Geeta Darshan #10

Unmanifest at the beginning, unmanifest at the end; in the middle is the world of the manifest.

Gibran has said somewhere: one dark, moonless night, I was sitting in a small mud hut, a little clay lamp flickering. There was darkness outside the front door, darkness outside the back door—darkness everywhere, except for that tiny circle of trembling light. A night-bird fluttered in through the door, circled two or three times in the lamplight, and flew out through the back door into the deep night again. Seeing the bird come for a moment out of darkness into light, flutter a moment, and disappear again into darkness, it struck me that life is the same.

Unmanifest before, unmanifest after—only a brief fluttering of the manifest in between. For those few moments of manifestation, flowers bloom, leaves come, life laughs and weeps—and then it is gone. In the unmanifest there is nonduality—before and after, on both sides. In the middle there is duality; not only duality, but multiplicity. Not just two—many. Everything appears separate.

You ask: is there a way, in these manifest moments, to know the inseparable, the undivided, the One—the nondual, the source and the beginning?

Certainly.

Stand beneath a tree. Leaves sparkle in the sun and sway in the wind. Each leaf seems distinct. If leaves were conscious, each would find it hard to believe that the leaf next to it and itself are one, joined below on the branch. Seeing its neighbor stir, the awakened leaf would think: a stranger.

And the logic would seem right. The neighbor is growing old while this leaf is still young. If they were one, wouldn’t they age together? One leaf yellows and falls; another is fresh and green. One is on the tree; the fallen one lies on the earth. If they were one, how could one be on the tree and the other on the ground? One is tender, another is withered. One has just budded, another is ready to drop. The leaf’s reasoning that it is separate looks sound.

But if only this leaf would stop looking outward—stop looking at other leaves—and look within. Not far within flows the stream of sap from which both leaves are joined: the old and the young, the arriving and the departing. If the leaf descends into itself, it will find the branch from which all leaves arise.

Even the branch may imagine itself different from the other branch. But if the branch goes inward, it is not hard to find the tree to which all branches belong. Then the tree may think the neighboring tree is other. If the tree goes deeper, how hard can it be to find the earth that holds them both and nourishes them from the same subterranean stream! The earth too may imagine the stars, moon, and sun are separate. If only the earth could descend within, as the leaf did, it would know: the whole cosmos is one within.

There are only two ways of seeing. One begins with “you,” and one begins with “I.” The way that begins with “you” leads to the many. The way that begins with “I” leads to the One. The “you”-path cannot take you into the unmanifest, because you can only touch the other from the outside; you have no door into their depths. Within, you can enter only yourself.

Each of us has within a staircase descending to where the unmanifest still is. Not everything has been, or can ever be, manifested. The unmanifest is infinite; the nondual must be infinite, while the manifest is limited. The manifest has edges; the unmanifest has none. On the vast ocean, a single wave appears and takes on a boundary. The ocean remains boundless.

But if a wave looks at another wave, it will never reach the ocean through the other. There is no way to enter another wave from within. By entering your own depths, you enter all. Going into yourself is the first step; as soon as you enter yourself, you have entered the Whole.

And here is the delight: the one who goes into the other comes back feeling “I am,” and the one who goes into “I” finds, “I am not; only the Whole is.” Descending the stair of “I,” you discover that the “I” dissolves, and only the All remains.

Yet in life we begin from the other—the Other is our obsession. We set off leaving ourselves behind. Across lifetimes we neglect just one thing—ourselves. We add up everything, account for everything, and leave the one fact of our own being out of the ledger.

Wei Wu Wei wrote a book, The Tenth Man, beginning with an old Indian tale. Ten men cross a flooded river. Reaching the other bank, they fear one might have been swept away, so they count—as we all do. Trouble arises. They are ten, but every count comes to nine. First one counts, then another, then a third; each confirms only nine remain.

As with everyone’s life, each counts the others and leaves himself out. The count is nine. They sit under a tree and weep for the one “lost.” It isn’t even clear who is missing; doubt arises that maybe no one is. But arithmetic feels more authoritative than doubt, so they wail.

A fakir passes by and asks what happened. “One of our companions is lost,” they say. “Ten started out; now we count only nine.” They beat their chests and cry. The fakir glances and sees they are ten, but he understands worldly minds and their arithmetic.

He says, “Count again, but with one condition. I’ll slap each face. The one I slap will shout, ‘One!’ The next, ‘Two!’ and so on. I’ll slap you so you remember you are not to leave yourself out.”

To their amazement the count reaches ten. “What miracle did you perform?” they ask. “How did the count reach ten? We counted and always stopped at nine.”

The fakir replies, “There are two ways of counting in this world. One arithmetic begins with ‘you’; one begins with ‘I.’ The arithmetic that begins with ‘you’ can never take you to the unmanifest, because there is no entry into the other. The arithmetic that begins with ‘I’ leads into the unmanifest.

