Isn’t Prabhupada’s Gita just one among the many interpretations of the Gita?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

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who have written Bhagavad Gita and given their interpretations so Srila Prabhupada has given his Bhagavad Gita is that also his interpretation and apart from his interpretation is there the original Gita yes the original Gita is the Sanskrit verses the Sanskrit verses are available for anyone to read and Srila Prabhupada is very transparent he doesn’t just give his interpretation he gives the Sanskrit verses he gives the word to word translation he gives the translation and he gives his commentary now Srila Prabhupada calls his Bhagavad Gita as Bhagavad Gita as it is now how do we know that it is as it is there is a simple way to know see if say I attend somebody’s class and then I see at that point that I go and repeat this is what they said in the class now how can you know whether I am repeating the exact same thing or something else now you can see that ok if that class was spoken to somebody what was the not a class it was a discussion between two people what was the understanding of that person and if this person is having the same understanding as that original student this is the same so we can look what Krishna spoke to the Bhagavad Gita it is spoken to Arjuna so what was the understanding of Arjuna we can check and then we can check what is the understanding that those who have studied Srila Prabhupada’s Bhagavad Gita and have adopted that as their guide book what is their understanding so we can understand Arjuna’s understanding through his own words and through his actions basically the Bhagavad Gita is about two things sadhana and sadhya what is the means and what is the goal if I am at place A where should I go and how should I go there where should I go is sadhya how I should go there is sadhana so now after the 4 shloka in the middle of the Gita at which point actually the Gita’s essence is given 10.8 to 11 after that Arjuna speaks Arjuna uses like this that you are the supreme absolute truth you are the god of all gods you are the ultimate shelter basically he acknowledges Krishna as the ultimate sadhya and at the end of the Bhagavad Gita what does Arjuna do he takes up his bow and starts fighting what is his consciousness he doesn’t say I will fight he says I will do your will I will do your will for him the important thing is not fighting the important thing is doing Krishna’s will and doing God’s will is an act of bhakti so the Bhagavad Gita teaches many different conceptions of the absolute truth Arjuna tells the ultimate sadhya is God as the all attractive supreme person Krishna the Bhagavad Gita talks about many different paths for spiritual elevation but what it tells ultimately is give up everything and surrender to Krishna it’s very categorical and Arjuna’s action is also the same he gives up everything and surrenders to Krishna so the sadhya is Krishna the all attractive supreme person and the sadhya is God this is what Arjuna’s understanding if you look at the text of the Gita now if you look at Sri Prabhupada what he tells in his Bhagavad Gita and what the understanding of his followers is people from all over the world who had no knowledge of Krishna before, they gave up everything and they surrendered to Krishna accepting him as their ultimate son and not only that they actually took up the process of Bhagavad Gita so they gave up all other ideas of nature and just focused on the practice of Bhagavad Gita so the same effect in terms of understanding sadhya and sadhya that was there on the original student of the Gita is seen on the students of the Bhagavad Gita as it is therefore by this consistency we can understand that yes the Bhagavad Gita can have many different interpretations but the interpretation that is most faithful in the Bhagavad Gita will be that which is faithful in its conclusion the Bhagavad Gita is inclusive in the sense that it talks about many parts it talks about Karma Yoga, it talks about Dhyan Yoga but Bhagavad Gita is also inclusive it gives a conclusion and in terms of its technicalities there are many different things the Bhagavad Gita talks about and they can be analysed a lot and many different commentators they often take certain aspects of the Gita and they highlight it which is okay but then that is Bhagavad Gita but that is not the conclusion that is not highlighting the conclusion of the Bhagavad Gita so Shri Prabhupada’s Bhagavad Gita at one level we could say it is an interpretation but we can say that it is an interpretation that is faithful to the conclusion of the Gita so in that sense, in the conclusion sense it is Bhagavad Gita as it is did that answer your question? Thank you