Gita 11.12 – Human perception and description are inadequate before divine self-revelation

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thank you Bhagavad Gita 11.12 Bhagavad Gita 11.12 here Sanjay is trying to describe the indescribable so he says Divi Surya Sahasrasya Sahasrasya Shatha is hundred Sahasra is thousand so Divi Surya Sahasrasya would mean that there are blazing suns in the sky if thousands would rise Bhaved Yugapad Uthita Bhaved if this happens Yugapad Simultaneously they happen Uthita Yadi Bha Sadrushi Sahasrasya and Bha at that time the effulgence the light that would come whatever kind of light might come Bha Sastasya Mahatmanaha that is the kind of effulgence that is coming out of this great person Mahatmanaha now Krishna is manifesting his universal form he is described initially in 4 verses 3 verses actually 5,6,7 and 8th verse he told Arjuna that I am giving you divine eyes by which you can see and now Sanjay is describing to Dhrashtra what Arjuna is seeing and the effulgence is so great that it is unimaginable that it is just not only it is ineffable ineffable means that which cannot be put in words so human perception and human imagination both fall inadequate when contacting the absolute so human perception refers to the capacity of our eyes and our senses to see and perceive various ways according to each senses particular capacity this does not mean that the absolute cannot be perceived at all that human perception falls inadequate means that we cannot perceive the absolute fully or properly so that would mean that actually speaking we have to recognize that we as souls are eternally parts of Krishna and we are always parts Krishna will talk about this in 15th chapter so being as parts the part is never equal to the whole so with our with the tiny windows to the world that we have in the form of our senses what we can perceive actually is very little and with what little we can perceive we cannot even understand the material world fully what to speak of understanding the one who is the source of all the material and spiritual worlds as Krishna tells in 10.8 aham sarvasya prabhavam so the absolute transcends human perception and also perfects human perception that means there are some people who say that actually the absolute is so great that we cannot perceive him at all but then that would imply that actually the absolute is that our senses are of no use at all but bhakti, the expertise of bhakti is that bhakti actually uses, dovetails our senses in the service of the absolute so we don't behold Krishna for the purpose of conquering Krishna we behold Krishna for the sake of serving Krishna we behold Krishna for the sake of loving Krishna we behold Krishna for the sake of moving closer to Krishna not necessarily knowing him or certainly not knowing him in full so the absolute transcends materials and our senses that means that we cannot know him through our senses but at the same time the absolute also perfects our senses that means that our senses, the purpose and perfection of our senses is to be used to behold him and to serve him so although he is beyond our perception that does not mean that he is meant to be completely completely beyond description the scriptures do describe the absolute and the purpose of describing in whatever way is possible is to help us channel our senses in his service and by such service we can move onwards steadily towards Krishna and ultimately attain him now the important thing for us as sadhakas is to avoid the overconfidence that comes from thinking that I know God and that notion so Krishna when he is present in his two handed form people may think that I know him who is this person he is also on a chariot in fact he is not even a warrior he is a charioteer right now but from that charioteer Krishna has now manifested his cosmic form his universal form and it has breath taking, hair rising, mind boggling heart astounding magnificence and the one aspect of the magnificence is the effulgence so now normally we see different kinds of fire, sometimes there is a forest fire you might see a huge area of vegetation on fire long giant swaths of forest may be burning and that is Dawaan it is a forest fire of material existence but beyond that we can also if we imagine the sun how especially in midday it is blazing down scorching us and if we went closer to the sun we could even get burned, incinerated but if there were thousands of suns rising at the same time then the effulgence would be incredible and by giving this metaphor so he is just trying to tell, convey to Dhritarashtra that this is nothing that anyone has ever seen before as Arjuna will also say later this has never been seen before, Krishna himself has said that nobody has seen it and Arjuna also reiterates that nobody has seen it and in this way Krishna tells Arjuna that I have given you such an extraordinary special vision and Sanjay is trying to convey the extraordinary of that vision to Dhritarashtra now the sun is illuminating but the same sun can also be scorching and especially not one when thousands of suns are there and Arjuna will talk about this blinding effect, the burning effect and then all this causes it has a unnerving or scaring effect so all the effects of this vision will be described later in due course Arjuna first will say that you are very difficult to behold because of the tremendous effulgence that is coming from you and in this way Sanjay gives us all an indication of the awesomeness of the universal form through this metaphor of thousands of suns rising simultaneously and that is the effulgence sometimes in movies or cartoons some hero like a he-man or a batman is shown with some light coming from their bodies or light surrounding their bodies such aura can be quite striking but consider the effulgence, the aura that is there with this universal form that exceeds the brightness of the sun itself and exceeds it not just by one but by thousands of times indeed it is an astonishing vision and the further description of this vision will come in future verses Thank you.