“Hence the supreme realization of religion is God; the preliminary step is the self. One begins with the self and culminates in the All.”

So begin counting from within. The unmanifest is present in you even now. You just don’t look. It is right at your feet—immediately at hand. Take two steps inward and it is there.

Who is breathing you? You? Try stopping it and you will see—you are not doing it. The breath will force its way and move. Blood flows twenty-four hours a day. You don’t run it. If it were your job, you’d have no time for anything else, and a minute’s forgetfulness would end it all. If man had to keep his breath going by effort, humanity would have vanished long ago. You sleep, pass out, get drunk—still the breath and blood continue.

You eat—but who digests? You? The greatest laboratories haven’t turned bread into blood. Scientists say that if someday we do, it will take a factory stretching for miles and hundreds of thousands of workers to do what a small human stomach does—and even then there’s no certainty. Who is running it? You?

One thing is certain: it is not you. Within you is the unmanifest, a hidden power beyond the boundary of your “I.”

You say, “I sleep.” Don’t fall into that illusion. Sleeping is not an act. The insomniac knows: turn as you will, try all tricks, sleep doesn’t come. When it comes, it is not because of your efforts; efforts only exhaust you, and then it happens. It comes from the unmanifest within. Psychologists have a glimpse of it; they call it the unconscious.

You cut your foot—instantly the wound fills with pus. Did you do anything? The whole body mobilizes. What you call pus is a living layer of sentinels that surround the wound to protect it from the world while the skin is broken. Inside, the unmanifest immediately begins repair.

Ordinary physicians think they heal. The extraordinary ones, who have gone deeper, say, “No. At most we cooperate a little—if that. Perhaps it’s truer that we remove a few obstacles; the healing force comes from within.” Psychologists now say that if the will to live disappears in a person, wounds won’t heal; medicine can’t cure. The unmanifest withdraws its consent. In the old, nothing fundamental has changed in the body; rather, the unmanifest begins to recede. The ebb has begun.

Peer within a little and you will see: where you live is only the crest of a vast energy. You know only the peak; behind it is the unmanifest. Behind every manifest event is the unmanifest. Behind the visible, the invisible; behind the conscious, the unconscious; behind form, the formless. Descend beneath the layer of form.

How to descend? What to do?

Forget the other. Difficult—close your eyes and still the other appears. We are obsessed with the other. The inner crowd is all “others.” Bid this crowd farewell.

The way is witnessing. With eyes closed, simply witness the reflections of others within. Just watch. Take no sides; be neither for nor against. Neither love nor hate. Invite no image and expel none. Sit and look, look, look. Slowly the images depart. Guests whom the host only looks at cannot stay long. Show friendliness—they linger; show hostility—they come again. Show nothing.

Buddha gave a key: upeksha—indifference, equanimity. Remain, showing nothing—no pro, no con. Slowly, the images of others scatter; thoughts dissolve.

And the moment there are no images of the other, for the first time the sense of your own being descends. In that very moment, suddenly you feel your presence—a spring breaks open, as if a stone that the other had placed over the source is removed and the waters burst forth. For the first time you experience your own presence, your own being—and the journey into the unmanifest begins. Beyond that, nothing needs to be done.

It is like jumping from a roof. If you ask, “I’ll jump, but what should I do to reach the ground?” we would say, “Do nothing; the ground will do the rest. Just step off; gravity is skilled. Its pull will bring you down.” In the same way, take one step away from the other; the unmanifest will draw you. Its gravitation is supreme; there is no greater pull. It will take you in. But we cling to the other so tightly that the door cannot open through which the unmanifest can call, pull, and drown you in itself.

Once you have dived into the unmanifest and returned, you will see in the other what you saw in yourself. You can know the other only to the extent that you know yourself. The day the eternal abyss of the unmanifest opens within you, from that day you begin to see the same unmanifest in every eye and every face. In leaf and flower and sky, its presence is everywhere.

But the first step of the journey is within. Call it indifference, witnessing, awareness—become conscious of the inner images of the other and do nothing. If you do anything, you grasp them; do nothing, and suddenly you will find the event has happened—you have descended into the unmanifest.

This is what Krishna is speaking of. It was before, it will be after, and it is even now—only covered by the manifest. Go beneath the surface layer of the manifest, and it is revealed.

If we drop the desire to live, the Unmanifest starts shrinking; or the Unmanifest starts shrinking, therefore we drop the desire to live—if these were two separate events, I could give you a definite answer. They are not two events; it is a simultaneous happening. The contraction of the Unmanifest and our letting go of the desire to live are one and the same event. Our dropping the desire to live and the Unmanifest’s contracting are also one and the same event. Because we are not separate from the Unmanifest—we are not other than it. It is one and the same thing.

