Analyzing Bhagavatams Retelling Of Ramayana Subjectivity and Objectivity In Scripture part 1

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then, Translation purport by His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swamishla Prabhupada, Shukadeva Goswami said, After constructing a bridge over the ocean by throwing into the water the peaks of mountains whose trees and other vegetation had been shaken by the hands of great monkeys, Lord Ramachandra went to Lanka to release Sita Devi from the clutches of Ravana.
With the direction and help of Vibhishan, Ravana’s brother, the Lord, along with the monkey soldiers, headed by Sugriva, Nila and Hanuman, entered Ravana’s kingdom, Lanka, which had previously been burned by Hanuman. Purport, Great mountain peaks covered with trees and plants were thrown into the sea by the monkey soldiers and began to float by the supreme will of the Lord. By the supreme will of the Lord, many great planets float weightlessly in space like swabs of cotton.
If this is possible, why should great mountain peaks not be able to float on water? This is the omnipotence of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. He can do anything and everything He likes because He is not under the control of the material nature. Indeed, material nature is controlled by Him.
Only under His direction does prakriti or material nature work. Similar information is given in the Brahma Samhita 5.52 Describing how material nature works, the Brahma Samhita says that the sun moves as desired by the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Consequently, for Lord Ramachandra to construct a bridge over the Indian Ocean with the help of monkey soldiers who threw great mountain peaks into the water is not at all wonderful.
It is wonderful only in the sense that it has kept the name and fame of Lord Ramachandra eternally celebrated. Srimati Bhaktivedanta Swami Iti Namane Namaste Saraswati Devi Gauravani Pracharane Nirvishesha Shunyavadi Pashchatya Desha Tharane Pancha Kalpataru Bhyascha Krupasindho Bhyevacha Patitanaam Pavanibhyo Vaishnavibhyo Namo Namaha Chaitanya Mahaprabhu Jai Sri Krishna, Jai Kanya Prabhu Nityananda, Sri Advaita Today we’ll be discussing the pastimes of Lord Ramachandra as they have been described in the 10th and 11th chapters of the 9th canto of Srimad Bhagavatam. So broadly, I’ll be taking this theme analysing Bhagavatam’s retelling of Ramayana.
So Ramayana is a classic spiritual text and it occurred long before the Bhagavatam was told. So when the Bhagavatam is retelling the Ramayana, what is its focus? What is its purpose? So we will talk about the theme of subjectivity and objectivity in scripture. So before we do that, let’s have a quick overview of the chapters and then I’ll mention briefly about the verse we discussed and then we’ll move to this topic which is based on another important verse from this chapter, this chapter of the Bhagavatam.
So this chapter is called the Pastimes of Lord Ramachandra. It has 55 verses and Shukadeva Goswami accelerates his retelling of the Ramayana and still what he spends time on is revealing. So if you see, there are 55 verses in this chapter.
Now 1 to 12 are Ram’s story till he reaches the sea. Then he is pacified by the sea god in three verses. When he gets angry, the sea god doesn’t give him the way.
Then 16 to 23, Ram fights demons and kills Ravana. So that’s the section which we’re starting. Lord Ram has crossed the ocean, has entered into Lanka.
And then it’s significant here that five verses are devoted to the lamentation of the queens of Ravana. In one sense, if you consider big, big pastimes like Lord Ram getting exiled to the forest or even Sita getting abducted, that is described in one verse. But five verses is to describe the lamentation of the queens.
Why is that? We’ll come to that in due course. But generally, if an author writes a book, the author always has to keep distinct decisions that how many pages to spend on what. So if somebody is writing a novel or a historical fiction or even a book on history, we could write, say, recently in America, the American Independence Day.
We could write a whole book on the particular day and the event that happened in that day. Or we could write a book about the battle that led to that and eventually the day that took place. Or we could go into a history of a century or so before that.
So which incidents to focus on, which incidents to summarise, which incidents to elaborate, which incidents to give dialogues and other things to, all varies. So now what is focused on by the author reveals the emphasis of the author. So in one sense, there is not much direct speech in this chapter.
The only direct speech or the major significant direct speech, direct speech means that the characters are conversing with each other and a character is speaking. So then mostly it’s events being described, but dialogue or direct speech is here, the queen’s lamentation. And then after that in brief is described, after that is five verses, then Lord Ram’s virtuous rule after he goes back to Yodhya.
That’s elaborately described. There are 26 verses describing that. Now that is the 9th chapter, 10th chapter.
Now the 11th chapter is something similar. Again here the many things could be described about Ram’s virtuous rule, but first thing is described is how he gives generous charity to the Brahmanas. It is said he just gives the whole earth in charity and they give the earth back in charity because they don’t want it.
That is such is the nature of the Brahmanas. And then 12 verses describe Ram’s separation from Sita and the agony he experiences in her separation. And then again 20 to 36 is described Ram’s virtuous rule.
