Bg 8.11
yad akṣaraṁ veda-vido vadanti viśanti yad yatayo vīta-rāgāḥ
yad icchanto brahma-caryaṁ caranti tat te padaṁ saṅgraheṇa pravakṣye
Bg 8.12
sarva-dvārāṇi saṁyamya mano hṛdi nirudhya ca
mūrdhny ādhāyātmanaḥ prāṇam āsthito yoga-dhāraṇām
Bg 8.13
oṁ ity ekākṣaraṁ brahma vyāharan mām anusmaran
yaḥ prayāti tyajan dehaṁ sa yāti paramāṁ gatim
Translation
1. That which is declared Imperishable by the VEDA -knowers; That into which, the self-controlled and desire-freed enter; That desiring which BRAHMCHARYA is practised --- That Goal I will declare to thee in brief.
12. Having closed all the gates, having confined the mind in the heart, having fixed the life-breath in the "head, " engaged in the practice of concentration,
13. Uttering the one-syllabled 'OM' --- the (symbol of) BRAHMAN --- and remembering Me, he who departs, leaving the body, attains the Supreme Goal.
Commentary
This stanza, which is reminiscent of a famous Upanishadic declaration, while glorifying the goal, is promising that Krishna will, in the following verses, explain the Supreme destination of Perfection and the means of achieving it.
Worship (Upasana) of the syllable OM is frequently advised in almost all the Upanishads as a sure method of making the final adjustments in the mind-intellect-equipment of the meditator, so that complete success in meditation may be assured to him. From the Pauranic era onwards, meditation with faith and devotion, regularly, upon any of the recognised incarnations, has also been found to serve the same purpose with the same efficiency.
Here, very many necessary precautions and warnings are given to the seeker, so that his spiritual pilgrimage may be comparatively easy and pleasant. The obstacles about which meditators generally complain arise from their own lack of self-withdrawal from the finite matter-envelopments. It is necessary that, as a Science of Self Perfection, Vedanta should not only give the techniques of meditation, but also indicate for the seekers the possible pit-falls on the path and equip them, sufficiently early, with all instructions as to how they can get out, in case they fall into any of these jamming ruts. This verse indicates how one can be assured of an easy path while moving ahead on the track of meditation --- carefully avoiding all extrovert desires that cater to one's sensuous appetites, and by practising severe and consistent self-control.
In the opening of this chapter, (stanza-3) the Supreme was defined as the Imperishable. Quoting Himself, Krishna emphasises here that the very same Imperishable Truth can be realised --- they come to "enter into the Imperishable" --- when they, the men of self-control, who are unagitated by desires, withdraw successfully from the changeable and the perishable in themselves.
FREED FROM ATTACHMENT (Veeta-ragah) --- The entire Geeta is a Song of renunciation; not a dull-witted and un-creative renunciation, but a healthy detachment through right knowledge, which is the harbinger of all progress and development everywhere. The renunciation of desires is not a psychological suppression of the existing appetites, but that which takes place as a result of a natural blossoming of the intellect. The newly opened buds, after a time, renounce their soft, beautiful skirts and stand naked, expressing a renunciation of the gorgeous; but in nature, this happens only when the flowers are pollinated and the fruits are well in the making. The shedding of the petals may be a sacrifice or renunciation from the standpoint of a casual flower-gazer, but to the farmer who knows, it is a sacrifice or renunciation of the flowers in their newly gained maturity that has automatically made the beautiful petals fall off.
Similarly, in the Spiritual Science of India, no doubt, there is an emphasis on the necessity of renunciation, but it is not a sad and melancholy self-denial or self-punishment, which some other religions do preach and practise. A renunciation that has sprung up from the fertile lands of efficient discrimination is that which is insisted upon by the intellectual giants of the Upanishads. The term "ONE FREED FROM ATTACHMENT" is therefore, to be understood as one who has grown out of his passionate attachments to the finite, that constitute the insignificant parade of the world, in his more mature and steady understanding of the nature and the goal of his life.