Yes, there can be a difference in what we notice first. In existence they are one; in our knowing, the entry point can differ. One person may first notice that the desire to live in him is ebbing. Another may feel, “My desire hasn’t died, but something inside has begun to shrink.” Where the noticing begins will depend on the person.

If someone has lived continually in ego, his realization will take one form; if someone has lived continually in egolessness, his realization will take another. The realization depends on the presence of ego, not on the existence of the event. The event is one. It is not two. But we live in ego, so ordinarily when life begins to contract, when being begins to sink, it seems to us…

You hear old people say, “Now there is no wish to live. I don’t want to live anymore. Death itself would be good now.” Yet even now they are saying, “Now there is no wish to live,” as if until now they had been living out of their own will. Having tied everything to themselves, they will tie this to themselves too.

Our situation is almost like this. I have heard: the chariot procession of Jagannath was under way. Thousands were bowing to the chariot. A dog too got in front of the chariot. The dog’s strut was a sight to behold—for a good reason: everyone was bowing to him! Whoever came in front, fell at his feet. The dog’s arrogance kept growing. Then he looked back and saw that not only in front, even behind the chariot was moving. Naturally, if a dog is being so honored, the chariot must follow him. The chariot is following the dog! These people are bowing to the dog!

Our ego stands almost like that dog between the events of life and the chariot of the Unmanifest that moves behind. All salutations are taken as being for this “I”; all happenings from behind are taken as happening to this “I.” But who will explain this to the dog—and how?

It depends on how you have taken life. When hunger arose, did you think, “I am hungry,” or “Hunger is arising from the Unmanifest”? When you grew from child to youth, did you understand, “I have become young,” or “Youth is flowing in from the Unmanifest”?

It is a matter of interpretation, of how you explain. The event is as it is. But you cannot prevent the dog from interpreting in his own way. The chariot is moving; the bows are to the chariot. Yet you cannot stop the dog from interpreting, “They are bowing to me; the chariot moves for me!”

Whatever man interprets, everything becomes ego-centered from that. Otherwise, drop the ego, and then not two things remain—only one—because we too are part of the Unmanifest. If we were separate, there would be some other way; but we are a part of it. Whatever we are doing, the Unmanifest is doing. Whatever we are thinking, the Unmanifest is thinking. Whatever we are becoming, the Unmanifest is becoming.

The day this is seen, this question will not arise. For now it will, because it seems to us that we are doing something. That “we are doing something” is man’s interpretation. In that interpretation Arjuna is entangled, hence he suffers and is distressed. He says, “Shall I kill? Shall I cut them all down? No, they are mine; I won’t do it. Better I run away.” But it is that same one who will also run, who would also kill. He cannot let go of the doer; he cannot drop the interpretation centered on “I.”

If Krishna is saying anything, it is only this: the center from which you interpret—from the “I”—that center is false; it does not exist. You are dedicating everything to a center that isn’t there; therein lies your error.

But to us everything appears split in two. This breath comes in, then another goes out. These are not two breaths; it is one breath. Someone may ask, “Do I exhale first, therefore I must inhale? Or since I inhale, must I then exhale?” We will say, “In-breath and out-breath are the two swings of a single breath.” It is one breath; that same breath goes in and the same goes out.

In truth, even inside and outside are not two in the Unmanifest. Outside and inside—in the Unmanifest—are two ends of one thing. But where we live—in the manifested world, the expressed—where everything has become many, there all is different, separate. From that separateness all our questions rise.

A man came to Buddha, asking many questions. Buddha said, “Do you want answers to questions?” He replied, “Only answers.” Buddha asked, “How many have you asked?” He said, “I have tired myself out asking many; now I have come to you.” Buddha said, “After asking so many and not finding an answer, does it not occur to you that by asking, answers never come?” He said, “No, I didn’t think that. I only think: ask someone else again, ask someone else again.” Buddha asked, “How long will you go on asking? Shall I give you an answer the same way others did? Or do you want the true answer?” He said, “I want the true answer.”

Buddha said, “Then stop; for one year do not ask at all.” He said, “Without asking, how will I receive an answer?” Buddha said, “Drop the question. After a year, ask on that very day. For a year do not ask, do not think, do not speak. Be in silence.” He said, “What will that do?” Buddha replied, “Ask me exactly one year from today.” When Buddha said that, a monk sitting under a tree burst out laughing.