So we can see certain things seem to be the emphasis. One is how virtuously Lord Ram ruled when he was here. That has a lot of verses in the previous chapter, a lot of verses in this chapter also.
Another theme is that the separation from Sita, the agony he experienced in separation from Sita, that is described over here. So if we look at the Ramayana, it is a familiar book. And when Parikshit Maharaj is being told the Ramayana by Shukdev Goswami, Shukdev Goswami initially says, you have heard this before.
So I’ll describe this briefly. So when he’s describing this briefly, what is his intent? What is his purpose? Let’s try to understand that. So here we will see, this is a few verses ago.
So it describes the incident, the three verses describe the incident by which Sita is abducted. And what is described over there? What is the purpose of this abduction or what is illustrated or taught by this abduction? So it is, let’s look at that verse. Okay.
Is my connection better now or it’s still poor? Are you able to, I got a message from Athena that it’s not good. Is it okay now? Yes, it’s okay. Okay, thank you.
So, So, the wicked demon, like a tiger, he pounces upon the sheep. When Sita was unprotected, she didn’t have anyone to protect her. So she was the daughter of Vaideha.
She was a princess. She was abducted by him. And then after that what happened? With his brother in the forest, Lord Ram wandered like an attached person in great agony.
Krupana means one who is materially attached. Just like an attached person when they are separated from their beloved Priya, like that Lord Ram wandered. And what do you do by this? In this way he demonstrated what is the agony that a person suffers because of attachment to one’s partners.
Trisanginam, so how material attachment causes misery. So the Lord demonstrated this by his personal example. Now we may say, what does this mean? Is it that the Lord, just to illustrate how an attached person suffers, he orchestrated the whole pastime and he had Ravana abduct Sita and then he could suffer from Sita, suffer from Sita’s separation.
So now, is this the primary lesson? Is this the reason why the abduction happened? So that the Lord could demonstrate this? Well, let’s look at that theme. So we have to remember the context of the Bhagavatam. The Bhagavatam is being spoken by Shukadeva Goswami to Parishad Maharaj.
And Shukadeva Goswami is speaking everything or telling all pastimes and whatever pastimes he is telling all those pastimes which will help Parishad Maharaj fix his mind on the Lord and also help him take his mind of anything that may distract him from the Lord. So these two are the primary purposes. And the particular reasoning that is given over here or reason that is given over here, let us try to understand how that serves this purpose of translating of demonstrating this principle of attachment.
So, as I said, we’ll be discussing on this topic of subjectivity and objectivity in scripture. And I’ll be discussing this in three parts. First, we’ll try to understand what we mean by subjectivity and objectivity.
And then we’ll try to understand how scripture transmits spiritual knowledge. And this topic, I’ll continue tomorrow where I’ll be discussing further the very important practical carry-home for us. How do we focus in scripture on what is relevant for us? What we can learn from scripture? Focussing on what makes scripture relevant.
So let’s look at So what is the point? Why am I discussing subjectivity and objectivity over here? There is a very particular lesson that Parishad Maharaj is being taught by Shukadeva Goswami from this pastime. And that lesson is based on the subject over there. The subject is Parishad Maharaj.
And in case Parishad Maharaj has some residual thoughts that, oh, I had such a prosperous kingdom. I had such a good family. And because of this unfortunate curse, I lost everything.
If there is any residual remorse or feeling that he has lost something, he wants to remove that from his mind. But actually having these things only makes one attached and causes one to suffer. So no need for you to lament having lost that.
So the particular lesson that is being drawn is based on the subject that is there. Subject is the person who is receiving the knowledge. So that’s why we’re discussing this topic of subjectivity and objectivity in scripture.
So let’s first try to understand what these terms mean and how they relate with knowledge acquisition. So what is objective knowledge? So in the process of knowledge acquisition, there is the subject. This is a person who is trying to gain the knowledge and there is the object, that which you want to know.
So when the focus is on the object of knowledge, on what it is that is to be known, then when the focus is on that, that is what is called objective knowledge. And objective knowledge is usually considered to be universal and invariable. Now whether it is so or not, that’s open to question.
Say for example, newspapers. Ideally speaking, there is a difference between news reports and opinion pieces. So the news reports are meant to be as objective as possible.
Just report the facts. Don’t tell your interpretation of the facts. And there is a place for that.
But that place comes in the opinion pieces. So of course, nowadays with political polarisation, hardly anyone follows the standard of giving objective news. Even the objective news are tilted according to the particular political orientation of that particular media outlet.
But the point is, objective knowledge is at least considered to be something desirable. And that doesn’t mean all knowledge has to be objective. So what are the facts? What actually happened? That’s the focus on that.
Usually considered to be universal and invariable. What happened? A attacked and B fought back and then in that this happens. These are the events.
Let’s focus on the events. That’s objective knowledge. In contrast, there is subjective knowledge.
Subjective knowledge means it focusses on the subject of knowledge. Who is the person that is seeking the knowledge? Who is the person that has received that knowledge? These opinion pieces are subjective. That means the person is giving their interpretation of the events, giving their explanation of what has happened.
