Nirdvandvatā – the path of harmony and integration
What Krishna states now is extremely spiritual, philosophical and yogic. It clearly reveals how Krishna’s discussion, no matter what subject he takes up, is underscored and climaxed by spiritual vision and philosophical sublimity at every stage.
The Soul, which is the centre of one’s being and the universe, should be made one’s basic vision and ultimate strength in life. This means that the Soul-perception should be infused into the analysis of life and its activities with practical relevance and insight. Herein lies the effectiveness of spiritual wisdom and its pursuit. Krishna excels in ensuring this:
Whatever action, proper or improper, man begins to perform through his body, speech and mind, these five are its causes.
Like so many other absolute dicta on karma, this too is a summary statement. Any activity one performs by thought, word or deed, whether proper or improper, is governed by the five factors Krishna has pointed out. Human activity can only be bodily, oral or mental (including intellectual). Naturally, Krishna’s enunciation includes the whole range of human activities – religious or secular.
Since in all actions our body, speech and mind are employed, there is the need as well as freedom to think, plan and design our efforts in all matters. At the same time, it has to be understood that the result of all our planned actions will not fully be in our hands. The fifth factor has its place in everything. And, therefore, a measure of unpredictability will be there.
Krishna says that both righteous and unrighteous acts will be governed by the five constituents. Simply because an action is righteous, it cannot claim an absolute fruition. Even the best of the humans may fail in their views and judgement. There will always be elements that defy human conception. Should not this fact be considered?
The play of the Providential factor will be there in the case of all activities, no matter whether they are right, proper and benevolent. Even the best of surgeries performed by the most knowledgeable and skillful doctors sometimes prove fatal. Is it always because the surgeon’s intention or the need of the operation was not in place?
What about the pitiable death of Abhimanyu, whom the most righteous Yudhiṣṭhira asked to penetrate into the enemy’s battle-line, in spite of the fact that the young warrior warned that he did not know the art of exiting from that special formation? What does this mean? Krishna’s pronouncement on this matter is quite significant and should be remembered with all care and attention. That is why Krishna says ‘proper actions’ (nyāyyam vā) also are equally under the fifth factor.
Another point is also there. In no case, the destiny of the complex world should be made to rest on the wish or will of one individual or even a group. What may prove good, relevant and useful now, may turn to be different after a while. Changefulness is the very nature of the world and life. So the desirability of any thing may vary from time to time. In fact, the freedom enshrined in every human is amazing. It may not always yield benevolent effects. It can also prove very harmful, destructive. A definite check is necessary.
That is how our scriptures portray instances like Rāvaṇa and Hiraṇyakaśipu, where the pauruṣa (human power) was ill-directed to a destructive level. But for the pañcama factor, the disastrous courses would not have been checked.
Hiraṇyakaśipu had become unconquerable, having armoured himself with a number of boons from Brahmā. Yet the pañcama factor took over the plight and delivered the necessary redress. A form, neither human nor animal, which Hiraṇyakaśipu had not envisaged, suddenly came down to subdue him! In Hiraṇyakaśipu resorting to severe tapasyā and obtaining abundant boons to make himself invincible, we find the play of the first four factors, constituting his pauruṣa. If the Providential factor were not there to check, he would have succeeded in his disastrous mission. But it came down with its expediency to allow the might of boons, only to overwhelm it with its own higher might.
In the same way, everything that the dhārmic votaries think and do will not fruition. Some omissions or shortcomings may creep in. How is it that the great ári Rāma’s wife was abducted by Rāvaṇa? Why did Sītā feel attracted to the illusory deer? Even when Rāma was setting out to catch hold of the deer at the persuasion of Sītā, did not Lakṣmaṇa warn him that it could well be the witchcraft of Rākṣasas? And what did the elder say in reply? “If it were so,” Rāma argued, “I must punish them. Or else, I must get the deer alive for Sītā, who had never asked for any such gift in life.”
