Talks on the Gita is a collection of talks given by Acharya Vinayaka Narahari Bhave (Vinoba Bhave) while he was in prison as a fighter for national freedom. Acharya Vinoba Bhave is also known as the National Teacher of India.
Publication Information
Bhave, Vinoba. Talks on the Gita. Kolkata: Spiritual Hierarchy Publication Trust, 2019.
I found this book to deeply engaging and inspiring. Given below are some excerpts from the book which interested me. The numbers before the quotes indicate the pages in which they appear in the book, publication information of which is given above.
Hope you will be induced to read the book after going through these insightful quotes:
Introduction by Jayaprakash Narayan
vii - viii
One final word about Vinoba is essential so that he may be truly understood. Vinoba is not a politician, not a social reformer, nor a revolutionary. He is first and last a man of God. Service of man is to him nothing but an effort to unite with God. He endeavours every second to blot himself out, to make himself empty so that God may fill him up and make him His instrument.
The talks of such a man of Self-realization on one of the profoundest spiritual works of all times should be of inestimable value to all-irrespective of race, creed or nationality.
Note from the Publisher
xii
Vinoba agreed to give a talk every Sunday and delivered 18 talks on the 18 Chapters. P.S. Sane alias Sane Guruji, a great writer and freedom fighter, wrote them down in long hand.
There was no question of their being taped and their publication was also not thought of. In fact, Vinoba had given talks on the Gita many times in the past, but none of them had been published. However, Sane Guruji preserved the notebooks and the talks were published first in the weekly edited by him, and then in the form of a book in 1945 when Vinoba was in jail even before he could find time to go through them for necessary editing. It was only thereafter that Vinoba edited the talks.
Vinoba on the 'Talks on the Gita'
xviii
My writings and talks on the Gita elsewhere would not have the magic touch that these 'Talks' have, as these were delivered in jail which, for us, was a battlefield, before the soldiers in the freedom struggle. Those who heard these talks can never forget those moments. The atmosphere of the jail at that time was charged with a spiritual elan.
XIX
The 'Talks on the Gita' is the story of my life, and it is also my message.
7.
The Gita has been accorded the status of an Upanishad since ancient times. It is, in fact, the Supreme Upanishad. It is as if Lord Krishna has distilled the essence of all the Upanishads and offered it in the form of the Gita to the whole world. Arjuna's despondency provided only an occasion. Almost every idea and thought necessary for the blossoming of life can be found in the Gita.
10.
Arjuna looks around. And what does he see? He finds his kith and kin, his near and dear ones arrayed on both the sides. He finds four generations of his own people intent on fighting to the finish. It is not that Arjuna had no idea of what he was going to see. But the actual sight, as is always the case, had a devastating impact. Seeing his kinsmen on the battlefield, Arjuna lost his nerve and deep anguish assailed his heart. In the past, he had slain innumerable warriors in many a battle, but he had never before felt so dejected, never had his bow Gandiva slipped from his hands, never had he trembled so, never had tears welled up in his eyes! Then, why was all this happening now? Was he coming to abhor violence like King Ashoka? Certainly not. It was nothing but attachment to his kith and kin. Had those in front of him not been his kinsmen, he would even now have felt no qualms in severing their heads and merrily tossing them around. But attachment to the kith and kin clouded his sense of duty, and then he started philosophising. When a man with a sense of duty is caught in delusion, he cannot face his naked lapse from duty. He tries to justify it by citing lofty principles.
11.
I am reminded here of the story of a judge. He had sentenced to death hundreds of criminals. But one day, his own son, accused of murder, was produced before him. The guilt was proved and the time came for the judge to pronounce the sentence. But then he hesitated, and started arguing, "The death sentence is inhuman. It does not behove a man to inflict such a punishment. It destroys all hopes of reforming the guilty. One commits murder in a fit of passion. The moment of bloodthirsty madness then passes off. Still we coolly take him to the gallows and hang him to death. It is disgraceful to humanity." Such were the judge's arguments. But, had his son not been there, he would have gone on sentencing people to death. His arguments lacked inner conviction; they were born out of attachment to his son.
