Gita 17.14 Austerity enables us to use our bodily vehicle constructively not destructively

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
it simply increases one’s ignorance. And that is the stress of this verse.
Thank you. Here, Krishna is speaking about three kinds of austerities. This is the section in the Gita where there is two levels of three-point analysis.
Throughout this chapter, Krishna is talking about things in the three modes in response to Arjuna’s question about what is the nature of faith, of the faith of those who are not following scripture. Krishna says that the faith can be in the three modes and to understand their faith, he says we can look at their aahara, their food, their yajna, dana and tapa. Now, he’s talked about aahara and yajna till now.
He’s talked about that. Now he’s going to talk about tapa. But before going into tapa, first he talks about how our tapa itself can be classified into three levels.
So the austerity that we do can be at the level of the body, the mind and the tongue. So these are the three primary faculties with which the soul works in this world and sannyasis, especially in the Vaishnava tradition, are called as Tridandis because they use all these three in the service of the Lord. So now these three faculties, Krishna will describe how austerity can be performed with these and the first, he talks about his body.
So, Devadvija Guru Prajna Pujanam. Dev can be the Supreme Personality of Godhead or the Celestial Being, the Devatas. Dvija is the Brahmanas.
Guru, of course, is the teacher, spiritual master, as well as other teachers can also be referred to as Guru. Prajna, in general, those who are advanced in knowledge. It’s interesting, we would normally think that the Brahmanas would be advanced in knowledge and the Guru is advanced in knowledge.
Now, of course, the Devas have knowledge, but Krishna is also stating Prajna as a separate category, which indicates that knowledge is, the state of being in knowledge is not defined or determined only by one’s social position, which is frequently determined by birth. So if somebody has knowledge, even if that person is not born in the Brahmana family, the person is not a Dvija officially, still that person should be respected, Krishna is saying over here. Prajna.
See, even in this verse, which is not actually about universal, universality is about austerity, there also, there is a reference which points to universality. So anybody who has knowledge, anybody from whom we can learn, the knowledge that we need, we should respect them. Devadvija Guru Prajna Pujanam.
Pujanam means be respectful. So, the word Puja specifically refers to the practice of doing worship using the Arati paraphernalia. Pujanam refers to holding in a respectful position.
This means that we recognize that at our core, we are spiritual beings, and others are also spiritual beings, but there are people who are in a respectable position because of what they have done in their past or previous lives. And that position needs to be acknowledged. And we acknowledge them by offering proper respect.
The body does not like to offer respect, we could say at one level. That means the body may want to slouch, body may want to just be in a bossy kind of position, but conscientiously we strive to act respectfully. Conscientiously we try to act in a way that is uplifting for others, and of course for ourselves.
That means we strive to act in a way that helps us to become elevated. We act thus, we move steadily towards growth. Pujanam.
Then Shoucham. Shoucham is cleanliness. The natural situation in this world is that things tend to become disorderly.
If we just keep things here, there, and everywhere, the result is that things just get damaged, they get spoiled. And if you don’t want that to happen, then we need to have something tangible to do. We need to have some tangible source of steady illumination that enables us to move towards a purposeful direction in our lives.
And when the things around us are in a cluttered state, then that also makes us feel irritated. That makes us feel negative. But if the things around us are in an uncluttered state, that enables us to have an uncluttered mind, which can be more focused and more purposeful.
That Krishna talks about here, when he says that he is going to help us, that we should help ourselves by practicing the austerity of cleanliness. So even if we don’t feel like being clean, still we make the effort conscientiously and determinedly to strive to be clean, to keep things orderly. Pujanam Shoucham Arjavam.
Arjavam refers to straightforwardness or truthfulness. Now it’s interesting, Krishna classifies this as an austerity of the body. So normally we would think that this is something which is more related with conduct.
How do we behave? But then this comes in with Brahmacharyam and Ahimsa, the next two points. That if we look at the austerity of Brahmacharya, that means, there is a normal inclination to indulge in sensuality, which we have to avoid. Now Arjavam, when it is used in this context, it refers more to simplicity of living.
So again, Shoucham and Arjavam are related. Shoucham means that what we have we keep in an orderly, neat way. And Arjavam refers to that we don’t clutter ourselves with too many possessions.
The more things we have, the more difficult it is to keep them in order. If we have only less things, then it’s much easier to keep them in an orderly way. That’s what Krishna is pointing to over here, when he says that we should keep things properly.
Arjavam. So Brahmacharya and Ahimsa refer to the two normal drives within the body, which need to be restrained. That is Kama and Krodha.
Krishna has repeatedly talked about how we need to control them. Kama, Krodha, Bhavam, Vegam. So he is talking about how, if we can tolerate the problems that come from our body-mind complex, then we can move forward steadily towards elevating ourselves.
So the drives that come in, Krishna says, they will come, but we don’t have to succumb to them. And we can avoid succumbing by being thoughtful, by being focused, by learning to cultivate purity. To the extent we do that, to that extent we grow in our life.
To the extent we fail to do that, to that extent we can’t grow. So, Shariram tapo uchchate. Recognizing that there will be a tendency towards sensual indulgence, and there will be a tendency towards violent actions whenever temptation or provocation comes in our life.
Austerity at the physical level means we do not succumb to these tendencies. So, Krishna will in the next verse talk about austerity of speech. But overall we see the common thread in this is that we recognize the body as a tool that we have, and that tool comes programmed in some unhealthy ways.
So, austerity is basically the conscious choosing of actions that helps us to channel our bodily vehicle constructively and to prevent it from making