Is Prabhupada’s Gita bhakti biased The Monks Podcast 157 with Garuda Prabhu

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This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Hare Krishna Guruji. Thank you very much once again for joining today.
Thank you for having me. Always wonderful to be here in discussion with you about all kinds of things. Yes, it’s amazing.
In what all directions over the last several months, we have discussed a wide variety of topics. We discussed about the Rasleela, we discovered writing, we discussed about scholarship and devotion, Guru. So today I thought we could discuss about another topic which you have quite deeply specialised in.
But from one particular perspective that we discussed about our Prabhupada’s Bhagavad Gita. And that is a cardinal, that is a book which we use foundationally as the basis of our outreach and even our understanding of Krishna Consciousness. Yes.
So there are, I would say, not just people who are, you could say, envious critics, but even people who are objective thinkers, they sometimes have some concerns with Prabhupada’s Gita. And I have my ways of answering them, but I thought we could discuss this, that appreciating how Prabhupada has presented the Bhagavad Gita, not just appreciating in a like a hagiographic or a fan sense, but actually intellectually appreciating what Prabhupada has done in the Gita and addressing the common charge that Prabhupada’s, his commentary is biassed toward Bhakti. So I have a set of questions.
Maybe I’ll start with one by one and I’ll briefly offer how I answer and then maybe you can elaborate or amend or however you want to take it forward. Sounds good. So the first question is itself, the title itself is a challenge.
Bhagavad Gita as it is. It can seem quite presumptuous to people that how do you say something like this? So my understanding of this is that Prabhupada says as it is, he’s talking in terms of its essential conclusions being maintained. And Prabhupada mentions that in his introduction also that our purpose in writing the Gita is the same purpose of that was of Krishna for descending to the world.
And that is to raise human consciousness, to share Krishna consciousness. So if we consider that there are like in any spiritual path or any spiritual book, there are broadly two things, there is sadhana and sadhya. There is the means and there is the end.
The path and the purpose, different words can be used for that. So if we look at, let the Bhagavad Gita speak for itself, even if we read no commentary at all, we just read the Sanskrit, it’s quite clear that the Bhagavad Gita is talking about a personal divinity. So Krishna is the sadhya, the Bhagawan.
Now we could go into further nuances that how that personal divinity is different from ordinary person or even other traditions, conceptions of divinity. But the sadhya is Krishna, even the Gita is very clear about that at one level. And Arjuna also acknowledges that after Krishna, the chatushloki Bhagavad Gita, aham sarvasya prabho, Arjuna says param brahma param dhama in 10, 12, 13.
So Krishna is the sadhya and bhakti is the sadhana. So sarva dharman pratyajamami ekam suranam vraja, manmana bhava madhvakta, 1865-66. It’s quite categorical and it’s not just in the end, throughout.
Krishna does talk about bhakti and you have done a masterful job in presenting that bhakti aspect in your commentary also. So in terms of the essential conclusions about sadhana and sadhya, Prabhupada is very, very unambiguous and emphatic. In that sense, Prabhupada’s Bhagavad Gita is as it is.
The essential conclusions are very clearly and consistently conveyed. So any thoughts on this, Prabhu? Oh, lots of thoughts. Lots and lots and lots of thoughts.
You are correct in saying that Prabhupada’s titling of Bhagavad Gita as Bhagavad Gita as it is, is a way that he especially emboldens his presentation. It separates his Gita from all others. Because it’s not even in a subtitle.
It’s in the main title. Now, you and I know that the Bhagavad Gita is not a title given in the Mahabharata context. And in fact, nor are there any chapter titles given in the Mahabharata for the Gita chapters.
So the Bhagavad Gita title and the chapter titles are things that have become conventional over hundreds and hundreds of years. So Prabhupada boldly steps up to the plate, not even as a subtitle, but Bhagavad Gita as it is. Wow.
Okay. That’s sort of a wake-up call. It is kind of an unexpected, you know, who? And in one sense, it immediately calls into question, who could be saying this? Who has the audacity, right? You know, to stand up and say as it is.
Well, you know, I believe that Prabhupada wanted to shake things up. After all, the Gita had been translated into English. Hundreds of times since Charles Wilkins first translation in 1785.
And in every case, it’s called Bhagavad Gita. And then there’s some subtitle. So after a couple of hundred years of translations of a Bhagavad Gita, Prabhupada tags on to the primary title, Bhagavad Gita as it is.
Now, the first thing that this implies very strongly is that there are so many Bhagavad Gitas as it is not. I mean, that is the first thing it’s saying to everybody. Oh, this is the one that is as it is.
And all others are somewhere along the spectrum of as it is not. This is very not as it is. This is somewhat not as it is and everything in between.
But the whole thing is as it is not. So then the question stands, then what is Prabhupada insisting that the Gita stands as it is? What is that and why has he been so emboldened to be able to say that? And who is he to say that? Well, let’s go to the who is he to say that. There are very few people that have translated the Bhagavad Gita that actually live and breathe the Bhagavad Gita.
So in one sense, Prabhupada is saying this is the Bhagavad Gita as it is meant to be lived and breathed. That’s one interpretation of as it is. What gives Prabhupada the qualification to even say as it is is that he lived and breathed the Gita.
Okay, so that’s one as it is. A second as it is. Sorry, so in this case, as it is, you’re shifting from the content of the book to the impact of that content in the life of the person or life of the person who is writing the book.
So in that sense, it is as it is. That’s right. That’s one sense of as it is.
If one can live and breathe the teachings of the Gita, then they have realised the Bhagavad Gita as it is. If you’re not living and breathing the Bhagavad Gita in your life, then you’re going to be producing a Bhagavad Gita as it is not. Okay, so I think that’s one very powerful message that Prabhupada is sending through the sort of suffixed title as it is.
Another one would be, and to my mind, the Bhagavad Gita as it is aligned with the great teachings coming from a long and sophisticated lineage of prolific theologians and philosophers. Okay, so this one, right? So would you like to give all the meanings and then I respond? Or how do you want to do this? Because if you’re on a thoughtful, you can go ahead. However, it’s natural.
If you feel like jumping in Chaitanya Charanjee, I say jump in. Okay, thank you. That is a very powerful point because Prabhupada also when he met George Harrison, he said, you know, how do you know who is a devotee of Krishna? He says that is who is Prabhupada, who is the most addicted to Krishna? That who is talking about Krishna, singing about Krishna, living for Krishna, you could say.
So that is a very important point. Now, but still that raises a question that what does living and breathing the Gita mean? Say somebody might be, we will come to, we probably will have to discuss it later. Somebody might say that I am living nonviolently.
And this is what I have, this is what according to me is the meaning of the Gita. And in that sense, I am living and breathing the Gita. Somebody else might say Karma Yoga is what I see as the essence of the Gita.
Somebody might even say impersonalism is the essence of the Gita. So, in that sense, that claim could be made by others also. But what we could say is that it certainly narrows the circle to, in one sense, leave out what Prabhupada would call as dry logicians or merely academic scholars, for whom Krishna is simply a historical or a mythic entity.
And the Gita is just a historical or anthropological text or abstract philosophical treatise. So, we could say that it narrows down. But still, it is, it’s not that Prabhupada alone could make that claim exclusively.
I think that segues to the next point about a tradition also, isn’t it? Yes, yes, precisely. It is about application of the teachings. Now, you’re right to say that there can be people coming along and say, well, I’m applying this part of the Gita.
But that’s another part of what it means as it is. Because only part of the Gita is not as it is fully. It is not as it is completely.
So, Bhagavad Gita as it is in its complete whole form, taken fully, not partially. So, as it is means fully, wholly, not partially. So, if somebody is deriving impersonalistic or karma yoga or non-violence ideas, those could also be, those could also be claimed to be based on the Gita.
But they are based on a part of the Gita, not the whole of the Gita. That’s right. And Chaitanya, I mean, we know how annoying it is to be quoted only partially and then have that plucked out of everything else that we’ve said.
It’s very annoying. True, true. Right? Now, so, but Krishna, you know, he’s already spoken his teachings to Arjuna.
It’s very intimate, private setting. No one else could hear him. Sanjaya was empowered to hear him by the mercy of Vyasa, Vyasa Prasada Srutaban.
So, this was a very personal discussion between Arjuna and Krishna. And yet, its message is universal because Arjuna’s trauma represents the trauma of being a conditioned soul. Now, if you leave that out and only go into the parts that talk about the yogi should leave his body on the waxing moon, not on the waning moon.
