Bhagavad Gita Quotes, Chapter 1, The Grief of Arjun
Kauravas are scattered on the battlefield of Kurukshetra, not unified. Bheeshm is there because of promise. Dronocharya is there because of loyalty to the state. Karna is there to replay an old debt. Pandavas, on the other hand are unified by Dharma.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
Dharma is not a special presence of the extra-ordinary. Dharma is the absence of illusion, ignorance, etc which are mostly found in normality. Stay here; do what is needed. For that is Dharma. Be here; do the needful. For that is what you must do
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
Duryodhana is greatly perturbed. That happens when you side against Dharma. When you side against Dharma, then though logic, numbers, arguments will be on your side, yet something within you will be sensing an impending doom.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
You'll tremble, feel unsure, wrong footed. You'll be confused and afraid. Your inner being will refuse to feel okay. At that moment either you can change position in favor of Dharma or stubbornly suffer. Are you whole and compact within? Or are you fragmented within? Can you look at Dharma in the eye? Or is there a part of you that is very ashamed of itself?
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
Somebody who appears to be doing a little but at the right place will end up greatly. Somebody who is doing a lot but at the wrong place will end up lowly. It is easy to do a lot at the wrong place. It is difficult to do even a little at the right place.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
Dharma is continuous remembrance of place value. Do not just count the amount; see to whom the amount is dedicated to. It is not quantity that matters. It is the place of quantity that provides quality to the quantity.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
Duryodhana has realized that he is siding with adharma and Pandavas are siding with Dharma i.e. Shri Krishna. Duryodhana knows that he is wrong and he will be defeated and killed; just because he is on the wrong side. Duryodhana has a flash of clarity that he is wrong. But he continues to be more and more wrong.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
Duryodhana is bewildered; but he has no Krishna to go to. Arjun is bewildered; but he has Krishna to go to. Arjun has worked hard to stay with Krishna. But Duryodhana has worked hard to loose Krishna! Arjun asked for Krishna. Duryodhana asked not for Krishna but for Krishna's mighty invincible Narayani army.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
What is to you dear than the Truth? Use your mind, arguments, intellect to further and in service of Truth. Give everything in finding out the highest. Once, highest is found - now stop accessing it and rather start serving it.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
If there is anything that makes you stand against a Krishna; that thing should be called your personal falseness. If something makes you stand against Krishna, then your that lovely thing is simply falseness. Falseness won't openly declare that it is falseness. It'll take the names of friendship, love, duty, even dharma.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
When there is no center, strength crumbles and becomes weakness. Dharma is the center that holds everything together. Wholeness does not mean to have whole lot of things; it is about having a center. A huge thing without center crumbles and falls apart. A little thing crystallized at the center is as powerful as a bullet. Something small but held tightly to its core will prevail over something very big but very amorphous, powdery.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
Dharma is like an internal adhesive. It keeps all parts of you whole, in sync, centered. Dharma is the parts not being at cross purposes with each other. Dharma is an absence of an internal conflict within a body - human body or army body. Dharma means an inner peace; no civil wars. Who will win when one arm wrestles with the other? For sure you will loose. Myth has daemons with multiple arms and heads - this depicts our scattered and conflicting mind.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
Duryodhana loves Shri Krishna! How deeply at this moment Duryodhana is wanting, loving, worshipping Krishna? Krishna makes you paryapta; and absence of Krishna makes you aparyapta.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
Don't oppose the Truth for so long and with great determination, that it becomes impossible for you to retreat your steps. Never let yourself come to that place. Even Truth cannot save you if you violate the Truth. Don't let violation of Dharma be an addiction to you.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
The thing with Truth is that it is within you as well. It'll demonstrate to you that you're wrong. Now, how will you live with this sense of wronghood? The Truth can bring sanity to you. Truth can also turn you mad. It depends on your decision. Don't be placed against the Truth.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
Don't bring yourself to a point where death feels better than living life of insecurity. For the ego, Truth is not omnipotent. Omnipotence of Truth is contingent on your receptivity and willingness to improve, to recover, to dissolve. Don't be too confident that there is Truth ready to redeem you. Even the Truth can fail to redeem you.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
Keep rising continuously from the right center. More practical approach is the approach of negation. Right center will provide you integrity for long. Right center is so beautiful that you just cannot manage to defy or overrule it.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
Keep progressing; keep moving - Charaivati Charaivati. Life should be an unending journey in betterment, learning and dissolution. Don't ask for easy endings and conclusions. Have the stamina to run a life long marathon. What's the need to conclude? What's the need to say the end? Don't be lazy. If the heart does not get tired pumping the blood to the brain, then why must the mind get tired of rising endlessly. If you cannot think anymore, what's the point of having an active brain.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 1 - 20
Duryodhana has numbers and army men on his side. Yet he is quivering. There is no center to keep those numbers together. That center is the Truth. Truth gives power to fight any battle in life.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 21 - 38
In a moment of epiphany, reality has stuck Duryodhana that Truth is absent from his side. He didn't realize the value of consciousness over the value of material. He opted for the Krishna's army (material) and not Krishna Himself (consciousness).
