Does the Gita flow from 2.58 to 2.61 reflect rise from karma-yoga through jnana-yoga and dhyana-yoga to bhakti yoga?

Answer Podcast

Hare Krishna. Can the flow of the Gita from 2.58 to 2.61 be seen as a flow from Jnana Yoga to Ashtanga Yoga to Bhakti Yoga or what is the flow over there? Answer Yes, if we look at the content, 2.58 focuses on withdrawal of the senses. So, it says that the characteristic of an enlightened person, the Pragya person is that person withdraws the senses from the sense objects.
Now, this may raise the question how is it possible to withdraw? Isn’t it difficult to withdraw? The natural desire is there to engage the senses in the sense objects. So, what about that? Krishna answers the next verse, So, he says that okay, one can withdraw the senses but Krishna acknowledges Arjuna’s problem that even if one withdraws the senses, it is like starving, it is like fasting. Hunger will still remain.
Sensual hunger will remain and one can remove that hunger by a higher taste. Now, what that higher taste is? Prabhupada translates param drishtva as higher taste. Technically speaking, it is superior vision.
Param is higher, superior, transcendental. Param drishtva, drishta is actually a variant of drishti. So, by a transcendental vision, one can become well situated.
Now, Krishna continues that so first is withdraw the senses, second is while withdrawal without a higher taste will be difficult. After that the verse says, So, here Krishna is saying that even if somebody may say okay, if one doesn’t have a higher vision, higher vision, but if one uses, one is intelligent and one is determined, can one control? Krishna says no. One may endeavor, one may be discerning but still senses will drag one down.
Impetuous senses will drag down the senses. withdraw, but withdrawal will not remove the desire without a higher taste. If the higher taste is not there, senses will drag one down.
And then 61 says, But, if one regulates the senses and fixes the consciousness on Krishna, then one will become well situated. So, here also Krishna uses the same word prajnapratishtita. So, that means 58 gives one part of the aspect of prajnapratishtita.
That is the withdrawal of the senses. 61 gives the other part that along with withdrawing the senses, one should fix the consciousness on Krishna. So, the one example we could give is that Krishna is saying, don’t just try to empty the mind of temptations.
Crowd temptations out of the mind. It’s like emptying is like trying to create a vacuum. That is difficult.
If I try to have a glass and create a vacuum, it will be difficult. But if I fill the glass with water, automatically the air will go out of it. So, like that Krishna… 59 and 60 say, the process of trying to empty the mind will not work.
And 61 says that filling the mind is what will work. So, filling the consciousness with Krishna is the way to stability on the spiritual path to eventually to enlightenment. So, it’s more of rejection of mere negation and affirmation of positive connection.
Now, 59 and 60, do they specifically refer to Jnana Yoga and Dhyana Yoga? We can say that they generically refer to any process that focuses on rejection. So, Jnana Yoga focuses on Naiti, Naiti. Not this, not this, not this.
And Ashtanga Yoga, Yoga is Chitta Vritti Nirodhaha. The movement of consciousness, the material movements of consciousness are stopped. So, both of these processes primarily focus on negation, negation of the material.
Now, if we are to correlate 59 with a particular process and 60 with a particular process, we would need more specific describers. The verse itself does not say anything. Now, Prabhupada in the 60th Parport says that the test of a yogi is that a yogi controls one’s senses as per a plan.
He talks about that in 59, 66, that section. And he says, so now, he is talking about yogi here not just in the sense of Ashtanga yogi. He is talking about an inclusive sense of a person who is trying to pursue transcendence.
So, we could say that 59 and 60 refer to transcendentalists who are pursuing transcendence by any path that primarily focuses on negation and rejection. And 61 talks about pursuing transcendence through the process of connection. And 59, 60, they also have their inner flow that they say that without, without higher vision, without higher taste, one will not be able to sustain.
And what will happen, as he is talking about it, they will be dragged down. So, in one sense, it is a linear chronological flow which acknowledges the importance of rejection in 58 as a beginning step. But it says that that is not sustainable.
Even, instead of calling it as rejection, we could call it as regulation. So, regulation is essential for any transcendental path. Regulation is the interaction of senses with sense objects.
That’s what it talks about. But regulation alone is not enough. Regulation should become like a stepping stone for connection.
So, that means, instead of letting our consciousness get dissipated in many material objects, we regulate our interaction with the material objects. And then we focus on connecting our consciousness with higher spiritual reality. So, 59, 60 say that if you only regulate, but we don’t connect with the higher reality, then that will not be sustainable.
So, it could be more from regulation of the material to connection with the transcendental. That is the flow from 58 to 61. Thank you.