Bg 5.20
na prahṛṣyet priyaṁ prāpya nodvijet prāpya cāpriyam
sthira-buddhir asammūḍho brahma-vid brahmaṇi sthitaḥ
Bg 5.21
bāhya-sparśeṣvasaktātmā vindaty ātmani yat sukham
sa brahma-yoga-yuktātmā sukham akṣayam aśnute
Translation
20. Resting in BRAHMAN, with steady intellect and undeluded, the knower of BRAHMAN neither rejoices on obtaining what is pleasant, nor grieves on obtaining what is unpleasant.
21. With the self unattached to external contacts, he finds happiness in the Self; with the self engaged in the meditation of BRAHMAN, he attains endless happiness.
Commentary Excerpts
Just as an excellent artist working at his masterpiece on his canvas would again and again approach his piece of art to add more details with finer strokes to his picture, and would again and again retreat from the canvas to gaze at his art from a distance, so too here, the Lord is creating with his chosen words the picture of the mental life of a man of equipoise and perfection upon the canvas of man's heart. He dedicates many stanzas in order that the picture may clearly and vividly come into the recognition and appreciation of even the ordinary, casual student. Here is yet another stanza offered with a burning enthusiasm and almost missionary zeal, so that Arjuna, the confused, may come to gain a vivid picture of the Man-of-Perfection, who is not a mere impotent stone idol on the Ganges-banks, but a veritable dynamic factor that moulds and influences his generation of fellow beings.
Ordinarily, man gets excited or becomes despondent, not because of the happenings in the outer world, but because of his individual contact with them. If any man dies in the city, it is not tragedy to me, but when my father dies, it is my calamity. This clearly proves that the death of a man, in itself, cannot bring any disturbance to my mind, unless my mind had already projected itself on its relationship to the individual who has died. The Man-of-Perfection who has won over his mind and has come to experience the Infinite Self, can no more, therefore, "FEEL ANY JOY ON RECEIVING WHAT IS PLEASANT, NOR GRIEVE ON RECEIVING WHAT IS UNPLEASANT." It does not mean that a Man-of-Perfection is a wooden doll or an iron statue, incapable of reacting to the external things whether they be pleasant or unpleasant. It only means that a man of true inward culture, discovers in himself, in his own wisdom, a balance and an equipoise, which cannot be shattered very easily.
It is, in fact, very interesting to note how the ideas arranged in this stanza, in their very sequence, explain a wondrous truth. One who is unaffected by the presence of things, good or bad, is the one whose "INTELLECT IS STEADY," and the one whose INTELLECT IS STEADY, is the "ONE IN WHOM ALL DELUSIONS HAVE ENDED." A steady intellect from which all delusions have dropped becomes the instrument for "KNOWING Brahman" --- and the "one who knows Brahman becomes Brahman," and therefore, comes to live "ESTABLISHED IN THE BRAHMIC CONSCIOUSNESS OF INFINITE BEATITUDE," a living God-man walking upon the earth that is Olympus to him.
The foregoing stanza might give to an unprepared student, the idea that spiritual life is a static existence where a baked, stony heart, vainly comes in contact with the heart-throbs in the world of objects, and feels for itself nothing but a monotonous equanimity. In that case a majority of us, without much discussion, can take our hats off and say "goodbye" to all spirituality immediately. For, who can deny the fact that the world, as it is constituted to-day, in spite of its imperfections, when it comes in contact with our own inner world, however maladjusted the inner world may be, can and does give minute flashes of joy? Why should I deny myself the brilliant flashes of momentary joys in exchange for a steady stone-like, impregnable monotony, call it equilibrium or equanimity, peace or God-hood? By changing the name, the thing itself is never changed!
This doubt is not a mere exaggeration. This is often heard in the halls of Vedanta from the lips of all sincere seekers. Any sensible seeker entering the halls of spiritual study with his intellect bright and clear, should come to doubt its efficacy and utility. No teacher can afford to ignore answering these questions and re-assuring the students; Krishna, as a professional teacher, is doing the same in this stanza.
THE ONE WHO HAS GAINED COMPLETE DETACHMENT FROM THE EXTERNAL OBJECTS, REALISES THE BLISS THAT IS THE NATURE OF THE SELF. Though the process of self-development is essentially a process of detachment, this technique of negation does not take us to an empty and purposeless zero, but when we have negated all that is false, we come to experience and live a total positivity. When the dreamer has renounced all his contacts with the dream-world and thrown away his dream personality, he does not become a non-entity, but he re-discovers himself to be the more vital, the more effective personality, the waker.
Similarly, whenever contacts with the external world through the media of the body, the mind and the intellect are clipped off clean, we awaken in the meadows of God-consciousness and come to live the joy that is the eternal nature of the Self. A seeker having thus redeemed his own mind and intellect from their preoccupations with the external world, at least during his meditation, when he comes to keep his HEART DEVOTED TO THE MEDITATION OF Brahman, attains imperishable happiness. Here the term "heart" is to be understood as a collective name for the inner instruments of knowing and experiencing.
