Gita 07.20 – Don’t let desire steal your knowledge
Bhagavad Gita 7.20 here Krishna is now taking in the overview of all of existence that is there in this chapter further he has talked about how the various elements that comprise material nature how the modes and everything that is manifested in the modes ultimately rests in him and how those who surrender can go beyond the illusion of the mode that's what is there in 7.40 then in 7.15 he talked about those who don't surrender to him from 7.16 to 19 he talked about those who surrender to him and thereafter from 7.20 onwards he talks about those who are in between these two categories so those who don't surrender and those who surrender are to extremes in between the two are those who surrender but to something else so here from 20 to 23 Krishna will talk about those who surrender to the devatas so he says so he is using the same word as he had used in 7.40 those who surrender to me go beyond maya those who surrender to me go beyond maya but those here who are the people who surrender to him surrender to other devatas anya devata who are these people those whose gyana knowledge has been taken away stolen away abducted by kama by self centered desire so the the point of saying of using the word gyana and using kama is that gyana is that in the previous verse Krishna has stated how those who surrender to him they are gyanavan bahunam janmanamante gyanavan mam prapadyate vasudeva sarvamiti samahatma sudurlabhaham so he talks there about those who are fixed in devotion to him those who understand him to be everything, they are gyanavan vasudeva sarvamiti but in contrast those who surrender those who people are gyanavan they will surrender to him but if they are gyana so the vana is often used as a suffix which describes possession like we have dhanavan which means one who possesses dhana so if we consider dhana to be a wealth one who has dhana dhana is dhanavan wealth can be stolen away similarly knowledge can be stolen away and what can steal away that knowledge desire kama so the word kama is used in different senses in the Bhagavad Gita some places it is used narrowly to refer specifically to lust as contrasted with say other anathas like greed and anger so when Krishna says that lust, anger and greed are the three gates to hell as you will see in 16.21 so lust is one kind of selfish desire the desire for sensual gratification Krishna says in third chapter that lust is what will cause bondage lust is our inner enemy that also uses it more or less in a more inclusive describer of selfish desire beginning with the desire for physical gratification now in this chapter itself in 7.11 Krishna is talking about from 7.8 onwards when he talks about various how he is manifest as the essence of all things when he says there he refers to kama not just as self-destructive force but as a natural human need as a natural human need which needs to be fulfilled in a dharmic way in fact it is not just a need, it is a purpose of life dharma artha kama moksha which are the four purusharthas among them kama is also an important purushartha so there kama refers not just to sex desire it refers to overall material prosperity the pursuit of material prosperity should not be at the cost of ethics that's what he has told earlier now Krishna is saying that those whose knowledge has been destroyed by has been stolen away by desire it's an interesting thought provoking conception, knowledge being stolen by desire that means say somebody knows that smoking is injurious for the health but if there is an addictive desire for a particular, for say cigarette then that person forgets the knowledge that one may have acquired by being told by the doctor by reading some health related literature by even one's own experience of the health consequences despite all these one will end up indulging in it and in this case the desire steals away the knowledge so Krishna is telling here that's of course a very directly self-defeating kind of stealing away of desire here Krishna talks about they surrender to other devatas and following rules accordingly this is not that these people so let us say somebody starts smoking or somebody gets into some religious activity because of the influence of karma in that case the person is actually up all dharma entirely but in this case Krishna is saying that they don't give up dharma but they follow the rules rules according to their nature this can broadly refer to how there are tamasic people in the Matsya Purana there is a classification that is described that the tamasic people worship Shiva, the rajasic people worship Brahma and sattvic people worship Vishnu basically Krishna tells over here that those who have knowledge they worship him but those who don't have knowledge then depending on the way that their desire has depleted their knowledge they will accordingly being driven by their nature they will worship some other devata so this whole system of the devata upasana we will understand gradually in the next three talks.