Let none, pious or righteous, ever think that no adversity should ever befall his lot. Righteousness is not an end by itself. The righteous mind will have to transcend the dual plane of abhorring the wrong and admiring the right, and get to the transcendental plane of nirdvandvatā.
The great loyal Draupadi, for whom Krishna always had a tender heart, could be mauled by Duḥshāsana in the open Kuru assembly. This shows how Duryodhana’s pauruṣa could have its way to perpetrate such cruelty. And Draupadi was pitiably subjected to torture in the hands of a wicked person while the entire assembly of men was looking on. Nonetheless, Duḥshāsana could not succeed in his wrath. The pañcama factor had its role to make him exhausted and withdraw.
Thus, the righteous should not always expect an easy and successful path. It is likely to meet insurmountable obstacles. In fact, only then the righteous mind will delve deeper and get to the pedestal of nirdvandvatā. In such transcendence reigns the sovereign magnificence and splendour of the Soul. Far from contradictions, this is the path of beautiful harmony and integration.
The non-acting Soul
Having exposed the pañcama factor and its role in the dhārmic and adhārmic endeavours alike, Krishna provides the true spiritual sublimation to all activities, by showing the non-acting Soul, reigning supremely within and above all activities:
Despite that, due to unrefined intelligence, he who views the Singular Self as the doer, is of ill-directed (perverse) vision. He does not verily see at all.
Whether righteous or unrighteous, all activities have their undulating fates. At the same time to think that this acting plane – the body, mind and speech – is the only one the human consists of, is grossly wrong.
Leave actions to their own limitations and fates and elevate the vision to the Eternal Soul. The Singular Soul is the least involved in any movement, action or its result. One who thinks that the Soul acts and hence is subject to dharma and adharma as well as its three-fold result, is perverted. He does not understand the truth at all. The identity denoted by the term ‘I’ always refers to the Supreme Soul, which as pointed out right from the second chapter, is non-acting, unaffected, immovable and full.
To use the word ‘I’ to denote oneself, one’s identity, at the same time not to understand what it represents is absurd or ludicrous. The body, mind, etc. are at best one’s possessions, but none of these is oneself, one’s Self. Being so, should not an effort be made to know and realize what this ‘I’ identity verily is?
While the body, mind, etc. are given to constant activity and its effects, the ‘I’, the Soul within, remains totally above all causal and actional processes. This is what Krishna emphasized in the guṇa-traya vibhāga discussion of the 14th chapter (14.19).
Krishna’s sole purpose is to discuss a subject and in the process elevate and sublimate the listener. In every chapter this is what he has attempted and achieved, keeping Arjuna in front. The most important part of the discussion is that the mind and intelligence should be elevated to the Soul-level. They must be able to interact with the world remaining anchored in the transcendental sublimity of the Soul.
Unaffectedness through non-doership
With this vision, many of the negative traits such as dislike, disgust and repulsion, will drop from the mind. A level of fullness and radiance will be reached. None, not even one’s enemy causes irritation or resentment in the mind of one who has reached this exalted level. At the same time, such a Knower will be able to respond in the most appropriate manner to every situation. Freed of their deterring or tormenting notes, activities become most effective and benign. With effort and striving, this refinement and sublimation can be actualized by any good seeker.
To be lost in activity to such an extent that one does not care to think of the non-acting Supreme Soul within, is to fall a victim to akṛta-buddhi (impure intelligence) and even durmati (perverse intelligence). Krishna uses very strong words to denounce these negative traits, so that the seeker will be persuaded to eschew them in all earnestness.
Now comes the summary statement of Krishna on how all actions lose their binding effects when the mind reaches the pinnacle of the Soul-state:
Even if one kills all these people, he does not verily kill, nor is he bound by his killing, provided he has outgrown the sense of doership (and ego), and his intelligence is not tainted.
The Soul is Impersonal, Impartial and Neutral to the core. It is so in spite of whatever seemingly takes place in the world around. Naturally nothing in the level of the body, mind, intelligence and speech involves It at all, either in the form of an activity or its consequence.