Arjuna's condition was like that of the judge in this story. His arguments were not unsound. The world has witnessed precisely the same consequences of the First World War. But the point is that Arjuna was not voicing his own authentic conviction. His words were seemingly wise, but not really so. Krishna realised this. He, therefore, paid no attention to Arjuna's arguments and straightway proceeded to dispel his delusion. Had Arjuna really become a votary of non violence, he would not have been satisfied until his arguments had been convincingly answered. But the Gita nowhere deals with them, and yet Arjuna was ultimately satisfied.
13.
Swadharma is not something to be adopted because it is perceived to be great or noble, nor it is to be cast off because it appears lowly. Swadharma is neither great nor small; it is equal to our measure. It is that which fits us the best. Shreyan swadharmo vigunah. ('One's own dharma, even if it is devoid of merit is the best for oneself.'), the Gita says.
15.
The Lord gives us freedom. Let everybody make efforts in his own way. Therein lies the charm. A child enjoys sketching figures with his own hands; he does not like anybody else holding his hands for this purpose. If a teacher just goes on rapidly solving all the mathematical problems himself for the students, how would their intellect develop? The teachers and the parents should only guide the children. God guides us from within. He does nothing more than that. There is no charm in God shaping us like a potter. We are not earthenware; we are beings full of consciousness.
15.
The Lord asked Arjuna at the end of the Gita, "O Arjuna! Has your delusion gone now?" And Arjuna replied, "Yes, Lord. The delusion has fled away. I have realised what my swadharma is." Thus, taking into consideration both the beginning and the end of the Gita, it is clear that the removal of delusion is its central message. This is the purpose of the Gita, as well as of the whole of the Mahabharata.
30.
The Lord has no doubt enunciated the principles of life. But this, in itself, does not serve the purpose. These principles were already there in the Upanishads and the Smritis. To restate them is not the Gita's unique contribution; that lies in its explaining how these principles are to be translated into practice. It is in solving this great problem that the ingenuity and uniqueness of the Gita lie.
Yoga means nothing but the art of translating the principles of life into practice.
56.
That is why all the saints continued to hold on steadfastly to the means even after reaching the end, the pinnacle of fulfilment. They kept on working till the last breath. A mother actively participates in the children's play with the dolls even though she knows that it is all make-believe. If she takes no part in the play, the children will not enjoy it. Likewise if a karmayogi stops working because of contentment, others will follow suit despite being discontented; but inwardly they will continue to be dissatisfied and joyless.
64.
The Gita uses the word 'karma' (action) in the sense of swadharma. We eat, drink, sleep; these are all actions. But these are not the actions that the Gita refers to when it talks of karma. Karma refers to the performance of swadharma. But in order to attain desirelessness through such karma, an important aid is necessary. One must overcome desire, attachment and anger. One cannot have desirelessness unless and until the mind has become pure and calm like the waters of the Ganga. The actions necessary for the purification of mind are called 'vikarma' by the Gita. Karma, vikarma and akarma - these three terms are important in the Fourth Chapter. Karma means the outward actions done in the pursuit of swadharma. Vikarma means total involvement of the mind therein. We may bow to somebody, but that outward action is meaningless without inner humility. There should be unity between the inner and the outer.
69.
We act, but still we are not the doers. As the Gita says, you are not the slayer even if you slay somebody. A mother may give a thrashing to her child, but the child will still turn to her for solace. He would not do so if you were to thrash him. It is so because the mother's heart is pure. Her action is totally devoid of any self-interest. Vikarma, or the purity of mind, erases the 'action-ness' of the action.
72. [Footnote]
Vikarma is normally translated as wrong or forbidden Vinoba has given the term a different meaning. He had once explained the logic behind it in 1957. The prefix 'vi has three different meanings : (1) opposite, as in viyog (2) different types, as in vijnana and (3) special, as in vidhwams. Vinoba says that one has to see the context while determining the meaning of any term. "It has been said in the 4th Chapter that one should understand karma, vikarma and akarma; only then one can grasp the meaning of the principle of karma. This means that it is an introductory remark; the 4th Chapter is going to explain them. But there is no mention of opposite karma (If vikarma is to mean opposite karma, such actions should have been mentioned there). Rather, different special actions (which aid the performance of swadharma) have been mentioned from verse 25 to 32.
76.
