Gita 07.02 – Understand the appearance and the substance of everything

Thank you Bhagavad Gita 7.2 Krishna speaking here about the glory of the knowledge that he has shared he will be sharing in this 7th chapter previous verse said that by this knowledge your mind will become attached to me, you will know me in truth and getting the mind attached to Krishna is perfection of Yoga so in this text he continues further glory of the knowledge I am giving you knowledge and I am giving you Vijnanam realization different Acharyas explain differently what knowledge refers to and what realization refers to but essentially I am speaking this without anything remaining after you know this there will be nothing left to remember for you to remember nothing will be left so what exactly does this statement mean nothing more to remember Vijnanam Teham Krishna is stating that he is giving the fundamental categories of the features of existence or fundamental tenets of existence he is giving proper knowledge of them full knowledge of them this does not necessarily mean all knowledge in totality because he is also stating in the 10th chapter talk of Vibhutis I am only going to Vibhutis are endless as an example I will speak a few of them so essentially Krishna speaks something that enable us to speak the knowledge which enables us to get the fundamental categories the principles the Upanishads talk about Tattvatraya generally so there are three principle truths in existence that is Jiva, Jagat and Jagdish the soul matter material world you could say and the lord, control all the time so these three Krishna gives an understanding of them and if I understand these broad three principles then I understand totality of existence in principle details are many details are infinite but the principles in terms of the fundamental realities in existence that is explained Krishna talk about himself, Krishna talk about his material energy Krishna talk about his spiritual energy in 7.4, 7.5 and that is Ashesha, in essence we get everything and the words Jnana and Vijnana are explained differently by different Acharyas some Acharyas explain that it refers to knowledge of Aishwarya and Madhurya knowledge of Krishna's greatness and also his sweetness so Krishna's sweetness comes out in this chapter when he says that if those who surrender to me I will deliver them aham tvam sarvape vimoksheshyami no sorry mam eva ye prapadyante maya metam tarantate you surrender to me they will cross beyond mine Prabhupada explains Jnana and Vijnana to be knowledge and realization that's the way Prabhupada explains Jnana and Vijnana in many places but interestingly here he translated nominal and phenomenal so this is nominal and phenomenal are central concepts in most philosophical many philosophical systems the terminology specifically may be western nominal and phenomenal principles are universal so phenomenal refers to that which is perceivable to our senses and nominal as contrast to the phenomenal refers to that which is the underlying reality which is not necessarily perceivable to our senses so in philosophy often the question comes up that do we encounter the true nature of things or do we encounter just the appearance of those things so in other words senses give us a picture of reality that correlates with the actual nature of that reality or does it does the picture given by our senses correlate only with the way that reality appears to us as a famous scientist said that we can never know nature we can know nature only as it is exposed to our method of examination or put on lighter note if you have a hammer then everything seems like a nail that means that equate our perception of reality with the reality that means we equate phenomena with nomina but our perception is often misleading we see a mirage we feel that there is water in the mirage but actually there is no water and like that there are many ways in which our senses mislead us so understanding this helps us to understanding that our senses are not reliable always helps us to be open to extra sensory modes of perception in scripture offers us one such extra sensory mode of perception of course the word extra sensory is used for some paranormal or mystical sightings but still the point remains that what Krishna is stating over here if as Prabhupada translates that means that we will understand the appearance of things and we will also understand the substance of things that means we will understand that as we look in the chapter that it is due to three modes of material nature that things appear in different ways and their appearance is the result of the three modes so we cannot know everything about everything certainly we are finite beings but we can understand that in appearance whatever is appearing in whatever variety is there it is ultimately a product of three modes and that's why we don't have to get too attached or too infatuated by it and on the other hand substance of everything is Krishna substance of everything is Krishna there is no reality higher than Krishna and as he will say later in this chapter that he underlies all of existence because he underlies all of existence so he is the topmost truth and being the topmost truth he is the topmost is not just in terms of being high above everyone that talks about Krishna's transcendental position but he is also being present in everything and in this way Krishna is the substance of everything so Krishna is saying that in this section that gyanam teham sarigyanam idam vakshaam yasheshitaha so regarding the appearance and substance of things I will tell you completely that completely is not in terms of all details but completely is in terms of principles and yaj jnato aneha bhuyon yaj jnato vimoshishite having known this there is nothing more to remain known that means within it's not that there will be some new appearance that will come up which will not fit in the conceptual category of the three modes and throw us off putting us into illusion no we will understand that whatever we experience in this world is actually within the product of the three modes and thus it need not we need not get captivated or eluded by it because we are transcendental and by staying focused on our transcendental purpose we can transcend all such influences of course all this will be discussed in much more detail in the message of the Gita as we move.