their disposition so we are made of our faith Krishna earlier talks about kamaatmanah svargapra janma karma phala pradam kriya vishesha bahula bhogaishvara gatim prati in 2.43 in the Bhagavad Gita it says that some people are kamaatmanah that means their self is made of kama now the self is actually satchitananda the soul is eternal conscious and blissful but here Krishna is talking about people who are completely convinced that the way to happiness is by being materialistic and the way to happiness is by pursuing sensual pleasure and because of this belief they just operate accordingly they can’t pursue anything else so in that sense kama is what they are made of so similarly their faith is that in fulfillment of their desires they will be happy similarly their faith is there Krishna is saying over here in general that we are all made of our faith and we can’t change that or wish that away because that is the essence of who we are we are all composed of our faith and then last thing Krishna says is that our faith is also consequential the kind of faith we have that is what we will become so sometimes we may be materialistic and our past conditionings may be troubling us too much but that doesn’t mean that we are condemned to be materialistic always if we have faith in Krishna we have faith that Krishna will protect us from our lower desires that Krishna bhakti will purify us then even if presently we have lower desires those lower desires won’t stay for long rather our faith in Krishna will make us devotionally disposed and will eventually free us from those lower desires so in that sense our faith is consequential it will have the consequence of molding our life accordingly if we have faith in Krishna our life will get molded that way if we don’t have faith in Krishna our life will get molded that way also so the way we function shapes how we to summarize the way we function, the way we live shapes our faith in that sense our faith is causal and even now while we are living we are essentially defined by the faith we have in that sense our faith is constitutional to us and what we deeply believe in accordingly our future existence will get molded so in that sense our faith is consequential to who we will become thus Krishna in this verse talks about the intimate relationship between our existence and our faith