Bhakti in Gita

The ultimate purpose of the Bhagavad Gita is to teach egolessness to humans. There are three ways of achieving the state of egolessness, according to the Gita. The first is Karma Yoga, which was discussed in the previous post. Today we are going to look at the second way, Bhakti Yoga, the yoga of devotion.

Chapter 12 of the Gita discusses bhakti in particular though chapters 7 to 12 are more or less about bhakti and I’m going to look at that section today.

Bhakti or devotion is another name for love. Bhakti yoga is the process of discovering the divine through love. The love is so intense that the devotee surrenders himself totally to the divine. As a result, the devotee begins to see the divine in everything, in every creature. All that exists is now holy for the devotee. No real devotee can distinguish between people on the basis of caste, creed, language, etc. There is no place for such divisions since everything, everyone, is an extension of the divine.

The Gita speaks about different types of devotion. Not everyone will be capable of the absolute renunciation which is the ideal. Lesser devotees also can attain the divine through prayer and meditation, doing everything with the divine in mind (by performing all actions and functions for Me – 12.10), by being good to others (non-envious, merciful to others, free from egoism, forgiving – 12.13)…

As I was reading chapter 12 of the Gita, it struck me that the teachings are no different from what most other religions are saying. Why can’t then all these religions come together and agree on their core values and principles so that there will be peace and harmony in the world?  

The similarities are not confined to chapter 12. The god of this entire section – chapters 7 to 12 – of the Gita is quite similar to the god of the semitic religions too. This God who demands egoless devotion from the faithful is an entity full of ego and conceit, no different from Yahweh of Judaism and Christianity or Allah of Islam. How different is the God of the Gita who says “I am the beginning, and the middle, and the also the end of all beings” [10.20] from the Biblical God who says “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End” (Revelations 22.13)? The same kind of bombastic claims made by the semitic god are also made by the god of the Gita. Sample this: Of the Adityas, I am Vishnu; of the luminaries, the dazzling sun; I am Marichi of the Maruts; of the stars I am the Moon… Of the senses I am the mind and I am the consciousness in beings. Of the rudras I am Shankara and Kubera of the yakshas and the rakshas; of the Vasus I am the Fire and I am Meru among mountain-peaks…” That goes on and on. Not quite a humble God, right? No different from the Semitic God, that’s right too.

And the devotee is supposed to be egoless as well as aspiring to merge into the Great Ego!

Well, I know that logic has no place in bhakti. But that is one of my chief concerns about building theocracies like Ram Rajya. In today’s Telegraph newspaper, some scientists raise this same concern. In the name of culture, India is promoting pseudoscience in the country, particularly in its schools. The Gita is proposed to be taught in the schools of the country as a guide for ethical and spiritual behaviour. Thank my stars, I chose to stop teaching. Otherwise my ego would clash with that of Gita’s God in the classroom.

Interestingly, this section of the Gita which demands egoless devotion from devotees shows the mightiest ego of God in the form of his cosmic manifestation: Vishwarupam. That cosmic form is a mirror image of the biblical god of the final judgment.

Maybe, instead of teaching the Gita in schools, the students can be asked to make a comparative study of the relevant scriptures of all the major religions in the country. The students should also be encouraged to examine these scriptures critically in the light of the knowledge available to us today. Let the students devote themselves to learning, to widening the horizon of their thinking, their imagination, their hearts too.

The third and last part of the Gita [chapters 13-18] discusses knowledge. I’ll come to that tomorrow.

I repeat what I mentioned in this space yesterday: these are my personal reflections and opinions. As long as thinking is still free (not chained yet) in this country, I hope I can let my mind go beyond the horizons of sacred scriptures with total bhakti to pursuit of truth.