Go beyond the blindness caused by shortage of light – and by its surfeit by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 18

Whenever our surroundings go dark, say, due to a power failure, we become as if blind.

Something similar happens to us as souls in material existence. Due to our material attachments, we can’t see anything beyond matter – we become as if spiritually blind. To regain our spiritual vision, we need to shed our material attachments.

However, during our spiritual recovery, we may be blinded by an excess of light, just as a person on dark road may be blinded by a truck’s glaring front lights. The dazzling impersonal effulgence that surrounds the supreme spiritual truth can similarly blind us. How? Firstly, it can render us incapable of perceiving anything beyond the light. Secondly and more deleteriously, it can make us misconclude that the spiritual light is itself the highest spiritual truth, so no further search is necessary. This misconclusion terminates our spiritual quest at an intermediate impersonal level instead of the ultimate personal level.

To prevent premature termination of our spiritual quest, we need to place our experiences and inferences within the context of scriptural revelation.

To prevent such premature termination of our spiritual quest, we need to place our experiences and inferences within the context of scriptural revelation. Echoing a similar level of realization, the Ishopanishad (mantra 15) reveals a classic prayer wherein the seeker requests the Absolute Truth to withdraw the blinding effulgence and thus make the face of the Truth visible.

Gita wisdom reveals that Absolute Truth to be Krishna. While delineating a similar spiritual trajectory, the Gita (18.49-54)mentions how the seeker becomes equipoised towards everything material and attains the spiritual (brahman) level. Significantly, it (18.54) mentions this attainment not as the culmination of the spiritual quest, but as the commencement of transcendental devotion. By such devotion, the next verse (18.55) states, seekers understand Krishna in truth.

Thus the perception of the Absolute Truth that the Ishopanishad prays for, the Gita paves the path to.

Choose to act your way to feelings, not feel your way to actions by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita

Acting our way to feelings” means choosing conscientiously to act based on our intelligence, even when our feelings don’t agree, till eventually those actions engender supportive feelings.

“Feeling our way to actions” means letting our feelings determine our actions and reserving intelligent actions for times when our feelings agree with our intelligence.

Children usually feel their way to actions, studying and playing as per their feelings. If left to themselves, most children would play most of the time and wouldn’t study enough to have good careers. That’s why responsible parents gently but firmly push them to study. Though the children may initially sulk, over time, they realize the importance of studying and even relish its joy.

We have grown-up bodies, but our mind still remains childish – it impels us to feel our way to actions.

The human form offers us eternal souls an opportunity for spiritual education that culminates in a glowing career of eternal life with Krishna. We have grown-up bodies, but our mind still remains childish – it impels us to feel our way to actions. Because our present feelings tend to be material rather than spiritual, feeling our way to actions means that we keep groping for fleeting worldly pleasures, thus staying trapped in material consciousness.  Consequently, we can’t avail opportunities for spiritual growth and stay alienated from devotional happiness.

The Bhagavad-gita (09.14) states that serious devotees engage in devotional activities with rigid determination. Translated to the idiom of this article, this verse urges us to act our way to feelings, that is, to practice bhakti-yoga consistently, no matter how we feel. Though the mind may sulk initially at such discipline, steady contact with Krishna stimulates our swift spiritual growth. Soon, we realize the necessity of devotional service as our savior from material existence and relish its glory as the deliverer of life’s supreme happiness of pure love for Krishna.

See sense gratification as spiritual deprivation by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita

You are depriving yourself of so much pleasure,” the mind whispers when we practice spiritual life seriously and regulate sense gratification.

We may neglect the mind, but it keeps repeating its proposals for sense gratification. Over time, its relentless whispers may start echoing inside us and make us feel deprived.

But the reality is that we are souls who need lasting happiness. Our need can never be fulfilled at the material level in sense gratification, which can offer at best only a few moments of titillation sandwiched between long segments of dissatisfaction. Lasting happiness is available only at the spiritual level in steady devotion to Krishna, who is the reservoir of infinite happiness.

Due to the mind’s misdiagnosis, we witlessly go away from the source of satisfaction, Krishna, and towards the cause of dissatisfaction, the sense object.