It should be at this time of day. It should be this and so on. One should have the name, you know, of the divinity on one’s tongue at the time and so on.
And so, of course, that’s a wonderful teaching. And that’s just one of many teachings that Krishna gives in the Gita. But why does he give any of the teachings? See, that’s the point.
Why does he give any of the teachings? It’s out of love for Arjuna. True. So, if we scrape away the narrative from the teachings, then the teachings are seen in a distorted way.
Just like plucking a statement that you’ve made out of the context of everything else that you’ve said. Yeah, makes sense, Bruce. So, just this is maybe we’ll… How should I put it? It’s every question that we are answering, it’s also going to open further questions.
Yes. So, now here in one sense, are we presuming what is the conclusion of the Gita? When we are saying that somebody should be based on the… their conclusion should be based on… not on the… If they say they are living the Gita, it should not be based on the part of the Gita. It should be the whole of the Gita.
Now, one point definitely the example is very apt. If somebody talks about dying at a particular point and a particular condition of the moon’s movements and things like that, of the Uttarayan, Dakshinayan, now that is a very small aspect of the Gita. Very small.
And anybody who reads the Gita can agree that this is really not the teaching of the Gita. Certainly not the central teaching of the Gita. Yeah, or the whole teaching of the Gita.
Yeah. And maybe we could also say that non-violence. Non-violence, however laudable a virtue it is, it doesn’t play a central role in the teaching of the Gita.
It’s again not the whole of the teaching of the Gita. So, we could leave that out. Now, if we talk about Karma Yoga, I was thinking of what all… These are the major explanations.
Maybe you can also add to that. What are other claims? So, Karma Yoga could be one explanation. Just Yoga or Ashtanga Yoga could be another.
Dhyana Yoga could be another claim that it is the essence of the Gita. And of course, Jnana Yoga or impersonal meditation, those could also be claims. So, to some extent, we may… So, when we say Bhagavad Gita as it is, it’s actually in one sense self-evident that to evaluate whether it is as it is, we actually ourselves need to know it as it is.
Or we need to know what it is, to put it another way. So, if now, if we look at the Gita, if we say somebody looks at Sanskrit and they look at the translations. Now, in general, from what I have seen, there are some differences in translations.
But it’s not that there are, not many people have given radically opposite translations of the same words. So, overall, if someone looks at the Sanskrit or other translations, by that they can get a broad sense of what the work is about. And we can say that Krishna is present throughout the Gita, right from the second chapter as not just a teacher, but as ultimately object of spiritual focus, object of devotion.
And bhakti is also permeated throughout. And I think in your book, you also mentioned this that Krishna, is it 12 or 14 times, Krishna talks about, you will come to me, you will attain my abode. So, maa methi, you will come to me, yad gattva anani vartante, you will go there and you will never come back.
So, there is a certain consistency. So, we could say there is a sheer repetition of the theme of Krishna’s position of the role of bhakti and the attainment of Krishna. And it’s not attainment of merging in Krishna, but attainment of come to him, not unite with him.
It’s come to him to come to his abode. So, we could, if an objective reader reads the Gita, is it fair to say that they can come to a, objectively that the Gita does emphasise bhakti, Bhagavan, and attainment of Bhagavan’s abode, not merging in Krishna. What are your thoughts about this? Yes, Krishna says that you come to my state of being, you come to the spiritual realm, you will leave the temporal realm of prakriti, in which the purusha is embedded, and you will be free, you will be free, and you’ll be free to love me, Krishna says.
So, freedom is the bedrock of love. If we don’t have freedom, then you cannot love. The idea here is that the Gita does tell us, a lot of books don’t tell you, but this conversation, in this conversation between Krishna and Arjuna, Krishna does tell us how he wants to be understood.
He says, in the very last words he speaks to Arjuna, he asks two rhetorical questions. The first one is the more important one in this regard. He says, have you heard this whole teaching, with thought focused on the single highest point, a kagra? Okay, with thought on the single highest point.
Then we must ask, what is that highest point? Then, several verses later, after Krishna’s, Arjuna’s last words occur, Krishna’s last words, first Krishna’s last words occur, then Arjuna’s, and then Sanjaya, characterises the whole teaching of the Gita. The whole teaching. He calls it, guhyam param yogam, the supreme secret of yoga.
So there’s something secret happening here. And that is why so many people read Bhagavad Gita as it is not. Because the book carries a secret message, that people just don’t get.
So, once we understand that there’s a single highest point, to which all the teachings are tethered, then it changes the way we see those teachings. For example, I’m close to Washington D.C. here in America, and if I’m to travel to New York, which is about a five hour drive, and I look at the scenery on the way, that’s one way of viewing the scenery. I’ve never been to New York, but I’m seeing the scenery on the way.
Once I’ve been to New York, and I have to come back to New York another time, I will see the scenery in a very different way, because I’ll see how it leads up to New York. The first time I go to New York, I don’t see how it leads up to New York. But when I see it with an advanced knowledge of New York, I see the different stages of the journey differently.
Similarly, when we know the single highest point, then we’ll look at Chapter 8 differently, about the waning and the waxing of the moon. We’ll look at that differently. We’ll look at Palatiyaga differently, in Chapters 3, 4, and 5. We’ll look at the renunciation of the fruits of actions.
Yes, of course that’s important. Yes, Chapter 8’s important. All these teachings are important.
But you don’t have the perspective of what really is being said, and why it’s being said, until you’ve been to the peak. Prabhupada came from the peak to us, and said Bhagavad Gita as it is. Okay, it’s beautiful.
I love this metaphor. It’s actually, even if we consider something like a, say, a mystery novel, which has a plot. If we read a book, we can read a book as a reader, and we can read a book as a writer.
When we read a book as a reader, it’s just enjoyable. But when we read a book as a writer, then we come to the conclusion, then we start seeing how the author has constructed the various parts. What is the point of this plot, plot twist? What is the point of this character elaboration? What is the point of this narrative? And in one sense, till we come to the end, especially if it’s something like a mystery novel or fiction, sometimes if it’s a non-fiction book, the author might tell right in the beginning.
This is how I’m constructing my argument. This part of the book is about this, this part of the book is about this, this part of the book is about this. But if it’s more of a, and the mystery novel metaphor might work, because this is, as you said, Guhiya.
So, this is Paramaguhiya. So, in that sense, it’s, we can look at all the parts, and we will understand those parts to some extent. But when we see the whole, then all the parts fit into a coherence, which often is, I also read some Gavitas before I was introduced to Krishna Consciousness, and after also I have read some.
So, what I found is that, it’s very difficult to show the coherence of the Gita for most commentators. So, now Prabhupada has come from the top, and he, so Prabhupada is at the end, in one sense. We could almost say, it’s like some mystery novels, they become so famous, that maybe there are authors who write about those authors, or about that particular book.
How is this book constructed? So, Prabhupada is doing like that. So, in one sense for Prabhupada, he is giving us the conclusion of the mystery, or the revelation, and then he is telling us, okay, how is this mystery constructed? How is, to some extent. So, again, it leads to a further assumption, and maybe we will have to discuss this point, that we are assuming that Prabhupada is coming from the top, knows the conclusion, is coming through on that.
So, maybe for any kind of study, there is some amount of, in terms of concepts, some axioms have to be accepted, and in terms of teachers, some kind of authority in the teacher has to be accepted. Without that, we just will not be able to move ahead at all. So, what are your thoughts on this? So, are these two axioms, that the Bhagavad Gita is a coherent body, which expresses God’s love for us, and that Prabhupada is himself relishing that love, Krishna’s love, and wants to share that with us through the Gita.
Would these be like the foundational axioms, and authority that we may need to accept to understand the Gita? Yes, well, okay. The authoritative, shall we say, position of the commentator is one thing, but what the text is saying, the original verses of the Gita are saying, as you said, it’s fairly plain to see what’s going on. I mean, some translations can be rather weak, and frankly, if they’re not informed of that single highest point, then they can translate, or some of them are not translators, even though they say they’re translating it from the Sanskrit.
They don’t even know Sanskrit. Many of the published Gitas, they don’t even know Sanskrit, and then you say a new translation. How does that make any sense? It’s cheating, actually.
It’s cheating. Don’t say that I have a new translation when you don’t know Sanskrit, because then what are you translating from? You’re translating only from your own subconscious mind, which could say anything. Very subjective.
