​Gita 11.24 Repetition is not always rambling – it can be for stress or beauty

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vinda-mishamam javishnam, nabhas-prisham, touching the sky, antam-anekavaranam, antam-anekavaranam, there are different colours in it, vyatananam, vyatananam means, vyata is open, ananam refers to mouth, anana is mouth, ananam is plural, deepta-vishal, netram, netra is again eyes, deepta-vishal, so describers are given of the eyes, they are large and they are effulgent, drishtvahitvam pravithitantaratmam, on seeing your lord, drishtvahitvam pravithitantaratmam, the word pravithit is coming thrice now, it had come twice, in the previous verse also it had come, so antaratma is not just superficial fear, the very deepest core of my being there is fear, stuck within me, Arjuna is saying, dhrityamna-vindami-shamam javishnam, and O Vishnu, I am not able to maintain my poise, I am not able to, dhriti, dhriti is steadiness or determination, kamna-vindami, I am unable to sustain my calmness, O Arjuna, O Supreme, so again there are some repetitions and some first descriptions here, so nabhaskrisham, reaching up to the sky, that was mentioned earlier in yavaparthivyordhamantaram, that was 11.20, that right from the earth to the sky it is universal form pervades, that same thing is stressed over here, sometimes when we see something very astonishing, we become either tongue tied and are not able to speak anything, it's like say when boys and girls are in the age of courting, at that time if a boy sees a girl who captivates him or the girl sees a boy on whom she feels a crush, then in their presence their first meeting may be very awkward because their emotions, either shyness or excitement or fear, they may do something, whatever the emotions, these emotions overwhelm them, and when emotions overwhelm two things can happen, one is that they just don't speak anything or sometimes when they speak they repeat the same thing again and again, O how are you, how are you, how are you, did you eat this or did you go there, O I am doing this, sometimes people just repeat the same thing again and again, now we may say this is mundane, that is true also, but the principle is that there is, we have a rational faculty and we have emotional faculty, and when the emotional faculty becomes too strong, at that time the rational faculty becomes weak and either it stops or it doesn't function so effectively, so that could be the two reasons why there can be, that could be a reason when the emotions are too strong that we are not able to speak coherently and that's why there is repetition, but there is another possibility that something is very special and something is very noteworthy, then there is repetition for the sake of emphasis, so we know that we are told something, somebody has cooked some item very deliciously, then we may tell it 3-4 times, this was delicious, this was delicious, this was delicious, that may be because we just feel it's so important that it's worth repeating, so repetition does not always have to be a flaw, repetition can also be an ornament as it's said in Sanskrit in terms of an alliteration, it doesn't have to be a dhushana, it can be a bhushana, dhushana means a defect, bhushana means ornament, so repetition doesn't have to be, repetition is an ornament, it doesn't have to be an impediment or a flaw, it is an ornament and here Narayana is repeating certain features, he is driving home through such repetition, he is driving home at a subconscious level because they are so prominent that he is voicing them again and again, so the fact of universal form pervades all of the visible space around him, so in this verse the word Deepthak also comes twice, so the many colors, varna had come earlier in Sanjaya's description and Arjuna is also repeating it over here, the mouth being wide open, so it was indicated the mouth was open earlier also when it was stated that Deepthahutasya Vaktaram, that fire is coming out of the mouth, if the mouth is closed, what may come out is some smoke and some sparks, even if a person is angry some sparks may come out, but it is when the person's mouth is open that fire comes out, so that was also implied but now it is made more clear and further when some very fearsome being has a mouth open, that also conveys a particular intent, the intent of destruction, consumption, that is also conveyed through the imagery of Vyathananam, the mouth is open, Deeptha Vishalanetram, so now the eyes large, now eyes are often the most expressive part of the face of a person and the way a person say blinks or moves or raises their eyebrows or just moves their eyes around that conveys a lot about that person and the eyes are large, they also contribute to the beauty of the person, Sundara Kundalananda Naina Vishala, so in a song which describes Krishna's beauty it is said that his eyes are large, so the large eyes can be a sign of beauty and the large eyes can also be a sign of vigilance, and in this case Deeptha Vishalanetram when it is said that there are not only large eyes but they are also blazing that indicates angry vigilance, so for example if say there are police forces who are in a particular city who are very careful about maintaining law and order in that city especially during some important events and yet despite all the precautions suddenly something goes wrong and a bomb explodes somewhere, so at that time the police will be on high alert, so they will be angry that something has gone wrong and their eyes will be alert, with their eyes full open they will be looking for what is what, whether something has gone wrong or whether things are right or not, so that kind of angry vigilance that is what is conveyed over here when it is said Vishalanetram but also Deeptha, so Deeptha indicates angry, so Krishna's anger is definitely not towards Arjuna or Sanjaya, Krishna when he is manifesting the Virata Rupa he is expressing very clearly his intent to protect the Pandavas no matter what the cost, and his intent to destroy the Kauravas no matter what the cost, so the revelation of the Virata Rupa is meant to convince Arjuna that actually there is no better course of action for Arjuna than to become an instrument of the divine, and of course that same conviction was needed by Yudhishthira also after the Kurukshetra war that is described in the Bhagavatam, but the essential message is the same, the context is significantly different, now here after describing this Deeptha Vishalanetram, the effulgent large eyes after that they stated that, Hrishtvahitam Pravattantaratma, for a Kshatriya to admit that I am feeling afraid, people will call him chicken, chicken, sometimes there can be no end to the teasing, when someone is expected to be heroic and fearless, acknowledges fear, but Arjuna is in an extraordinary situation where he is getting a divine revelation, and that divine revelation is captivating as well as frightening, so it's natural that the fear is also a feature of the effect that comes on Arjuna, so Krishna resides in the core of our heart and naturally the emotions connected with Krishna, they also come from the core of our heart, all the more so when we may not realize the difference in different kinds of brands or different kinds of waters or different kinds of foods initially, but as tongue gets habituated to different kinds of food, we can understand oh this is this kind, that is that kind, so like that, so now if we see a particular creature which looks predatory, we may give certain food to that creature and that way we expect that this person will, this animal will let me go away and I won't be troubled anymore, but if there is no way to identify what the predator is, then it becomes very difficult to know what kind of offering to make to it or how to pacify it, and in Arjuna's such a fearsome form, he just loses his composure, and further you see that he will make an inquiry, who are you, so you might ask a predator, hoping that the predator understands our language, that you know who are you, what can I feed you, what do you want, that way you might be able to avoid or minimize destruction and the damage, so here, so Arjuna in one sense, another force that comes in the last part of the verses, that he identifies that this is Vishnu, earlier when he has said, when he lists out the paraphernalia, much of which belongs to Vishnu, so that itself indicated that Vishnu is present there, but this universal form is actually a manifestation of Vishnu, but here, although Arjuna is using the word Vishnu, he is trying to reconcile what his head knows with what his eye sees, Vishnu is known to be an administrator, a loving God, and he is seeing here that Arjuna is extremely destructive, so naturally that raises questions, what is this, and such questions will be addressed in the, some of them in the future verses, especially regarding the Bhagavad Gita's context and purpose, and other questions at other times during the course of our scriptural study, but here Arjuna gets to see, gets to at least recognize that undermining the fearsome facade of whatever is within, still there is a core that is good, so like that, some people may look bad at the surface, but internally they are good, so we too need to work similarly and complete things without letting ourselves get distracted by the appearance which is fearsome of the universal form.