How can then one have detachment? For this, the mind must cooperate fully. Nothing can be achieved without the cooperation of the mind. Parents sometimes keep their wards in a residential school. There the boy leads a disciplined life. He wakes up early, takes exercises regularly and is generally away from bad habits. But as soon as he comes home, he abandons all the good habits. A man is not like a lump of wet clay to which you can give the form you like. He has a mind of his own, which must be ready to assume that form. If there is no cooperation on the part of his mind, all efforts to educate him would be in vain. Cooperation of the mind is, therefore, extremely necessary irrespective of the means adopted.
78.
When karma becomes effortless and burdenless, it is transformed into akarma. Akarma, as we have seen in the Fourth Chapter, means effortless, burdenless, natural karma.
83.
Crowing is a cock's natural action. Similarly, it is natural for a sage to speak the truth, to have compassion for all the living beings, not to find fault in others, to serve everybody. He cannot, in fact, live without this karma. Do we honour anybody for having taken his food? Just as eating, drinking, sleeping are normal and natural actions for worldly persons, serving others is natural to a man of wisdom. Helping others is his second nature. Even if he were to decide not to help others, it is impossible for him to do so. Karma of such a sage can be said to have become akarma. Such a state has also been given the sacred term 'sannyasa'. Sannyasa is nothing but the blessed state of akarma. It can also be called karma yoga. It is karma yoga since the man of wisdom goes on acting; and it is sannyasa since there is no feeling of doing anything even while actions are done, The man of wisdom acts with such ingenuity that the actions do not bind; hence it is yoga and as nothing is done even while doing everything, it is sannyasa.
84.
The way to renounce such action is to do all the actions in such an ingenuous way that they are shed as soon as you complete them. Only then sannyasa can be attained.
85.
To act, and still not be the doer, is one aspect; while the other aspect is to make the whole world act without doing anything oneself. In this state there is immense power to impel others to act. This is the beauty of akarma. It is packed with power that is capable of infinite work. It is like steam which, when compressed, does enormous work. It can then easily move big trains. The sun also does no work outwardly, but still work round the clock and is not aware of doing anything. Working day and night and still not doing anything outwardly is its one aspect and setting in motion an infinite number of actions without doing anything outwardly is another aspect. This is the two fold splendour of sannyasa.
89.
Who is greater : a karmayogi or a sannyasi? It is impossible to say who works more. In fact, remaining inwardly inactive while doing everything and doing everything while outwardly remaining inactive, both are forms of yoga. But for the purpose of comparison, one is called yoga and the other is called sannyasa.
94.
That is why the Lord days, 'Ekam sankhyam cha yogam cha ya pasyathi sa pasyathi' (He truly sees who sees both sankhya and yoga, that is, knowledge and selfless action as one'). He who realises that yoga and sankhya are one understands the true secret.
106.
The yoga of meditation consists chiefly of three important components: (i) One-pointedness of mind, (ii) Moderation and regulation in life to help attain one pointedness, (iii) Equanimity and evenness in outlook. A true spiritual quest is not possible without these three.
173.
Karma Yoga means planting the tree without expecting anything in return. Bhaktiyoga means getting attached to God with love and devotion. Karma Yoga and bhaktiyoga combine together in rajayoga. Rajayoga has been defined by different people in different ways. I would like to define it as a beautiful blending of karma yoga and bhakti yoga.
179.
Any work, howsoever ordinary or commonplace, assumes sanctity if performed in the spirit that it is God's work. You can experience it yourself. Just look upon a guest as the Lord Himself and then see the difference it makes. When some distinguished guest is expected in our house, we clean the house thoroughly and prepare special dishes. Imagine the difference it will make if we look upon the guest as the Lord Himself! Saint Kabir was a weaver. While weaving, he would lose himself in spiritual bliss and sing ecstasically. He was as it were weaving the sheets to drape the Lord.
182.
('Whatever you do, whatever you eat, whatever you offer as sacrifice or gift, whatever austerity you perform, dedicate all that to Me.")
185 - 186.