And subjective knowledge is usually considered to be individual and variable. That based on the subject here, whoever is the person who is going to interpret, read, analyse the events, they will give different readings of the event. So that’s individual and therefore it’s variable.
So now if we consider basically broadly speaking, how do we humans gain knowledge? It’s a complex blend of objectivity and subjectivity wherein we ourselves may not know what part is objective and what part subjective. That means I’m just reporting the events to you. But our biases, our predilections, they may come out in small word choices.
So for example, if we want to say the person X made a statement. Now we could say the President of America said. The President of America announced.
The President of America claimed. So now said is quite objective. Announced means we are saying this is the truth and he is announcing it.
And then as soon as you claimed, it means maybe there’s something suspicious about it. Maybe it’s not true. So what happens is when we gain knowledge, when we report knowledge, it’s a complex blend of objectivity and subjectivity.
So which part is objective? Which part is subjective? We ourselves may not realise it. Generally, if we like someone and some events happen involving that person, when we report the events, we will always try to portray the person whom we like in a positive way. And the person whom we dislike, we may portray in a negative way.
So that is just the way human psychology works. Now, sometimes the biases are very evident. Sometimes they are not.
But nobody can have completely objective knowledge. So we start with facts and then we read those facts in our particular way. And that’s why every viewpoint is a view from a point.
That means that if we consider somebody looking at a mountain peak, are they looking from this side or are they looking from that side? From this side, it’s all greenery. From the other side, it’s snowcapped. From the other side, it’s just bare rock.
So they can see it differently. So basically when we gain knowledge, it’s a blend of objectivity and subjectivity. And we’ll come back to this point later when we talk about how we learn from Scripture and how we can maximise what we learn from Scripture.
So now we may think, okay, objective knowledge, isn’t it good? Yes, we want to know what really happened. And is subjective knowledge bad? Is it undesirable? Not necessarily. All paintings, poems, stories, they are subjective experiences of reality.
And if the person conveying that reality is insightful, then subjective narrations can teach us much more than objective descriptions. Sometimes you may, okay, there was this bomb attack over here. There was this terrorist attack over there.
There was this war over there. There was this thing over there. We just read five different news and feel the world is going to hell, you may think.
But then maybe an insightful social commentator says, actually all this is due to the rise of extremism. I mean, it’s religious extremism, it is secular extremism, or it is all these, the connecting link over here is this kind of people with this kind of thoughts. And if that is true, then that gives us an insight, okay, this is what is happening.
So in one sense, subjective is not bad. If the person is insightful, the subjective person, the person who is doing the subjective narration, they bring things together. And that’s what makes it much more, much more illuminating, much more enriching.
So subjective knowledge is, is not undesirable. It’s sometimes what helps us learn things. And we’ll come back to subjectivity in scripture, this later.
Actually subject to rasa, which is the essence of what we seek in bhakti. We are all looking for rasa. Bhakti Rasa Amrit Sindhu is a classic book which Rupa Goswami wrote.
So rasa is quintessentially subjective. Rasa is experienced in the heart of each particular devotee. So rasa, so the principle of rasa is very important.
As a subjectivity has, it’s not undesirable, not always undesirable. Sometimes a person can be very biassed and then that might be undesirable. Now that brings us to another question.
Okay. Is any knowledge entirely objective? No, not possible. Because the subject can’t be eliminated from the process of knowledge acquisition.
The subject is always going to be there. This is what I heard. This is what I understood.
So knowledge, even when we go to some, we read a book, we think, okay, this book is here and I’m reading these facts from the book. But knowledge doesn’t exist as a set of disembodied facts. It exists as facts perceived by certain people.
That’s why throughout human history, it is quite often the history is written by the winners. And when the winners write the history, they write it in such a way that they paint themselves in the kindest, brightest colours and they paint their opponents in the darkest colours. So a British politician famously or infamously said after the Second World War, he says, history will treat me kindly because I will write history.
Now, of course, there we might say that the bias is quite clearly there. But even when the bias is not there, even if you have something like an encyclopaedia, which ideally is supposed to be objective, but still it is facts perceived by certain people. So if we think that there is that ideal of objectivity, this is what happened.
So what happened when we consider Lord’s pastimes. Okay, this is what happened. Now we will see the same incidents Ramayana is told in different ways by different commentators, different great Ram devotees.
Even Chaitanya Leela, which happened relatively very recently, Ramayana is millennia ago, whereas Chaitanya Charitamrita is just 500 or so years ago. And even then Chaitanya Charitamrita, Chaitanya Bhagwat, Chaitanya Mangal, Chaitanya Charitamrita Mahakavya, Chaitanya Chandrodaya Natak, all of these give slightly but significantly different tellings, narrations of the story, a story of narration of the incidents of the pastimes. And we could go into specifically why a particular story is told in a particular way, but that’s the author bringing their rasa into the narration.
