Swami Divyakripananda
Arjuna had come all prepared for the battle of Kurukshetra. For long, his blood had been boiling at the thought of the atrocities committed against his family. Now time and tide were both looking favourable for taking revenge on those who had sided with unrighteous ways of life. During the many years they had spent in exile, every moment had felt excruciating, like an arrow stuck in the heart. The planning and preparation for the war had been going on for a long time, and it had culminated in having Arjuna’s best friend, philosopher, and guide by his side throughout the war.
Thus far, Arjuna had flowed with the current. He did not have to take any crucial decisions in his life, including his marriage. He was third in seniority among the five Pandava brothers. Most of the important aspects of his life were decided by either his mother or his elder brothers. He was thus saved from the disadvantages of both—being the eldest or being the youngest. The eldest bear the brunt of responsibility towards the family; they are weighed against high expectations and judged by a yardstick of excellence in everything. The youngest are pampered to the extent that they are systematically spoiled and sometimes end up being good for nothing. Being in the middle, Arjuna was neither burdened with the responsibility of decision-making nor spoiled by excessive indulgence from his elders. Probably, as a consequence of such a situation, he had an element of residual childishness carried forward into his adulthood.
Many a time we find such examples around us. Some people do not grow up till they are yoked with some compulsive responsibility and awakened to the harsh realities of life. Then their survival instincts are activated. It is most likely the law of nature that makes this happen. Siddhartha Gautama was completely away from the miseries of the world, unaware of them, until his horseman showed him the reality of this merciless life, where disease, old age, and death are always on the prowl. Narendra, who later became Swami Vivekananda, was also a happy-go-lucky boy until his father died of a sudden heart attack and his family lost all their wealth overnight. Thus, the best within us is sometimes overshadowed by our naivety.
The Kauravas, on the other hand, were victims of entitlement. When someone is an heir to a great legacy and did not have to sweat and toil to achieve the status that came naturally, it is more likely that he will succumb to arrogance and complacency. Entitlement is a responsibility, not a privilege, and this wisdom comes only through sacrifice, about which the Kauravas knew nothing. Human beings are built on the premise that they must act, choose, suffer, experience, and evolve. They are not made to be like machines, eternally the same. Machines, being purely made of matter, have no choice but to undergo the same predesigned processes and functions, whereas humans are born to cut through the intricate web of ever-changing appearances and open themselves to eternal Reality. In that sense, this Kurukshetra war can be depicted as a struggle for existence between spirit and matter, between those forces that want to evolve and those who resist evolution. In contemporary times, we can find an analogous struggle in the tug of war between the orthodox or reflective and the progressive or liberal forces.
Animals can also be equated with machines in the sense that they act purely on instinct, compulsively following the laws of nature and acting without considering the consequences. Humans, in their initial stages of development, are like animals who do not know how to navigate their free will. In fact, what they call freedom is a grosser, slavish form of ‘free will’. In this state, they are unable to understand that their actions produce good or bad outcomes and, consequently, they will have to endure the results of those actions, whether willingly or unwillingly. The Kauravas can be said to have exhibited such tendencies.
Humans in their evolved state are more careful about their intent, which makes them act with full awareness of future consequences. The Pandavas, especially Arjuna, were stuck at the crossroads of possibilities. He was a thinking being who would not want to do anything compulsively. The reality of war between his kith and kin had suddenly forced him to relinquish his past naiveties—as he had depended on his mother and elder brother for all major decisions of his life. But this life and death situation forced him to consider the fundamental outcome of this catastrophic faceoff, in which he wanted to decide for himself the future course of his life, taking the whole responsibility on his own shoulders. Here, Arjuna stands apart from the other warriors in that he was fully equipped for war but was not convinced about the outcome of the ‘eye for an eye’ and ‘tooth for a tooth’ philosophy.
Most of the time, what we think of as righteousness outwardly is, in fact, the contrary. But here, Arjuna, out of delusion, devised a convenient philosophy to justify his magnanimity in allowing the Kauravas to have the entire kingdom while he himself was willing to remain a recluse. Arjuna was not a cunning warrior. His bravery defied cunningness in all its forms. However, he appeared to be swayed by weak emotions and attachments to his near and distant relations, who were ready to shed each other’s blood. Despite being a man of intelligence, dignity, and prowess, when he became weak emotionally, his weaknesses apparently activated his survival mechanism and presented a number of excuses before him. There may also be an element in his behaviour of seeking a litmus test for the validity of this war.