Gita savants illustrate our predicament with the example of a fish out of water. From the moment the fish comes out of water till it returns, it deprives itself. Similarly, when we give up constructive service to Krishna, we come out of the nourishing and fulfilling ocean of devotion and we start feeling tormented by dissatisfaction. Unfortunately, we fail to recognize that the torment is due to disconnection from Krishna. We unsuspectingly believe the mind’s misdiagnosis that the torment is due to disconnection from the sense object. And thus we witlessly go away from the source of satisfaction, Krishna, and towards the cause of dissatisfaction, the sense object.

To avoid being fooled thus, we need to place our faith not in the mind, but in scripture: The Bhagavad-gita (05.21) assures that those who become indifferent towards external sensations and turn inwards attain unlimited happiness. And we can reinforce our faith in scripture by recollecting our own fulfilling spiritual experiences and frustrating sensual experiences. This combination of scriptural illumination and personal recollection will convince us that the pursuit of sense gratification will cause deprivation and the practice of devotion will bring lasting satisfaction.

Don’t just read the Gita – heed the Gita By Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita

The Bhagavad-gita is a profoundly philosophical book, yet it is also an eminently action-calling book. This pragmatic nature of the Gita is seen in its conclusion (18.73): Arjuna tells Krishna, “I will do your will.”

This voluntary harmonization of the human will with the divine will is the essential purpose for which the Gita was spoken. And it is the purpose that should underlie our reading of the Gita: “Amidst my opportunities and problems, how can I do Krishna’s will?”

See heeding the Gita not as an exercise in unwilling submission but as a festival of loving reciprocation

If we read the Gita and then go on with our life as if no change were needed, then we deprive ourselves of most of the blessings that Gita study offers. Yes, contact with Krishna through his words in any form, even a cursory reading or just a casual touch, offers some benefits. The Gita is akin to a legendary herbal medicine that just by placing in a room spreads a healing fragrance. Yet just as the medicine offers full benefit when it is properly ingested, similarly Gita study offers full benefit when we heed what we read.

And heeding the Gita is not all that difficult, especially when we read it with a devotional disposition. The Gita is not a law-book coming from a dictator who wants to dominate us – it is a guidebook coming from a benevolent God who wants to liberate us. By reading the Gita, we understand that we are souls, who are parts of Krishna and can find the highest happiness by loving him. When we grasp how much Krishna loves us and how much he wants us to rejoice in his love, we see heeding the Gita not as an exercise in unwilling submission but as a festival of loving reciprocation – a festival that will ultimately elevate us to Krishna’s immortal world of love.

The Gita is a book of theology for the purpose of therapy by by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita

I am not interested in God,” so say many people while turning away from the Bhagavad-gita. What they don’t understand is that the Gita is not just a book about God – it is about them and what interests them the most: the search for lasting love.

No doubt, the Bhagavad-gita is a book of profound theology. It reveals a majestic conception of God that can charm any open-minded seeker.

Emotional wounds originate not so much from our specific relationship problems as from the universal problem of the rupture of the human heart from the divine heart.

But its theologically erudite discussions are framed in the context of a broken heart that needs urgent healing. The Bhagavad-gita (01.31) depicts how Arjuna is overwhelmed by the prospect of an emotionally wrenching fratricidal war that began as a bitter relationship conflict. We all face relationship conflicts that sometimes leave us heartbroken.

The Gita is a therapeutic message for healing all such wounds. It explains that these emotional wounds originate not so much from our specific relationship problems as from the universal problem of the rupture of the human heart from the divine heart. That rupture subjects us to bhavaroga, the disease of material existence. We are eternal souls meant to love God, Krishna, but being ruptured from him, we seek the same love in relationships formed on the basis of our bodies. However, even the best of such relationships are thwarted sooner or later by the inevitable perishability of all material bodies.

The therapy for our ruptured heart is bhakti-yoga, which redirects our love from the world to Krishna. The Gita’s theology sets the stage for this therapy. Its revelation of Krishna’s glory convinces us that his love possesses the omnipotence to heal even the most inconsolably wounded hearts. No matter how worldly relationships disappoint or devastate us, our relationship with him always solaces and strengthens, as Arjuna’s restored morale at the end of the Gita demonstrates.

Restraint is not repression – it is the roadway to real expression by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita

Many people champion self-expression and deride restraint as repression.

But is it really repressive?