So knowledge never exists as a set of disembodied facts. It exists as facts perceived by certain people. Now, I won’t go into this too much, but this is important.
Sometimes science is considered to be objective. So is it objective? We want completely objective knowledge. Science strives for objectivity, but subjectivity still remains in science.
Why? Because science is done by scientists, is done by individuals. And there are philosophers of science who analysed how science works within a particular paradigm, famously the structure of scientific revolutions is considered one of the books that significantly problematised the unquestioned authority of science. So Thomas Kuhn showed how scientists operate within particular paradigms.
So, for example, even if now there is some evidence, scientific evidence for reincarnation, scientific evidence for near-death experiences, but science operates within a materialistic framework. And that’s why any evidence that points to non-material truths that is not accepted within the paradigms. So science aims to be objective, but it’s not entirely objective.
And this is not just because, this is not just because scientists are operating within particular biassed frameworks or particular paradigms. But actually, as we have gone deeper into science, we realise that even there it’s a problem because subtler science is more subjective. Now, if I say that I hold Apple down, it falls down.
And you hold Apple and it falls down. You are in America, I’m in India. Somebody else in Australia holds Apple, releases Apple and falls down.
That’s objective. Everybody can see it. But as we go deeper into science, even science becomes subjective.
How does that happen? Because the very act of, for example, Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, we can’t simultaneously determine the location and the speed of a subatomic particle, electron, for example. So the very act of observation changes what is observed. We send a light beam to detect the location and that light beam itself changes the, changes the state of the particle over there.
And even more fundamentally in quantum physics, this observation causes the observed to change from wave to matter. Einstein was very upset by this and he said, I would like to believe that the moon continues to exist even if I am not looking at it. You say, obviously it exists, doesn’t it? No, but according to quantum theory, it’s only when the observer is there, the wave collapses.
I’m not going to go into technicalities. But the point I’m making is, this is a universal challenge, subjective and objective. Subjectivity and objectivity of knowledge.
So how do we function basically then? So what do we do with the knowledge that we get? We have to live with knowledge. We have to learn certain things so that we can function. So if you want to go out today, one person says it’s raining, another person says it’s not raining.
Or one person says one weather forecast says it’s likely to rain, another weather forecast says it’s not likely to rain. So what do we do? We have to have, we have to use some knowledge, count on it and then function. So when we have some knowledge, when we get some knowledge, or we give some knowledge, one extreme would be to say that this is completely objective.
This is exactly what happened. Now, as soon as somebody says that I am a completely unbiased describer of things, that in itself should signal some alarm within us. Because actually that is not humanly possible.
You can say that I’m trying to be as unbiased as possible. But everybody has their perspectives. Now the word bias certainly has a negative connotation, a very strong negative connotation.
But everybody has their own way of looking at things. Every viewpoint is a view from a point. So to insist that the knowledge we have is completely objective is to say that, to actually make an unrealistic claim.
And the other extreme is nihilism. Other extreme is super scepticism. This is actually nobody can have any knowledge.
Everything is completely subjective. So that what you say is just your opinion and what somebody else says is somebody else’s opinion. And there is absolutely no ground for any shared understanding of things.
That is, of course, extreme. So the way we function is, so we have knowledge that is a combination of subject and object. But we use the knowledge based on how it helps this subject, me, to navigate our object.
Our object is the world as we encounter it. So for us, we have to use some knowledge for functioning. And this knowledge is what I’ve got.
Now, how can I use this knowledge? Does this knowledge help me to function right now? If it is, let me use it. So this is, you could say, beyond objectivity and subjectivity is something like pragmatism. It’s be pragmatic.
This is how this knowledge accepts me to navigate my world. And we will come to this point again. This is the background for how when we study scriptures and we see sometimes different devotees may have different opinions on different issues.
There could be issues about culture. There could be issues about sociology. There could be issues about medicines.
So there could be many issues. And so should people dress like this or like that? Should people do this or not? Should somebody take vaccines or not? There can be so many different opinions that different people have. So we need to find out that knowledge which helps other subjects to navigate our objects.
That’s the first section. Now this brings us to the second part. Understanding how scripture transmits spiritual knowledge.
Now we may say, isn’t this subjectivity and objectivity? All this is just a result of our human conditioning. And scripture is perfect. Yes, scripture is perfect.
But what does perfection mean? Even if scripture is perfect, still it is we who are individual persons who are receiving that knowledge. So we are still subjects. We are individual subjects.
So let’s try now. I’ll emphasise one point which probably I’ll discuss in tomorrow’s session that subjectivity and objectivity is not the same as relativism and absolutism. Everything subjective is not relative.
And everything’s objective is not absolute. Why that is not so? That’s a very important subject, a very important point to understand. And I’ll discuss that tomorrow.
But let’s take a couple of points. And then we will have one or two questions. So subjectivity and objectivity in scriptural knowledge, if you want to see that, scripture contains universal timeless truths.
