Are there many Gitas other than the Bhagavad-gita?
Answer Podcast
There are many other Gita’s which are part of the what about them everything that is there within the broad Indian tradition is necessarily of the same level of authenticity Madhvacharya talks about Shastra Tarakamya Tarakamya means hierarchy or classification so for example in Siddhanta Darpana Baldev Devashankar has a book called Siddhanta Darpana where he states that certain books like say the Devi Bhagwat that is not an authentic Puran in the category of Vedic Purans so sometimes followers of Devi Bhagwat claim that that is the real Bhagwat and what the Vaishnava Bhagwat is not the Bhagwat but that is clearly not true because the Devi Bhagwat is a later book, the Devi Bhagwat is aware of the Srimad Bhagwat and it is claimed that that is not actually Bhagwat, that is the real Bhagwat so it is basically a book later written by certain people who are the worshippers of the particular Devitas and they are trying to ascribe it to sages and that way they try to gain authenticity for their traditions so many of the later Gitas, the less known Gitas the later Gitas they try to follow the pattern of the Bhagwat Gita and try to glorify the particular Devata in a way similar to how Krishna is glorified so there are certain truths certain statements in those Gitas which if they are harmonizable with the Siddhanta that is given in the scriptures then they are acceptable but if they are if they contain certain things which are not harmonizable with the Siddhanta then they have to be considered contextually given for particular people but they are not necessarily part of the Vedic canon so we have to look at each of those books which are called as the Gita and we have to see whether they are actually a part of the scriptural canon and for that we may have to look at at the broader traditions and what they talk about about various books so the content of the books as well as the explanation about the authenticity of those books and explain the broader traditions that will help us to understand the level of authority, level of authenticity of the content in the various books that are also considered to be Gitas