The man asked that monk, “Why are you laughing? What’s the matter?” The monk said, “If you want to ask, ask now—because we too were caught in this very device. We spent a year. After a year, one knows for oneself; nothing remains to ask. If you must ask, ask now; otherwise, you won’t be able to ask later. These Buddhas are great tricksters. I too was caught in the trick, and I later learned others were as well.” Buddha said, “I will stand by my word. If you ask after a year, I will answer.” A year passed. The same day returned. Buddha said, “Friend, stand and ask your question!” The man laughed and said, “Let it be. There is no substance in such talk.” But Buddha said, “It was my promise, so I remind you—lest later you say I deceived you.” He replied, “No, if you had answered that day, that would have been the deception. When I became silent, I saw that all my questions were constructions of thought—because thought had divided existence into fragments, while existence is indivisible. When I became thoughtless within, I saw all the questions were false—because they were raised by breaking the Whole.”

In that Unmanifest, in that Whole, all questions drop; in the manifest, questions arise. So either we keep asking—and life becomes philosophy—or we go within—and life becomes religion. And irreligion is not as opposed to religion as philosophy is. Because thought leads to more and more thought; and every thought keeps breaking things. In the end all things are broken; only questions remain; no answer.

Go within: there there is only One, not two; and where there are not two, there can be no question. For a question, at least two must be—at least.

That which was before—the Unmanifest; that which will remain—the Unmanifest—is right now as well. To enter it, to drown in it, is the path.

देही नित्यमवध्योऽयं देहे सर्वस्य भारत।
तस्मात्सर्वाणि भूतानि न त्वं शोचितुमर्हसि।। 30।।

O Bharata, even when the body is destroyed, this Self is never destroyed; therefore you should not grieve for these bodies.

स्वधर्मपि चावेक्ष्य न विकम्पितुमर्हसि।
धर्म्याद्धि युद्धाच्छ्रेयोऽन्यत्क्षत्रियस्य न विद्यते।। 31।।

Looking to your own svadharma, you should not waver; for a Kshatriya there is nothing more auspicious than a righteous war.

Krishna tells Arjuna: even if you leave aside everything else, you are a Kshatriya, and for a Kshatriya there is nothing noble in fleeing the battle.

This needs a little understanding, for several reasons.

First, in the past five hundred years the idea that “all humans are equal” has been so widely propagated that Krishna’s words may sound very strange—“You are a Kshatriya.” Before the birth of socialism, all over the earth, those who had known and reflected on life held a very different view: no two persons are the same. One.

Second, bound up with that inequality was another understanding: there are types of persons—distinct types. Broadly, in this land our seers divided into four types, the four varnas. The idea of varna has been severely denounced—not because there is no psychological truth behind it, but because those who upheld it proved terribly unintelligent. Those who today propagate it are extremely reactionary and unscientific. Bad company ruins good principles!

Hence today it becomes difficult when Krishna says, “You are a Kshatriya.” On the day it was said, this psychological truth was very clear. And as Western psychology matures, this truth is being re-established. Carl Gustav Jung has again divided man into four types; and if anyone in the West has penetrated the human mind deeply, it is Jung. He divided it again into four parts.

No, people are not of one type. Freud—the father of Western psychology—opposed socialism on psychological grounds. He said, “I’m no economist, but the more I understand the human mind, the more I say inequality is the fact; equality is a myth.” Equality is not; cannot be—because individuals are fundamentally very different.

If we sketch these differences in broad strokes, by Krishna’s time this country had evolved a very profound psychological understanding and recognized four varnas. Wherever humans have been divided, it has never been into less than four, nor more than four—here and elsewhere. Some reason is seen—some natural fact behind it.

• Brahmin: one whose entire vital energy is dedicated to the intellect. All his energy is transformed into understanding; his life’s quest is for truth. If he doesn’t get love—fine; wealth—fine; status—fine. But for “What is truth?” he can sacrifice all. Office, wealth, pleasure—he can lose all. A single longing burns in him: how to know? This is the Brahmin.

Today, Western scientists are Brahmins. Einstein should be called a Brahmin, Pasteur a Brahmin. In the West, those who have offered themselves in the quest for scientific truth these past three centuries—call them Brahmins.

• Kshatriya: for him, knowledge is not the source of aspiration; power is. There are people whose whole life is a search for power. Nietzsche wrote The Will to Power. He said, “Those who are the real salt among men are all eager for power, worshipers of power.” Hence Nietzsche said, “I have heard the finest music, but when I see soldiers’ feet marching in step and their bayonets glinting in the light, I have never heard music so beautiful.”

To a Brahmin this man will seem mad. Music in a gleaming blade? Music in the thud of marching feet? Music lies in contemplation, in sitting under the sky by a tree, pondering the stars. Music lies in music, in poetry. Music lies in the search for truth. This Nietzsche is mad!

But Nietzsche speaks aptly for one class. For some, the stars mean nothing. There is only one resolve: how to rise to the highest peak of power and energy! We called such a one Kshatriya.