Yet those truths are spoken to particular audiences at particular times. And that context affects their presentation. So there are eternal truths, but there is contextual emphasis, contextual presentation of the truths.
So for example, the Bhagavad Gita is offering us eternal truths. The Bhagavad Gita is telling us about how we are essentially spiritual and how we need to live according to a spiritual consciousness, live for a spiritual purpose in life. At the same time, the Bhagavad Gita is spoken on the battlefield.
Therefore, there are some verses at least in the beginning and the end, primarily in the beginning actually, very little in the end, but where Krishna does talk about the war or the Sanjay talks about the war and Krishna also mentions this. So now is the Bhagavad Gita’s message that everybody should fight a war? No, that is not the message of the Bhagavad Gita. Although Krishna has verses where he is saying fight Arjuna, so those that fight, that specifically pick up your weapon and fight, that literal message is for that particular subject, that is Arjuna.
But that literal message is not for us, the universal message is. So fighting is the way Krishna, sorry, Arjuna harmonises with Krishna’s will. Arjuna expresses his devotional service attitude to Krishna and that service attitude is a universal message.
So there is the objective, we could say the universal truths are there in scripture, but they are spoken to particular subjects and that shapes their presentation. If you go further, now in India there are many dhams, dhams are sacred places and there are literature which describes the glory of those dhams. That’s called dhammahatmya.
So there is Vrindavan dhammahatmya, there is Mayapur dhammahatmya, there is Jagannath Puri dhammahatmya and there are also genre of literature called Sthal Puranas. Puranas are like Bhagavat Purana, Bhagavat Purana is one of the top 18 Puranas. But there are many Up Puranas, there are smaller minor Puranas and many of the sacred places have their own Puranas.
And in each of these, that particular dham is glorified as if it is the best. So Vrindavan dhammahatmya will say there is no dham like Vrindavan, this is the greatest. Naudeep will say that Naudeep is the greatest.
So why this difference? Because at one level that dham is experienced as supreme by those who are composing, those great people, those poets, those authors, those devoted souls who are living in that dham, who are writing that dhammahatmya. They are experiencing it as the best. Now generally in the material sense, there can be only one best.
If you say this is the best player in the tennis world, then there cannot be another best player. But in the spiritual domain there can be many bests. And we will come back to this when we discuss the Brihad Bhagavata Amrita in our next session.
But subjectivity is there very much in spiritual knowledge also. So a particular devotee has devoted their lives to Vrindavan, they may consider Vrindavan the supreme dham. And somebody else may consider Naudeep Mayapur to be the supreme dham.
So that is subjectivity in scriptural knowledge. Now if you want to consider, there can be a lot of subjectivity at many levels. So for example, not lot of subjectivity, there can be frequent, many occurrences of subjectivity actually.
So we know in Govardhan Leela, Krishna is teaching Karma Mimamsa to the Rajivasis. Karma Mimamsa is a particular Vedic school of thought. It is not the Vedic conclusion, but one of the schools of thought which arose, which falls short of the Vedic conclusion.
And that is says that if we do our duty, we are obliged to be given the result by the universe. And even the universal gods, the devatas, they cannot intervene. They are also subordinate to the laws.
So basically Krishna uses this philosophy to tell the Rajivasis, there is no need to worship Indra. You don’t have to worship him at all. You are doing your farming, you are doing your cow care and you will get whatever is required.
So now this is not the Vedic conclusion and yet Krishna speaks this. So why is he doing that? That is simply to provoke Indra over there. So even the absolute truth may not always speak the absolute truth.
That is the remarkable context sensitivity of scripture. Even the absolute truth may not always speak the absolute truth. That same point applies over here.
Shukadeva Goswami is retelling the Ramayana over here. And what is the purpose of telling the Lord’s pastimes? At one level, it is to help a devotee fix the mind on the Lord. And that’s true.
At the same time, Shukadeva Goswami is second division. He wants to take his mind, take Parashar’s mind off everything else, for anything that may distract him from Krishna. And therefore he is bringing this additional lesson over here.
Yes, through his wandering like that, Ram is demonstrating the plight of somebody who is attached. Attached and the agony that they suffer when they are separated from their wives. So in this way he is saying, O Parikshit, you are separated from your wife.
Don’t worry about it. Don’t worry about it. Don’t think you have lost anything over here.
So now of course, that same pastime could be understood at many different levels. Now we could say that Lord Ram is demonstrating transcendental viraha. And Shukadeva Goswami himself will say later, how when the Gopis are separated from Krishna and Krishna is separated from the Gopis, how what they experience of separation is the highest experience of divine love.
And Lord Ram is experiencing the same thing in separation from his consort Sita. But here 9th canto especially is described by Acharyas. Before the 10th canto comes, the 9th canto, the 10th canto is giving the Artha Pravrutti, the object to focus the mind on.
