Gita 18.54 Devotion doesn’t culminate in liberation, liberation culminates in devotion

Transcript

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18.54 here Krishna is now speaking about how we can become elevated how we can progress towards transcendence by steady consistent practice of detachment from the world and advancement towards spiritual reality in the previous set of verses 50 to 53 he has talked about how by renunciation of the material one can establish a connection with the spiritual till one gains one becomes situated in the spiritual level was the last line of the 53rd text now the 54th text is Brahmabhoota situated in the spiritual level, what is the result? Prasannatma joyfully situated Nashochati Nakankshati Nashochati we do not lament Nakankshati we do not crave because in both situations we are well engaged or well situated for serving Krishna Nashochati Nakankshati Samah Sarveshu Bhuteshu when we are getting Prasannatma, when we are internally content then externally at the material level even if we gain something or we lose something, it doesn’t matter if say to give a contemporary maybe a little crude example some people are so caught in watching entertainment on their TV inside their homes or playing a video game or whatever else they spend hours and hours days upon days sometimes, it’s going on and on the food is supplied for them there and outside sometimes a storm comes outside sometimes sun rises and pleasant weather nothing matters to them because inside they are so joyfully absorbed now of course we could say that joy is trivial, what is the joy of just watching a movie or playing a video game but we are not talking about a specific joy we are talking about the principle sometimes somebody may be absorbed in speaking or writing or doing some creative work sometimes some musicians, some writers, some artists painters painters they may get so absorbed for hours upon hours in their work, inside their labs in their studios in their libraries that outside what weather comes and goes they may not be aware of it at all again here at least say being caught in video games is we could say in the mode of passion and ignorance being lost in doing something constructive is in a higher mode we could say relatively speaking in the mode of goodness somebody is writing, doing some artwork but the point, principle here is that if inside the house we are getting so much stimulation and so much satisfaction that we don’t care what is happening outside the house so similarly we are so satisfied internally that we don’t care what is happening externally we are so fulfilled that externally at a material level whether there is loss or gain, it hardly matters for us and there are some sometimes some gain or loss some pleasure or pain comes simply by the higher forces of nature sometimes the weather goes good, weather goes bad sometimes the stock market crashes sometimes the stock market becomes bullish and there may be no specific personal causes that we can trace to this but sometimes there are some specific people some person acts as an enemy and causes a lot of trouble some person acts as a friend and gives us a lot of joy, gives a lot of help and now if we are very materially conscious then the person who causes us some material distress will become like our enemy, in fact our worst enemy we could say on the other hand the person who gives us some material pleasure will be like our friend, even our best friend so this differentiation happens because we are unable to see beyond the specific situations to the generic realities we are unable to see beyond the specific material events to the overall patterns in the material world at one level ups and downs are simply inevitable at another level all those ups and downs which are materially endless and we could say even pointless what is the point, sometimes pleasure sometimes joy, sometimes pleasure, sometimes it just goes on and on that which seems materially pointless is spiritually purposeful through the ups and downs of material life our consciousness is slowly meant to look for something beyond these ups and downs and every up and every down is meant to push our consciousness up and up towards our lord so when our consciousness is being pushed towards spiritual reality then and we understand that is the purpose of life, indeed the purpose of all of existence then samah sarvesh bhuteshu then we don’t get so affected by what people do to us madbhaktim labhate param madbhaktim we become joyfully absorbed in Krishna and at that time we attain devotion to Krishna and what kind of devotion? Para, the transcendental devotion, it’s interesting here, this trajectory will explore more in future verses but Krishna is here talking about how through the process of karma yoga, doing varnashram, then jnana yoga, dhyana yoga, so after action through renunciation to devotion that is the progression Krishna talks about, so here in when brahman bhuyaya kalpate might be considered to be the perfection by some people here in Krishna says that is not the perfection rather there is a perfection beyond that too that after that labhate when one is situated purely on the brahman platform then one goes further to attain pure devotion that means devotion is the culmination of brahman liberation some people think that bhakti is a means to liberation but here it is said that the culmination of liberation is in devotion and in that sense if you consider university in which attaining brahman is the graduation then attaining bhakti is like the post graduate program and attaining love for Krishna paravakti is the doctoral graduation it is the zenith it is the summit of our spiritual evolution thank you