Let this idea inform all your actions. It is all the more important in the sphere of education. A teacher should feel that the pupils are the Lord incarnate and he is serving Him through teaching them. He would not then act upon the axiom 'Spare the rod and spoil the child. He will not scold the pupils right and left and hurt them with disparaging remarks. Instead of rebuking them, for example, for wearing dirty clothes, he would wash their dirty clothes. If the teacher does so, what a deep impact such loving care will have on the pupils' minds! Can caning ever have any good effect? The pupils should also look upon the teacher with the same reverence. If the pupils and the teachers regard each other as images of the Lord and behave accordingly, then the knowledge that the pupils gain will have a rare lustre. If the pupils feel that they are being taught by the Lord Himself, you can imagine how they would behave.
187.
'Pathram pushpam phalam thoyam' - Leaves, flowers, fruits, water, anything can be offered to Him. What is important is that it should be offered with bhakti.
189.
Rajayoga, which asks us to work and offer its fruit to the Lord instead of giving it up, is a step ahead of karma yoga. Karma Yoga asks you to work without desires and give up the fruit of the work. Here karma yoga stops. Rajayoga tells, "Do not renounce the fruit of the actions. Dedicate all the actions themselves to the Lord. The actions are a means that help you in making spiritual progress.
194.
Satatyayoga means continuing the sadhana the spiritual quest - till death. One should never leave the chosen path; one should go on advancing along that path without break. If one vacillates, there cannot be any hope of reaching the goal. One should never despair or get tired and complain, "How long am I to go on doing sadhana?" Sadhana should continue till it attains fruition.
198.
The first and the foremost form of the Lord for us is our mother. The Veda says, 'Maathrudevo bhava.' (Let your mother be your God.") Who but the mother does the new-born baby see first? The Lord Himself stands there as the embodiment of tenderness. We can move on from the worship of the mother to the worship of Mother India and still further to the worship of Mother Earth. But in the beginning the mother is the highest form in which the Lord appears before the child. It is quite possible to attain moksha through the worship of the mother. Worship of the mother means worship of the Lord as love incarnate; the mother is just the medium. The Lord endows her with His affection and impels her to toil for her child. The poor mother does not understand why she feels so much love and affection for the child. Does she do everything for the child with the calculation that it might be of use to her in her old age? Not at all.
199.
Jesus was greatly fond of children. Once his disciples asked him, "You talk so much about the Kingdom of God. Who can enter it?" Jesus lifted up in his arms a child standing nearby and said, "Only those who are like this child."
200.
As the age advances, innocence gets eroded. Then one hardly thinks of the Lord. The minds of children are pure and unsullied. We teach a child, "Do not tell lies." He asks, "What is a lie?" Then we explain that the statement must correspond to the facts. The child is nonplussed. How can one make a statement that does not correspond to the facts? It is like telling that a rectangle must be called a rectangle and not a circle. The child is surprised at this teaching. Children are the purest manifestations of God. Adults give them wrong ideas.
201.
Likewise, look at the sun. To see him is to see che Lord. He keeps on painting an endless variety of pictures on the canvas of the sky. Artists labour hard for months in trying to catch the beauty of the sunrise on the canvas. But rise early in the morning and just have a look at the Lord's art on the horizon. With what can we compare that divine art, that infinite beauty?
203.
The worship very first hymn in the Rig Veda, in fact, is about fire-worship -
अग्रिमीळे पुरोहित यज्ञस्य देवमृत्विजम् । होतारं रत्नधातमम् ॥'
207.
'अज्ञानान्धस्य लोकस्य ज्ञानाञ्जनशलाकया ।
चक्षुरुन्मीलितं येन तस्मै पाणिनये नम:'
('We bow to Panini who opened the eyes of the people, blind with ignorance, by putting the collyrium of knowledge in them.')
213.
The Veda has said, 'Namo nama stenanenam pathaye namo nama. Nama punjishtebhyo... Namo nishadhebhya... Brahma daashaa Brahma daashaa, brahmaiveme kithavaa' - 'Salutation to the robber chieftain, salutations to the cruel and the violent. The robbers, the cruel, the swindlers, all are Brahman. Salutations to them all.'
219.
Arjuna was very dear to the Lord; so dear that, in the Tenth Chapter, while mentioning different manifestations in which He is to be contemplated, the Lord has said, "Among the Pandavas, contemplate Me in the form of Arjuna." Can love ever be more crazy? This is the height of madness in love. The Lord's love for Arjuna knew no bounds. The Eleventh Chapter is the blessed gift of that love. The Lord endowed Arjuna with the divine vision and fulfilled his desire to see His cosmic form.
