Chapter
2. Contents of the Gita Summarized
TEXT 39
esa te 'bhihita sankhye
buddhir yoge tv imam srnu
buddhya yukto yaya partha
karma-bandham prahasyasi
buddhir yoge tv imam srnu
buddhya yukto yaya partha
karma-bandham prahasyasi
SYNONYMS
TRANSLATION
PURPORT
According
to the Nirukti, or the
Vedic dictionary, sankhya means
that which describes phenomena in detail, and sankhya refers
to that philosophy which describes the real nature of the soul. And yoga involves
controlling the senses. Arjuna's proposal not to fight was based on sense
gratification. Forgetting his prime duty, he wanted to cease fighting because
he thought that by not killing his relatives and kinsmen he would be happier
than by enjoying the kingdom by conquering his cousins and brothers, the sons
of Dhrtarastra. In both ways, the basic principles were for sense
gratification. Happiness derived from conquering them and happiness derived by
seeing kinsmen alive are both on the basis of personal sense gratification, for
there is a sacrifice of wisdom and duty. Krsna, therefore, wanted to explain to
Arjuna that by killing the body of his grandfather he would not be killing the
soul proper, and He explained that all individual persons, including the Lord
Himself, are eternal individuals; they were individuals in the past, they are
individuals in the present, and they will continue to remain individuals in the
future, because all of us are individual souls eternally, and we simply change
our bodily dress in different manners. But, actually, we keep our individuality
even after liberation from the bondage of material dress. An analytical study
of the soul and the body has been very graphically explained by Lord Krsna. And
this descriptive knowledge of the soul and the body from different angles of
vision has been described here as sankhya, in
terms of the Nirukti dictionary.
Thissankhya has nothing to do with the sankhya philosophy
of the atheist Kapila. Long before the imposter Kapila's sankhya, the sankhyaphilosophy
was expounded in the Srimad-Bhagavatam by the
true Lord Kapila, the incarnation of Lord Krsna, who explained it to His
mother, Devahuti. It is clearly explained by Him that the Purusa, or the
Supreme Lord, is active and that He creates by looking over the prakrti. This is
accepted in the Vedas and in
the Gita. The
description in the Vedasindicates that the Lord glanced
over the prakrti, or
nature, and impregnated it with atomic individual souls. All these individuals
are working in the material world for sense gratification, and under the spell
of material energy they are thinking of being enjoyers. This mentality is
dragged to the last point of liberation when the living entity wants to become
one with the Lord. This is the last snare of maya or
sense gratificatory illusion, and it is only after many, many births of such
sense gratificatory activities that a great soul surrenders unto Vasudeva, Lord
Krsna, thereby fulfilling the search after the ultimate truth. Arjuna
has already accepted Krsna as his spiritual master by surrendering himself unto
Him: sisyas te 'ham sadhi mam tvam prapannam. Consequently,
Krsna will now tell him about the working process in buddhi-yoga, or karma-yoga, or in
other words, the practice of devotional service only for the sense
gratification of the Lord. Thisbuddhi-yoga is
clearly explained in Chapter Ten, verse ten, as being direct communion with the
Lord, who is sitting as Paramatma in everyone's heart. But such communion does
not take place without devotional service. One who is therefore situated in
devotional or transcendental loving service to the Lord, or, in other words, in
Krsna consciousness, attains to this stage of buddhi-yoga by the
special grace of the Lord. The Lord says, therefore, that only to those who are
always engaged in devotional service out of transcendental love does He award
the pure knowledge of devotion in love. In that way the devotee can reach Him
easily in the ever-blissful kingdom of God. Thus
the buddhi-yoga mentioned
in this verse is the devotional service of the Lord, and the word sankhya mentioned
herein has nothing to do with the atheistic sankhya-yoga enunciated
by the imposter Kapila. One should not, therefore, misunderstand that the sankhya-yoga mentioned
herein has any connection with the atheistic sankhya. Nor did
that philosophy have any influence during that time; nor would Lord Krsna care
to mention such godless philosophical speculations. Real sankhya philosophy
is described by Lord Kapila in the Srimad-Bhagavatam, but
even that sankhya has
nothing to do with the current topics. Here,sankhya means
analytical description of the body and the soul. Lord Krsna made an analytical
description of the soul just to bring Arjuna to the point of buddhi-yoga, or bhakti-yoga. Therefore,
Lord Krsna's sankhyaand Lord Kapila's sankhya, as
described in the Bhagavatam, are one
and the same. They are all bhakti-yoga. He
said, therefore, that only the less intelligent class of men make a distinction
between sankhya-yoga andbhakti-yoga. Of
course, atheistic sankhya-yoga has
nothing to do with bhakti-yoga, yet the
unintelligent claim that the atheistic sankhya-yoga is
referred to in the Bhagavad-gita. One
should therefore understand that buddhi-yoga means
to work in Krsna consciousness, in the full bliss and knowledge of devotional
service. One who works for the satisfaction of the Lord only, however difficult
such work may be, is working under the principles of buddhi-yoga and
finds himself always in transcendental bliss. By such transcendental
engagement, one achieves all transcendental qualities automatically, by the
grace of the Lord, and thus his liberation is complete in itself, without his
making extraneous endeavors to acquire knowledge. There is much difference
between work in Krsna consciousness and work for fruitive results, especially
in the matter of sense gratification for achieving results in terms of family
or material happiness. Buddhi-yoga is
therefore the transcendental quality of the work that we perform.
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