Gita 07.27 – Go beyond duality by spirituality
Bhagavad Gita 7.27 Iccha is desire or infatuation attraction dvesha, aversion with it with desire and aversion with these two dualities all living beings they are deluded like this they take birth so here Krishna is speaking about how the souls come under illusion in the previous verses in the 25th verse he has stated how because of being covered by maya the souls cannot know him that is 25th text 26th text was that he himself is not under maya he is omniscient that he knows everything past present future so just as the sun is above the clouds and people are below the clouds so these clouds don't cover the sun the clouds cover the people who are under those clouds similarly Krishna is not under illusion we are under illusion the question comes up how did we fall under illusion Krishna says that it is because of our attachment and aversion so when we take birth sarva bhutani sammoham sarge yanti sarge yanti sarga refers to creation or beginning or birth so when we are born we have the attachments and aversions from our previous life and those attachments and aversions affect our conduct our behavior our character and this life they shape who we are just as when we if we work on a computer and then after working on the computer for some time we make a email id and we surf on the net using a browser and all these things we do and after that when we shift to another computer and then login to that computer using our email id at that time we will find that our bookmarks our search references and our search history all that is it becomes connected with that computer because it is associated with that particular email id similarly just as there is transfer of information from one computer to another computer when we shift from that computer to the next computer similarly there is along when the soul goes from one body to another body there is transfer of the soul's preferences from one body to the next the soul whatever attachments and aversions it has they go from one body to another and in this way the soul takes birth so Krishna has talked about this earlier in the third chapter when he stated 33 to 35 he talks about his analysis that time he states he says between the senses and the sense object there is attachment and aversion which is already situated it is there the senses are attracted to certain things and they are averse to certain things one should not come under the control of those attachments and aversions obstacles on our path we need to break free from them we need to go beyond them so here Krishna is stating that these attachments and aversions they are there from our birth itself later on Krishna will talk about the divine and demoniac nature in the 16th chapter and there also he uses a similar theme while enlisting qualities Abhijato Si Pandava Abhijato Si means that we are born with these qualities some people are born with a divine nature some people are born with a demoniac nature but one of the most hope giving and defining teachings of the Gita is that our destiny is not a slave of our biology our destiny is not a slave of our biology that means biologically we are driven towards certain actions by biology we can include not just our physical drives for eating,sleeping,eating and defending all animals are driven by those drives and we human beings also have those drives and we cannot entirely resist or reject them but we do have the higher intelligence and the greater will power by which we can resist or atleast regulate we can resist those aspects of these drives that are unhealthy and regulate them so that our energies are wisely channeled,yes we all have to eat,we can regulate our eating so that we can take food that is sanctified by offering to Krishna,we can take food that is favorable for the raising of our consciousness and thus we can move out of the illusion which we presently are in we will see that Krishna will talk about this theme of coming out of illusion more in the next verse in this verse the theme is that we are born with a certain set of attachments and aversions at a very gross and broad level we can say that we human beings have an aversion for excreta especially human excreta,all excreta in fact but say hogs have an attachment to that excreta so how does this come about this is this is sargeyanti paranta sargeyanti this is born we are born with it and this is what we get and this attachment and aversion through this example we can understand that this is not bad for us,this is not necessarily bad certain things which we are averse to they are also biologically arranged in such a way that things which are harmful for us we are often averse to them but our biological drives do not always discern correctly what is the best for our spiritual growth and that's why we need to use our intelligence guided by scripture to know what is right and what is wrong and then we can act properly so with attachment and aversion I like this I don't like this this is good,this is bad this is duality actually for the soul is transcendental at one level nothing material is good because everything material is foreign to the soul's spiritual nature at another level if we consider matter also as Krishna's energy then we see material things in terms of their potential to be engaged in Krishna's service and we don't see them oh this is going to give me pleasure or this is going to give me misery rather than having that self-centered vision of duality we have a Krishna-centered vision of service of ourselves engaging in the service and of using the material resources that we have in the service and thus moving onwards in our spiritual journey so all living beings are born in illusion at the time of birth that Arjuna should fight and conquer this illusion is hinted at in the usage of the honorific for addressing him parantapa one of the chastiser of enemies so Arjuna just as you chastise your outer enemies similarly chastise the inner enemies of raga and dvesha of dvanda moha and stay fixed in your duty and thus you will attain perfection that theme of attaining perfection through diligent execution of dharma that we will talk about in the next verse which we will discuss in our next.