222.
There is a beautiful description of the colour of the Self in an Upanishad. What could be its colour? The sage says lovingly, 'yatha ayam indragopa' (The Self is like an indragop').
228.
The Lord has Himself told us, in the last verse of this Chapter how to do it, how this can come about Shankaracharya has, in his commentary on the Gita called this verse 'the quintessence of the Gita' -
'मत्कर्मकृत्मत्परमो मद्भक्त: सङ्गवर्जितः ।
निर्वैरः सर्वभूतेषु यः स मामेति पाण्डव ।।'
He who is free from enmity to all creatures, who is ever engrossed in serving the world impartially without any expectations, who dedicates all his actions to the Lord, who is full of devotion, who forgives all and is detached and full of love, becomes an instrument of the Lord. This is the essence of the Gita's teaching.
231.
The Gita too is holy from the beginning to the end, still some of its Chapters have special holiness like the places of pilgrimage. The Chapter on which I am going to talk today [12th chapter] is one such Chapter. The Lord Himself has described it as the nectar : 'ये तु धर्म्यामृतमिदं यथोक्तं paryupasathe.' This is a small Chapter with only twenty verses; but it is as sweet and life-giving as a spring of nectar. The Lord has Himself eulogised here the greatness of bhakti.
247.
Tenderness and warmth of devotion must be there. That is why the Lord told Arjuna, 'mayyaasaktha manaa partha' : - O Arjuna! Have attachment to Me" - and repeated the advice again and again. The Gita otherwise detests the word 'attachment' and repeatedly exhorts us to work without attachment, love or hate, and expectations. Non-attachment is its constant refrain. Still it asks Arjuna to have attachment to the Lord. But, then, attachment to the Lord is a lofty ideal; it has nothing in common with attachment to worldly things.
286.
Overcoming laziness is one thing; another is to overcome sleep. Sleep is, in fact, something sacred. When saintly persons put in selfless service till they get tired and then go to sleep, that sleep is a kind of yoga. Only the blessed ones can have such a sound and peaceful sleep. The sleep must be deep; its duration is immaterial. It does not depend on the kind of bed or the duration of its use. The deeper the well, the purer and sweeter the water. Likewise, deep sleep is more rewarding even if it is short.
290.
'Raajasam chalamadruvam'. A rajasic activity is invariably marked with fickleness, wavering and lack of firmness.
292.
How to determine one's swadharma? The only reply to this question is that it is natural. It comes naturally to everyone. The very idea of going in search of it is strange. When a man is born, his swadharma too takes birth. Swadharma, like one's mother, is not to be searched for; it is already there when one is born.
295.
Swadharma may appear to be commonplace, imperfect and uninteresting; still that alone is good and beneficial. When a man is drowning in the sea it is the log floating near him, however rough and misshapen, that will save him. There may be a number of beautiful pieces of polished and carved wood in a carpenter's workshop; they are of no use to the man who is struggling for life in the sea. It is in his interest to catch hold of the log at hand.
309.
Jesus has said that when you fast, your face should appear cheerful: "But thou, when thou fasteth, anoint thine head and wash thy face : that thou appear not unto men to fast." In short, we should be so full of bhakti that we do not feel any hardship. We talk of patriots walking smilingly to the gallows. Sudhanwa was smiling in the cauldron of boiling oil, chanting God's Name. It means that to such persons even the most terrible tribulations did not appear to be so because of bhakti.
311.
Nothing exists in the world except these three : the worshipped, the Lord and the means of worship.
316.
By teaching Purushottam Yoga, the Gita is bringing the life of action to fulfilment. The Lord (Purushottam) is the Master, I am His servant, and this creation is the means for worship.
322.
'Prabhaathe karadarshanam' - One should behold one's palms in the morning. The Veda is there in the palms. They ask you to serve. See whether your hands have toiled yesterday, whether they are ready to toil today, whether your palms carry marks of labour. 'Prabhaathe karadarshanam' implies that when your hands work tirelessly, that which has been ordained for you by Providence will become clear; you will know what you are destined to and are supposed to do.
