Arjuna's last question
1. My brothers, now by the grace
of the Lord, we have reached the Eighteenth Chapter. In this world
of chance and change and mutability, the fulfillment of any resolve
depends on the will of the Lord. And in jail, at every step, one
experiences uncertainty. To start anything in jail and to expect to
conclude it here is far-fetched. When
we started this study of the Gita, we did not expect that it would
be possible to finish it here. But by the will of God we are
approaching the end.
2. In the Fourteenth Chapter
life, that is all our activity, was divided into three classes, saattvik,
rajasik and tamasik. Of the three, we learnt that we
should give up the rajasik and the tamasik and take to
the saattvik. Then, in the Seventeenth Chapter, the same was
treated in a different way. Yajna, dana and tapas,
sacrifice, gifts and austerity, or, in one word, yajna,
sacrifice, is the essence of life.
Then, in the Seventeenth Chapter, it
was suggested that actions like eating, which are ancillary to
sacrifice, should be accepted only as a form of sacrifice, and only
after making them saattvik. We should accept only those
actions which are saattvik in nature and come to us in the
form of sacrifice; it is proper that we give up all other kinds of
action. We have also seen why we should constantly remember the mantra,
'om tat sat'. |