Gita 01.27 – Undiscerning visual perception erodes spiritual conviction

Hare Krishna Bhagavad Gita 1.27 so Arjuna has beheld the various relatives for many generations ready to fight so taan, all those samiksha, on seeing them so Kaunteya, the son of Kunti when he saw this sarvan bandhun avasthitaan he sees all of them are bandhun, sarvan bandhun avasthitaan, situated together they are all related to each other in different ways krupaya paraya vishto he became krupaya, by compassion paraya, very strong, overwhelming, avishto he became overwhelmed by that vishidan idam aprave, vishidan he started lamenting and in lamentation he must speak now so here the effect of undiscerning visual perception is being depicted undiscerning visual perception is that we see with our eyes but if we don't if we use our intelligence to carefully process what we are seeing then we can be dragged away by illusion and that is precisely what happens to Arjuna so when he sees all of these various warriors sansamiksha, he sees all of them and then his first perception is sarvan bandhun let me see earlier 1.23 when he was speaking he said dhartarastra sindhur buddhe ruddhe prachipirshava he said that who are those who are fighting on the side of the evil minded son of dhartarastra so at that time his perspective was this is a war between good and evil and those who have sided with evil they have to be punished so at that point his vision was based, was rooted more firmly in reality where he sees how actually but at that time he was seeing that the kauravas are vicious and yudhisthira is virtuous and krishna is a lord of virtue so i am fighting on their behalf but now he sees because that vision undiscerning visual perception has distorted his conceptions and he sees them not as those who have sided with evil but he sees them as relatives and even now subsequently how can i kill my relatives now krupa means mercy but here krupaya refers not to mercy but to compassion so krupaya refers to the emotion that is experienced by one who is the dispenser of mercy so krupaya makes one do krupa so for example if a beggar is in a very destitute condition hands and legs are cut off and very pitiable almost skeleton with bones looking very hungry and destitute then that may invoke krupaya in a passerby, may invoke compassion in the passerby and because of that krupaya the passerby may do some krupa, may give some charity so like that now what has happened is when arjuna sees all these warriors assembled over there in the battlefield about to fight and fight till death which is going to be a brutal bloody affair so he starts feeling overwhelmed with compassion so do all these relatives deserve to fight each other and kill each other like this and he starts having overwhelming second thoughts about the inevitable conflict that is going to take place and he starts and he starts lamenting oh such a thing should not happen this fight should not happen that's what he starts thinking and and he starts speaking words so actually the Bhagavad Gita's first chapter is called by different names two prominent names that are used by the commentators are Sainyanirikshayog and Arjun Vishadayog so this verse marks the transition between these two topics so till this point till one point we could say 26 or 27 there is Sainyanirikshay that is happening so first Durudhana is observing the armies on both sides then the event that are happening after the conches while the conches are being blown that in Sainyanirikshay is being done by Sanjay and he is reporting it to Dhritarashtra and then Arjuna is doing Sainyaniriksha first he desires to do Sainyaniriksha that is described from 20 onwards to 23 and then 24 to 26 what Sainyaniriksha he does and what is the effect that is described so when Durudhana talks about his Sainyaniriksha at that time he does not talk in terms of relatives and friends Durudhana's mind is so conquered by greed that greed has destroyed any affection based on relationships and that's why he doesn't refer to the Pandavas anywhere as his brothers so we see in his description of the warriors on both sides he talks in terms of this is a great warrior, he is like this he is like this, we also have great warriors but there is no mention of any relationships that he talks about over there so is it that he has transcended bodily affection bodily attachment, no not at all actually there are three levels there is a level, there is a level of bodily attachment, there is a level of spiritual vision and spiritual attachment which rises above bodily attachment and there is a level of material greed that also destroys bodily attachment not by making a person unattached but by rather making a person so attached to things that one sacrifices even one's bodily relationships for that just as you know in Indian history Aurangzeb in order to capture the throne after Shah Jahan he imprisoned his own father Shah Jahan and then he killed his own brother Dara Shukoh so here what has happened is it's not that he was so spiritual rather he was so greedy that even basic human civility in terms of respecting and having regard for one's relatives that is also lost to a person so now if we consider these three levels so such material attachment such greed that one doesn't even care for relationships that's the lowest level which is exhibited by Arjuna, the second level is the level of attachment to material relatives which is based on a sense of duty and then there is the highest spiritual attachment to Krishna where one doesn't become indifferent to material relationships but one subordinates those material relationships to our spiritual relationship with Krishna so we could say Adharma, Aparadharma and Paradharma, so Duryodhana is at the level of Adharma Arjuna is at the level of Aparadharma and Krishna's instructions will through the Gita will take Arjuna to the level of Paradharma so Arjuna's concerns which he expresses are not wrong now to be concerned about one's relatives, to be concerned about not wanting any unnecessary bloodshed and certainly the bloodshed of one's relatives is all laudable as compared to Adharma, Aparadharma that means as compared to religion material religiosity is also good because it at least maintains order in society and enables people to act in relatively less selfish ways and more somewhat selflessly so Aparadharma is required for maintaining order in society but in some cases Paradharma is what is required so Arjuna's soft heartedness here is not a weakness necessarily but only when that soft heartedness makes him go away from his duty towards Krishna at the level of Paradharma then that becomes a weakness so we will see about Arjuna's character more in the future verses but here the theme is that undisturbing visual perception actually distorts our spiritual convictions thank you.