The whole idea is to understand the Bhagavad Gita as it is. Now, that must mean, now here’s where your mystery novel metaphor doesn’t quite work, okay? It’s only a mystery to readers who are not guided by the proper teacher, one, and two, even when guided by the proper teacher, we have to be purified enough to be able to receive that message in our hearts. So that’s why we read Bhagavad Gita as it is for decades, because the more we read it, the more it sinks in, and the more we realise the supreme secret of yoga.
So it’s secret only because we’re not ready to hear it. It doesn’t want to stay secret, but it remains secret because it’s the most profound message of the Gita. What Prabhupada is doing when he presents the verses of the Gita, and sometimes, as you spoke earlier, sometimes people will object, you know.
There’ll be yoga in the word-for-word, and then Prabhupada will put devotional service in the translation. Wait a minute. How do you go from yoga to devotional service? The reason he can do that is because he was at the ultimate peak of yoga, ekagra.
The problem is that yoga is very complex. There are many yogas as a means, and there are many yogas as an end state. Prabhupada was concerned about the absolute process and the absolute end, which is there in the Gita.
But if you don’t know that, if you’re not realised in that, then you’re going to object to things like that, but what’s really happening there is Prabhupada wants to fast-track his reader to that ultimate mountain point. It’s sort of like, instead of having to climb up so strenuously, let me take you on a lift and get you right. There are these lifts that go up to the mountaintops, right? You just glide along, right? I don’t know, on these ski places that have those lifts, right? And once we get to the top of the mountain with Prabhupada, with a teacher like Prabhupada, then we can ski down.
Teach other people how to ski. We can tell people what we saw at the top of the mountain, and we can tell others how Prabhupada showed us the top of the mountain, skiing as it is. You know, Bhagavad Gita as it is.
Okay. So, that’s why you need a teacher, even in skiing. Now, I honestly, Chaitanya Charanjee, I will confess, I know nothing about skiing, okay? Let’s just get that right out here, okay? But I have to insist that skiing is a very skilful sport and that it requires a teacher.
True. So, the authority of the teacher, you brought that up. One of the ways we know the authority of the teacher is that he or she practises what he or she preaches.
True. There has to be an embodiment, a veritable embodiment of the very teachings that are dispensed. And that’s when the student becomes inspired.
This is when the student will be moved to want to go to the top of the mountain. Now, people who read other Gitas, I’ve not noticed that they get terribly moved to reach the top of the mountain, because half the time, they can’t figure out what the Gita is saying. And that’s the reason for Prabhupada’s commentary.
And I’ll just stop after saying this, that Prabhupada’s Gita is either being read by the devotee in us, by the bhakta in us, but if we’re really not bhaktas yet, then Bhagavad Gita as it is, is not for you. My God, that’s a strong statement. And the way you can tell when it’s not for someone is that they don’t like it.
That’s interesting. So you could almost put it this way that Prabhupada sometimes gives the example that if you’re going to open a gold shop, you’re not going to have millions of people coming to the gold shop, because how many people can buy the gold? There we go. So similarly, when Prabhupada is giving Bhagavad Gita as it is, he is giving the bhakti message, and that is a message of gold.
So in one sense, we distribute the Bhagavad Gita as it is very widely, because we don’t know where those souls with those devotional inclinations are. They could be scattered in various parts of the world. And for those who have those devotional inclinations from their upbringing, from their previous lives, it’s like the Bhagavad Gita has such a magnetising power.
It could ignite that. Ignite, you know, something that’s been lying dormant. It may not be a book that immediately is efficacious.
But sitting on the shelf, with the bold printing on the side, Bhagavad Gita as it is, as it was printed back in the day, in 1972, very bold, very thick binding. One day, you just don’t know. You can’t predict the way the presence of such a book in one’s home can take effect.
There’s no predicting that. And in one sense, Prabhupada also gave that metaphor when he said that it’s like sowing a seed. You don’t know exactly.
We are sowing the seed, but we ourselves in one sense don’t know how long the seed will take to grow. So, in one sense, if we say Prabhupada’s Bhagavad Gita is as it is, and Krishna himself says, that those who even want to know him as he is, are Manushyanaam Sahasreshu. One in thousands endeavour for perfection at 7.3, and among them, one among those thousands actually come to know him.
So then, that means what we, to some extent, it becomes our responsibility to explain Prabhupada’s Gita. Yes. And Prabhupada, you have done that with your Bhagavad Gita book, which is a classic, and we all devotees give Bhagavad Gita classes.
I write my Gita dailies. We are all trying to, Prabhupada has given us, shown the devotional essence of the Gita. Now, it is for us to make, in one sense, the Gita, show the people the Gita’s relevance, and also show the Gita’s essence.
Why does it matter to you, and what is it actually saying? So, how Prabhupada’s Bhagavad Gita is as it is, that may be our responsibility to show, to explain. I think Prabhupada also said, my devoted disciples and followers will write books on my books. Purports are my purports, sort of.
That’s right. Yes. But we don’t do that enough.
Yes, I agree. We do it orally, but we don’t do it in written form enough, in terms of a deliberate commentary that illuminates Prabhupada’s commentary. You know, I hear a lot of classes where devotees will give class, and they’re obviously not familiar with exegesis, and with the way to comment on Prabhupada’s words, and the words of the Gita.
And you don’t have to be a master of Sanskrit in order to do that. There are ways to illuminate, you know, embellish and expand beautifully what is there, and not go off and tell stories about, you know, whatever. You know, someone you met the other day, or someone you ran into out on Sankirtan, or whatever.
Yeah, that’s true. You know, again, and while some of those things could be relevant, I mean, you know, I’m not going to discount that 100%, but to delve into each and every word of the text, to know how to perform an exegesis. Exegesis means generating out from, literally in the Latin, exegesis, to generate out from the text itself further layers of meaning and angles of approaching.
It’s so important. That’s true. So, if we are not, as I said, not everybody has to be necessarily academically trained, but at least broadly we need to understand the issues that are going on.
I remember one of my early days, another friend of mine, who had also been interested in Bhakti. He had grown up like me in an Indian Brahminical family. He knew little more Sanskrit at that time than what I did.
So, he asked one question and the same point which you mentioned, sometimes Prabhupada translates yoga or Karma Yoga as devotional service. So, he said, how does this, how can this be translated like this? And the preacher who had answered, do you think you know Sanskrit better than Prabhupada? Now, I felt that, rather than answering the question, it’s attacking the questioner. And, we could say that the devotee maybe felt that it is an attack on Prabhupada and attack on their own faith.
So, do you consider that as an unhealthy way of doing exegesis? Yeah, you know, devotees can be very nervous around those devotees who have the academic training and background. You know, and, I mean, even when I was flown out to LA in 2017 to be the keynote speaker at the Prabhupada festivals that they’ve been holding there for several decades. I was the keynote speaker and the GBC for that zone called me up a week or two before and said, you know, there are some devotees I have heard from that are concerned that you correct Prabhupada’s Sanskrit in class sometimes.
I said, I never correct Prabhupada, ever. I may offer alternative understandings of a word, but I don’t correct my spiritual master. And I challenged him, you show me one recording in which I correct Prabhupada’s Sanskrit and I will perform prayaschittam the rest of my life.
You know, I don’t do that. You see, what he was really expressing was a nervousness with erudition. Now, some people will say Garuda is a mundane academic.
Well, that’s like saying to a devotee who happens to know how to use power tools when they build a temple, oh, he’s just a carpenter. That’s not fair. No, he’s a devotee using power tools, a power saw.
Now, academics provides power tools. I mean, the devotee building the temple could have used a manual saw, right? Have you seen those? Uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, right? But how much more efficient and advanced is having an electrical, you know, saw? So, I forgot what they call it, circular, whatever saw. But anyway, it’s electric and it saw something maybe about 20 times faster than a hand saw.
So, now, the problem with academic devotees, if there’s a problem, is the same problem that you can have with any other devotees who gain the tools but become so identified with the tools that they forget what the tools were meant for. Beautiful. But the tools themselves, we don’t condemn.
Suddenly, when it comes to academics, it’s too easy to condemn them. Prabhupada says all kinds of things about scholars, whether they know the honey on the outside of the jar, you know, you cannot, you know, being a scholar of the tradition is not a qualification and so on. But if one is a bhakta and has those tools, we are silly not to use them and take advantage of them.
Cool. So, we should not be afraid of the electric saw. Now, if you don’t know how to work an electric saw, stay away from it because it’s dangerous.
Academic tools can also be dangerous if you do not know how to work them properly. So, the same thing. You see, we all have tools from different areas.
Suddenly, when it comes to, say, a Harvard PhD, oh, Guru is just a mundane scholar. Oh, is that okay? That’s fine. You can toss me out that easily.