Krishna knows Arjuna well. He is of the Kshatriya type. Right now he is talking like a Brahmin. He will get confused; he will get into trouble. His entire structure, the anatomy of his mind, is Kshatriya. The sword is his soul; it is his radiance, his music. If God’s glimpse is to come to him, it will come from the sword’s flash. There is no other way for him.

Thus Krishna says, “You are a Kshatriya. Even if you drop all other arguments, I tell you this: as a Kshatriya, if you go here and there, you will only become mean and self-reproachful, a sinner against yourself.”

And note this: the greatest crime in the world is the crime against oneself. Because one who becomes a criminal against himself becomes a criminal against all. Only those do not wrong others who do not wrong themselves. In Krishna’s language, the greatest crime against oneself is to fall away from one’s intrinsic note—from one’s original swara of life.

• The third type: for whom the sword holds nothing but fear; music, never—only fear. For whom the quest of knowledge appears folly—a thing of crackpots. For this type, wealth is glory, wealth is everything. Around wealth all his life is arranged. Even if such a man speaks of liberation, he will see it in terms of wealth. If he contemplates God, he cannot but make him Lakshmi-Narayana. He is not at fault; it is just a fact. Such it is. And if such a person hides himself, he will suffer. If he suppresses himself, he will be in trouble. For him, the door to the ultimate is likely to open through the search for wealth, not elsewhere.

A Rockefeller, a Morgan, a Tata—these are not small people. There is no reason to call them small. In their class, they are as eminent as a Yajnavalkya, a Patanjali, or an Arjuna in theirs. There is no comparison.

The idea of varna is not comparative; it is factual. The day it became comparative—who is higher, who lower—its scientific basis was lost and it became social iniquity. The day hierarchy entered—Kshatriya above, Brahmin above, Vaishya above, Shudra above; who below; who behind—the day varna was exploited and made the foundation of social oppression, from that day the notion became abuse.

Any principle can be abused. Varna was abused. And now those who defend it here support not its scientific basis, but the oppressive structure erected on it. Because of them they will sink, and a very scientific insight may sink with them.

• A fourth type: to whom wealth is of no use, power meaningless, knowledge no attraction, but whose life at its depth revolves around service. If he can dedicate himself somewhere and serve someone, he can attain fulfillment.

These four types are neither lower nor higher. They are four broad divisions. Krishna’s entire psychology rests on this: each person’s path to the Divine goes through his svadharma. Svadharma does not mean Hindu, nor Muslim, nor Jain; it means the person’s varna—his type. And varna has no intrinsic relation with birth.

But that relation was constructed, for many reasons—scientific reasons. There was no link by birth, hence there was fluidity; a Vishwamitra could journey from here to there. One could move from one varna to another. But as the insight became established that each person can attain truth only through his own varna, his own svadharma, a pressing question arose: how to know a person’s varna? If not set by birth, a man might spend a lifetime and never discover what he is inclined toward—what he was born to be. How then to make it easy? Perhaps by fixing it by birth.

But how to fix it by birth? If someone is born in someone’s house, is it decided? Born in a Brahmin’s house—he becomes Brahmin?

Not necessary. But likely. The probability is higher. To increase that probability, many experiments were done. The greatest experiment was to give a Brahmin a defined way of life—a discipline—so that the soul choosing that womb would clearly know whether it matches its type.

That is why, as I said the other day, it was not out of fear of “varna-mixing” that intermarriage was avoided—for out of mixing very evolved personalities can be born—but for another reason: we wanted to give each varna a clear form, a clear mold, so that souls choosing their new birth would have a simple arrangement. Still, mistakes happened. In such a vast society, even scientific experiments bring errors. Then sometimes…

A father and mother whose life was devoted to knowledge—surely the womb they form will be most suitable for a knowledge-seeking soul. Hence it is very probable that a Brahmin type is born in a Brahmin home. Probability, not certainty. Errors can happen. There was fluidity to correct them; one could shift a little.

This stratification into four parts—later it got filled with notions of higher and lower. In the beginning it was a deeply scientific, psychological experiment, to help a person recognize his fundamental passion, his core longing—because only through that longing can he travel to desirelessness.

Krishna tells Arjuna, “You are a Kshatriya. Even if you drop all else, I tell you, do not flee the battle. Fight. You can fight. Your entire personality is that of a warrior. You cannot sit with a book in hand. You may hold a book, but it will not reach your soul. If you start serving, massaging people’s feet, your hands will go on pressing—but your soul will not be there. If you set out to accumulate money, you will pile up rupees, but they will be valueless to you.”

Value does not lie in money; it lies in a person’s varna. Money draws value from that. In a Vaishya’s hands, money has value. In a Kshatriya’s hands, its value is only that he can buy a sword—no more. There is no intrinsic value in money in a Kshatriya’s hands; yes, an external value: he can buy a sword.