330.
Kurukshetra, the battleground of the Mahabharata war, is inside us as well. If you observe carefully, you will realise that it is the battle raging within the mind which we see in the world outside in the concrete form. The one whom I see as my enemy confronting me in the outside world is, in fact, the evil in my mind that has taken concrete shape.
331.
In fact, all the virtues are contained in truth and non-violence; truth and non-violence are the essence of all of them. But fearlessness and humility are in a different category. Fearlessness makes advancement possible and humility ensures safety. With truth and non-violence in our armoury, we should march ahead fearlessly. We ought to move freely over the whole expanse of the vast and extensive life. There must, of course, be humility to prevent us from slipping. We can then fearlessly move ahead, carrying out experiments in truth and non-violence. In short, truth and non-violence develop because of fearlessness and humility.
347 - 348
The Sun is the preceptor of the jnanis. The Lord has said in the Gita that he taught karma yoga first to the Sun and Manu - the thinking man - learnt it from the Sun. The Sun is free and independent. The secret of its freedom lies in its regularity. It is our everyday experience that if we regularly take a particular route, we are able to think while walking, without paying any attention to the road. But if we walk on different roads everyday, our attention would be focused on the road and the mind would not be able to think. Thus, we should have discipline in the life to have a free and joyful, and not burdensome, life.
350.
When we serve others without taking anything in return, that is altruism; but we have already taken much from the society. The service that is rendered to repay that debt is dana. Dana means contributing to the progress of mankind. While yajna means working for the replenishment of nature's loss, repayment of the debt to society through exerting oneself physically or through money or some other means is dana.
350.
The third institution is the body. It too gets worn out daily by our use. We daily use our mind, intellect and organs. Tapas has been prescribed to remove the defects and distortions that arise in the body and to purify it.
355.
All our actions are images of our mind. If the mind is pure, the actions too will turn out to be beautiful. We should judge the purity of outward actions by the purity of mind and the purity of mind by the purity of outward actions.
383.
There is one more thing to say. You must not take up the action that has not come to you in the natural course, even if you feel that you could do it quite excellently. Do only what has come to you in the natural course. Do not go out of the way to take on new tasks which are not naturally yours. Avoid the work which needs a lot of deliberate efforts, even though it appears attractive. Do not be tempted by it; for, renunciation of fruit is possible only in the case of the actions that come to you in the natural course.
384.
Swadharma is comprised of swadeshi dharma, swajateeya dharma (duties arising out of one's being a part of a particular community) and swakaleen dharma (duties appropriate for the time). These three together constitute swadharma. While deciding about one's swadharma, one is required to take into account what is appropriate to one's nature and tendencies and what are the duties that have fallen to him.
389.
Let sadhana be done with such single-minded dedication that there is no thought of moksha in the mind; then moksha itself will seek you on its own. Let the seeker be totally immersed in his sadhana. The Lord had already said, 'Maa te sangostvakarmani'. (You should not covet the state of akarma, or moksha'). Now He is again saying in the end, 'Aham tvaa sarva papebhyo mokshayishyami maa shucha'. ('I shall release you from all sins; be not grieved.')4 'I am here to accord you moksha; forget about moksha and be concerned about your sadhana. Sadhana will attain perfection when you forget moksha, and then moksha will itself be attracted to you.
391.
The final state of moksha is the zenith of sadhana. In this state, sadhana becomes natural and effortless. Then there is not even the thought that 'I am doing something.' This final state of realisation (Siddhavastha) is not a state of morality. A child speaks truth, but it is not a moral act, as he has no idea of untruth. To speak truth while being aware of untruth is a moral act. In the final state, untruth does not exist; truth alone exists. So there is no question of morality. What is forbidden, what is worth abjuring comes nowhere in the picture. Ears do not hear what should not be heard; eyes do not see what should not be seen. Only that gets done which ought to be done; one does not have to do it consciously. One need not have to avoid consciously what is worth avoiding, but it does get avoided. It is in this culmination of sadhana, when it has become natural, amoral - or you may call it supra-moral - that morality reaches its supreme height. We may call this a state of sattvic sadhana wherein sattva has been transcended.