Consider musicians wanting to express themselves. Do they go on stage without preparation? If they do, what will come out will be nowhere near their best self – it will be a pale shadow. Musicians who excel at extempore performance have spent long hours in meticulous training. And what is such training if not restraint? It involves careful churning of one’s musical instincts to repress the unwholesome instincts and express the wholesome ones.

Whenever we allow uncensored self-expression, what usually comes out is our lower self.

This principle of screening applies for all forms of self-expression. Gita wisdom explains that our real self is much deeper than just some artistic or similar aspect of our self. Our essential self is spiritual – we are pure souls, reservoirs of glorious qualities, and parts of all-pure Krishna. But the way to that self is blocked by a lower self, which is primarily the mind running according to the default program created by our past indulgences. This lower self often imagines the basest indulgences to be the most enjoyable. And because we have pandered to the lower self for a long time in this and previous lives, it is frequently swifter than our authentic self. So whenever we allow uncensored self-expression, what usually comes out is our lower self, which makes us behave worse than our normal self, leave alone our best self.

Restraining ourselves according to scripture, as the Bhagavad-gita (02.64) recommends, enables us to firstly check which self is expressing itself and secondly kindle the expression of our authentic self, thereby bringing out our best. Such spiritual self-expression, by propelling us towards life eternal with Krishna, brings real freedom and lasting fulfillment, which is what champions of self-expression actually long for.

Thus restraint far from being repressive paves the way to authentic self-expression.

To grow through problems, go beyond the circumstantial to the existential by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 01

“What should I do now?” When we face this question, we usually answer based on practical concerns. But when confronting dilemmas that have no practical solutions, we are forced to either become frustrated or look beyond the circumstantial to the existential, asking questions about the very nature and purpose of our existence.  We realize we can’t answer the question “What should I do?” without confronting the question “Who am I?”

At the start of the Bhagavad-gita, Arjuna faced a circumstantial dilemma that had no practical answers. He found himself torn between two courses of action. “If I am a warrior, then my duty (kshatriya-dharma) is to fight for a righteous cause, whoever be my opponent. But if I am a member of the Kuru dynasty, then my duty (kula-dharma) is to avoid shedding the blood of my family members, whatever the price.” He found neither option acceptable and felt himself trapped in a lose-lose situation, as the Gita (01.30) depicts.

Krishna didn’t offer Arjuna any pat answers, but changed his frame of reference by revealing the deepest dimension of his existential identity – as a soul. And the dharma of every soul is to love and serve Krishna. As Krishna is the greatest well-wisher of everyone, doing his will enabled Arjuna to do the best for everyone involved.

When we face intractable circumstantial dilemmas, we too can turn towards Krishna by prayerfully seeking guidance and submissively opening our heart to him. With this devotional disposition, the Gita (10.10) assures that we will get the intelligence about how to best serve amidst life’s perplexities. Such intelligence will resolve not just our circumstantial crisis, but also our existential crisis by stimulating deeper realization of our eternal spiritual identity, which is for all of life’s perplexities the only ultimate solution.

When the mind makes the irrational seem rational, catch it in its irrationality by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita

When we do something irrational, we may wonder, “Why did I do such a thing?”

Because the mind may have stupefied us by using some specious, often almost subconscious, argumentation.

For example, the mind may prompt us to do something wrong by arguing, “Everyone is doing it.” If our child used that argument saying, “I want to ride superfast on my bike because all my friends do it,” we would forbid, replying, “That doesn’t make it safe.” Similarly, just because everyone does something doesn’t make it right. Yet when our own mind makes the argument, we sometimes tamely acquiesce. Thus, the mind often uses flimsy arguments to make the irrational seem rational.

We can objectively retrace the trajectory of our fall by recollecting our thoughts when we were clear-headed and when we started becoming fuzzyheaded.

Whenever we fall for the mind, we can objectively retrace the trajectory of our fall by recollecting our thoughts when we were clear-headed and when we started becoming fuzzyheaded. By noting what caused the shift in our thoughts, we can identify what argument the mind used to rationalize the irrational. Then we can prepare scriptural and logical counter-arguments to expose the fallacies in its argument – and keep those counter-arguments readily available always. Thus we apply the Bhagavad-gita’s instruction (06.25) to restrain the mind with the intelligence.

Next time when the mind starts rationalizing the irrational, we can catch it in its irrationality with our prepared counter-arguments. This will not only protect us from relapse, but will also increase our ability to catch the mind.

