My heart tells me that jnana-yoga is the best path for me. What should I do?

I believe that the best path for every person depends on his/her nature, and my heart tells me that gyanayog is the best path for me. Only knowledge will help me understand god, and the more I understand, the closer to moksha I will be. What should I do?

Transcript

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I feel that the best path for every person depends on his or her nature and my heart tells me that the Gyan Yoga is the best path for me, only knowledge will help me to understand God and the more I understand the closer to Moksha I will be please comment answer yes it is surely true that all of us have different natures and according to our natures we will practice spirituality accordingly that doesn’t necessarily mean that there have to be different paths actually there is only one path which is the path to God path to the absolute truth and depending on different aspects that are emphasized at different levels of one’s spiritual advancement that path may get different names depending on what is considered or considered to be the highest goal at that particular level so surely it is true that all of us have different natures and the Vedic scriptures do take this variety in our individuality into account and that’s why they have different paths recommended like Karma Yoga, Gyan Yoga, Bhakti Yoga at the same time the Bhagavad Gita does talk about the indispensability of Bhakti in understanding the absolute truth and it also very clearly traces that Gyan and Bhakti are not antithetical in fact cultivation of philosophical knowledge is an integral and generally essential part of Bhakti so sometimes these paths are simplistically divided into the path of Karma Yoga is for the hard working people, the path of Bhakti Yoga is for the sentimental people the path of Ashtanga Yoga is for the austere people and the path of Gyan Yoga is for the intellectual people now this sort of classification is simplistic because you cannot really make a watertight separation like this and if you look at the Bhagavad Gita closely as we will later in this answer, you will see that the path of Bhakti integrates all these elements, it’s not that it is only for the sentimental people and the second problem with this is first of all this division is not watertight the second problem is that this sort of misclassification misrepresents the message of the Bhagavad Gita and message of the Vedic literature in general nobody likes to be called as a sentimental person and just by this kind of enabling as Bhakti Yoga is for sentimental people at a subtle but sure level Bhakti is being downplayed now first of all there is no scriptural basis for the idea that Bhakti is for sentimental people in fact Krishna says that the path of Bhakti is embraced by those who attain and climb the summit of intelligence Krishna says that those who are Gyanis those who are pursuing the path of knowledge, the Gyan Yogis when they become from seekers to seers from Gyanis they become Gyanavan Gyanis means seekers of Gyan, Gyanavan means seers or possessors of Gyan so in the 7th chapter of the Bhagavad Gita verses 16, 17 and 18 and 19 talks about how different people come towards God so Krishna says that surely of all the people who come towards him he mentions 4 categories of people Artho, Chikyas, Artharthi and Gyani the distressed, the seekers of material wealth, the inquisitive and the seekers of knowledge and among these 4 categories he unambiguously says that the seeker of knowledge is the best and Krishna says actually I love him Gyanitvaatmai Vavimatam is as good as my own self so Krishna doesn’t minimize or reject Gyan but then what is the culmination of Gyan he describes in 7.19 Bahunam Gyanavan Ante Bahunam Janmanam Ante Gyanavan Mam Prapadyate so when a person becomes Gyanavan he surrenders to me surrender is essentially the characteristic of Bhakti so therefore surrender and principle of Bhakti is not for sentimental people but it is for the people who have climbed the summit of intelligence so they become fully Gyanavan then they surrender to Krishna so therefore if we look at the Bhagavad Gita there is no basis for the idea that Bhakti is just for sentimental people and similarly there is no basis for the idea that just because a person feels himself to be an intellectual that means the path of Bhakti is not for him, in fact the Bhagavad Gita very clearly concludes with Manmanabha Madh Bhakto and Mam Ekam Sharanam Vraja 18.65 and 18.66 which are very explicitly exhorting Arjuna and through Arjuna all of us to practice Bhakti, always think of Krishna, surrender to Krishna only, all these are very explicit expressions of Bhakti and where do these come, they come at the end of the philosophical deliberation of the Bhagavad Gita so the whole Bhagavad Gita in one sense we can say it’s Gyan because it’s philosophy but it’s philosophy that culminates in a call for Bhakti so even if one feels that one has an intellectual nature and therefore one feels that the path of Gyan is the best for me these two are not necessarily inextricable one can be intellectually oriented and still one can in principle as well as in practice take up the path of Bhakti Yoga because Bhakti Yoga does not deny the role of the intellect in fact it emphasizes that actually it is through philosophical analysis and deliberation that one can understand the sublimity and the supremacy of devotional emotions so in this way the principle is clearly recognized in the Bhagavad Gita that the intellect is not to be derided or minimized but it is to be utilized and when it is utilized in the understanding of the absolute truth then that use of the intellect is recommended by Krishna and it is glorified by Krishna as a form of worship of him. In 18.70 he says विष्टस्यामिति नेमति हे those who study with intelligence this message of ours this conversation of ours of Arjuna Krishna is telling, they worship me with their intelligence so here Krishna is telling that an activity which would seem to be part of the Gyan Yoga study he says that is actually a Limbo Bhakti, that is a form of worship of Krishna. So therefore we don’t need to have this simplistic watertight division into various parts even if we feel intellectual we can use our intellect to understand the philosophy of the Bhagavad Gita and as I said both from the 7.16.19 sequence and from the overall Bhagavad Gita sequence where Krishna after the philosophical discussion declares that the conclusion of the philosophy is to surrender to him and he says to use our intelligence to understand the philosophy is also worship so Krishna doesn’t at all downplay or deny the role of the intellect now if one feels