Gita 09.05 – God’s self-contradiction points to his inconceivable multi-level manifestations
Thank you. Bhagavad Gita 9.5 Bhutani, all living beings, all of existence. It is not situated in me.
You see my opulence, Yogam Aishwaram, see my extraordinary opulence. Bhutabhran, that he is the maintainer of all living beings. I am the, although I am the maintainer of all living beings, I am not situated in them.
Mamatma Bhutabhavanam, for I am the very source of all existence. Now, many significant points in this verse again. All living beings are not situated in me.
Pashyame Yogam Aishwaram, this is my mystic opulence. So now, this is itself astonishing, this is heard in these two lines, the assertions within them are astonishing because the previous line, previous verse had stated Matsthani Sarva Bhutani. So normally, if a person speaks something and then immediately after that, that person contradicts, speaks something contradictory, we will feel object, what's going on here? And that person will probably clarify, apologize, oh that was a slip of tongue or something like that.
But Krishna here, far from being apologetic about the contradiction, self-contradiction, Krishna is celebratory. He is stating that he has, but this is opulence, this is mystic opulence. So what this means is that Krishna is not, this is definitely not a slip of tongue, it's an intentional statement and it's meant to convey something.
What is it meant to convey? That we are at our core finite and we can't really understand God's infinite glory, but we can celebrate it and we can get some understanding of it if we are guided by God and those who are devoted to him, those who have realized him. So here it said that, so now Matsthani Sarva Bhutani, and Matsthani Sarva Bhutani, the way to understand this seeming self-contradiction is by recognizing that it refers to different manifestations of the absolute truth. Matsthani Sarva Bhutani refers to the Paramatma aspect.
The Paramatma refers to the immanent feature of the absolute truth, the feature that pervades all of existence by entering into the existence. So, if the absolute truth has entered into all of existence, then how exactly is the absolute truth distinctive from the rest of existence? That is the Bhagawan manifestation where God is in his self-existential glory. So God is great not just because he is the creator of the world or the maintainer of the world, God's greatness has its own aspect.
Which is self, which talks about his self-existence. So here it is stated that, that it is that manifestation which is being referred to. That all living beings are not situated in him.
So God sustains the world but he is not burdened by the world. It is not, there was the, in Greco-Roman mythology, there is the image of Atlas who lifted the world. And this Atlas who lifted the world is often depicted as a person who is soon tired, soon exhausted by carrying the huge burden of the world.
Such an image should not be entertained about Krishna because Krishna is transcendental. So sustaining the world doesn't burden him at all. पश्यमे योगमाईश्वरम् You see my mystic opulence, Krishna says over here.
And he further explains his relationship with the world in the next verses when he says, भूतब्रिण् नच भूतस्थो भूतब्रिण् He is the maintainer of all of existence, नच भूतस्थो But I am not situated in them. So in this world, ममात्मा भूतभावना ममात्मा Now this is an intriguing usage because we know that Krishna is non-different from his body. You know, Krishna doesn't have this difference of the body and the soul which characterizes us.
Then why does Krishna use the word ममात्मा? So Ishwarnath Chakravarthakar explains that this is just conventional usage. So, for example, he says, we may use the word Rahu's head. But Rahu, Rahu is a celestial being.
Actually, he was a subterranean being. He was a demon whose head was cut off by the Suvarshan of Vishnu in his manifestation as Mohini Murthy during the Amrit Manthan Leela. And when that happened, at that time, Rahu became, because Rahu had drunk the nectar that had touched his throat, at least his upper part of the part above the throat, although his throat was cut off, he was cut off, he was decapitated at the throat.
So he did not die because his tongue and throat had touched the nectar. That part continued to live. So now Rahu is at, when he is nothing more than the throat.
Rahu exists as the head in the, as the part above the throat, as the head. So Rahu has no body apart from the head. His body is the head.
But still, a conventional usage says, Rahu's head. So Raja says, Rahu's head refers to Rahu. Similarly, Krishna's soul refers to Krishna.
We are all, that Krishna is, he is the maintainer of all living beings. When Krishna says, that all living beings are not situated in me, that does not mean that Krishna is not the maintainer. Since he maintains, but he is not consumed by the maintenance, he is not exhausted by the maintenance.
I am the source of all living beings, I am the sustainer of all living beings, but still I am separate from all of them. So this verse enables us to understand that God, although he is intimately connected to this world as a source and maintainer, but still he is also having a self-existence separate from the world. And to the extent we understand his self-existence, existential glory, to that extent we can actually separate his existence and his nature from the misery that characterizes the world, and thus recognize that he is not responsible for the misery, that he is a source of happiness, and he wants us to become attracted to that source of happiness, and to attain that happiness.
This subject which we will come back to later, when we discuss with Asin, in 11.9, 9.9, but suffice it to say here that Krishna is not burdened by the world, although he takes the burden of the world through one of his manifestations, that is the super soul, but he.