Gandhi, Godse and Geeta

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Jay: It is a matter of mere scholarly debate when Bhagawad Gita was inserted. Even considering it written by Vyasa does not exclude the possibility of after thoughts. Bhagawat Gita is written in epic poem style and taking out a verse or two would be out of context. It is not written in ghazal style, rather it should be read in its entirity to get the essence of it, like Homer`s epics.
Reading it as after thought leads to better understanding without lowering its scriptural importance. It changes it from a case of good against evil to a case for preventive care and precaution against prescription and treatment.
As an after thought, it is Dr. Krishna treating Arjun`s restlessness and insomnia due to the moral dilemma of fighting and bloodshed againast his own cousins. Dr. Krishna is ultimate psychiatrist here. He is prescribing regimented treatment to cope and cure Arjun`s moral dilemma using Dharma to offset bad Karma.He finally succeds in curing Arjun by convincing him that his Karma was in fact good according to Dharma. However, this is not the moral of the story.
The moral of the story is even better Karma through Dharma used in prevention and precaution. It is through Dharma applied to Karma, not to get into moral dilemma on the first place so that the question of restlessness and insomnia does not arise. Otherwise it needs regimented doses of Dharma to cure it.
This is what Gandhi is supposed to extract from Gita and his non-violence is a preacution and preventive mesaure against falling into moral dilemma. This is the esssence of Gita and not good vs. evil. Preventive Karma medicine is better than prescription Karma medicine because of no side effects or long term damage to Dharma.
Arjun had to go for a treatment to cope and cure only because moral dilemma happened. It does not matter if Gita is the moving account of events or after thoughts, if the conclusion drawn from it is Karma of the higher order. Godse went exactly opposite way.

dost-mittar/Nand . . . the Yervada Jail/Aga Khan Palace reference was in context with the difference in ``jail`` conditions that the absolutely fair level playing Britishers imposed on general desi freedom fighters versus Congress type freedom fighters. It has taken India over 50 years to give places like Yervada Jail/Pune and Cellular Jail/Andamans their due place . . . while the fantastic Aga Khan Palace with its 53 aircon rooms serving as Gandhi`s jail . . .

Harpreet, Stuka, Sabina, others . . . for the Bhagvad Geeta, may I suggest a dispassionate reading of the various translations by Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan (late & ex-President of India) . . . the best advice I got when I read it was to try to keep the question ``Who and why am I`` foremost while trying to understand it. 9 months at anchorage in the Persian Gulf helped, alongwith liberal doses of other books . . . most religions.

re: Gandhi, Godse and Geetha

As i said in my last post, Geetha can be interpreted by different people in different ways, depending on their advancements in the spiritual sphere. For some, it is just a text that tells about how societies should behave and what is right or wrong. For others, it has a deep spiritual and esoteric message.
Gandhijis whole life was a constant struggle between his outer physical and inner spiritual spheres. He constantly tried to perfect himself spiritually and did whatever was possible towards that end. He read Geetha as he claimed it gave him deep spiritual insights and solace (an inner peace). He used Geetha to resolve a number of inner conflicts that confounded him from time to time.

Hindu spiritual texts teach us that man needs to conquer all desires before he can reach spiritual perfections. Gandhiji undertook Brahmacharya (lifelong celibacy) at 35 years of age after consulting his wife and getting her approval. He seemed to have had an epic conflict against his ``natural`` sexual urges and tried spiritual path and teachings of Geetha to overcome this conflict. Gandhiji`s vegetarianism, his frequent fasts at self-purification, even his carefully chosen diet (eating only what he called ``satvic`` food and shunning the food that increased animal tendencies) are a testimony to his inner conflict. This did not mean he shunned female company (Mullahs may have a lesson to learn here). He realised that women are not to blame for his weakness, that the conflict was really in the mind. Women were, OTOH, his constant companions.
Godse is the very antithesis of Gandhiji. It is highly unlikely that this brahmin ever understood the real meaning of Geetha. He probably understood the epic battle at Kurukshetra to mean violence is desirable and rationalised his killing of the mahatma. He was against Gandhiji because he thought Gandhiji did not prevent vivisecton of India. Did he really believe Gandhiji could have prevented partition? Did he not know it was the people and not leaders who decided what they wanted? How could Gandhiji have prevented partition if this is what a large number of muslims wanted. So, what does Godse do? He gets angry and takes the easy way out. He kills the mahatma. This places him at the same level as the evil Kauravas in Mahabharata. Godse is not in the same league as Gandhiji. Godse let the anger and hatred get the better of him. For people like Godse, there is no inner conflict. The choices are simple. You hate somebody and you elimate that person.
Today, Godse clan seems to be on the rise. Rise of BJP, hindutva elements means Godse like creatures abound India and are on the prowl, killing Gandhiji`s teachings and giving it the final burial.

Shall we ever see another Gandhi in a millenium? I doubt it.