And the 9th canto inspires Anartha Pravrutti. 9th canto describes many many pastimes of immorality among the great sages, of many objectionable actions by great personalities. That is meant to demonstrate the dangerousness of worldly attachment, of lust, of anger and therefore just become detached from it.
So in harmony or in pursuance of that theme, what is Shukadeva Goswami telling? Yes, through this agony you can understand how the attached people suffer. Now particular pastime is the abduction of Sita. Now why was Sita abducted? There could be many different reasons for it.
We could say it was because Ravana was so cunning and Sita was over trusting. So Sita, many times the lesson that is drawn is why did Sita get abducted? Because she trusted Ravana and came out of the Chakra, of the Lakshmana Rekha and that’s how she was abducted. Now there is another way of understanding it is, so that we could say the immediate contextual explanation from that pastime’s perspective.
From a more cosmic perspective, Lord Ram had come at the request of the Devatas so that the world could be freed from the atrocities being inflicted by Ravana. So the Devatas wanted to accelerate Ravana’s death and that’s why they arranged for the situation in such a way that Sita could get abducted and then Ram would confront Ravana and would defeat him and destroy him. So that was also another reason for Sita’s abduction.
And then we could say that why didn’t Lord Ram directly go to Ravana, attack him and defeat him and finish off the whole thing. Why did he let Sita be abducted? Why this narrative twist we can say? It is actually the Lord wants to give us lots of pastimes that we can relish. It’s a drama for Bhaktas to relish and that is what is the reason why this pastime was there.
So why was Sita abducted? There are different reasons for this. But the Bhagavatam focusses on that reason, that which is most relevant for Parishad Maharaj according to Shukadeva Swami. And in this way, there is the subjectivity in scripture that is being demonstrated and how that subjectivity is there in Shri Prabhupada’s teachings, how we can learn subjective lessons that are most important for us without relativising scripture.
That will be the theme we’ll discuss tomorrow. So I’ll summarise what I discussed today. Broadly, we discussed three main points.
First, we did a quick overview of the two chapters of Ram Leela and then we talked about how the overall theme of purpose or mood of retelling the Ramayana here is to illustrate how to help Parishad Maharaj fix his mind on the Lord. And therefore, the pastime of Sita being abducted and Ram’s plight after that is told that this is to demonstrate the plight of somebody who’s attached. So now that’s not the only lesson.
So for our connection, we discussed subjectivity and objectivity in scripture. So our knowledge that we acquire, it is never completely objective. But we can’t reject it as subjective and we have to function in the world.
So we use the knowledge that helps us as subjects to navigate the world as we encounter it. And even science is not completely objective and subjective knowledge is not necessarily bad. It can actually give us a better understanding of things if the subject giving that knowledge as analysing the events is insightful.
And then in scripture also subjectivity is there. The truths are universal. At the same time, those truths are told to particular audiences.
The Bhagavad Gita has a call to fight. That is not its universal message. That is its contextual message.
That is for the particular subject. That’s subjective. And then we also talked about the subjectivity in the absolute truth.
We don’t always tell the absolute truth like Krishna, Karma, Mahamsa and Govardhan Nila. And then here, there could be many different reasons for explaining why Sita was abducted or why Rama is in this agony. But Shukadeva Goswami is teaching Parikshit, that lesson which will help him to become detached from everything else and to become focused on Krishna.
Thank you very much. So any other questions? Hi Tushar Chaitanya Charan Prabhu. Thank you so much for such a thorough analyzation of the subjectivity and objectivity.
I’ve never seen someone break it down so detailed. And this brings up, I guess, a point of discussion that I’ve had about scripture. I appreciate the point that you had said that even our scripture cannot be fully objective in the sense that there is a subject receiving the knowledge and there’s a context in which it’s being spoken.
But of course, there’s insights from it. But the question of the preservation of the actual knowledge, I have encountered, say, from those who are asking about the Vedic literature. So, for example, you can say there’s a defence that, say, the Koran, even though it’s subjective in the sense that it’s given at a time, place, and circumstance.
The dwellers, they’re being harassed by X, Y, and Z. And so Allah is telling Prophet Muhammad to fight, etc. The objectivity of the actual truth and what was given from God to Angel Gabriel is quote-unquote objective in the sense that I think there were like 70 people hearing the Koran and it was memorised and then written down and then thoroughly checked just to make sure that there was absolutely no deviation. It was absolutely preserved.
This was exactly what was said. And then when we turn to our Vedic literature, for example, you have Krishna speaking the Gita to Arjuna on the battlefield. And while we know Sanjaya, whose mystic vision is saying, it’s Vyasadeva who wrote the Gita down for us in Kali Yuga.
So the argument is, well, one, how do we know that Vyasadeva didn’t bring his own subjectivity in writing down the actual verses? What is actually spoken by Krishna? And from our viewpoint, you can say, well, we just have to have faith that he is a Shakti Visha avatar. You can just see his work, that he must be empowered to have written so much. I mean, it’s impossible for someone today to do so.