On this basis, one who is able to incorporate the Soul-dimension in his mind and intelligence, will virtually be a “non-actor”. Consequently, he will be unaffected by the actions and their results. In fact, Krishna has been speaking about this kind of spiritual poise and freedom throughout.
What Krishna states next may be stunning. Nevertheless, that is the supreme Truth of spirituality. “Even if such a Self-knower kills the entire world, he does not really kill; and he is not bound by any effects thereof.”
What a sweeping negation of physical acts and their mental consequences! Is it possible, one may wonder! But the entire purpose of spirituality is to enlighten the seeker and steep him in a state of unaffectedness. Nothing short of non-doership will be concomitant with Self-perception, Self-realization and sthita-prajñatā. Self-vision is such that it negates all actions and interactions, even while one is intensely involved in them. What the body does is not true of the body-different Soul! The feeling of non-doer (akartṛtva) and non-enjoyer (abhoktṛtva) has to emerge from Soul-perception and Soul-realization. To realize the Soul is to be freed of all the feelings of doership about anything and all.
Even if one becomes free from the sense of doership while acting, it is possible that the action assails his mind some time later, may be after months, years or even decades. While any action passes away with the march of time, its memory in the actor will persist. That can afflict and torment the mind any time later. Krishna emphasizes that Self-vision is a safeguard against all such torments. What a powerful pronouncement!
Yudhiṣṭhira’s episode is the best illustration on this. The Kurukṣetra war was over. Of the nearly 47 lakhs (18 akṣauhiṇīs) of warriors assembled in the battlefield, all but 10 were killed. That means, annihilation was almost complete on both sides. The fight came to an end.
The survivors had to perform post-death ceremonies, udaka-tarpaṇa for the departed. Yudhiṣṭhira stepped into the holy river Bhāgīrathi along with many others to offer ceremonial water. Just as he began the ceremonial offering, there came running his mother Kunti in visible distress, shouting: “Dear son, perform tarpaṇa for Karṇa, your elder brother, too”.
The words plunged Yudhiṣṭhira into untold grief, torment and self-condemnation. “What? Was Karṇa my elder brother? Why did not my mother tell me this all these years? Accursed am I! Had I known it earlier, would I not have placed myself at his feet and asked him to lead us as the ruler? Was this huge bloodshed called for? What can I do now? How? Where?”
Yudhiṣṭhira even cursed that no woman should be able to keep any secret in her heart! This is an instance of kartṛtva tormenting the mind after the performance of an action.
Keeping all such possibilities in mind, Krishna emphasizes that the practice of the two-fold virtue – non-doership and non-enjoyership – should be ensured. Self-realization alone will enable this. Thus Krishna gives a full answer to the bewilderment that Arjuna expressed in the beginning: “Ah, we are out to perpetrate the greatest sin. For, due to greed for kingdom and comforts of life, we are ready to destroy our own relatives”(1.45).
All that Arjuna said would have been true if his mind was vitiated by greed, as he confessed. But Krishna was out to instill in Arjuna’s mind the true spiritual vision of nobility, non-action and immortality. The entire dialogue was to this end.
The very kartṛtva, the root of these, is wrong, untrue, says Krishna. Dismiss it! Be illumined! Then all psychological and intellectual taints will drop. If the actorhood itself vanishes from the mind, then the action ceases to have any sinful or virtuous effects. The mind becomes synonymous with the Impersonal, Impartial Soul. No religious or spiritual consequences can then befall the mind. So, the only redress for you is to set right your mind, its attitude and your intelligence, its perception. In doing so, the whole confrontation and distress will dissolve and harmony surge forth in abundance.
Thus, a singular thread runs from the first chapter to here now in the 18th chapter (1.45 to 18.17), radiating the full brilliance of the entire dialogue.
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(From Essential Concepts in Bhagavad Gita - Volume 6)