Also, it is true that the more the number of desires entertained, the greater is the mental tossing, and the consequent agitation. The greater the disturbance in the mind, the lesser is the mental potentiality expressed. A meditator's success depends upon his mental dynamism, and the only wealth that can ease the rigours of the journey is his own mental equipoise and inward peace. Therefore, as a policy, it is advised that men of least desire have the maximum chance for the greatest success in the Path of Knowledge.
IN ORDER TO INDICATE WHAT THE EARLY STAGES OF 'UPASANA' AND THEIR RESULTS ARE, THE FOLLOWING IS ADDED:
The practice of concentration can most effectively be undertaken and efficiently continued only when three necessary conditions are fulfilled by the meditator. These are narrated here in the verses in the sequence they have to be practised.
CONTROLLING ALL THE SENSES --- Each sense-organ is an aperture in the physical body. The porous skin, the ear, the nose, the eyes, and the taste-buds are the five main gates through which the external stimuli reach the mental zone to agitate it. To shut these five doors through discrimination and detachment is the first process, before the meditator can ever hope to enter the field of meditation. These are the five inlets through which not only the external world storms in and agitates the mind, but our mind also runs out to wander among its sensuous ditches. When once these tunnels-of-disturbance are blockaded, the new flow of disturbances is shut out.
CONFINING THE MIND IN THE HEART --- Even though the mind is not now directly open for any onslaught by fresh contingents of sense stimuli, it is capable of getting disturbed due to the previous impressions that it might have gathered in its past experiences in the finite world of change and pleasure. Therefore the mind, the instrument of emotion and feeling, it is advised, is to be confined in the 'heart.'
The term 'heart' in Vedanta is not the pumping-organ that maintains the circulatory system in a physical structure. In the field of literature and philosophy, heart is a conceptual centre in the mind from where all positive and noble thoughts of love and tenderness, kindness and charity, devotion and surrender, constantly spring up. When once the gross stimuli are held back from entering the mind, the seeker is advised not to choke his faculty of emotion and feeling but to DIVINISE IT. Let the mind function only in the dignity and status of the heart. It has already been discussed how positive thinking brings into the mind the least amount of disturbance. Negative thoughts are those that bring into the mind stormy conditions of agitation and restlessness.
WITHDRAWING ALL THE PRANAS, "THE VITAL MANIFESTATIONS OF LIFE THROUGH THE DIFFERENT EQUIPMENTS," INTO THE INTELLECT means the total withdrawal of the intellect from all its identifications with the lower, gained by dissociating ourselves from all our perceptions, etc. This is accomplished through a process of totally engaging the mind-intellect in the contemplation of the Self. When the meditator's mind, drawn away from the sense-disturbances, is purified in the realm of the diviner thoughts, and when such a mind is perfectly controlled and held steady by an intellect gushing out towards the contemplation of the Self, as explained earlier, (Ibid.-9, 10) the existing mental condition is said to be "occupied in the practice of concentration" (Yoga-dharanam).
Every meditator who can make an attempt at forgetting his immediate sensual surroundings, and, surcharged with joy and contentment, can bring his mind under the total control of his discriminative intellect, can mentally chant OM with ease and enthusiasm, and observe the rising OM-waves in this otherwise silenced mind... is the student fit for the worship of OM. The following line in its amplitude of significance clearly brings out the same view-point.
HE WHO DEPARTS, LEAVING THE BODY --- While chanting and contemplating upon the significance of OM, the seeker becomes so detached from all his delusory identifications with the false matter-envelopments that the ego is sublimated; this is the true death "LEAVING THE BODY." In his single-pointed, all-out, self-forgetting contemplation upon the significance of OM --- as the Substratum on which is played the drama of life and death, projected by the mischievous mind --- the seeker, in Krishna's own words, "ATTAINS THE SUPREME GOAL."