That’s fine. But what is going on is there’s a fear of those power tools. But every field has power tools.
Every field does. It’s, you know, I think what you’re, what you are talking about is not restricted only to academics. There’s certainly academic scholars may experience it more than others.
But even when new people come and they have a lot of questions, yes, and not just questions, but a lot of difficult questions, then the tendency is that this person will never become a devotee. It’s too many questions. So, they get neglected.
They get neglected. They get rejected. So, in some many ways, I was fortunate.
I was introduced to Krishna Consciousness and to teachers, devotees who introduced me. They were very patient answering my many, many questions. Oh, I can’t imagine all the questions you would have been asking, Chetana Charanjee.
A boatload of questions, I am quite sure. And of course, and of course, you keep asking questions, but in the devotional context, in the teaching context. Yeah.
So, I think, so that fear is, as I said, because maybe there’s a certain sense of insecurity of one’s own faith. And I’m not saying that in the sense of criticising, but it’s just that one feels unequipped to deal with the questions. Yeah.
I think you’re right. So, you could say that if somebody is asked, how could Prabhupada say, call his Gita, Bhagavad Gita as it is? Or how is Prabhupada translating like this? So, I remember once I was involved in some, I made some statements which some devotees found questionable or disrespectful. So, you had gone through the transcript and you said that, you also said the same thing.
Now, you’re dealing with important issues and you had valid points, but you didn’t have the training to deal with those issues maturely enough, expertly enough. So, I think that if some devotees find that, similarly, I could say that if some devotees find that somebody is asking difficult questions about the Bhagavad Gita or Prabhupada’s Bhagavad Gita, rather than attacking the person, maybe it’s best that they connect that person with somebody else, somebody who’s more expert, more trained, who can answer those questions maturely, not make it an attack on that person, not doubt the person’s person’s sincerity or integrity or whatever. Would that be a healthy approach? Yes.
I think that you raise an important issue about really carefully hearing devotees. Now, you implied earlier that sometimes when someone has so many questions, that could be unnerving. You know, that can be sort of, well, and you know what? That’s okay.
We’re not, we don’t have to know everything. You know, I gave a whole talk on the Upanishads. There was a yoga group who wanted to start reading the Upanishads, but they didn’t know much about them.
And I said, you know, ask me anything. Now, when I say ask me anything, that doesn’t mean I’m going to be able to answer everything. I could say, I’ll answer all your questions.
I don’t say that. I say, ask me anything, and then we’ll see what happens. So in other words, that’s the disclaimer.
You can ask me anything. I don’t know if I can answer everything. Okay? But you can ask me anything, and then we’ll see what we’ve got.
You see? It’s okay to say, you know, I haven’t thought deeply into this enough. I will look into it for you. Or there’s a place where you can look or read that should be able to respond to that question.
So it’s okay, you know, not to know everything. I mean, we can’t know everything. Everything is too big.
True. So I think that, you know, when we approach the Bhagavad Gita through Prabhupada’s eyes, it’s a privilege. Because for the first time, the Bhagavad Gita is being presented in a way to be intensely devotionally absorbed in Krishna Seva.
I don’t know of any other Gita that really fosters that kind of presentation. Beautiful. That’s true.
Now, I was just going back to your earlier metaphor. You said that you go to the top of the mountain. Yes.
And then somebody who has been at the top of the mountain will come down from there. Yes. So, they will tell us about the path also differently.
Okay, what is here in this path? What is there in this path? So, you could say that, yes, there are places where the Sanskrit is Karma Yoga. And Prabhupada is translating as devotion. Or it’s just Yoga also provides devotional service.
So, it’s almost like we could say that you look at it, you look, if it’s a road and it’s a landmark, and some kind of landmark, it might appear to be, if I look at it from here, it appears to be like an ordinary stone. I look at it in isolation, it looks like a stone. But from the top, I look at it, hey, there is some pattern on it.
It looks different. Maybe it’s a part of the whole structure. That’s right.
So, when Prabhupada is translating Karma Yoga as Bhakti Yoga, he is, you can say, giving us the top of the mountain view of what it is. And if you look at from that perspective, Krishna does talk at several places how Karma Yoga culminates in Bhakti Yoga. That’s right.
3.9, 3.8. So, what is that? 3.3 is Mayi Sarvani Karmani Sanyasi Adhyatmachitasa. That’s right. Of course, 18 chapters.
Karmanatam Abhyarcha, worship me with your work. Right. So, in that sense, Prabhupada is, I love the metaphor, Prabhupada is giving us from the top view.
And also, we could say that Prabhupada is not denying or cancelling what Krishna is doing. Because Prabhupada is giving us the Sanskrit, Prabhupada is giving us the word to word translation, is a transliteration. And then, so, if Prabhupada was just simply, we could say, whitewashing the Gita or Bhakti washing the Gita, if there is a word like that, just rendering everything into Bhakti, if that was his intention, he could have avoided giving the Sanskrit.
That’s right. So, that means Prabhupada is giving us how the stone, if you consider one particular word or one particular verse from the Gita to be like one brick on that part. Prabhupada is letting us see how the brick seems in that particular context.
And then, he is also telling us how the brick is seen from the top view. So, in that sense, Prabhupada is not really cancelling or overwriting Krishna’s words. No, it can appear to be, it can, what appears to be a deviation is in fact a genuine deepening.
So, in other words, so, it looks, now, why would, why would any author want to put in his own book something that would de-authenticate what he’s saying? I mean, why would any author do that? No, what Prabhupada is showing is that this is where this is going. There is a a facet of bhakti which involves acting from the heart. And that’s the ultimate action.
Now, if you want to just leave it acting, you know, in the world as something that gradually builds up to some level of yoga, well, that’s, you know, I mean, okay. It’s not perfection. Or maybe it’s not the perfection of perfection.
Maybe it’s a perfection. But it’s not the perfection. Prabhupada was giving us the perfection.
So, he was uncompromising. He sees karma yoga, he says, devotional service. Because we human beings are feeling, thinking, and acting creatures as human beings.
So, each of these yogas is absolutely essential. But karma is produced. We act out of our thinking.
And our thinking is coming out of our feeling. We originate, everything we do starts with the heart. Why? Because the self is situated in the heart.
Divinity’s presence is within the heart. So, that’s where we all start, whether we know it or not. So, from the heart, the affective faculty to the cognitive faculty.
And then finally, the interactive faculty. By affective, you mean action or A? Is it A or? Affective, affective. Okay.
Right. Feeling, the sentient, the sentience, a sense of feeling, the sentience. Okay.
So, you’re translating thinking, feeling, willing into adjectives, is it? Approximately? Affective, cognitive and? Yeah. Interactive. Interactive.
Interactive, okay. That’s more of intention. Or interaction with people, basically.
That’s right. Or interaction with the world. Interaction.
You know, when you act in this world, you’re interacting, whether you know it or not. Okay. You could be in a desert and you’re acting, you’re interacting with the outer world.
But it all starts from the heart. Hmm. It’s the heart start.
Okay. Yeah, that’s true. So, just I’m trying to understand.
First, you said that why would author put in their book something that would be the authenticate? And then you came to it starts from the heart. So, what was the exact connection between these two points? Okay. So, so, Prabhupada, if we read carefully into Prabhupada’s words, and even his other teachings, you know, the other teachings we know in the CC, we know that, you know, karma, jnana is not necessary to pursue.
Bhakti is the only thing necessary to pursue. Why? Because it includes jnana and karma. Anavrtam.
It’s there in uncovered or pure form, you could say. That’s right. Hmm.
So, in other words, you know, you know, I mean, karma may, well, human beings cannot act without drawing from the heart. The question is whether the heart is purified. And once it’s purified, it automatically engages the cognitive and interactive faculties.
Because everything ultimately is grounded in the heart, comes from the heart, expands from the heart, and is, and one is ultimately liberated in a totally free and pure heart. So, bhakti contains everything. And then, of course, there’s the precondition to bhakti and karma and jnana in the first place.
There’s no reason to be a human being unless there is divinity of which we are as tiny little infinitesimal sparks. So, so it’s all in relation to the divine. Bhakta means a participant, literally, a kind of participation.
Yes. A division, a participating portion, you know, of the divine. And the more we become purified, the more we perceive that, the more we live that, the more we breathe that, and then Prabhupada’s Gita just makes a whole lot more sense.
But that’s what Prabhupada’s Gita is promoting. It’s promoting acting from the heart. Okay.