that by adopting the path of Gyan one will come to know Krishna because one can study and analyze and discuss and deliberate first of all studying analyzing, discussing, deliberating is also there in Bhakti just because one wants to do that doesn’t mean that one has to adopt the path of Gyan Yoga but although Krishna encourages all these, Krishna is quite unambiguous that these in and of themselves do not lead us to an understanding of the absolute truth Krishna clearly says bhaktyamam abhijanati yavan yash chasmi tatvataha as I am, how can I be known? it is only by bhakti 18.55 he says this and the verse before was 18.54 is also very significant, Krishna says that after one comes to the path of the level of Brahman that after one attains the Brahman platform then one attains pure bhakti, so again the principle here is what? after Brahman realization which is considered the perfection of Gyan after one attains that then one comes to the level of bhakti so therefore this idea that bhakti is lower is not substantiated in the Gita and apart from that again in 11.53 and 54 Krishna is very unambiguous aham evam vidho vishtum vishtvanasi mam yatha which is not by studying of the Vedas not by performance of austerity not by giving of charity, none of these means I can be known, then what is the way? bhaktyatva nanya ashyakya aham evam vidho arjuna gnatum drstum chidatvena bhavishtum chiparantapa so Krishna says bhaktyatva nanya ashyakya it is only by analog bhakti can I be known aham evam vidho arjuna this is the only way it is possible for you to know me and gnatum one will know me only by this way and Krishna is saying even if one wants to enter into me, even if one wants to attain impersonal realization bhavishtum chidatvena bhavishtum chiparantapa even if one wants to enter into him so this entering into him can be in two ways it can be to enter into the impersonal infulgence or it can be enter into the spiritual abode just like we can say entry, somebody enters into the city that person doesn’t merge with the city but if somebody so the point is this entry if somebody wants to enter into Brahman that is also requires cultivation of bhakti, so what Krishna is telling is even for attaining moksha one requires to cultivate bhakti and of course if one wants to get enter into the kingdom of God just as somebody wants to enter into a particular country, for that also Krishna says one requires bhakti so therefore even the path of bhakti includes gyan and the path of bhakti also allows for individuality within its own parameters so if we are more intellectual there are so many scriptures that one can study but in principle both from the philosophical point of view and the logical point of view from the philosophical or scriptural point of view it’s clear that Krishna is unambiguous that as I gave two references there are several other references also in the Gita that if you want to know him it is only by bhakti it is not by gyan, Krishna says that it is not by gyan that we can know him, very clearly he mentions that so even if you want to know God and come closer to him and whether we want to attain Moksha through the impersonal means or the personal means bhakti is indispensable and within bhakti we have the scope for individuality, we can focus more on studying scriptures and discussing the philosophy and through that understanding Krishna more and more but in principle from the logical point of view just by our efforts intellectually we cannot understand Krishna, why? because our intelligence is limited whereas Krishna is unlimited and therefore we cannot examine Krishna with our intellectual tools now we may be able to do it with material nature generally speaking if you look at Deva Govinda it uses a three level hierarchy there are Tattvatraya which is talked about in the Upanishads there is Jiva Prakriti and Ishvara Jiva, Jagat and Jagdish so Jagat is the material nature or material universe Jiva is the living entity and Jagdish is the lord of them all now among these three in the hierarchy material nature is unconscious so it is the lowest and the living entity is higher because it is conscious and above both of them above the material nature and above the living entity is God so now to some extent because material nature is below us in the hierarchy of things we can control it and we can observe and monitor it and that’s why to some extent we can understand material nature by using our intellect so now science requires controlled experiments so and we can do some controlled experiments because to some extent we can control material nature, material nature is below us in the hierarchy but Krishna is above us, we cannot conduct any controlled experiments in Krishna because Krishna is above us in the hierarchy we cannot catch Krishna with our intellect our intellect is finite where Krishna is infinite so therefore the only way we can understand Krishna is by Krishna’s self-revelation so our intellect is like a lamp and Krishna is like the sun, our lamp is extremely helpful for us when it is dark at night and we may even feel it is indispensable without the lamp I would maybe walk into a wall or stumble over a fallen object and trip and fall so we will feel that the lamp is invaluable and even indispensable in darkness and that is true but the lamp cannot show the sun to us and the lamp becomes unnecessary when the sun rises so similarly our intellectual capacity is like the lamp whereas Krishna is like the sun while we are in the darkness of material existence our intellectual capacity is extremely important for us to guide us, to understand what is right, what is wrong to separate philosophy from just non-scriptural illogical speculation so it’s important for us to use our intellectual faculty but at the same time we cannot use our intellectual faculty to understand Krishna because it is like a lamp it is finite and the sun is infinite the sun rises by its own will similarly when we get understanding of Krishna that is not by our intellectual exercise but it is by the self-revelation of Krishna coming by his own mercy according to his own sweet will and Krishna says that he will reveal himself to us when he is pleased with us and to please him he requests us to practice bhakti in the Bhagavad Gita very clearly so therefore the important principle here is that from the logical point of view the only way the finite can know the infinite is by the will of the infinite and the will of the infinite is that he will reveal himself only when he is pleased with us and he is pleased with us by the performance of our devotional service therefore the Vedic scriptures recommend in the Bhagavad Gita explicitly recommends that the path of bhakti is the path to know Krishna thank you