So he is chosen by God, empowered by God to write, just to document all the Vedic literature. But again, that’s based on our faith that he is a Shakti Visha avatar and it wouldn’t be altered. There are no checks and balances.
And then so that’s one level. And then the next level is, well, one, my understanding is that Vyasadeva had seen… Let me address this level or is it the same question or a separate question? It’s the same. It’s just this next level is that when Vyasadeva had written down the Vedic literature, I think it was on like banana leaves or like bamboo leaves and or something, but it’s not the most formal way of documentation.
So when that was passed, whoever translated it or actually put it into print, how do you know that was preserved and there wasn’t subjectivity from that person altering what Vyasadeva had written down? So the key question is, how do we know that our Vedic literature was not altered at any point in time from the subjectivity of, say, the person writing it, perhaps even if intentions were correct, to actually say that this represents that this is exactly what God said and this is exactly the truth and completely unaltered. Thank you. Okay.
Thank you. That’s an important question. So, say, how do we know that the knowledge we have is completely unaltered? Whereas, say, for example, the Quran, they say there are multiple ways in which they checked and correlated it.
Well, this is a whole field in the study of religion called textual criticism. That means, you know, is the text exactly what it was in the past? And in general, before the advent of the printing press, it is very difficult to preserve texts. So even the Quran, I don’t want to go too much into the hermeneutics with respect to the Quran.
Actually, there is a huge amount of subjectivity there because the Quran was never composed as one book. It was at different times. Muhammad had revelations.
The spirit spoke to him and he spoke to different people and all those different people met and then they put it together. So it’s like we have to have faith that although it’s not just the credibility of one person who, as we say, is very pure hearted and exalted, it is the different people he spoke to, all of them exactly remembered what they spoke, what he spoke. They exactly reproduced it and then it was all put together.
So there is a huge amount of subjectivity there also and none of them wrote things down. Muhammad himself was not literate in terms of writing things down. When Archangel asked him to write, he said, I can’t write.
So then he just spoke and others wrote at that time. So the point is that there is subjectivity there also. So subjectivity can’t be avoided.
Now having said that, now with respect to the Vedic tradition, there is also a tradition of textual criticism. So sometimes Vishwanath Chakratakur in his commentary or Prabhupada in his Bhagavatam commentary says, in some version this verse is like this, in some version this verse is like this. So what is the essential purpose of scripture? Is that being fulfilled? That is the key question.
Just like say if there is a, now there is a pandemic and say suppose a cure is found that can both prevent the disease, cure the disease, that can just eliminate the disease from the world. Say that happens. So now that particular thing is manufactured at a particular place, maybe by some company and from there it comes to us.
So how do we know for sure that there has been no doctoring in between, nobody has replaced it and changed it for their ulterior motives to maybe earn some quick bucks. So the way we can know it is by the effect, phalena parichayate, if say the person A was given the medicine and the person A was cured by that medicine and then say person Z is given that medicine, it’s passed down from A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K up to Z and person Z is given the medicine and person Z is cured. Then that A and Z, they got the same thing.
So we see what is the result of hearing the Bhagavatam or hearing the Bhagavad Gita that is demonstrated in the book itself. So what happens by hearing the Bhagavad Gita? Let’s look at the Bhagavatam for that matter. Bhagavatam, the result is Parikshit Maharaj becomes absorbed in Krishna.
He becomes so attached to Krishna that he is able to turn away from everything and everything else and become absorbed in Krishna. So similarly, is that happening for us today? Is by our hearing of the Bhagavatam, are we becoming absorbed in Krishna? So historically speaking, if somebody wants to trace, is this exactly the same text that was passed from here to there to there? Well, we can try to do that. But just consider how difficult it is.
If you wanted, you got a medicine from a particular store and you wanted to check whether from this medical store when I got this medicine, it is exactly the same medicine that came from that manufacturing unit. So how would we do that? We would have to have CCTV cameras for every stage of the transmission of the medicine. Okay, this was the medicine from there and it went into this box.
And then we have to have 24 hours monitoring of that box to make sure that nobody opens that box. Or even say the seal is there. But what if somebody opened the seal and put the seal back again? Then okay, it went into this truck.
And how do you know exactly, nothing happened inside the truck? Do you put a CCTV camera inside the truck? So it’s impossible to monitor. What to speak of spiritual knowledge, nothing is possible to monitor like that if one wants to start with a hermeneutic of doubt. That means one starts with the attitude of scepticism then there is no way to prove the fidelity of anything, not no way, it’s extremely difficult and mostly impractical to prove that even an ordinary medicine, which is manufactured a few hundred miles away, that is exactly the same that we have got today when we are taking it.
But the way we work is pragmatically. Does it cure me? If it cures me, of course, there are some checks and balances. It’s not that there are no checks and balances.
So in the Vedic tradition, there are checks and balances. There is, as I said, first is from our perspective, we look at the phalleinu parichayate, the fruit. Is the same fruit happening? If that is happening, that means the knowledge is preserved and we’ve got that knowledge.