So, this is beautiful. So, what, if I understand that what you are doing is that without getting too much into the technicality of the flow of the Gita, you are talking about how Prabhupada’s explanation of the Gita in one sense resonates with or echoes universal human experience. Yes.
Exactly. Yeah. Exactly, Chetan.
From the heart. Yes. If we are parts of God, that means God also acts from the heart.
So, His divine heart to us. Sorry, divine? Yeah, from His divine heart to our hearts. Yes.
I mean, look, in the Gita, it’s like Krishna is not playing His flute. Yeah, okay. But He’s still sending out a love call to Arjuna.
It’s no different. Yeah, I think you called it the beloved Lord’s secret love song. Secret love song, yeah.
It is a secret love song. Look, how does the Gita begin? You know, it’s so typical for the reader of the Gita that’s already familiar with the Gita to skip the first chapter. After they read it once, okay, I know, Arjuna’s freaking out, whatever.
Right? They don’t understand that the first chapter is extraordinarily profound. The first chapter begins with a conflict in the outer world, in Arjuna’s outer world. That conflict in the outer world becomes now an inner world conflict for Arjuna.
He then tries to deliberate on what to do with this irresolvable ethical dilemma. And he starts emptying the contents of his mind to Krishna, his confidant. And then it becomes something so futile and so impossible.
It becomes an irresolvable conflict and it describes how Arjuna’s heart is now a shattered heart. So his innermost realm of the heart is shattered and therefore he collapses. We don’t collapse when there’s an intellectual issue.
Do you ever, we don’t collapse when there’s an intellectual issue. But when our hearts are shattered, our knees buckle and we fall over. Amazing.
So, again, that’s where the Gita starts, Chaitanya Charanji, as you well know. Beautiful. So, what you’re saying is that, if we overlook the first chapter of the Gita, the fact that the Gita is actually addressing a collapse that originates in the heart, that it is, it is the divine heart speaking to the human heart, but a shattered human heart.
That’s without that setting, we will get caught at the level of the head in analysing the Gita. But the first chapter serves to show how it is not, the head is not involved, but it is, it runs much deeper. The concerns of the Gita, they are, they are profound, we could say, existential concerns and of the heart and from there the Gita starts and then it’s beautiful.
So, we could say from Arjuna’s shattered heart that is revealed in the, toward the end of the first chapter and the start of the second chapter. Then we move forward and by the end it’s almost like Krishna is bearing his heart and revealing his love. That’s right.
So, and that, I think that revelation of Krishna’s love is what ultimately heals Arjuna’s heart. That’s why he gets up at the end. Exactly.
And every teaching, every teaching Krishna gives, whether it be Palatyaga, whether it be Ashtanga Yoga, whether it be a Yajna, whether it be whatever, whatever the teaching, it is laced fully but subtly with Krishna’s love. You know, as a parent, when you raise a child, you know, you can, if they’re, if they’re taking geometry, you know, the kid needs a compass and a pencil and calculators maybe or whatever, I don’t know. Now, if that, if that equipment is given with love, it’s more important than the equipment itself.
Now, if a perfect stranger gives it to them, then it doesn’t carry meaning the same way. Prabhupada gives the example of the mother that finds the shoe of the child who is absent. And love wells up in her heart.
Now, frankly, you know, Chaitanya Charanjee, if you ever see me looking at my shoe and somehow love welling up in my heart, I mean, you should be concerned about me, okay? Now, but this is the child’s shoe who is absent. And so the shoe takes on more value than just the cloth it’s made of. It’s about the heart.
We are a tradition of the heart. It’s so easy to deviate from that by getting caught up in all the philosophical little details. You know.
That’s what you said that earlier. What can seem as deviating is actually deepening. That’s right.
So, it’s not deviating, it’s deepening. Okay, so you’re translating Karma Yoga. So, Prabhupada is like that, you could say, like that mother.
And for him, everything in the Gita is the words spoken by Krishna. Yes. They are expressing Krishna’s love.
So, Prabhupada is revealing that to us. Yes. And in one sense, we can also say that Krishna also does that throughout.
It’s almost… Absolutely. Everywhere he’s sprinkling in drops of bhakti. Absolutely.
And, well, but there’s a precondition to bhakti and that is Krishna’s love for us. Bhagavat Prema. Bhagavat Prema.
That love is what ignites the hearts of souls who then learn and think about things. That’s the Jnana Yoga and then you act accordingly. That’s the Karma Yoga, but it’s all in Bhakti Yoga.
Beautiful. So, there are various parts. So, one way of looking at is that they culminate in Bhakti Yoga, but other ways also, you can say, they’re also included in Bhakti Yoga.
Yes. Both ways. So, if you take it from one perspective, that when Krishna is teaching it, his purpose of teaching it is an expression of the love of his heart.
then, in that sense, if there’s a, at least, that’s the beginning of the divine reciprocation with the divine, we may not have reciprocated, but still, from Krishna’s perspective, it is coming out of his love and even if somebody is reciprocating at the level of Karma Yoga, at one level, it is a part of the circle of Bhakti. The circle may not have been completed till now, but still, it’s like Krishna is here, we are here, and his message has come to us. If we have not comprehended it, then the circle is not yet completed.
So, from our perspective, it may not even be clear that it is coming from Krishna’s heart. So, we might say, it’s okay, it’s coming, who is Krishna? Maybe Krishna is some, Krishna is whatever conception of Krishna somebody might have. So, from our perspective, the circle is not completed yet.
We don’t even know where it is starting and we don’t know where exactly it is meant to be going. But still, we are already in that circle because we are studying the Gita and trying to live it at some level. Yes.
So, So, even the title of this book, I mean, we get back to the title, Bhagavad Gita as it is. So, what is as it is referring to? Bhagavan and Gita. Gita.
His song issuing forth from his divine heart to us. This is not just an academic teaching to Arjun in the middle of a battlefield. This is not a technical, you know, a treaty on some sort of philosophy.
All of these teachings are perfectly carrying that Gita, that song issuing from the heart of the divine to us. Now, when Prabhupada sees everyone reading Bhagavad Gita in the West and so many translations, dozens and dozens of translations, and they’re not hearing the song, Prabhupada comes along and says, you don’t hear the song, so I’m going to amplify it. You don’t have the ears to hear it.
The song is there, but you’re not hearing it. So, I will set up a little amplifier called Bhashya. Okay? And this way, you can hear the song.
Maybe. Maybe. If you’re not ready to hear the song, then you’ll just put it down.
And in one say, his title as it is, is itself the beginning of the amplification. Yes. That itself is, you know, the word you had used the word audacious earlier.
Yes. The word audacious has, initially, it was somewhat that when he was impudent, but now it is also being used in the sense of courageous. Yes.
That was audacious. So, it has a positive connotation also. That’s right.
So, an uninformed reader might find Prabhupada’s titling audacious in the negative sense, but we can say that Prabhupada’s titling is audacious in the positive sense. It’s not presumptuous, but it’s courageous. It’s heroic.
He’s issuing a, issuing a, you could say, almost a bold statement of purpose over there. Very, very bold. Very bold.
Think of a bolder way to do it. It’s a wake-up call. You know, it’s Prabhupada setting an alarm, you know, when someone wants to get up, you know, early at a certain time, you set the alarm.
So, we didn’t set the alarm. Prabhupada has set the alarm for us. He’s coming to our lives through a book.
He set the alarm. Wake up. Here’s what you need to wake up to.
But if you need to go back to sleep, so be it. Okay. So that means you don’t really, I love this wake-up metaphor because it’s, even in our sleep, we are, we are thinking something, we are dreaming something, we are feeling something.
That’s right. When we wake up, it’s a drastically different experience. That’s right.
So, you could say Prabhupada’s title as it is and some of the places where Prabhupada seems to bring bhakti where it is not there, literally speaking. So, those are all meant to jolt us or wake us out of our intellectual preconceptions. Yes.
Our preconceptions and what is going on here? So, if we wake up, then we will, if we really wake up, then we will try to explore and then we will appreciate what Prabhupada is doing. Yes. And if we don’t, then we will just say, okay, this doesn’t make sense to me, this is just, this is biassed, this is, this is, whatever, some negative, they will dismiss it as with some negative perspectives.
Right. I mean, it could be an in-between state, like on an alarm, you can press the snooze button, right? You can get, you know, let me snooze a little longer, you know, let me avoid really addressing these important life issues a little longer, I’ll come back to it. You know, there are those people too.
