Gita 02.19 – The soul’s non-doership points to the complexity of matter-spirit interaction

Tangible call for action also. Thank you.

2.19 Bhagavad Gita. Krishna is continuing his instructions to Arjuna about deciding the right course of action based on an understanding of the soul. One who understands is that, one who thinks that the soul is the killer.

Here, refers here to anyone who, one who knows this, this refers here to the knowledge of the soul. And similarly, anyone who thinks that the soul is, one thinks that the soul is killed. So, those, ubhau, ubhau refers to both, ubhayor api drishyon, thus Krishna uses a similar word in 2.15. So, here, 2.16 rather.

So, now here, ubhau, tau, both of them, navijani, neither of them know the truth, that what is the truth, nayam hanti nahanyate, that the soul kills not and is not killed. So, now, that the soul kills, is not killed, Krishna has emphasized quite repeatedly, avinashi, anashinom, nasato, nabhavah, rather. So, all that he has talked again and again.

So, it's clear that the soul is not killed. The significant point that Krishna introduces over here is hantaram, that the soul is neither killed nor is the soul the killer. So, this point that the soul is not the doer, will be explained more by Krishna in the third chapter, in the fifth chapter and again in the 18th chapter.

It is a complex philosophical term. Adi Krishna just hints at it over here. He doesn't elaborate it over here.

It requires elaborate analysis and the point is that actually the soul being spiritual, how can it interact with matter? How can it make matter do anything at all? When a pet, say, A is shooting arrows at B and killing B. So, now, B is not the body, B is the person. So, B never gets killed. It's only the body that gets destroyed.

Now, A is also not the body, A is the soul. So, now, the soul is different from the body and the soul practically can't really control the body. One of the main reasons why the concept of the soul was drawn out of the, or was abandoned in the Western philosophical tradition, was that the concept just could not be digested by many people.

That how can something which has no material mass, no material, is completely non-material, how can that, how can something that is non-material affect something material? And Descartes was one of the, Rene Descartes was one of the prominent philosophers who talked about this substance duality, that soul and matter are two different substances. And these two different substances, he said that it is the soul that is the source of consciousness, soul is the source of life, the spirit. Sometimes he used, in the Western philosophical circles, the word mind is often used to refer to the spirit.

We'll discuss about that in one of our future sessions. But here, the point is, he talked about that dualism and the effect of talking about the dualism was that most people just couldn't digest the idea that how could something which is completely spiritual affect something material? And Descartes himself could not give any satisfactory answers. And after he passed on, then the theory became even more strongly criticized.

And in the Western intellectual circle, the soul was practically exiled because of the inability to digest and able to explain how the soul could interact with matter. Now, actually, in the Western intellectual tradition, in Christianity also the concept of the soul is there. But often the soul is used, is not really described as an ontologically distinct entity.

Ontology refers to the nature of study of the nature of existence. So ontologically distinct entity means an entity which has its own distinct existence. So their existence, so there the soul is often used in the sense of a metaphorical reference to our non-material essence.

So it means we have a non-material essence, something which is different, something that is something that makes us more than matter. Now, what that is, how that exactly functions, none of us know that. But it is there, a non-material essence.

And we have to refer to it by some way. The word soul is used for that. It's a metaphorical reference to a non-material essence.

And because that was the conception of the soul at that time, the soul is actually a non-material thing, refers to a non-material side, whatever that is, and because that was not very clearly known. So the focus was on not primarily separating the soul from the body, but just giving attention to one's spiritual side by doing certain religious rituals. So there were some Christian theologians who came up with the ideas like that the soul is while in material existence inseparable from the body.

And again further the idea came up that actually the soul and body can never be separated. And then came up the idea that at the time of pre-omnipotence, at a time of judgment day, when the souls who had been faithful to Jesus and God, when they would be redeemed and taken to God, at that time they would have the same bodies that they had now. Because it was very difficult for people in the Judeo-Christian tradition to conceive of a soul separate from the body.

So now if the soul is something which is intrinsically connected with the body, then what is it actually needed for? The body is what we know and the body is what is sufficient. That's what scientists thought, philosophers thought. And the idea that the soul is different from the body, significantly, substantially different as was proposed by Rene Descartes, that was not defensible in terms of how the interaction could happen.

So both ways, the point was that one Rene Descartes theory came into criticism that how does the soul interact with the body? And Aquinas was one of the proponents of the soul is not different from the body idea. And they said that how can the soul exist different from the body? Actually, we can't conceive the soul different from the body. So either way, the interaction of spirit and matter has been a serious philosophical challenge in intellectual circles.

And how the Bhagavad Gita resolves it, we will discuss in 13.22 and 33. In brief, what it says is that it is true that the soul can't interact with matter. But beyond soul and matter, there is a supreme soul.

And God is not just transcendent as is thought about, many of the Abrahamic traditions, that God exists beyond matter. But rather, God exists also in matter, in his immanent manifestation of the super soul. And the super soul's presence and his arrangement that makes the interaction between soul and matter possible.

So actually, that means the super soul is present not just as an overseer or a permitter, the soul is also, the super soul is also acting as a mediator or the facilitator of the mediation between matter and spirit. And that way, the point is, we will discuss about the soul's non-doership in an elaborate class in the future. We will discuss about the super soul's role in the interaction of matter and spirit also in a future session.

But here the important point is that the soul is neither the doer nor the object on which the action gets done. So therefore, one should not, there's no need to lament. So Arjuna, your lamentation for the Kurus is misinformed because they themselves will not be killed.

So there is no need for you to grieve for them. And you will not be the killer because the soul does not do. Soul is not the actual doer.

We'll see about that more. But the point is, therefore, you will not be over-compassing for the actions. Now, it's not that Nirsala was licensed for doing anything and everything and then claiming the soul is not the doer.

There are the principles of Dharma which ensure that there is no karmic entanglement when the soul acts at the level of matter. And Krishna will ask Arjuna to act according to Dharma. But the point is, we hear when the philosophical conceptions are being discussed.

The point that is, if you look from the spiritual perspective, soul has nothing to do with matter. So the destruction of matter does not affect the soul. And therefore, material considerations need not sway the soul from spiritual duty,.