यज्ञार्थात्कर्मणोऽन्यत्र लोकोऽयं कर्मबन्धनः ।
तदर्थं कर्म कौन्तेय मुक्तसङ्गः समाचर ।। ३.९ ।।

yajñārthāt-karmaṇo’nyatra loko’yaṁ karma-bandhanaḥ |
tad-arthaṁ karma kaunteya mukta-saṅgaḥ samācara || 3.9 ||

YAJNA – an Attitude of the Mind

Krishna at this point brings in the concept of Yajna with a new dimension. He introduces this religious term with a very wide philosophical import. He says that all sentient as well as insentient creation around us is pulsating with activity, and man’s activity also comes under this compulsion. But the problem for man is that he gets afflicted and bound by his actions. The only way to avoid bondage and torment is to transform every action into Yajna. Not only that, if any act is not transformed into Yajna, that will bind the performer.

What does this mean ? How can one transform all activities into Yajna? Is not Yajna a sacred religious act where one sits in front of an altar and offers oblations to the fire, chanting various mantras ?

Isavasya Upanishad in its first mantra pronounces renunciation (tyaga) as the right way of living :

Whatever is here in the world, perishable and fleeting, all that is permeated by Divinity. Therefore, one should take to the enjoyments and experiences of life only after renouncing the sense of possession with regard to anything. Never covet. Whose is the wealth ?

The Upanishad advises that one should enjoy or experience the world only after identifying everything in creation as subsisting in God, Brahman, and as such belonging to God. As all the fleeting waves belong to the Ocean and are Ocean itself, so too the fleeting creation subsists in Brahman and is nothing other than Brahman. Everything belongs to and is a display of Brahman. Why then bring in ideas like “my body, my son, my house, my property”?  To feel possessive about anything including one’s own body, will be to dislodge the creation from its very base !

But this renunciation is purely in the mind. It implies leaving the ego and the sense of possessiveness. To be spiritual, to  be wise, is to take away the feeling of possession from the mind. Be rid of attachment while interacting in the world, says the Upanishad. The sublime spirit of detachment that graces one’s mind while pursuing activities, is the tyaga factor that makes all actions a Yajna.

In the ritual Yajna, the articles like rice, ghee, pulses, fruits, gold, cloth, etc, are acquired and offered either to the fire or to the poor and the Brahmanas. Whether the offerings are to the fire or to individuals, for the offerer it means ‘tyaga’ or renunciation. Yajna is to make the performer dispossessed. Even the great kings used to become poor after performing the legendary yajnas or sacrifices. The yajna was regarded meaningful only when the king’s treasury became empty after the performance.

Is it possible for all to take to such yajnas ? Moreover, such a yajna is only a material-based time bound ceremony. What about all the other actions throughout one’s life ? Krishna extends the concept of yajna to all actions performed by a karmayogi. He emphasizes that it is the yajna attitude of the mind, the sublime note of dispossession, that matters. He says that any action will surely stain, agitate and bind the performer if it is not purified by the note of dispossession, note of yajna. So the only way is not to attempt inaction, but to make one’s whole life a yajna.

Any action performed without the attitude of yajna will cause bondage to the performer. Therefore, O Kuntiputra, do everything being mukta-sanga, free of attachment.

The latter half of the verse gives the golden formula. How to transform all actions into yajna ? By becoming mukta-sanga while performing. Attachment, possessiveness, alone makes the mind constricted, vitiated and bound. Attachment is the result of ignorance and lack of introspection. Detachment does not mean abhorrence. Detachment is the lightness, freedom, born of introspection, born of wisdom.

Sanga and mukti from it are the words to be specially borne in mind. Sanga (attachment) is inborn in man. Getting  rid of it lies within man’s understanding and effort. Once sanga is shed, the mind becomes pure and sublime, making all actions a comprehensive yajna. Freedom from sanga comes from the understanding and realization of Divinity in everything.

With the realization of the all-permeating Divinity, the creational activity becomes a huge yajna, and our life and activities become a part in this comprehensive yajna of Nature. With the dawning of this wholesome vision, sanga resulting from partial divisional point of view, resulting from our preference for the desired and abhorrence for the undesired, naturally vanishes. We become mukta-sanga. Our whole life becomes a Yajna. All our actions become pure and Divine.

Activities are an external expression. Yajna is an internal attitude.