Sridhar

Dost-Mitter

Thank you. That`s the point I was trying to get across i.e. in the matter between Godse and Gandhi, Gita is irrelevant. That was the fallacy in your argument.

re: Geetha and the spiritual truths
Jay asked if Geetha was really written at the time of Mahabharata and not interpolated into the main book by Shankaracharya (i presumed he meant Adi Shankara, the first one). I gave an answer but i want to elaborate on it and the spiritual significance of Geetha.
There are some interesting aspects of Geetha (also called Bhagawat Geetha or ``the celestial song``) being discussed in this forum. Pankaj has quoted some beautiful verses. One of them ``karmanyeva...`` is my favourite.
But Geetha is a lot more than just verses. Geetha forms an important chapter in Mahabharata. Scholars do not even know for sure when Mahabharata actually happened. The end of the epic battle is said to have ushered in the Kalyuga, which some place at around 3200 BC. Others have said that it happened anywhere between 6000 BC to 800 BC. So much for the so called experts!
The author of Mahabharata, veda Vyasa lived during the time all the events happened in that epic. He wanted to write the epic for the benefit of humanity and is said to have taken the help of Sri Ganesha (``the elephant headed God). While Vyasa went into deep Samadhi and relived the events and dictated them, Ganeshji dutifully wrote them on palm leaves (and later preserved for posterity thr` word of mouth by pundits, who also copied the original texts). All this happened somewhere in Himalayas and went on non-stop for many months until it was completed.
Geetha, which is a prelude to the epic battle, has message at material, intellectual and spiritual levels and depending on one`s propensities, one can interpret it in any manner possible. Spiritual prophets usually used metaphors, parables and allegories to teach (eg Jesus christ taught mainly thr` parables in Bible). Geeta has been written by Vyasa by interweaning historical facts with psychological and spiritual truths by use of such parables and allegories. The epic battle between the virtuous Pandavas (the five brothers) and the evil Kauravas (the 100 evil ones) also symbolises the constant inner battle that every man has between his material and spiritual aspirations.
Historically, on the brink of such a horrendous war between cousins, it looks unlikely that Krishna and Arjuna would draw their charriots into the open field between the 2 opposing armies and engage in an extensive discourse on ``yoga and dharma``. It is more likely that this chapter is there for a higher purpose. While many of the events in Mahabharata has a historical basis, Vyasa has arranged the characters in a way to propound the essence of ``Dharma`` or rightful living.
As the war is about to start, blind Dhritharashtra implores Sanjaya (the narrator who has been bestowed divine vision to view the war and narrate it to the blind king) as follows:
``Dharmakshetre kurukshetre samaveta yuyutsavah
mamakaah paandavaas caiva kim kurvata sanjaya``
(On the holy plain of kurukshetra, when my offsprings and the sons of Pandu had gathered together, eager for battle, what did they do, O Sanjaya?).
Sanjaya here is both a historical entity and symbolic of ``impartial intuitive self- analysis``.
Paramahamsa Yogananda has written a beautiful 2 volume book ``God Talks with Arjuna: The Bhagwat Gita``, which is a spiritual interpretation of the original work. Those interested may read it.
Mahabharata itself transcends time, civilisations and cultures. If anyone has not read it, i recommend C.Rajagopalachari`s book, which is written in simple, lucid English.
More on the spiritual symbolism of Geetha in my future posts.
Sridhar

mittar ji...your first article on Chowk, mubarak hoN ji! I don`t know enough about the Gita to comment much on this...but have enjoyed the discussion surrounding it. More later, hopefully :)

dost-mittar:

you say:

[...So, who was following the message of Geeta in the true sense? Gandhi, Godse or both? If both, should holy scriptures play a role in morality?...]


…ironically …our world is full of Godses…from the believers who takes the life of others to those who take their own lives to cause damage to others…all in the name of a belief or cause….

…extrapolating above…in addition to role of scriptures in morality…following queries come to mind:

---what is the role of conscience in our individual and collective moral outlook
---and how much of that role is derived from religion, culture, environment?

further…

…if individual conscience is the driving engine behind individual morality…the dichotomy enters and we cannot blame the message or the messenger when one individual engages in murder and mayhem citing some message while another is horrified and objects to the action citing the same message/messenger...

Dost Mitar, thought provoking article. Sadna, I too tried reading the Gita about a decade ago, maybe its time for a new attempt.

An excerpt from `Freedom by Midnight`

His party set out at sunup. Gandhi`s pretty ninteen-year-old grandniece Manu had put together his Spartan kit: a pen and paper, a needle and thread, an earthern bowl and a wooden spoon, his spinning wheel and his three guru`s, a little ivoy representation of the three monkeys who ``hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil.`` Shr also packed in a cotton sack the books that reflected the eclecticism of the man marching into the jungle: the the Bhagavad-Gita, the Koran, the Practice and Precepts of Jesus, and a book of Jewish Thoughts.

re:#44 by jay
You seem to sugget that people in those times (especially the learned) were gullible enough to be hoodwinked by Adi Sankara. Remember, he was waging a war for the revival of hinduism and his fight was against Buddhists, Jains and even Kapaliks who were rapidly gaining ground. Something like inserting Geetha in Mahabharata would have exposed him as a manupulator and discredited him in front of so many pundits of different belief system.
Anyway, just claiming something won`t do. You need to post proof of your claim.
Sridhar

Jay #44
Think about it, here is an answer to dost-mittar`s or perhaps nasahji`s question on another board about why Gandhiji said the Gita inspired his nonviolent satyagraha.