In a Brahmin’s hands money means nothing; it is a potsherd. Hence a Brahmin will call money a potsherd. A Vaishya can never understand what that means. He sees that nothing moves in this world—money moves everything.

Thus, every social order that has arisen has been a transformation of varna-based arrangements. Nowhere yet has a Brahminical order prevailed. Perhaps it may in the future. Today in the West, intelligent people are speaking of meritocracy; it may come that the world is run by Brahmins. Scientists may become so influential in fifty years that politicians will have to make way. Even now they are very influential. Even now the outcome of a great war depends on a scientist.

If Einstein had stayed in Germany, victory would have been different. He was in America, and the result changed. If Hitler rues any mistake now in hell, it is only this—that he let the Jew escape. To hinge such decisions on one man…

Knowledge is becoming decisive. Kshatriyas have ruled the world. Vaishyas rule today in America. Shudras rule today in Russia and China. Shudra means the proletariat, those who have served—but after serving long, they say, “Move aside; now we want to own.”

But rule may also come into Brahmin’s hands. The possibility grows. For as long as Kshatriyas ruled, nothing happened but swordplay. In America, since the Vaishyas’ money power rose, nothing remained worthy of consideration but money. And since the proletariat, the servant, the laborer has held power, he is bent on destroying whatever excellence the aristocracy created.

In China what they call a cultural revolution is not a cultural revolution but a cultural murder. Whatever culture created in China, they are bent on destroying. Buddha’s statues are broken, temples torn down! Viharas, mosques, gurudwaras are razed. Precious paintings—“bourgeois”—are burnt.

When Krishna tells Arjuna this, he is saying something very psychological. He says, “You cannot be otherwise.” And this too needs understanding: why not? If Arjuna wishes, why can he not be a Brahmin? If Buddha, born in a Kshatriya home, can become a Brahmin—and none became more Brahmin than he—if Mahavira, born Kshatriya, can become Brahmin—and none more Brahmin than he—twenty-four Tirthankaras of the Jains were Kshatriyas, yet did no Kshatriya work; they took the purest Brahmin path—then why does Krishna insist that Arjuna can only be Kshatriya? If Buddha can, Mahavira can, Parshva can, Neminath can—Neminath was Krishna’s cousin—then why can’t Arjuna? A few things need to be understood.

Psychology today says that by age three a person learns fifty percent of all he will learn in life. The remaining fifty he learns in the rest of his life. And what he has learned by three is nearly impossible to change; what he learns later can be changed. By three, the inner mind is almost mature.

If Buddha and Mahavira, born in Kshatriya homes, took the Brahmin path, their signs were clear from early childhood. Buddha, in a contest of shooting a deer, refused to aim. Arjuna never did that. He has been aiming all along; his entire journey has been Kshatriya. Today, suddenly, in a moment, he says “No.” The structure he has, is not such as can be changed now. All his training, education, conditioning have been meticulously for a Kshatriya. He cannot flee.

Krishna tells him, “What you are talking of leaving is no way; it is difficult. Know you are a Kshatriya. Your remaining journey can be completed with Kshatriya glory—or you can fall into disgrace and nothing else.” He says, “Either you can attain fame through the Kshatriya path, or you will fall only into infamy.”

यदृच्छया चोपपन्नं स्वर्गद्वारमपावृतम्‌।
सुखिनः क्षत्रियाः पार्थ लभन्ते युद्धमीदृशम्‌।। 32।।

O Partha, the gate of heaven has opened of itself—such a war comes to blessed Kshatriyas who desire the joys of heaven.

Here too Krishna reminds him of a Kshatriya’s blessedness. What is blissful for a Kshatriya? What brings fulfillment? Where does he become aptakami, content? War is his opportunity. There he is on the touchstone; there is the challenge, the struggle, the chance to be tested—the trial by fire of his being Kshatriya. Krishna says it is like standing at the gates of heaven and hell with the choice in your hands: enter the battle and accept the challenge—heaven’s glory is yours; flee, turn your back—hell’s disgrace is yours. Here heaven and hell do not indicate geography. A Kshatriya’s heaven is this…

I have heard: two Rajputs came to Akbar’s court. Young, with first lines of moustache. They said, “We are two brave men, present for service. Any task?” Akbar asked, “If you are brave, what proof?” They looked at each other and smiled. Their swords flashed out. Akbar cried, “What are you doing?” Before he could finish, blades flashed and in a moment fountains of blood rose; each had plunged his sword into the other’s chest. Their faces were bathed in blood—and they were laughing. “Is that proof enough?” Because a Kshatriya can give only one proof: that death can be received with a smile. What certificate can one produce?

