Gita 11.01 – Those enlightened by divine mercy desire similar enlightenment for others

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Bhagavad Gita 11.1 so here the 11th chapter is beginning and the 10th chapter ended with the declaration that everything attractive comes from Krishna the attractiveness of everything attractive comes from the spark of Krishna's splendor and there is no need for Krishna to describe his glories ek amshina, by one fragment of him, he sustains the whole universe so the word amsha came in two successive verses one that Krishna is sustainer of everything by just his amsha and everything attractive in this world manifests the amsha, a spark of his glory so now in this 11th chapter Arjuna will ask Krishna to reveal how by a fragment of himself he sustains this universe now that request Arjuna preludes by an expression of gratitude mad anugrahaya paramam mad anugrahaya out of your great mercy on me oh lord mad anugraha Krishna has used the word in 10.11 anukampa, mercy mad anugraha, mercy upon me so Krishna has said that by his mercy upon his devotees he from anugampa anugampa out of his great mercy on his devotees he frees them from the illusion of material existence and removes the darkness of knowledge by illumining within their hearts from the darkness of ignorance by illuminating within their hearts the torchlight of knowledge so what Krishna has told that he does for his devotees Arjuna is now confirming that Krishna has done for him mad anugrahaya out of your mercy on me paramam gohiyamidhyatmasangitam the word paramam supreme mercy your most confidential knowledge you have given to me spiritual knowledge you have given now Krishna has earlier talked about this confidential knowledge bhuya eva mahabahu shunume paramam vachaham so at the start of the 10th chapter bhuya eva mahabahu, again I am speaking this knowledge to you shunume paramam vachaham I am speaking my supreme words so here he is moving forward and he is stating that knowledge Arjuna is acknowledging that Krishna has given that knowledge yatvaya uktam vachasthena yatvaya uktam that which has been spoken by you vachasthena by those words moho yam digato mama moho yam, my moha, my illusion digato mama it has disappeared, it has gone so we see here Krishna's words have had the effect kutasthva kashmalam idam vishame samupastitam anaryashtam asvargyam akirti karam arjuna klaidhyam asmatam hakkartha partha naitatvayutapadhyate shudram hrudaya daurbalyam tyato tishtha parantapa in 2.2 and 3 Krishna had told Arjuna where does this contamination, where does this impurity come from heart where does this weakness of heart come daurbalyam, hrudaya daurbalyam so where does it come from so because of illusion there is weakness of heart now biologically or physically we say that a person has a weak heart when the heart is not able to pump blood into the body spiritually when we use the word weakness of heart that means the heart does not have enough strength to push aside undesirable emotions to do its function there are two kinds of emotions in our heart broadly speaking there are higher ennobling emotions and there are lower degrading emotions and when the heart is strong that means one is able to cognize the lower emotions as lower and one is able to resist them and one is able to recognize the higher emotions as higher and is able to sustain them but when one is not able to do this at that time a person becomes bound so essentially my moha has gone so what is moha what is the illusion which arjuna was suffering from under the spell of illusion we think of less important things to be more important and more important things to be less important under illusion we think our body and its drives are more important than the soul and its aspirations so when the moha goes away Krishna has used the word vigata several times in the bhagavad gita in 2.56 he has said that look when there is a happy situation one does not desire more and more of that material happy situation the goal and perfection of life i don't need anything more the person understands that actually life is temporary and there is no need to crave for permanence in material things rather if there is some stability in the material we use it to increase our momentum in the spiritual now here arjuna was confused about his duty and that confusion about his duty came from a confusion about his identity along with the confusion about his destiny so all such illusion about what he was meant to do, who he was and what he was meant to ultimately achieve all such illusion has been dissipated now arjuna is going to ask a question and desiring to see krishna's isvarupa that request will be made in verses 3rd and 4th here in one sense arjuna is reiterating what he has said earlier in the 10th chapter after hearing the chatushloki there he stated that reiterated what krishna has said and then accept everything that you say and here he is saying that yes my moha is gone in the next verse also he will say you oh lotus eyed lord your inexhaustible imperishable glories i have understood by your mercy through your words and we will see the same similar words will be spoken by arjuna at the end of the bhagavad gita in 18.73 when he says so he says that my moha is gone by your mercy the same words that and is same as prasada so same meaning and similar words are used there so in one sense arjuna has already reached the conclusion of the gita arjuna has already acquired the same understanding that he will say that he has acquired the end of the gita his illusion is already gone so the subsequent questions from here onwards are primarily for are for the benefit of the world so when krishna has explained the supreme position and arjuna has accepted that from here onwards and arjuna has asked questions these are primarily for the sake of clarifying various other related concepts related spiritual concepts which are known to the people at that time and how they are connected with this vision of atheistic cosmology of devotional centered worldview everything relates with that so arjuna will ask various questions in this chapter about the vishwaroopa next chapter about the impersonal form next chapter about the concepts of sankhya philosophy then in the 17th chapter about the shraddha and in the 18th chapter a question that will sum it all together about sanyasa and tyaga so here arjuna is already enlightened of course from a transcendental perspective arjuna is already enlightened and he is he has been put under delusion by krishna so that by krishna's arrangement so that he can ask questions and krishna can benefit the world but even within that transcendentally arranged illusion of arjuna by this point he has come out of that illusion and now he is asking questions for the sake of benefiting the world.