The Essence of the Bhagavad Gita
Explained by Paramhansa Yogananda
As Remembered by His Disciple Swami Kriyananda
Chapter Three: The Allegory of the Gita
The story on which the Bhagavad Gita is based is a brief episode in
the longest epic in the world, the Mahabharata. The Gita presents two
main characters of that epic, Arjuna and Krishna, as they move between
two great armies, ranged for battle on the field of Kurukshetra.
Arjuna symbolizes the devotee-the person, that is to say, who seeks
divine salvation and union with God. Krishna symbolizes God Himself,
the divine Self within every human being. Hence, in the Indian teachings,
Self-realization is described as the true goal of all spiritual striving,
whatever one's religion. The two concepts, Self-realization and the
knowledge of God, are synonymous.
In the story of the Mahabharata, Arjuna invites Krishna to be his charioteer.
The Bhagavad Gita is the story of the dialogue which takes place as
Krishna drives Arjuna in his chariot between the two armies, in response
to Arjuna's request to observe the two armies directly.
Arjuna, his brothers the Pandavas, and all the forces on their side
symbolize the champions of virtue. The enemy are the Kauravas, cousins
of the Pandavas, led by Duryodhana, who has usurped the throne. The
confrontation is, as we have said, allegorical-a fact which is suggested
by, among other things, Arjuna's very request. He is the leading general
of his army. Would the general of an army request something so apparently
foolish as to be driven between the ranks of the opposing armies, so
close to the enemy, and on the very eve of hostilities? Surely, in practical
terms, his request was absurd!
As Krishna and Arjuna pass between the two hosts, Arjuna voices his
doubts about the righteousness of the forthcoming war. "It would
mean destroying my own kinsmen!" he exclaims. "How can I commit
such a sin?" Krishna replies to this very understandable doubt,
dispelling it. He then proceeds to expound the essence of the teachings
of Sanaatan Dharma itself.
Obviously, this account is allegorical. The opposing armies represent
the opposition within every unenlightened human being between his upward-
and his downward-inclining tendencies. The upward tendencies are his
good qualities; the downward ones are those which induce him to seek
delusion, or evil. The war of Kurukshetra does not take place literally
on any battlefield, though the field of Kurukshetra actually still exists
in India. That historic site, and the story that grew out of the war,
represent the eternal conflict within man himself.
At the same time, the truths propounded in the Gita are applicable at
all levels of life: material, mental, emotional, and spiritual.
Paramhansa Yogananda makes the point that every great scripture is multi-leveled,
addressing human needs at every level from a standpoint of divine wisdom.
Thus, Krishna's teaching is also true in a literal sense, for it urges
the need for courage in righteous warfare. For righteous causes do,
of course, exist.
Krishna turns a righteous outward cause, however, into a description
of the eternal conflict within all men between high aspiration and ego-indulgence.
In a deeper sense, the war of Kurukshetra is the unending struggle in
the mind between good and evil. Its end lies only in final liberation.
Krishna himself makes clear the allegorical nature of his timeless dialogue
with Arjuna. In a later chapter of the Gita he states, "This body
is the battlefield."
Arjuna, seeing the enemy up close, confronts the distressing fact that
many of those he is about to fight are members of his own family! After
all, the Pandavas grew up side by side with their cousins, the Kauravas.
They studied under the same teacher, Dronacharya. As children, they
played together, argued and squabbled together-after the manner of growing
boys everywhere. The bonds they formed, though not all of them friendly,
were nevertheless deep and strong.
The first chapter of the Gita is not, as most commentators have considered
it, a mere description of the leading warriors on both sides of a coming
conflict. They are the opposing forces within human nature itself. Their
very names, traced to their Sanskrit roots, become the names of psychological
qualities.
Those opposing Arjuna, therefore, are his cousins, well known to him,
even loved by him. The Mahabharata is the full story behind this impending
war, telling how the material desires and the ambition of Arjuna's oldest
cousin, Duryodhana, head of the Kauravas, forced the conflict by refusing
the Pandavas their throne, which was theirs by right. Now Arjuna, seeing
these two related families geared up for mutual destruction, laments
the need to fight at all. "Surely," he cries out to Krishna,
"it would be a sin to slay my own kith and kin! Would it not be
more just for me to surrender our kingdom?"
This war is no mere conflict of ambition, however. It is described
in the Mahabharata as a righteous war between good and evil. Were Duryodhana,
who usurped the throne, to remain the king, the people would suffer
under his unrighteous rule. The war of Kurukshetra, which is to begin
on the morrow, will pit high principles against proud ambition, and
soul-aspiration against qualities in human nature that keep the ego
in bondage to delusion.
Krishna comforts Arjuna in his distress. Death itself, he assures him,
would be preferable to a life spent in unrighteousness. At stake here
are not mere physical life or death. Pitted against each other are the
life of the spirit and the abandonment of those qualities which lead
to soul-bliss. Death of the body, Krishna reminds Arjuna, is nothing:
the mere doffing of a garment. It doesn't affect a person's consciousness,
which continues throughout eternity. To reject spiritual principles,
however, means to embrace spiritual death. "Fight!" Krishna
urges his disciple. The war is not one of mortal, physical combat, but
of courageous inner struggle toward the victory of soul principles over
spiritual sloth and material ease. This is the first and central message
of the Bhagavad Gita.
Krishna goes on to say that there are several paths to God, according,
not to people's beliefs, but to each person's own temperament. He delineates
the right attitudes for the devotee, the various delusions that can
prevent him from finding God, and the way to overcome them. In one supreme
chapter is explained, in a highly metaphorical manner, the supernal
experience of God.
Although the battle setting is allegorical, the advice given in this
scripture may be taken as valid for every level of life, including righteous
warfare. A true scripture, Paramhansa Yogananda stated, addresses human
needs in their entirety.
The story of the Mahabharata is also, in fact, historical, and although
many of the characters in it are fictional, others actually lived on
Earth. In historical fiction today it is common to include known historical
figures, to lend verisimilitude to the story. Byasa (or Vyasa), the
author of the Mahabharata, differed from this technique primarily in
making his main characters the historical characters, while his lesser
ones served to demonstrate the great array of characteristics in human
nature. His main characters lived, as I say, historically. They include
the Pandava brothers (Yudhisthira, Bhima, Arjuna, Nakula, and Sahadeva),
some of the Kauravas, and a number of others. The rest of the characters
Byasa fictionalized, and presented episodes in their lives in such a
way as to conform to the allegory he was weaving like a tapestry.
The over-all theme of this great epic is the soul's first separation,
aeons ago, from God: the soul's long voyage through the barren land
of delusion; and its final return, after countless trials and tribulations,
to the Great Source of all life. This is the story through which every
soul must pass, once it enters upon the outward path of life and once
it chooses to follow the inward path of divine awakening.
The war of Kurukshetra describes the soul's final struggle to become
liberated from the clutches of maya, or delusion. The war itself, though
also a historical event, illustrates the struggle with which every spiritual
aspirant, sooner or later, is faced.