Akbar was shaken; he writes he had never been so shaken. He called Man Singh: “What is this? I only asked casually!” Man Singh said, “Do not ask a Kshatriya like that again. We carry life on our palms. Kshatriya means that death is not worth a moment’s thought.” Akbar recorded, “What amazed me was that even as they died they were radiant; there was a smile on their faces.” Man Singh said, “For a Kshatriya, what could be has happened. The flower has bloomed. Fulfilled! No one can now say ‘not a Kshatriya.’ The matter is closed.”

Krishna tells Arjuna: standing before the open gates of heaven and hell—that is the Kshatriya’s moment in war. Your entire preparation, your longing and prayer—what you desired is now to be fulfilled. And at the very moment you speak of running away! With your own hand you choose hell!

A Kshatriya’s identity is recognized where he wagers life as if life were nothing. For this his whole preparation is. This is his thirst. If he misses this moment, the sword will forever lose its edge; it will rust, and only tears will remain.

There is an opportunity for everything: for the knower, for the seeker of wealth, for the servant of service. He who misses the opportunity repents. And when the final opportunity for the personality to flower comes—as before Arjuna, which may not come again—Krishna says rightly: you stand at the gates of heaven and hell; the choice is in your hand. Remember who you are! Remember what you have wanted! Remember for what you have prepared, dawn to dusk, dusk to dawn! Now the moment of the sword’s flash has come and you wish to stain it with rust?

अथ चेत्त्वमिमं धर्म्यं संग्रामं न करिष्यसि।
ततः स्वधर्मं कीर्तिं च हित्वा पापमवाप्स्यसि।। 33।।

If you do not wage this righteous battle, then, abandoning your svadharma and fame, you will incur sin.

अकीर्तिं चापि भूतानि कथयिष्यन्ति तेऽव्ययाम्‌।
संभावितस्य चाकीर्तिर्मरणादतिरिच्यते।। 34।।

भयाद्रणादुपरतं मंस्यन्ते त्वां महारथाः।
येषां च त्वं बहुमतो भूत्वा यास्यसि लाघवम्‌।। 35।।

All people will talk for long of your infamy, and for a man of honor, infamy is worse than death. The great chariot-warriors will think you withdrew from battle out of fear. Those who held you in high esteem will belittle you.

Fearlessness is the Kshatriya’s soul. No fear should seize his mind; no storm of fear should shake him. Whatever the fear—even death—within there should be no ripple. Let me tell a small story.

I have heard: in China there was a great archer. He went to the emperor and said, “No one can defeat me now. I want to announce in the realm: if there is any competitor, I am ready. And if there is none—or if any compete, I am here for contest. And I want that if there is no competitor, or if he loses, I be accepted as the foremost archer of the land.” The emperor said, “Before we talk, go meet my guard.” The guard said, “You are great, but I know someone; go spend some days with him—lest you invite disgrace.”

Seeking that man, the archer reached the forest. Staying with him, he found he knew nothing!

He learned with him for three years—everything. Then he thought, “I’ve learned all; still how can I face the king, for my teacher at least knows more than I—or as much. Better I kill him and go.”

Often Masters are killed by their disciples—often. It follows a law.

Morning, the Master had gone to gather wood; the disciple hid behind a tree and shot from afar. The Master came with a bundle; instantly all overturned. The Master saw the arrow, picked a stick from his bundle, struck the arrow—it turned back and pierced the young man’s chest.

The Master pulled it out and said, “I had kept just this much in reserve. A Master must keep a little in reserve from his disciples. But you—needlessly! You could have told me. I would not come to the town. To compete with my own disciple? Are you mad? Go, make your proclamation. Consider me dead. I will teach no one for your sake. I will not come to compete with you. Go—but before you go, remember my Master still lives. I know nothing. I only picked up a few pebbles in ten years with him. Go, have his darshan once.”

The man trembled. The ambitious have no patience. Three years wasted with this one! Yet he could not go without seeing that man. He climbed to the high peaks searching. The Master had said, “He is very old, bent at the waist—you will recognize him.” When he reached, he saw an extremely old man, perhaps past a hundred, bent, almost round. He thought, “This man!”

He asked, “Are you the archer I was sent to?” The old man lifted his eyelids—lashes grown so long he barely opened his eyes—and said, “Yes. What do you want?” He said, “I too am an archer.”

The old man laughed. “You still carry bow and arrows? How are you an archer? When a man becomes perfect in an art, he does not carry this useless burden. When a veena-player becomes perfect, he breaks the veena, for it becomes a hindrance on the path of pure music. When an archer is complete, why the bow and arrows? They were only for practice.”

The man shook. “Only practice? Then what further archery is there?” The old man said, “Come with me.” He led him to the cliff’s edge where a thousand-foot drop yawned.