We often endlessly try to douse quarrels by surrendering ourselves and accepting defeat to avoid greater conflicts and violence. We may take pride in doing so, thinking we have mitigated a possible disaster. The Pandavas had tried all this. But that was just postponing a disaster rather than averting it, which made them feel like cowards. Arjuna’s mind presented myriad shades of grey. Fortunately, he had someone right before him who could segregate everything into black and white.
The narrative of the Bhagavadgita starts with graphic details of the battleground. It eulogises the various warriors and commanding officers from both the armies. This may lead us to think that the objective of this great ‘scripture of mankind’ was to instigate us to fight. To understand this better, let us first consider that the two extremes—the superconscious state of Samadhi and the unconscious state of death—always appear similar outwardly. The peace that we generally talk about is a peace of inactivity, tamas, dullness, and death. The so-called peaceful regions in the world have often been the least developed, both secularly and spiritually. The ultimate peace lies only in the realisation of Oneness. Peace in any other form cannot be everlasting. The path to peace goes through a dense forest of volatile action. All those propagating the message of ‘peace’ around the world must introspect and determine if they are, in fact, the messengers of dullness and darkness.
Humankind is at the mid-steps of the ladder of progression or evolution. At the top is the perfected supreme Soul, and at the bottom is the single-celled amoeba. We are sitting on a fence, one side of which represents all goodness and auspiciousness, while the other side represents all cruelty and selfishness. Being in the middle of evolution, we are empowered to make our own choices, determining whether we will climb up the ladder or fall down. The battlefield of Kurukshetra provided a decisive moment for all the ‘action heroes’ present to make this choice for themselves—whether to fight for the holistic progress of humanity or for egoistic progress of a particular person, family, or clan.
This Kurukshetra was not only a battlefield but also a holy place, a Dharmakshetra, where many penances and pious actions had been performed before. Now, it was turning into a court of judgement as well. Here, the verdict would be pronounced on who was on the side of dharma and who was on the side of adharma. If Arjuna had not suffered the mental trauma mentioned earlier, the event might have ended without delving into the subtleties of Dharma. Thanks to Arjuna and his dilemma, we come face to face with decisive factors of our thoughts and actions that might otherwise remain obscure to us, and that contribute to the cycle of birth, death, disease, and sufferings.
Arjuna was a professional warrior seeking his legitimate right to survive as a dignified human with the resources necessary for his family’s existence. Now, he had to accept the conflict imposed upon him by his oppressors, his Kaurava cousins, and face them in war. By dint of the fact that Arjuna was also a humble, truthful, virtuous, and kind human being responsible to his family and society, he experienced complex emotions while confronting the obviously disastrous war. This combination makes the situation in which the Bhagavadgita was set up much more relevant to us, as we often find ourselves in circumstances that, though not as intense as Arjuna’s, are similar in character. We may not be warriors by profession, but in our own places of living and working, we are likely to face an inner battle similar to that of Kurukshetra, between our current state and the ideal we are striving to reach. In that sense, the guidance of Sri Krishna for Arjuna may greatly benefit us if we understand it in the proper context with an unbiased mind.
An inspiration is often hidden behind a calamity. Arjuna’s predicament, vishada, acts as a springboard to enter the realm of Yoga—a union between the soul and God, a journey from imperfections to supreme Perfection. The Kauravas were not so confident and spirited, as they were unjust and unrighteous, and their hearts were filled with fear and devoid of morals. Their egos, especially that of Duryodhana, were bloated, which made them lack the necessary humility to approach the great acharyas present on the battlefield and consult them. Arjuna, on the contrary, unhesitatingly opens up to Sri Krishna about his great dilemma and seeks his guidance with utmost faith and surrender. This act opens the door to the yoga of action, knowledge, devotion, and so on, ultimately resolving Arjuna’s dilemma and making the Bhagavadgita the scripture of mankind.