Yeah, that’s true. That’s, you know, they wake up a little bit, then they press the snooze button, you know, let me snooze a little longer. But, we have to also make sure that we bhaktas, we devotees don’t press a snooze button even as bhaktas.
Okay. Right? That’s true. Yeah.
So, that’s why these discussions, these dialogues are also continuing the wake-up call. That’s the whole point of Sangha. Yeah, true.
I was thinking when you were going to say this, we bhaktas, I thought you’ll say something else, that sometimes, you know, Prabhupada’s books issue the wake-up call, but sometimes the way we respond to the people instead of waking them up further, we put them to sleep. This makes no sense. That’s right.
So, if we don’t present Prabhupada’s message properly, then we put people back to sleep. Yeah, we may also be doing a disservice. Sometimes devotees, they often talk about, and I am also guilty of this, that devotees talk about how many people I have brought to Krishna consciousness.
At one level, we never bring anyone. It’s Krishna uses us and Krishna actually brings, but even if we keep track of that, it’s, you know, we hardly keep track of how many people didn’t come to Krishna consciousness because of me. The way I acted, the way I presented things.
So, we might, so, in the name of being faithful to Prabhupada, if we end up being not reasonable in explaining what Prabhupada is doing, then we may actually do disservice to Prabhupada in a sense. Yeah, that’s right. It’s a very important point actually, Chaitanya Charanjee and I appreciate it.
We do need to be careful on how we present Krishna Bhakti. It is a very, very grave responsibility because we need to be careful that we don’t import issues that we’re dealing with personally and unconsciously try to take it through imposing aspects of Krishna Bhakti on others inside or outside of the movement. I’ve seen devotees you know do a lot of this importing and I’ve seen myself do it and I put a check on it.
It’s very important to put a check on those things. I love the way you phrase this. We are ourselves dealing with some issues in our lives so we import them into first our presentation of Krishna Bhakti even when that is not relevant and not only we import it over there but we also impose it.
It’s two different steps. So some things which are not relevant to the audience we don’t even have to present it at that point so we present it and we present it so forcefully that the audience is not going away from Bhagavad Gita actually they’re going away from what we are speaking the way we are presenting the Gita or what we are speaking which may not even be the core part of the Gita advancements. So this is very important.
I was actually this may lead to the next point I was going to make. So in one sense when Prabhupada is saying Bhagavad Gita as it is is it a exclusivist claim because you started by saying when you say as it is then it also means that other Gitas are not as it is that impression can come up but it seems that Prabhupada respected Ramacharya’s Gita Prabhupada respected Prabhupada said I think there’s a past time where somebody said Swamiji your Gita is like Ramacharya’s Gita and that person was seeming to say it in a critical way and Prabhupada said that’s a compliment so of course Prabhupada had his own distinct presentation that he gave but so because this as it is claim may be mistaken to be exclusivist by some readers or sometimes it may be mistaken to be exclusivist even by devotees and that’s how they may present it to others so how do we understand as it is claim in a way that is faithful but not exclusivist yes well you know I mean the fact is it is excluding most other Gitas it’s it does have that strong implication that most other Gitas are Bhagavad Gita as it is not you they would you know Prabhupada might very well label it not at the end of as it is not sorry I heard lecture I heard I have not read this Prabhupada this is not Bhagavad Gita as it is this is Bhagavad Gita as you are well okay see so many people can just project into the Gita and so on so so the thing is while it is exclusive in the sense that it’s excluding these other interpretations it’s also inclusive in the sense that in fact it’s the most inclusive because it brings out the universal message of the Gita if you can hear it Krishna’s love song is not exclusive it is secret when we’re not ready to hear it but when we’re ready to hear it it’s no longer secret okay but it is secret I mean why are some things secret okay sorry no I’m just trying to understand the link between inclusive and secret can we just discuss the inclusive first before you go to secret yeah so if what you are saying is like many people when they think about bhakti they think of some kind of sentiment where you claim that you have tears in your eyes or you get some dreams of Krishna people have their own conceptions about bhakti as as some kind of naive sentimentality but when we say that so it could seem that Prabhupada when he’s when he’s saying that bhakti is the essential message of the Gita but then it is exclusive but then if we look at what bhakti means then there is also very expansive or inclusive understanding of bhakti and in that sense if you say that it’s Krishna’s love coming out Krishna love song coming out then bhakti includes karma bhakti includes jnana bhakti you can say includes non-violence also so when we are saying that we are excluding those Gita other Gitas it’s not in we’re not saying that they are wrong it’s almost like you’re saying that they are wrong in saying that this is the conclusion of the Gita so so the the criticism is we could say even the criticism is is for their non-inclusiveness yeah right yeah they’re they’re sort of projecting their exclusive understanding of what they think the Gita should be on to Prabhupada when he says as it is oh and they are saying therefore yours is not as it is how dare you say yours is as it is that’s right okay that’s right so you see there’s a bit of projection going on there yeah but in Prabhupada invites his readers to read the Gita with an open mind and to see what happens you know in other words it’s it’s he’s he’s you know if you’re open to an experiment here then start reading it and take the words of the Gita very seriously so see what happens so it’s beautiful that’s a that’s very good example or good good approach so if we take as an experiment so if we if I say that as a reader how am I to know whether your Bhagavad Gita is as it is or not so right okay you Prabhupada is in one sense provoking but it’s not that from a Prabhupada is demanding faith because overall his tone is he’s making reasoned arguments throughout the book so but he and he’s also in one sense giving right in the beginning what he expects from the reader so those are like if you want to do this experiment this is what you need to do this is these are the starting axioms starting apparatus starting requirements and so Prabhupada says that at least in principle one should accept Krishna as God and approach in a devotional mood and this is not Prabhupada imposing Prabhupada also says that this is what Krishna himself says that Krishna does Arjuna you are able to understand this message because you are a devotee bhaktosi me sakha cheti rahasya me yaitaduttamam so so so the open-mindedness is that it’s like this is the experiment or this is the pathway that that so somebody looking at from the top somebody seen from the bottom from the bottom what I am seeing cannot confirm what is being seen from the top yes somebody saying okay this is what this is what I am seeing and if you go along this path see if it makes sense for you see if you come to this destination so in that sense it’s it’s you could say it’s a particular approach but the particular approach is not presented dogmatically it’s like a open-minded presenting it’s a call for open-mindedness towards a particular path so if somebody says I want to be open-minded that means I want to question this path itself right it’s like how can you do experiment if you are going to question the the basics of the experiment itself yeah yeah exactly exactly how can you enter into an experiment if you’re unwilling to do the experiment I mean it comes down simple as simple as that you know if you’re just gonna be fearful of the experiment then well then the no experiment will be conducted yeah but there’s a metaphor given for this right when I think Galileo he constructed the telescope he wanted to show how the moon the the moon is actually the earth is actually moving so his telescope would show that so there were some religious fanatics they said that they were refused to look in the telescope and they said no you’re wrong so he apparently said that you look at the telescope and then you see he says no we’re not going to look in the telescope but you’re wrong so it’s almost like that it’s a scientific approach but yeah yeah yeah no it’s so I mean you’re right to bring up the question of exclusivity but then we also must appreciate the inclusivity that is in the teachings themselves yeah you come on but about Dante tongues to tie the pyjama however anyone approaches me I reciprocate their love I offer my love to them pajami pajami I worship them I mean pajami is very strong word Krishna says I pajami means I worship I love them back that’s very inclusive no matter how we approach Krishna Krishna will reciprocate I say that’s darn inclusive I would say that it’s even supremely inclusive it’s amazing and that’s what is reflected next part of the words that all people are on my path that’s right yes yes yes uh just I mean since we are on this topic some people translate that 411 second part as all paths lead to me so manushya path sarvasya logically speaking the path the sarvasya is closer to manushya it’s not to vartama so in that sense it’s a it’s all people on my path is a much more logical translation but does the bhagavad gita what would you comment about this because you are recommending the bhagavad gita you are going against the inclusive spirit the bhagavad gita teaches all paths lead to that all paths lead to me right that is a more inclusive reading of the gita not it’s that bhakti is the conclusion of the gita that’s not an inclusive reading how would you respond to that you know um i went back to my own translation of that verse chapter 4 verse 11 and i found that there are some very subtle things going on in the sanskrit so i translated it okay so in the way they offer themselves to me in just that way i can offer my love to them reciprocally okay that’s basically what we have in Prabhupada’s