Of course, for ultimately controlling the mind, we need to adopt the supreme scriptural guideline: absorb yourself in Krishna through devotional service. And our training in catching the mind’s irrationality will help us expose it when it tries to irrationally dishearten us in our devotion. By thus practicing bhakti consistently, we will gradually convert the mind and attain Krishna’s eternal shelter.

The impersonal stereotype of impersonalists militates against personlism by Chaitanya Charan Das

An impersonal stereotype of impersonalists refers to the notion among some neophyte personalists that all impersonalists are blasphemers of Krishna.

However, the Gita itself differentiates among impersonalists. It (09.11-12) declares that those impersonalists who minimize Krishna’s form as materia, known as Mayavadis, l are deluded and ill-fated. In contrast, it (12.03-04) indicates that those impersonalists who simply seek the impersonal Absolute, without condemning the personal, known as Brahmavadis, eventually attain their desire – but only after great labor (12.05).

Many spiritualists frequently self-identify as impersonalists not due to intention but due to misinformation.

Nowadays, most people, even those who self-identify as spiritualists, are not serious seekers. Such dilettante spiritualists usually gather their spiritual conceptions from random readings or common cultural depictions. As such sources often portray that the personal manifestation is for non-intellectual sentimentalists and the impersonal for intellectuals, these fledgling spiritualists fancy themselves as impersonalists. They don’t usually have any envy towards Krishna’s personal form – to the contrary, they may even have some devotion for him. They frequently self-identify as impersonalists not due to intention but due to misinformation.

If explained properly based on Gita wisdom how the highest manifestation of the Absolute Truth is personal, such spiritualists often become personalists. We ourselves may have been such nominal impersonalists before our spiritual mentors rescued us from our misconceptions.

If we are to be similarly considerate in helping other nominal impersonalists, we need to avoid stereotyping them as blasphemers. Such stereotyping actually militates against our own philosophy. After all, personalism holds that not only Krishna but also all living beings are persons. So impersonalists are not a homogenous collective of blasphemy – they are distinct persons with individual conceptions and aspirations. By not judgmentally condemning them all as blasphemers but by cautiously yet open-mindedly offering them on a case-to-case basis opportunity for spiritual elevation, we honor our personalist philosophy and also reflect the compassionate desire of our personal Lord to benedict everyone, even impersonalists.

The best translation of the Gita is its translation into life by Chaitanya Charan DasBased on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 04

People interested in the Bhagavad-gita sometimes ask, “Which is its best translation?”

The best translation is its translation into life. That is, the Gita’s best translation will come from those who live it in their lives.

Mastery over a language doesn’t automatically imply mastery over everything written in that language. Just as English expertise alone wouldn’t qualify one to explain an English book on advanced quantum physics, so too Sanskrit expertise alone doesn’t qualify one to explain a Sanskrit book on advanced philosophy: the Gita.

The Gita is a book for healing – healing the human heart from the wound caused by its fracture from the divine heart.

What makes linguistic mastery further inadequate is that the Gita is not a theoretical book for abstract analysis; it is an action-calling book for practical living. It is a book for healing – healing the human heart from the wound caused by its fracture from the divine heart. This healing can fulfill forever our longing for love and happiness. For such healing, the Gita endorses bhakti-yoga as the best process.

In fact, the Gita (04.03)

declares that devotion is the qualification for comprehending its message. To access its healing wisdom, we need to learn it from the great bhakti exponents who are themselves healed and have healed others.

Suppose an ancient Chinese medical book that contains cures for many deadly diseases was available in two English translations: one by a linguist adept in both Chinese and English and one by a doctor with a basic grasp of both languages who has practiced that medicine for decades and healed thousands.

Which translation would we choose?

If we were interested in its medical insights, we would choose the doctor’s translation. Similarly, if we wish to go beyond linguistic technicalities to the Gita’s life-transforming potencies, then the translation by those who have translated the Gita into their lives and the lives of others would be the best translation.

The defect of dallying with the mind is that it makes the dallier a defector

We are all in an inner war with the mind, which the Bhagavad-gita (06.06) indicates is often our enemy. In this war, scriptural rules that mandate regulation of worldly indulgence are our protectors. When immoral temptations masquerading as pleasures seduce us, rules serve as fences that keep us within the safe zone of scripturally ordained morality.