So is it possible that a particular verse might have changed? Well, Prabhupada and our Acharyas say, okay, this verse is rendered like this here, this verse is rendered like that over there. They don’t consider that very consequential. That may happen, but as long as the essential meaning is kept, that doesn’t matter so much.
So we don’t have to be literalists in the sense of insisting that every single text or every single letter of every single text or every single letter of every single verse of the scripture is completely unchanged. That is not the claim of the tradition itself. The claim of the tradition is that the same spiritual potency is transmitted and that spiritual potency can uplift us even now.
Now I said that there are some checks and balances, that is especially if a book has been commented on extensively and if the commentator is a celebrated person, then that commentator’s followers preserve the book. So for example, the Gita is firstly not a very big book, 700 verses. And if you go back to 6th, 7th century when Shankaracharya was there and he commented on the Bhagavad Gita and his commentary is preserved and his commentary is preserved along with the verses which he had when he commented them.
So the verses are the same. There is just one verse, 13.1, in some versions Arjuna asks the question before starting the chapter, in some places Arjuna doesn’t ask the question. And then the numbering slightly varies because of that, based on the presence or absence of that verse.
But there are no significant differences. So if a book has been commented on and most major books, even the Bhagavatam has been commented on, the Vishnu Purana has been commented on, the Ramayana has been commented on, the Bhagavata of course has been commented on so frequently. So then we have not just the commentary but we have the book as it was when the commentator wrote it.
So it’s preserved over there. So in that sense we do have some checks and balances within the tradition. So in the tradition is aware that the possibility of some change in transmission and there is vigilance to prevent that.
But eventually we have to be Saragrahi. Saragrahi is that we have to focus on the essence. And the essence is the spiritual potency to transform our heart and to infuse us with the devotional energy to become absorbed in Krishna.
And that is very much available to the scriptures even today. Thank you very much. Does it answer your question? Thank you so much, Chaitanya Chakraborty.
Yes, that was so wonderful. If you don’t mind, just as a quick follow-up. We can talk tomorrow.
Oh sure. I’ll bring up the same point if that’s okay. Just tell me quickly what the question is then we’ll listen.
Sure. It’s that if you’re pushing that and it makes sense that it doesn’t so much matter the preservation of verse by verse but does it have the correct effect of what the purpose of the scripture is. Transformation of the heart, absorption of Krishna.
But then could you apply that same thing to say the Bible where it went through the Council of Nicaea and it was changed and there’s so many versions. There’s King James versions, there’s the standard version. And then details like Jesus is the only way.
And then maybe there’s some stories around prophets that the Muslims… That’s a big question. Maybe we can discuss it some other time separately. The point is that unless we are biblical scholars, we can’t really comment on that.
And Prabhupada in general didn’t… Prabhupada quoted some principles from the Bible like thou shall not eat meat and then how Jesus loved God so much that he was ready to give up his life for God’s sake. Prabhupada did not go into the specifics and technicalities. So if somebody is studied by biblical history, they can go into that.
Now whether the Bible has so many different translations and now Christian scholars have their own approach to this diversity of translations and how much of it is preserved. So my understanding would be that there is some preservation definitely there. People do develop high levels of consciousness.
People do become attracted towards transcendence. Now their conception of transcendental reality may be different. Now is it the complete spiritual potency that is there? I would say that we can’t really make statements like, it’s not, Bhaktivinoda says with respect to other traditions, be respectful when we are there, when we are approaching their particular, either it could be sacred places, sacred images, sacred books, whatever it is, sacred manifestations.
So I don’t think we as devotees need to demean other traditions to say that their revelation is not perfect, it has not been transmitted properly, only our revelation has been transmitted properly. We don’t have to go into that zone. What is in the revelation that we have been given, we have been given a very intimate vision of the ultimate reality and that has no parallels in world history and that is the distinctive contribution of Krishna consciousness to world theology.
So there may be some devotees who may be interested in that and if that is their approach, okay. But I feel that we can focus on the spiritual potency that we are experiencing in our tradition and elevate ourselves. Like if I am sick and I have a medicine that is curing me, then unless I am a professional doctor, do I have to really worry about whether this medicine is going to actually work for this person or not? Is this medicine right or not? Is that medicine right or not? If somebody wants to specialise and go in that area of scholarship, that’s okay.
Otherwise, I feel it’s not something which is essential. Okay. Thank you so much.
Hare Krishna. Thank you. Hare Krishna.
Hare Krishna. Thank you so much. I just wanted to quickly say thank you for clarifying this and Athena for asking this question because I was about to ask a similar question but not as well as Athena.
And I have asked it before and because my question was so not clear, I didn’t get a great answer. So I just wanted to thank you for that. I have been wondering about this for a while.
And I am running so I am a little out of breath. Anyway, I am jogging so I am a little out of breath. Thank you.
Thank you. Happy to be of service.