Sources: vedabase.com; The Holy Geeta
yad akṣaraṁ veda-vido vadanti viśanti yad yatayo vīta-rāgāḥ
yad icchanto brahma-caryaṁ caranti tat te padaṁ saṅgraheṇa pravakṣye
Bg 8.12
sarva-dvārāṇi saṁyamya mano hṛdi nirudhya ca
mūrdhny ādhāyātmanaḥ prāṇam āsthito yoga-dhāraṇām
Bg 8.13
oṁ ity ekākṣaraṁ brahma vyāharan mām anusmaran
yaḥ prayāti tyajan dehaṁ sa yāti paramāṁ gatim
Translation
1. That which is declared Imperishable by the VEDA -knowers; That into which, the self-controlled and desire-freed enter; That desiring which BRAHMCHARYA is practised --- That Goal I will declare to thee in brief.
12. Having closed all the gates, having confined the mind in the heart, having fixed the life-breath in the "head, " engaged in the practice of concentration,
13. Uttering the one-syllabled 'OM' --- the (symbol of) BRAHMAN --- and remembering Me, he who departs, leaving the body, attains the Supreme Goal.
Commentary
This stanza, which is reminiscent of a famous Upanishadic declaration, while glorifying the goal, is promising that Krishna will, in the following verses, explain the Supreme destination of Perfection and the means of achieving it.
Worship (Upasana) of the syllable OM is frequently advised in almost all the Upanishads as a sure method of making the final adjustments in the mind-intellect-equipment of the meditator, so that complete success in meditation may be assured to him. From the Pauranic era onwards, meditation with faith and devotion, regularly, upon any of the recognised incarnations, has also been found to serve the same purpose with the same efficiency.
Here, very many necessary precautions and warnings are given to the seeker, so that his spiritual pilgrimage may be comparatively easy and pleasant. The obstacles about which meditators generally complain arise from their own lack of self-withdrawal from the finite matter-envelopments. It is necessary that, as a Science of Self Perfection, Vedanta should not only give the techniques of meditation, but also indicate for the seekers the possible pit-falls on the path and equip them, sufficiently early, with all instructions as to how they can get out, in case they fall into any of these jamming ruts. This verse indicates how one can be assured of an easy path while moving ahead on the track of meditation --- carefully avoiding all extrovert desires that cater to one's sensuous appetites, and by practising severe and consistent self-control.
In the opening of this chapter, (stanza-3) the Supreme was defined as the Imperishable. Quoting Himself, Krishna emphasises here that the very same Imperishable Truth can be realised --- they come to "enter into the Imperishable" --- when they, the men of self-control, who are unagitated by desires, withdraw successfully from the changeable and the perishable in themselves.
FREED FROM ATTACHMENT (Veeta-ragah) --- The entire Geeta is a Song of renunciation; not a dull-witted and un-creative renunciation, but a healthy detachment through right knowledge, which is the harbinger of all progress and development everywhere. The renunciation of desires is not a psychological suppression of the existing appetites, but that which takes place as a result of a natural blossoming of the intellect. The newly opened buds, after a time, renounce their soft, beautiful skirts and stand naked, expressing a renunciation of the gorgeous; but in nature, this happens only when the flowers are pollinated and the fruits are well in the making. The shedding of the petals may be a sacrifice or renunciation from the standpoint of a casual flower-gazer, but to the farmer who knows, it is a sacrifice or renunciation of the flowers in their newly gained maturity that has automatically made the beautiful petals fall off.
Similarly, in the Spiritual Science of India, no doubt, there is an emphasis on the necessity of renunciation, but it is not a sad and melancholy self-denial or self-punishment, which some other religions do preach and practise. A renunciation that has sprung up from the fertile lands of efficient discrimination is that which is insisted upon by the intellectual giants of the Upanishads. The term "ONE FREED FROM ATTACHMENT" is therefore, to be understood as one who has grown out of his passionate attachments to the finite, that constitute the insignificant parade of the world, in his more mature and steady understanding of the nature and the goal of his life.