Degraded and demoralized, we then begin the slow labored journey back to the protection of the fences that we had ourselves broken down.

Dallying with the mind refers to letting our thoughts idly wander, unguardedly allowing them to go wherever the mind fancies. When we dally thus, the mind beguiles us into believing that many pleasures await us if we just step out of the fences of morality. As we fall for this lie, the mind subtly and sinisterly distorts our perception so that we see it not as an enemy, but as a friend. And we see scriptural rules not as protectors, but as deprivers.

By thus perverting our perceptions, the mind makes us defectors, who fight against the very principles we had resolved to uphold. Infatuated by the mind’s promises of pleasure, we break the protective moral fences and become its puppets, doing things that we would normally never do. Only when we experience the hollowness of its promised pleasures do we realize that we have been fooled. Degraded and demoralized, we then begin the slow labored journey back to the protection of the fences that we had ourselves broken down.

If we don’t want to become defectors, we need to stop dallying with the mind. By keeping ourselves busy in Krishna’s service, we can leave ourselves no time to dally with the mind. Over time, as our devotion develops we will become free from any need for such dallying, for we will delight in dallying with Krishna, in relishing constantly his presence invoked by our sincere devotional service.

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Worry not about falling into illusion – worry about staying in devotion

Serious seekers often worry, “Will I fall back into the illusions of material existence?”

Yes, if we keep worrying about falling into illusion. No, if we worry about staying in devotion.

Illusion allures us by promising material happiness. What protects us from its lure is not just the knowledge that its promise is false, but also the knowledge that there’s real happiness elsewhere, and, better still, the experience of spiritual happiness.

Dwelling on various dangers makes us feel paranoid. And dwelling on various prohibitions makes us feel cramped.

We can access spiritual happiness most easily by devotionally connecting with Krishna. In the middle of its section on sense control (02.54-72), the Bhagavad-gita underscores that we succeed in sense control when we fix our consciousness on Krishna. If we don’t, the preceding (02.60) and succeeding (02.62-63) verses outline our fall trajectory. When we don’t think of Krishna, we fall out of devotion and lose access to higher spiritual happiness. Our innate need for happiness makes us seek it elsewhere, usually at the illusory material level to which we are habituated. Though we may intellectually analyze how such pleasure is illusion, our need eventually blunts our analysis and we fall into illusion.

And such relapse can’t be prevented merely by worrying, “From where will illusion attack next?”

Why?

Because dwelling on various dangers makes us feel paranoid. And dwelling on various prohibitions makes us feel cramped. Overall we feel de-energized and over time illusion overpowers us.

Instead, we can worry about somehow staying in devotion, “How can I serve Krishna now?” Such worry channelizes our energy, provides us divine security and keeps us on the path to happiness. Significantly, this devotional worry is our constitutional worry, the worry that animates our eternal life in Krishna’s abode. Therein we worry about how best to serve him, and that worry intensifies our contemplation on him, thereby increasing our ecstasy eternally.

Focus not on being known – focus on knowing by Chaitanya Charan Das

We want to be known. Living in a world filled with nameless masses in its mindless metropolises, we sense subconsciously the threat of obscurity looming constantly – anonymity threatens to reduce us to a cipher.

The prospect of walking into a crowded boardroom that contains no familiar faces can be unnerving. When heads turn and nod in recognition, we feel affirmed.

The endless processions of meaningless interactions that often go on in the name of socializing, either physically or digitally, can blind us to our real need

Yet this natural human need for affirmation can degenerate into an obsession when we tie our self-worth to how many heads turn. In a culture that equates people’s value with the number of likes on their Facebook page, being unknown can sound like death.

Yet the endless processions of meaningless interactions that often go on in the name of socializing, either physically or digitally, can blind us to our real need – the need to know. And what we need to know the most is who we really are, what makes us actually tick and what will make us truly happy.

We may think that we know who we are: “I am an extrovert who thrives in socializing.” But extroversion is a characteristic of the psychological layer of our being. Beyond our physical and psychological layers lies our core identity, the real me.

To help us know ourselves, the Bhagavad-gita holds an introspective mirror in front of us. Therein we see that we are immortal souls, parts of the all-attractive Supreme, Krishna. We are spiritual persons who have within us the potential for life and love eternal. Such self-knowledge, theGita (02.29) states, cannot but amaze us.