The fundamental premise propounded by the Gita is the Truth that there is divinity/humanity in every human and a person`s own divinity/humanity is manifested through his realisation of this Truth.

If one accepts this fundamental premise of the Gita, then an arbitrary Indian subject who perpetuated violence against or killed an arbitrary Britisher was not only denying the humanity/divinity in the Britisher by his violent acts but was also diminishing his own humanity/divinity through these acts.

A nonviolent satyagraha is a way to put across rebellion which neither negates nor diminishes the humanity of either the rebel or of the object of rebellion. It forces the rebel to conceptualize his rebellion in the broadest and more universal humanist terms and through the methods it adopts ( including putting forth sound principle for the mobilisation of public opinion, civil disobedience, mass meetings, fasting ) it attempts to force the object of rebellion to better recognise the humanity both in himself and the rebel and adopt a more humanist position.

Gandhiji`s application of the Gita`s emphasis on the divinity/humanity in every human to the freedom movement is also what compelled Gandhiji to also give importance to the uplift of Dalits, for example. His emphasis on Dalit uplift was so strong in his activities that many in the Congress party felt that his choice of timing and emphasis on Dalit upliftment created a distraction from what they considered had precedence as the primary goal, namely ending British rule.

Stuka, Sadna, Dost-Mittar etc.

The Geeta sounds like a great learning book. To echo Harpreet`s question, is there any particular publication thats better ?

Obrigado.

Sameer 37,

The after thought part of the gita could be literally true. It is widely believed that Sankaracharya inserted the gita into the mahabharata. According to aurobindo, there is no reference to gita in any of the hindu works before sankaracharya. It is he who popularised it and it is believed that he inserted it there. Aurobindo discusses this aspect and leaves it with out any conclusions.

Sadna,

There is no concept in gita of non-violence, killing/ murder what ever you call it is not banned in any way. It is left to the karma and and the conciousness of the person to decide what is appropriate.

Pankaj # 32

Excellent post. This is what I call a fine balance between objectivity and relativity. You have seen through the fallacy in dost`s argument. I think no matter what position we take we are bound to look into things in terms of ``good`` and ``evil``. You cannot have the cake and eat it too. For example, in simple words, here is what Ajeet and Stuka are proposing in not so many words:

- Geeta is a source of moral code.
- Since Gandhi acted upon what Geeta dictates, therefore, he must be right.
- And since Godse acted upon what Geeta dictates, therefore, he must also be right.

This is a typical argument of the religious extremist who believes that an evil can be done for a ``greater`` good without realizing that the outcome of evil can only be more evil; you sow hawthorn you reap hawthorn. An evil done in the name of greater good is the ultimate evil. Which means that you don’t have moral courage to take a stand on the `right` where sometimes you might have to retract from what `you` think is right and give way to what is right in the moral code. This needs courage. So this suggests one of the two things:

- Either your moral code is irrelevant in this situation
- Or you have wrongly attached `all good` to your source of moral code.

Conversely, read through some of the other set of replies, and you will also see the line of argument such is this:

- Geeta is a source of `amoral` code.
- Since Gandhi acted upon what Geeta dictates, therefore, he must be wrong.
- And since Godse acted upon what Geeta dictates, therefore, he must also be wrong.

This is a typical argument that anti-religionists, perverts, anti-Muslim Hindu religious nuts on their websites, and twats like hamidm, sameerjb and saminashah use i.e. whole religion is bad no matter what. And why? Because if they don’t use the `the whole religion is bad` line of in-argument they are stuck with two choices:

- Use a fallacious argument like what Dost Mitter has put forth in this article.
- Or they have to use an argument, which is objective and relative. And in this case they know very well that they will lose.

And hence they run away from debate like a dog runs away from a piece of rock, saying that `arguing with a religionist is like arguing with a Nazi about the benefits and efficiency of gas chambers`.

Sadna, PMishra:

Please read a book called The Men who killed Gandhi by Manohar Moolgavkar.

He has done a lot of detailed research into the motivations of all the people involved, from Savarkar to Apte as well as Godse. The plan to assasinate Gandhi was not made spur of the moment. It was not done to affect future policy. It was not meant to terrorize the population.

Nathuram Godse`s equal would be Satwant Singh and Beant Singh, the Sikhs who assasinated Indira Gandhi. They did not do so for selfish reasons, they did not do so to change future policy or to terrorize people at large. It was done with a sense of duty.

Dost-Mittar

Congratulations on getting your first article published on Chowk. Can you suggest a translation of Bhagavad Geeta I can get to educate myself?? Which is the best version in your opinion.

-h-