The old man moved forward; the archer stayed back. The old man advanced till his toes peeped over the rock, his bent neck hanging over the chasm. “Son, come closer; why stop so far?” He said, “But I am terrified. How can you stand there? My eyes cannot trust it; a slight slip of breath…”

The old man said, “If your mind still trembles so, your aim cannot be infallible. Where there is fear, a Kshatriya is never born.” Where fear is, the archer cannot be born. If there is fear, there will be ripples in the mind—however subtle.

Krishna says to Arjuna, “You—and afraid? Those who honored you yesterday, who sang of your glory, who looked to you as a living symbol of the Kshatriya—they will laugh. Your infamy will be spoken; your fame stained. What are you doing? This is your own dharma; you cannot live against it. If you fall from the peak of honor, you will not be able to breathe.”

Krishna is right. Arjuna cannot live like that. A Kshatriya can die with glory, but cannot live by fleeing. That possibility does not exist in a Kshatriya. Krishna says, “Opposing your possibility, you will regret; you will lose all.”

On this, let me end with two or three points—keep them in mind lest grave confusion arise. One may think Krishna is war-mongering! Such incitement to war! It would be a mistake to think so.

Krishna is only a psychologist. He understands Arjuna’s potential—what he can be—and how he can be fulfilled—and that if he misses it, he will forever attain sorrow and despair and become self-destructive.

The deepest question before psychology today is this: can we tell each child his potential—what he can be? Everything is topsy-turvy.

Tagore’s father did not want him to become a poet. No father would. I have heard: at Nirala’s home there was a small gathering one night—Sumitranandan Pant, Mahadevi, Maithili Sharan Gupt, and others. Gupt had come after long. As was his habit, he asked the cook, “All well?” The cook said, “All well, Maharaj, but my boy—please fix him somehow—he is ruining himself.” Gupt asked, “What happened—has he turned thug, thief?” He said, “No, no—my boy has become a poet.”

What these poets have suffered, who knows.

Tagore’s father too did not want the boy to be a poet. They tried—taught, trained; the whole family pushed hard—be an engineer, a doctor, a professor—be something useful.

In Jorasanko House they kept a register. It was a large family—many children—about a hundred members. On each child’s birthday, elders would write prophecies about the child. For all of Tagore’s siblings, many good things were written. For Tagore, no one wrote anything good. His own mother wrote, “We have no hopes from Rabi.” Other boys shone—one came first; one brought a gold medal; one sparkled at the university. This boy had no shine at all.

But today you cannot even name those shiny brothers; they vanished.

Psychology says the world seems so unhappy because of displacement. Everyone is not becoming what he could be. He is put somewhere else. A cobbler has become prime minister; the one who should be prime minister is selling shoes. Everything is haphazard. No one even knows what he could be. It’s all accidental, as if by chance. The father is obsessed that the boy must be an engineer—so he must. What has the boy to do with the father’s obsession? If it was to be, the father should have become one. But he insists; then what can he do—he himself knows nothing.

Hence psychologists today are eager: the search for each child’s potential is the path for humanity.

Krishna is not talking war; do not mistake this—even by accident. That breeds grave confusion. Krishna speaks specifically to Arjuna’s type, to his possibility. This is not for everyone. Not for all.

But such understanding is lost. Mahavira spoke of nonviolence—it is meaningful for some; if the whole nation adopts it, it is dangerous. Krishna spoke of violence—it is meaningful for Arjuna and for some; if the whole nation adopts it, it is dangerous.

The mistake we habitually make is to generalize each truth—to make it a universal rule. No truth in the manifest world is a general rule. Leave aside the Unmanifest—even in the manifest, all truths are conditional, with qualifiers.

Keep in mind throughout: this is said to Arjuna—a potential Kshatriya, whose life has no other note and can have none. Krishna is after him with a stick, “Be what you can be.” He is running, evading, fearing, seeking twenty-five arguments.

Krishna is no war-monger. He is speaking to Arjuna. And do not, even by mistake, assume that what is true for Arjuna is true for all.

Yes, one thing here is generalizable: each person’s possibility is his truth. If any single conclusion is to be drawn, it is this: one’s own inherent potential alone is one’s path.

If Mahavira reads the Gita, he will remain Mahavira, not become Arjuna. He will see: my potential is my journey. If Buddha reads it, he will say, “Exactly; I go my way, the way I can be.”

Each must go on his own journey—what he can be. Each must discover in the manifest what his possibility is. The Gita’s message is only this—not war-mongering. But confusion has arisen reading it. The war-lover says, “Exactly; there should be war.” The non-war-lover says, “Totally wrong—he is preaching war!”

Krishna has nothing to do with war. You may find it difficult when I say this, but I repeat: Krishna has nothing to do with war. He states a psychological truth. He tells Arjuna: “This is your map, your built-in process. This you can be. In striving to be otherwise there is nothing but infamy, failure, self-destruction.”

We will speak further tomorrow morning.