Also, it is true that the more the number of desires entertained, the greater is the mental tossing, and the consequent agitation. The greater the disturbance in the mind, the lesser is the mental potentiality expressed. A meditator's success depends upon his mental dynamism, and the only wealth that can ease the rigours of the journey is his own mental equipoise and inward peace. Therefore, as a policy, it is advised that men of least desire have the maximum chance for the greatest success in the Path of Knowledge.
IN ORDER TO INDICATE WHAT THE EARLY STAGES OF 'UPASANA' AND THEIR RESULTS ARE, THE FOLLOWING IS ADDED:
The practice of concentration can most effectively be undertaken and efficiently continued only when three necessary conditions are fulfilled by the meditator. These are narrated here in the verses in the sequence they have to be practised.
CONTROLLING ALL THE SENSES --- Each sense-organ is an aperture in the physical body. The porous skin, the ear, the nose, the eyes, and the taste-buds are the five main gates through which the external stimuli reach the mental zone to agitate it. To shut these five doors through discrimination and detachment is the first process, before the meditator can ever hope to enter the field of meditation. These are the five inlets through which not only the external world storms in and agitates the mind, but our mind also runs out to wander among its sensuous ditches. When once these tunnels-of-disturbance are blockaded, the new flow of disturbances is shut out.
CONFINING THE MIND IN THE HEART --- Even though the mind is not now directly open for any onslaught by fresh contingents of sense stimuli, it is capable of getting disturbed due to the previous impressions that it might have gathered in its past experiences in the finite world of change and pleasure. Therefore the mind, the instrument of emotion and feeling, it is advised, is to be confined in the 'heart.'
The term 'heart' in Vedanta is not the pumping-organ that maintains the circulatory system in a physical structure. In the field of literature and philosophy, heart is a conceptual centre in the mind from where all positive and noble thoughts of love and tenderness, kindness and charity, devotion and surrender, constantly spring up. When once the gross stimuli are held back from entering the mind, the seeker is advised not to choke his faculty of emotion and feeling but to DIVINISE IT. Let the mind function only in the dignity and status of the heart. It has already been discussed how positive thinking brings into the mind the least amount of disturbance. Negative thoughts are those that bring into the mind stormy conditions of agitation and restlessness.
WITHDRAWING ALL THE PRANAS, "THE VITAL MANIFESTATIONS OF LIFE THROUGH THE DIFFERENT EQUIPMENTS," INTO THE INTELLECT means the total withdrawal of the intellect from all its identifications with the lower, gained by dissociating ourselves from all our perceptions, etc. This is accomplished through a process of totally engaging the mind-intellect in the contemplation of the Self. When the meditator's mind, drawn away from the sense-disturbances, is purified in the realm of the diviner thoughts, and when such a mind is perfectly controlled and held steady by an intellect gushing out towards the contemplation of the Self, as explained earlier, (Ibid.-9, 10) the existing mental condition is said to be "occupied in the practice of concentration" (Yoga-dharanam).
Every meditator who can make an attempt at forgetting his immediate sensual surroundings, and, surcharged with joy and contentment, can bring his mind under the total control of his discriminative intellect, can mentally chant OM with ease and enthusiasm, and observe the rising OM-waves in this otherwise silenced mind... is the student fit for the worship of OM. The following line in its amplitude of significance clearly brings out the same view-point.
HE WHO DEPARTS, LEAVING THE BODY --- While chanting and contemplating upon the significance of OM, the seeker becomes so detached from all his delusory identifications with the false matter-envelopments that the ego is sublimated; this is the true death "LEAVING THE BODY." In his single-pointed, all-out, self-forgetting contemplation upon the significance of OM --- as the Substratum on which is played the drama of life and death, projected by the mischievous mind --- the seeker, in Krishna's own words, "ATTAINS THE SUPREME GOAL."
Sources: vedabase.com; The Holy Geeta
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