Sources: Vedabase.com; The Holy Geeta
na prahṛṣyet priyaṁ prāpya nodvijet prāpya cāpriyam
sthira-buddhir asammūḍho brahma-vid brahmaṇi sthitaḥ
Bg 5.21
bāhya-sparśeṣvasaktātmā vindaty ātmani yat sukham
sa brahma-yoga-yuktātmā sukham akṣayam aśnute
Translation
20. Resting in BRAHMAN, with steady intellect and undeluded, the knower of BRAHMAN neither rejoices on obtaining what is pleasant, nor grieves on obtaining what is unpleasant.
21. With the self unattached to external contacts, he finds happiness in the Self; with the self engaged in the meditation of BRAHMAN, he attains endless happiness.
Commentary Excerpts
Just as an excellent artist working at his masterpiece on his canvas would again and again approach his piece of art to add more details with finer strokes to his picture, and would again and again retreat from the canvas to gaze at his art from a distance, so too here, the Lord is creating with his chosen words the picture of the mental life of a man of equipoise and perfection upon the canvas of man's heart. He dedicates many stanzas in order that the picture may clearly and vividly come into the recognition and appreciation of even the ordinary, casual student. Here is yet another stanza offered with a burning enthusiasm and almost missionary zeal, so that Arjuna, the confused, may come to gain a vivid picture of the Man-of-Perfection, who is not a mere impotent stone idol on the Ganges-banks, but a veritable dynamic factor that moulds and influences his generation of fellow beings.
Ordinarily, man gets excited or becomes despondent, not because of the happenings in the outer world, but because of his individual contact with them. If any man dies in the city, it is not tragedy to me, but when my father dies, it is my calamity. This clearly proves that the death of a man, in itself, cannot bring any disturbance to my mind, unless my mind had already projected itself on its relationship to the individual who has died. The Man-of-Perfection who has won over his mind and has come to experience the Infinite Self, can no more, therefore, "FEEL ANY JOY ON RECEIVING WHAT IS PLEASANT, NOR GRIEVE ON RECEIVING WHAT IS UNPLEASANT." It does not mean that a Man-of-Perfection is a wooden doll or an iron statue, incapable of reacting to the external things whether they be pleasant or unpleasant. It only means that a man of true inward culture, discovers in himself, in his own wisdom, a balance and an equipoise, which cannot be shattered very easily.
It is, in fact, very interesting to note how the ideas arranged in this stanza, in their very sequence, explain a wondrous truth. One who is unaffected by the presence of things, good or bad, is the one whose "INTELLECT IS STEADY," and the one whose INTELLECT IS STEADY, is the "ONE IN WHOM ALL DELUSIONS HAVE ENDED." A steady intellect from which all delusions have dropped becomes the instrument for "KNOWING Brahman" --- and the "one who knows Brahman becomes Brahman," and therefore, comes to live "ESTABLISHED IN THE BRAHMIC CONSCIOUSNESS OF INFINITE BEATITUDE," a living God-man walking upon the earth that is Olympus to him.
The foregoing stanza might give to an unprepared student, the idea that spiritual life is a static existence where a baked, stony heart, vainly comes in contact with the heart-throbs in the world of objects, and feels for itself nothing but a monotonous equanimity. In that case a majority of us, without much discussion, can take our hats off and say "goodbye" to all spirituality immediately. For, who can deny the fact that the world, as it is constituted to-day, in spite of its imperfections, when it comes in contact with our own inner world, however maladjusted the inner world may be, can and does give minute flashes of joy? Why should I deny myself the brilliant flashes of momentary joys in exchange for a steady stone-like, impregnable monotony, call it equilibrium or equanimity, peace or God-hood? By changing the name, the thing itself is never changed!
This doubt is not a mere exaggeration. This is often heard in the halls of Vedanta from the lips of all sincere seekers. Any sensible seeker entering the halls of spiritual study with his intellect bright and clear, should come to doubt its efficacy and utility. No teacher can afford to ignore answering these questions and re-assuring the students; Krishna, as a professional teacher, is doing the same in this stanza.
THE ONE WHO HAS GAINED COMPLETE DETACHMENT FROM THE EXTERNAL OBJECTS, REALISES THE BLISS THAT IS THE NATURE OF THE SELF. Though the process of self-development is essentially a process of detachment, this technique of negation does not take us to an empty and purposeless zero, but when we have negated all that is false, we come to experience and live a total positivity. When the dreamer has renounced all his contacts with the dream-world and thrown away his dream personality, he does not become a non-entity, but he re-discovers himself to be the more vital, the more effective personality, the waker.
Similarly, whenever contacts with the external world through the media of the body, the mind and the intellect are clipped off clean, we awaken in the meadows of God-consciousness and come to live the joy that is the eternal nature of the Self. A seeker having thus redeemed his own mind and intellect from their preoccupations with the external world, at least during his meditation, when he comes to keep his HEART DEVOTED TO THE MEDITATION OF Brahman, attains imperishable happiness. Here the term "heart" is to be understood as a collective name for the inner instruments of knowing and experiencing.
Sources: Vedabase.com; The Holy Geeta
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