When Arjuna had picked himself a little bit, the Lord rebuked him and said, 'How is
it that this delusion has come to you? It is unworthy of a warrior like you.'
But even then Arjuna stuck to his first position, refused to fight and said, 'If
in order to get it, I have to slay elders and other relations, I do not want not
only a kingdom on this earth but even the delights of paradise. My mind gropes
in darkness. I do not know where my duty lies. I put myself into your hands.
Please guide me.'
Finding that Arjuna was bewildered and aspired after knowledge, Krishna had pity on him
and proceeded to explain things to him: 'Your sorrow is for nothing, and you
utter words about wisdom without understanding. You have evidently forgotten the
distinction between the body and the embodied soul. The soul never dies; but the
body passes through childhood, youth and age and perishes in the end. The body
is born but the soul is birthless and unchanging. It ever was, is now and will
be there for all time to come. For whom then do you grieve? Your grief arises
from a delusion. You look upon these Kauravas as your own, but you are aware
that their bodies will come to an end. And as for the souls which inhabit these
bodies, no one can destroy them. The soul cannot be wounded by weapons, burned
by fire, dried by the wind or drowned in water. Then again, consider this from
the standpoint of your duty as a warrior with an army under his command. If you
refuse to fight this righteous war, the consequences will be the very reverse of
what you expect and you will become an object of ridicule. You have always
enjoyed the reputation of being a brave man. But if now you withdraw from the
battle you will be supposed to have been driven from it by fear. If it were part
of your duty to flee in the face of danger, disgrace would not matter, but if
you retire from battle now, you will have failed to discharge your duty, and
people will be justified in condemning your flight.
'Thus far, I have tried to reason out things, draw a distinction between the body and
the soul and remind you of your duty, as a warrior. But let me now explain
Karmayoga (the method of action). A practitioner of Karmayoga never comes to
harm. It has nothing to do with chopping logic. It is something to be translated
into action and experience. An ounce of practice is more profitable than tons of
argumentation. And this practice too must not be vitiated by speculation about
its fruit. Literalists perform Vedic rites directed to the acquisition of
material rewards. If one rite does not yield the expected fruit, they have
recourse to another, and being disappointed once more, they take up a third. And
thus they suffer from utter mental confusion. As a matter of fact, it is up to
us to do our duty without wasting a single thought on the fruits of our action.
To fight is the duty you have to discharge at present. Gain or loss, defeat or
victory, is not in your power. Why should you carry the needless burden of
thinking about them and be like the dog who walks under a cart and imagines that
it is being drawn by himself and not by the bullocks? Defeat and victory, heat
and cold, pleasure and pain come to a man in turn and he must put up with them.
Without worrying about the fruit of action, a man must devote himself to the
performance of his duty with an evenness of temper. This is yoga, or skill in
action. The success of an act lies in performing it, and not in its result,
whatever it is. Therefore be calm and do your duty clear of consequences.'
On hearing all this Arjuna said, 'The course of conduct you have mapped for me
seems to be beyond my capacity. Not to worry about defeat or victory, not to
waste a thought on the result, how can one attain such an evenness of temper and
steadfastness in spirit? How does a man with such attainments behave, and how
are we to recognize him?'
The Lord replied, 'O king, one who renounces all the cravings which torment the heart and
derives his contentment from within himself is said to be a sthitaprajna
or samadhistha (one stable in spirit). He is unruffled in adversity, and
he does not hanker after happiness. Pleasure and pain are felt through the five
senses. Therefore this wise man draws his senses away from sense objects even as
a tortoise draws in his limbs. The tortoise withdraws into his shell when he
apprehends danger. But in the case of human beings sense objects are ready to
attack the senses at all times; therefore their senses must always be drawn in,
and they should be ever ready to fight against sense objects. This is the real
battle. Some people resort to self- mortification and fasting as weapons of
defence against sense objects. These measures have their limited use. The senses
do not make for sense objects so long as a man is fasting, but fasting alone
does not destroy his relish for them. On the other hand that relish may be
heightened when the fast is broken, and a man can get rid of it only with the
grace of God. The senses are so powerful that they drag a man behind them by
force if he is not on his guard. Therefore a man must always keep them under
control. This end he can achieve only if he turns his eyes inward, realizes God
Who resides in his heart and devoted to Him. One who thus looks upon Me as His
goal and surrenders his all to Me, keeping his senses in control, is a yogi
stable in spirit. On the other hand if a man is not master of his senses, he is
always musing on the objects of sense and conceives an attachment for them, so
that he can hardly think of anything else. From this attachment arises desire;
and when the desire is thwarted he gets angry. Anger drives him nearly mad. He
cannot understand what he is about. He thus loses his memory, behaves in a
disorderly manner and comes to an ignoble end. When a man's senses rove at will,
he is like a rudderless ship which is at the mercy of the gale and is broken to
pieces on the rocks. Men should therefore abandon all desires and restrain their
senses, so that these do not indulge in undesirable activity. The eyes then will
look straight and that too only at holy objects; the ears will listen to hymns
in praise of God or to cries of distress; hands and feet will be engaged in
service. Indeed all the organs of sense and of action will be employed in
helping a man to do his duty and making him a fit recipient of the grace of God.
And once the grace of God has descended upon him, all his sorrows are at an end.
As snow melts in the sunshine, all pain vanishes when the grace of God shines
upon him and he is said to be stable in spirit. But if a man is not
stable-minded, how can he think good thoughts ? Without good thoughts there is
no peace, and without peace there is no happiness. Where a stable-minded man
sees things clear as daylight, the unstable man distracted by the turmoil of the
world is as good as blind. On the other hand what is pure in the eyes of the
worldly wise looks unclean to and repels the stable-minded man. Rivers
continuously flow into the sea, but the sea remains unmoved; in the same way all
sense objects come to the yogi, but he always remains calm like the sea. Thus
one who abandons all desires, is free from pride and selfishness and behaves as
one apart, finds peace. This is the condition of a perfect man of God, and he
who is established therein even at the final hour is saved (lit set free,
mukta).'