And we don’t have to give up being known; we just need to put knowing first. When we know ourselves, we can put being known to the best use – not to pacify or gratify our ego, but to share with others the amazing joy of knowing.

Devotion centers not on renouncing the material, but on reclaiming the spiritual

Some people ask, “Do I have to renounce everything material to gain devotion?”

No – the essence of devotion is reclaiming the spiritual, not renouncing the material.

Reclaiming the spiritual means regaining our right to spiritual existence and enrichment – a right we have unwittingly forfeited due to our infatuation with material enjoyment.

We are at our core spiritual beings, souls. And as souls, we are eternal parts of the supreme spiritual being, Krishna. In our relationship of spiritual love with him we find everlasting fulfillment. When we learn to love him by practicing bhakti-yoga, we regain access to that fulfillment.

The flame of a selfless service attitude burns away all material contamination and lights the heart with spiritual illumination.

Krishna is the source and master of everything, spiritual and material. So, even material things can be used in his service. TheBhagavad-gita (04.24) indicates that by internalizing such a spiritual vision of existence, all our activities become spiritualized, akin to a sacrifice. The flame of a selfless service attitude burns away all material contamination and lights the heart with spiritual illumination.

Then the material resources we use for serving Krishna become tools that connect us with him. Let’s see how this happens with two things often considered material: wealth and the senses.

Devotion helps us see wealth not as Maya, but as Lakshmi; not as the illusory energy that binds us, but as the Goddess of Fortune who blesses us when we re-unite her with her Lord – as did Hanuman in the Ramayana.

Bhakti-yoga is sensory spirituality. It uses the very material senses that are normally the pathways to illusion and bondage to connect us with Krishna’s manifestations such as the Deity and the holy name, thereby paving the way to illumination and liberation.

When we thus use the material in Krishna’s service, we progressively reclaim our lost right to a life of eternal spiritual love with him.

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The soul is metaphysical, but not metaphorical by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita

The idea of a soul is found in the metaphysical ruminations of almost all traditions. But few traditions explain clearly what the soul is. They frequently use the term as a metaphorical reference to our non-material essence.

Such metaphorical usages often extend to the essence of anything. For example, ‘the soul of Japan was shattered by the atom bomb attacks.’ Usages like these are not semantically wrong. But when coupled with the prevailing fuzziness about the notion of the soul, they tend to reduce the soul to a metaphor. It then becomes all too easy for materialists to banish the soul into non-existence, leaving occasional references to it ontologically meaningless.

That the soul is beyond fragmentation, incineration, dissolution and desiccation emphasizes the ontological actuality of the soul.

Such degeneration to meaninglessness is graphically illustrated in the phrase ‘the soul of materialism’ used by some materialist philosophers. Materialism’s central dogma is that matter is the only thing that exists; so the soul being non-material doesn’t exist. Therefore, the phrase ‘the soul of materialism’ makes sense only when the usage ‘soul’ is stripped of all ontological import.

Gita wisdom pre-empts such fuzziness and meaninglessness by explaining that the soul is a concrete higher-dimensional entity, a being that animates the body with consciousness. Its assertion (02.24) that the soul is beyond fragmentation, incineration, dissolution and desiccation emphasizes this ontological actuality of the soul.

How?

Breaking, burning, dissolving and drying – these apply to things that really exist. By applying them to the soul, the Gita communicates that the soul is just as real. And by simultaneously asserting that the soul is not destroyed by the actions that destroy physical things, it conveys that the soul exists at a level higher than the physical – the metaphysical level.

When we grasp the reality of the soul, we infuse our quest for self-realization with clarity, gravity and urgency, thus accelerating our attainment of lasting spiritual happiness.

Metaphysical blindness is more dangerous than physical blindness by Chaitanya Charan Das

Physical blindness makes us unaware of our surroundings, whereas metaphysical blindness makes us unaware of ourselves – our identity and our purpose. The Bhagavad-gita (15.10) indicates how the metaphysically blind can’t see their plight in material existence.

More troublingly, whereas physical blindness comes with the awareness that we are blind, metaphysical blindness frequently comes with blindness to our blindness – it couples with prevailing cultural conceptions to give us a pseudo-identity and a pseudo-purpose that makes us forget our ignorance.

 Metaphysical blindness frequently comes with blindness to our blindness.