translation but then i went back and i retranslated the second part to the turning of my own heart do humans respond with the turnings of their own hearts in every way hmm so that’s quite so that gets into okay so mama okay mama vartma vartma okay uh in a way that’s a turning vartma is a path it comes from the the sanskrit word uh the the root verb root vrit which means to turn and so vartma anuvartmante right uh i’m sorry anuvartante so to the turning of my own heart mama my own heart to the turning of my own heart do humans respond with the turnings they respond they anuvartante they respond the anu means they follow hmm that that their own hearts follow my heart what’s going on in my heart and so you see this so to the turning of my own heart do humans respond with the turnings of their own hearts in every way that’s beautiful so this is i mean it’s powerful this is this is this means that krishna is so close to us that his heart will will reverberate with our hearts even when we don’t know it there is such intimacy between divinity and humanity here now what are the reasons uh sorry sorry sure so you are saying that all paths lead to me uh there is a sense of that also in the translation but yeah it’s a oversimplification literally to say that all paths lead to me but it’s like to whatever extent the soul is turning to Krishna through whichever path to that extent that path is leading to Krishna but if the heart is not being turned we can’t literally say that all paths lead to him is that what you’re trying to say or yes that whether you see the problem with with saying all paths lead to me which is what i translated it originally is that you know some people think of a path say the Buddhist path how does the Buddhist path lead to him hmm you know how does the Confucian path lead to him well one could actually try to analyse that that in some sense any upliftment of the human spirit brings one closer to divinity that’s fine but what i feel this is saying on a deeper level is that whatever humans pursue in their own hearts Krishna’s heart receives that so in that sense everyone is on the path of Krishna’s heart whatever humans pursue in their heart Krishna receives that yeah because because our hearts you know we we participate in in the reality of the divinity’s love and all love comes from vladini shakti we know this so the the point is that we are uh off we are offering something uh even when we’re not offering it to Krishna yet he feels that love i mean he’s in he’s in the hearts of all living beings i mean do you think he’s just sitting there sitting there playing a video game i mean you know i mean he’s he’s not bored he’s not bored he is he is looking for our love he’s looking for the love coming from sentient beings he wants closeness love means closeness now can you get any closer than the heart so he is present within the heart the vraja gopikas maraj pariksha says how can these gopis married women go dancing with the lord and how can the lord dance with married women and the argument is those husbands are not husband the way krishna is her husband he is so close to them all way closer to them that any mundane husband can be true yeah the word for husband you know one of the words for a husband is bartra in sanskrit bartra which means sustainer there we go there we go but right so so the the idea is that it is krishna that is sustaining our ability to even love but he doesn’t control it it’s the one thing he doesn’t control as eswar it’s simply it is up to us because if he were to control it then it wouldn’t be love. Beautiful.
So, we could say in one sense, everybody, whether we say everybody’s on my path or all paths lead to me. If you understand it in terms that whatever anyone is pursuing in whichever path, it’s actually a part of Krishna. So, even if somebody is loving someone else, they may not necessarily be Krishna conscious in that love or even somebody is attracted to some mundane object, somebody is attracted to some natural scenery.
Krishna says that everything attractive manifests a spark of my splendour. So, in one sense, they are attracted to Krishna’s beauty. They are attracted to Krishna’s opulence only.
So, if we consider in our yoga podcasts, you had mentioned that divinity is embracing all of us and yoga is the means to return the embrace of divinity. So, we could say at one level, whatever we are attracted to, it is a part of, it is a manifestation of the divine. To the extent we become aware of that, to that extent, we will go closer to the divine.
If you’re not aware of that, we may not, then it depends on whether that particular manifestation, sattva, rajas, tamas, we may go closer or away from Krishna. But the point is that, so, both translations can, in one sense, be understood in a way that both harmonises the principle of bhakti and reciprocity. Yes, yes.
And here’s the point, Chetan Charanjee, you know, I’ve been teaching comparative religion, world religions for 30 years, 35 years in the university. And, you know, people want to say, you know, some people come up to me and say, oh, Dr. Schweig, I’ve got it. Religions are all saying the same thing.
I said, no, they’re not all saying the same thing. That’s what I’m teaching. I’m teaching how they’re saying different things.
But there’s one level where they can meet. And that’s the heart. That’s where we find utter inclusivity and unity.
But the ways we express it can be variegated, tremendously variegated. And that’s okay. That’s why Krishna says, ye yatha mam prabhadyante, however they want to express it.
However they want to express it. That is up to them. But I will reciprocate and give them my love.
So it’s about this kind of the turning of Krishna’s heart in relation to the turnings of our hearts. What he’s trying to say there is that I feel what’s going on with you. I’m not just sitting there like, you know, as if I’m watching something totally.
Look, the example is given in the Upanishads, right? The one bird is watching the other bird. And the other bird is considered the jivatman, right? Who’s eating the fruit. Of the tree.
Well, the other bird is watching, but not just watching. The bird is hoping that the other bird will gaze back. The first bird is gazing lovingly in a yearning fashion, the way Krishna calls out on his flute, the way Krishna dispenses his teachings in the Gita.
He’s calling us. And he’s next to us. He’s near us.
That the bird is not watching from another tree. He’s on the same branch. Branches the heart.
It’s beautiful. In the Abrahamic tradition, in the Old Testament, there is the metaphor of the prodigal son. How the father is so loving.
When the son comes back from squandering everything, still the father welcomes him back. But we could say from the Bhagavad Gita’s perspective, it is throughout the prodigal son’s wandering, the father is with him, prompting him to come back. So again, we can talk about the mountain metaphor.
So when the father, when the son comes back, then he comes to know, actually, my father was waiting for me. He might be worried, is my father angry with me? Will my father reject me? But he may see the father’s love only when he comes back and meets his father. But in a sense, the father was with him all the time and trying to, like you said, in the turning of the heart back to him, the father was waiting, hoping for that heart to turn back.
And so that’s a similar theme, a very similar theme. And really, it symbolises the way God is with us. Yeah, beautiful.
So as Bhagavad Gita as it is, why would you want to change or modify the divine love song of Krishna, of Sri Krishna Bhagavan? That’s like going into a great piece of literature, a great piece of music and changing it. Why would you do that? It’s so beautiful the way it is. The way it is.
It’s beautiful the way it is. Bhagavad Gita, the way it is, as it is. And as it is, ultimately.
So, Prabhu, there’s one, maybe one or two, I don’t want to take too much. One or two important questions with which we can conclude. So, at one level, we could say that we don’t want to, why do you want to change the Bhagavad Gita, beautiful as it is? At the same time, the Bhagavad Gita does contain a lot of wisdom, which is appreciable even for a people who are not necessarily in a devotional disposition.
So, we could say that if there are presentations of the Gita that don’t necessarily emphasise the devotional aspect, but they don’t deny downplay it, but that is all they are getting the heart to turn to some extent. I have written a book on 10 leadership sutras based on the Bhagavad Gita. So, many times when I present that to devotees, they often object that Prabhupada, that Gita is about Bhakti.
So, is the Gita about leadership? So, then I explain, yes, Krishna is a leader, Arjuna is a leader. It’s a conversation between leaders and they are talking leadership principles. But the point is that somebody who is not interested in devotion, does that mean that they will have no, they should have no access to the Gita or they will have no access to the Gita till they are going to become devotionally minded? We can open doors.
So, we can open doors as long as those doors come to the devotional aspect. That devotional aspect may not be emphasised and certainly I’m not calling leadership sutras on the Gita as Bhagavad Gita as it is. I’m talking about leadership sutras that are drawn from the Gita, that are inspired by the Gita.
Yes. So, the problem comes when, it’s not when we take one aspect of the Gita and present it for a particular audience. The problem comes when we take that one aspect and say that that is the essential conclusion of the Gita.
Isn’t it? Is that a correct understanding? Yes. Beautiful. Beautiful.
Yes. I love the idea of bringing out the tools from the Gita that will infuse us with a sense of sattvika, leadership. I mean, to me, leadership is simply a ship on which a leader puts us that leads to Krishna’s heart.
That’s leadership. Okay. It’s a ship.
You know, it’s Prabhupada’s ship. Okay. And we’re being led.
Okay. Prabhupada’s the leader. So, there’s a leadership.
I’m a little simple, but that’s my definition of leadership. Okay. So, the real problem is when we could say that if somebody is taking a part of the Gita, when Prabhupada talks about artha kukutanyaaya, half hand logic, it is, it is, there’s no problem to want the egg from the hen.
The problem is cutting off the neck. So, it’s a, if somebody wants to approach the Gita from a particular perspective and they feel inspired that way, I mean, a particular audience may be inspired the particular way. In principle, there’s nothing wrong in that.
