Gita 18.20 Seeing commonality alone is not vision in goodness – seeing spirituality as the foundation of commonality is

Transcript

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Bhagavad Gita 18.20 So in these three verses, 18.20, 21 and 22, Krishna will speak about knowledge in the three modes. First he speaks about knowledge and goodness, then in 21st he will speak about knowledge and passion and 22nd he will speak about knowledge and ignorance. By knowledge he is referring to how we perceive the world.
We interact with the world in two ways through our karma endriyas and our jnana endriyas. Through the jnana endriyas we take in information from the outside world. So how we take in that information is described by Krishna over here.
So 18.20 he states, When we look at the various living beings in the world, we see plants, we see animals, we see human beings and especially we humans interact a lot with other humans. And there is a remarkable amount of diversity even within the human species, what to speak of a cross species. But sarvabhuteshu ye naikam, one is able to see the unifying oneness.
And what is that oneness? Bhavam avyayam ikshate, ikshate means to see. So bhavam avyayam, the imperishable nature. The word bhava is sometimes used in the Bhagavad Gita to refer to emotion and sometimes it is used to refer to nature.
Madbhavam sodhi gachchate, so madbhava, they attain my nature or they attain emotion for me, they attain attraction for me. So here the word bhava is used to refer to nature. So those in knowledge see that no matter how much be the diversity among different living beings, underlying that diversity there is a commonality.
And that commonality is in the imperishable nature that all living beings share together. This refers to the atma or the level of perception of spirit, which is common in all living beings. And what is the characteristic of that, avibhaktam vibhakteshu, vibhakteshu, it appears as if divided but is undivided, avibhaktam vibhakteshu.
So the one’s universal spiritual nature permeates all living beings. This similar theme has come in the 13th chapter of the Bhagavad Gita when Krishna has spoken about how avibhaktam vibhakteshu, this is how the spiritual nature appears to be separated but is one. So here, this is, we can broadly speaking say this is the Brahman level of realization where one perceives that underlying this material diversity is the spiritual commonality.
Now what exactly is the nature of the spiritual commonality, that will be perceived later. That is not described by Krishna over here because this is knowledge in the mode of goodness. Knowledge in transcendence will perceive not just the spiritual reality but will perceive the diversity within the spiritual reality also.
There one will perceive that there is Krishna and there is the atma. Krishna has talked about this in 4.35, एज्ञात्वान्पुनर्मोहम् एवं यास्यसि पाण्डव येन भुतान्यशेषानि द्रक्षस्यात्मन्यतो मैः The vision beyond illusion, एज्ञात्वान्पुनर्मोहम् The vision beyond illusion is the vision wherein one sees that Krishna, everyone exists in Krishna and everything belongs to Krishna, येन भुतान्यशेषानि द्रक्षस्यात्मन्यतो मैः without exception, all living beings, द्रक्षस्यात्मन्यतो मैः they are in me and they are mine. So to see the soul is vision in the mode of goodness, but pure goodness or transcendence, devotional, perfectional vision is to see the soul as belonging to the whole, as being situated in the whole.
Though the mode of goodness vision is lower than the transcendental vision, but that is not to undermine the goodness vision. In today’s world, when there is so much divisiveness that comes based on caste, colour, gender, nationality, religion, if we could see the commonality among all living beings, that itself would be a huge step forward in decreasing friction in the world and increasing harmony. So we need to move towards goodness.
There are of course some indications of a rise of goodness in today’s world. We have the notion that all humanity belongs to one family. Indeed, humanism is a prominent school of thought in today’s world.
However, most humanistic thought is secular humanism. That means it removes all conceptions of religion and God and spirituality and focuses more on the commonality of all human beings. For example, say in the past, the racial division in America was much sharper and now it has gone down.
Although it is there at least at open level, it is not practiced by everyone. Similarly, the caste discrimination that is in India has, is still there in caste, politics, calculations, but slowly it is going down. Now at one level, is this a progression in the mode of goodness? We could say, but in this, there is no perception of the spiritual.
The perception is primarily of the human. So what is the common that we see with other human beings? Say we all belong to the same human race. We may have the sentiment, see the brother in the other.
See that others are also people like you. They are also our brothers and sisters. However, much this sentiment is appealing, it is actually very difficult to apply as long as our vision remains material.
At the material level, there is inevitably competition for material possessions and material pleasures. And because material possessions and material pleasures are limited in the world, so inevitably the competition grows into conflict. And thus divisiveness results when people contend with each other on conflicting interests.
But when we realize ourselves to be spiritual, that is the time when we understand that our real satisfaction will come through our spiritual growth, through our absorption in our own deeper self-understanding, and through our connection with the Supreme Lord. And thus when we get satisfaction through non-material things, then the competition for getting material things will decrease. And only through the decrease in such competition can we hope to bring harmony.
So secular humanism could be seen to be a better level of consciousness than sectarian humanism, sectarianism based on race or caste or whatever. But still, as long as there is no perception of the spiritual, one is not really properly situated in the mode of goodness. And of course such a vision is still leaving out the whole animal world, the non-human world.
There are also some people who are concerned with animal rights movements. And that also could be said to be a step in the expansion of human consciousness. Towards becoming aware of the consciousness of animals.
And yet, if we do not see the spiritual potential of animals, or do not see the spiritual potential of us humans, then our vision has still not yet come to goodness. The essence of goodness vision as described in this verse is that one sees the indestructible spirit underlying the indestructible body. And one sees the commonality of all living beings.
And such a vision is very much conducive for both material harmony and for spiritual growth. Thank you.