Most troublingly, whereas physical blindness comes with the humbling recognition that we often need help to find the way, metaphysical blindness comes with an arrogant assumption that we don’t need any help from anyone. Such arrogance insidiously makes aggressive anti-theists deride seeking help from God, the source of the supreme metaphysical vision, as a sign of pitiable emotional weakness.

These differences between the two blindnesses are not just theoretical but also consequential. Whereas physical blindness may trouble us for one lifetime, metaphysical blindness makes us do misdeeds whose reactions may haunt us for many lifetimes.

Thankfully, there’s a positive side to the differences too. Whereas physical blindness may not be curable, metaphysical blindness is eminently curable. The Gita (15.12-15) guides such people towards metaphysical vision by outlining how even the material things they need for their material survival and enjoyment are sustained by a non-material essence, the arrangement of God. Even if the metaphysically blind may never read the Gita, they can unknowingly follow its thought trajectory if they introspect open-mindedly and thereby infer the existence of God.

Gita wisdom stands ready to help them all the way in their healing journey right from showing them the first rays of metaphysical light to revealing to them the full beauty and glory of existence as an arena for love with the all-attractive Supreme Person, Krishna.

The use of force to convert doesn’t expand faith – it reduces faith By Chaitanya Charan Das

Some religious groups force others to convert to their faith, “Convert or die.”

But faith is a choice of the heart that can’t be forced. Though force may compel some to mouth a faith-pledge, that doesn’t constitute the change of heart at the heart of true faith. Brute force reduces faith from a matter of the heart to a matter of the lips.

That fanatics celebrate as religious victories converting others to such reduced faith shows that they grossly overrate the externals of their faith. Might they have never known the essence of faith: its security and sweetness? Might they be masking their inner emptiness by outer aggressiveness? Sadly, all traditions have been guilty, to greater or lesser degrees, of such superficiality.

Might fanatics be masking their inner emptiness by outer aggressiveness?

Can faith be shared while respecting people and their God-given free will? Yes, the Bhagavad-gita demonstrates how faith transmission can be respectful and successful: through education and experience.

The Gita’s narrative aims to persuade Arjuna to have faith in Krishna and do his duty. Rephrasing according to our context, Krishna wants to convert Arjuna. Yet he doesn’t resort to force, though he being God commands all the force in all of existence. Instead, he appeals to Arjuna’s reason by outlining a majestic worldview that makes faith the natural and desirable choice. And he offers Arjuna a divine experience by demonstrating his universal form. After making his case, the Gita (18.63) states that Krishna leaves Arjuna free to deliberate and decide. When Arjuna voluntarily chooses to do Krishna’s will, that choice demonstrates an authentic conversion, a triumph of faith.

The truly faithful similarly share with others scriptural wisdom to illumine their intelligence and yogic processes to help them experience the divine. Those who instead resort to force to convert simply expose their intellectual and experiential bankruptcy.

Study the Gita not to inform the head, but to transform the heart by Chaitanya Charan Das

The Gita does inform the head, no doubt – and it informs about life’s meaning and purpose far better than does the best university education. However, its purpose is not to inform the head as an end in itself, but as a means to the end of love – eternal love for the all-attractive Supreme Person Krishna.

The moment of the Gita’s delivery doesn’t alter its substance, but it does shape its form

This essential call for love is trans-historical, yet it was delivered at a particular moment in history. And that moment, though not altering the Gita’s substance, does shape its form. People’s social mores, political structures and cosmological conceptions then were substantially different from ours. The Gita naturally refers to those things to illustrate its message. Yet those very references that made it accessible for its original audience can make it inaccessible for us, coming as we do from a different frame of reference.

This difficulty can trouble us especially in the Gita’s tenth chapter, which uses then-contemporary examples to convey how things attractive to materially minded people manifest Krishna’s opulence. We can try to understand those examples, but if we make gaining that information the purpose of our Gita study, we will miss the underlying principle. That principle is stated towards the end of that chapter (10.41) – whatever attracts us does so because it manifests a spark of Krishna’s all-attractiveness. In fact, the previous verse (10.40) states that as the list of such opulences is endless, only a few are spoken, thereby downplaying the details and stressing the principle.

Accordingly, rather than straining to understand what things attracted people in the past and why, we can better strive to understand how the things that attract us now manifest Krishna’s opulence and how we can redirect our heart from them to him. That heart transformation alone will grant us lasting fulfillment.