But the problem is when we, in fact, we have discussed this was 1822, where we take knowledge in the mode of ignorance, we take a part to be the whole. That’s right. So, that is, that is itself, that would be a problem.
So, Prabhupada’s Bhagavad Gita, as it is, is in one, we could say, a reproach of all other commentaries on the Bhagavad Gita or all other presentations of the Gita, which, which take a part of it and make it to the whole. As it is in the sense, he’s presenting the whole to be the, he’s very clearly making it evident that this is the essence, this is the heart, this is the whole. The whole that, by which, the whole by which we can understand the different parts.
That was the, in my analogy, when you’ve gone to New York already, then you can understand the different steps of the trip in a way that’s different than if you never got, have never been to New York. Amazing. So, the heart, the whole, and how to understand the parts in light of the whole.
Very important. But you see, if we don’t have the whole grasped, within our grasp, then, then we will use the Gita in different ways. But when the Gita is embraced for itself, as it is, then we are liberated.
That’s amazing. So, what Prabhupada is doing is, he’s giving us the whole and then he is, in one sense, we as, we as readers of the Gita and we as those who are trying to teach the Gita to some extent, we, it’s our responsibility to see how the parts fit into the whole and explain that to others. That’s right.
So, but Prabhupada is giving us the whole. And we can strive to do that more and more and more. Exactly.
With each other and in our own swadhyaya. That’s right. Beautiful.
So, that’s, I was thinking about that verse towards the Gita and when Arjuna says that, I accept fully what you say. So, that sarvam can, in one sense, it can mean all, but maybe a more precise whole. The whole.
That’s right. Sarva. That’s right.
Yeah. So, I accept the whole and then, okay, this is the whole and how do the parts fit in? So, the parts were loved, the part, each part was lovingly offered to me, just as a parent, lovingly offers this, that, the other, but the more important thing is not the content of those things, but the way it is given out of love. Oh, okay.
You know, in English there is a saying that, it is the thought that matters when you give your gift also. That’s right. So, we could say that, what Prabhupada, if you go back to the metaphor of the top view, what Prabhupada is seeing, not just the particular words and the particular limb of path of spirituality that is given, but Prabhupada is seeing what is Krishna’s thought behind it.
That’s right. He is telling us that thought. That’s beautiful.
So, now you will summarise. Yes, I will try. This is amazing.
I am so excited to attempt to summarise now. So, we will try to discuss today, how to understand Prabhupada’s presentation of the Bhagavad Gita. Is it too biassed towards Bhakti? So, we started by discussing that, as it is provocative, it can seem presumptuous, but what Prabhupada is doing by that is, that very bold claim, audacious claim, forces people to think, what is he doing? Then I mentioned that it is in terms of sadhana and sadhya.
Prabhupada is clearly, Prabhupada is stressing that and what you said is that, actually at one level, it’s Prabhupada is giving us the, I think one consistent metaphor which came back repeatedly is that, that it is the Bhagavad Gita is coming from Krishna’s heart and that is what Prabhupada is consistently giving. So, we could say, we could take a horizontal journey from a place A to place B and then we start seeing all the landmarks along the way in a different way when we get to the end of the landmark, end of our journey or we get to top of a mountain and then from there we look down at all the parts of the mountain, then we can see how all of these are constructed to take a person to the top of the mountain. So, the mystery novel is a mystery for the reader, but it’s not a mystery for Prabhupada.
It’s not a mystery. So, Prabhupada is coming from the top down and he is giving us the top view of everything, the view as seen from the top. From the top means that the Bhagavad Gita is a heart-to-heart communication and that we see from the start of the Gita.
The first chapter is important because it depicts not just Arjuna’s outer conflict and not just some inner mental or intellectual conflict, but inner shattering of the heart. So, that setting is, that scene is set in the first chapter and if you look at the end, Krishna’s heart comes out when he is calling out, have you heard with one point, with your concentration on the one point and then Sanjay speaks also that this is a confidential conversation. So, the point which we are making is that Krishna is, ultimately the whole Gita is Krishna’s heart to address Arjuna’s healing heart and how it is Krishna’s heart, we see it toward the end of the Gita as we come closer and closer to the end.
But what Prabhupada, Prabhupada is, you are the fast-pacing or we are fast-paced, Prabhupada is giving us, showing everything in terms of the intent of Krishna in speaking it, of Krishna’s heart of love and Prabhupada is not obscuring Krishna as well because Prabhupada is giving the Sanskrit also. So, when you are translating Karma Yoga as Bhakti Yoga, as devotional service, so why would the author deauthenticate, put something in that book that is deauthenticating. So, all these are in one sense like a wake-up call.
They force us to think, right from the title to some of his translations which may be, which may seem questionable. So, he is not hiding anything, he is making, he is forcing us to think and if we wake up, then we will see the whole Bhagavad Gita from a different perspective. If we don’t wake up, then we may, we go to sleep, then we will just dismiss the Bhagavad Gita, Prabhupada’s Gita as it.
So, then we talked about how, if somebody is asking questions about the way Prabhupada is translating, we have to, we can’t dismiss those questions or disrespect those questions by attacking that person as a doubter or a questioner. So, you talked about, you talked about your experience with the intellectual tools that academia provides us high power tools and one becomes a mundane scholar not just by using those tools, but by getting so obsessed with the tools as to forget the purpose of the tools and that can happen in any field. So, if we use those tools properly, then actually even a deep study of the Gita will show us how the Gita is actually permeated with devotion, how the whole of the Gita is in one sense Krishna’s heart calling out in love to us, Krishna’s love song, not the flute song, but the love song here and then it is our reciprocation, our bhakti is like it comes from the Bhag.
So, it means participating, participating in the divine reality, in the divine love and so, if instead of dismissing or disrespecting somebody who has questions, we may need to, we say I’ll get back to you with the answers or I’ll connect you with somebody who can answer those questions. So, we shouldn’t, because of our, what is it, we may import some of our own issues and then impose them on others. So, we need to avoid that.
Otherwise, we will do disservice to Prabhupada. Prabhupada is waking people up and we may put them back to sleep again. So, then we talked about how is Bhagavad Gita exclusive in calling as it is.
Yes, it does exclude those explanations of the Gita which focus only on the part and make it the whole. But at the same time, it is inclusive because if you understand that ultimately creation is a reciprocation between God’s heart and our heart. Everything that we do, we don’t do anything without engaging the heart.
The way it is engaged to the extent it is engaged, in what it is engaged, that will vary. But we engage. So, if we consider from the heart to the heart as a reciprocation of bhakti, then bhakti itself is inclusive.
Bhakti includes karma, bhakti includes jnana. So, it’s like when Krishna is teaching about karma and jnana, it’s like a parent giving geometry instruments to a child. The instruments are themselves one thing, but they are given out of love by the parent.
So, Krishna is teaching karma yoga, jnana yoga, all these things, but it’s ultimately his love. So, we could say the circle of love coming from him and to the extent we start practising bhakti, that circle of love becomes completed. And if we don’t, still we are a part of the circle, we may not realise it.
And then you give a translation of mam vartamanu vartante, that to the turning of the heart or to the turning of my heart, the souls respond by turning their heart. So, Krishna gives us love and one thing he doesn’t control is our heart, but he wants us to turn towards him. And so, if all paths lead to me, if somebody, it’s not just literally every path literally leads to Krishna, but all paths, we can say to the extent they comprise the turning of the heart toward Krishna, to the extent whatever the person is pursuing, that is a manifestation of Krishna.
So, in that sense, it’s true. And we discussed toward the end that, so, the Bhagavad Gita itself is like, it’s so beautiful because it expresses Krishna’s heart. So, why would somebody want to change it? But of course, we can open more doors to it.
So, it’s not wrong to take up parts of the Gita and present. It’s only when we make the parts the whole. If the parts can lead people to the whole, then that is perfection and Arjuna manifests that perfection.
He says, Sarvam, I accept the whole. So, Prabhupada’s commentary gives us the whole and then it is our responsibility to ourselves understand and explain to others how the various parts fit into the whole. Beautiful.
So, the concluding words of this is beautiful, Roo. It’s amazing. Excellent summary and a very rich discussion.
And I always expect nothing less with you, Chetan and Charanji. I go to higher and higher levels of union between intellectual gratification and spiritual satisfaction. That’s good.
Excellent. Excellent. Thank you very much.
I look forward to our podcast again in the future soon. Thank you so much, Chetan and Charanji. All the best.
Thank you.