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 21 - 38
Duryodhana stands for greed, covetousness and envy. Duryodhana stands for someone who has repeatedly made so many bad choices in his life that now there is no chance for Truth to redeem and recover him.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 21 - 38
Weight of all the misjudgments in the past is too heavy that it is now impossible to make amendments now. e've invested all time, energy, money into falseness - Realizing this at the end of life will feel unimaginable and unbearable pain and shock. This is what Duryodhana is going through.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 21 - 38
Duryodhana seems to have realized that he made a tremendous blunder. Duryodhana is seeing that he is already defeated and worse still, he has not lived at all. Duryodhana stands in the state of near hopelessness. Duryodhana is nearly finished.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 21 - 38
When the world dominates and pulls you, go, but the trick is to take Krishna along with you wherever you go. Don't make a mistake by entering a place without Krishna which can potentially swallow you in. Keep the God-ideals and Scriptures with you wherever you will display your beastly, dark and animalistic tendencies.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 21 - 38
Gita is needed when we acknowledge that we're in trouble. When it is in your mind, then you see it everywhere in the world.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 21 - 38
Arjun's situation is that of energy lessness and indecisiveness. Arjun is making a very clear decision in the favor of the body.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 21 - 38
Most animals don't kill their blood relationships because the body wants to propagate its DNA. Biologically we're designed to side with our family i.e. blood. The aim of reproduction is the furtherance of our DNA.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 21 - 38
Inner animal lives in such a dark cave, that it cannot see its own face. The body is militating against Dharma.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 21 - 38
Arjuna is representing common body identified man. Arjuna is a great exemplification of the common man. Arjuna is placing pleasure as the highest goal of life. Since Arjuna represents each of us, therefore, the Bhagavad Gita is useful to each one of us.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 21 - 38
We acquire power, land, gold, money, etc for the sake of our family. Joy is not bringing pleasure to relatives; it is about liberating oneself.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 21 - 38
In the language of flesh, it is sin to kill your own blood. In the language of consciousness, it is sin to identify yourself with the flesh. When you're centered in the flesh, the highest value is one's own flesh. When you're centered in the consciousness, the highest value is ego's and world's liberation.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 21 - 38
What Arjun is saying is squarely applicable to our age and time. Arjun is saying "Dharma equals Ceremony". Is that also not the view of ours? We're Arjun. Arjun is sitting in the middle of us.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 39
Ego acts as the teacher of the teacher. The ego takes itself to be the Truth. The central belief of the ego is "I am the Truth". The ego has the deep and unquestionable belief that "I am the Truth"; though being humble on the outsides. We take ourselves as to be real and true.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 39
The sacred is not necessarily that which has been thought of the sacred; the sacred is only that which liberates you this moment. Geeta passes the test of sacredness.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 39
Times have changed but the mind has not changed.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 40
Krishna is the destroyer of prevalent social conditioning. Krishna liberates women and lower-caste. Krishna demolishes misogyny and casteism.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 40
Arjun thinks that hell is mixing with someone from another caste. Whereas, Niralambh Upanishad says hell is mixing with someone of poor consciousness.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 41
Qualifications of Arjun are that he chose to bear the proximity of Shri Krishna and he exposed his ugliest self to Shri Krishna.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 42 - 43
Duryodhana is a dark example of a wasted human life. He does not acknowledge the sheer agony of his state in his own words, yet his helplessness was visible. He could not stab Shri Krishna in his back because he was an honest enemy!!
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 42 - 43
Human birth is a limited opportunity. The relationship between ego and Truth is of eternal love. But life of a man is limited, so, the window for the ego to dissolve into the Truth is limited. Limited, not just by life span, but also by elasticity of the consciousness. Ego can stretch itself so far away from Truth, that meeting again can become impossible.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 42 - 43
In life, the final bottleneck is time. The beauty of flow of time and life lies in the hope that tomorrow you'll be more enlightened, more liberated and more free. If tomorrow will be more bondaged, then time and life is just torture and torment.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 42 - 43
Gita exists to solve Arjun's problem and Gita solves it using "self-knowledge", which dissolves Arjun's ego. Another name for ego is "self-illusion" and "self-delusion" which says "I believe in something that doesn't exists at all".
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 42 - 43
Battle is fought so that the kingdom can have the best king. If Arjun becomes the king, then a misogynist, castiest and superstitious king will rule the country. That Shri Krishna doesn't want. So, apart from requesting Arjun to fight for Dharma, Shri Krishna is shaping-up a worthy ruler for Hastinapur.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 42 - 43
Where do all problems of the self and the world comes from? Lack of self-knowledge. Because when you don't know who you are, so, you create a mess within and without.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 42 - 43
Liberation of the ego is liberation from its own ignorance. Aim of Spirituality and Scriptures is to address the ego's need to be free from itself.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 44 - 46
Arjun stands for conservatism and orthodoxy. Shri Krishna stands for Liberation.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 44 - 46
Usually chapter-1 of Bhagavad Gita is ignored because Shri Krishna doesn't speak in this chapter. We're closer to Arjun than we're to Shri Krishna. Arjun is standing among us. Wherever ignorance is present, all problems of Arjun will definitely be present even today.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 44 - 46
Gita is a rebellion and militating against Arjun's physical tendencies, blind beliefs, traditions, culture, etc. Gita is a loving gift from the Rishis and Vedanta. Sanatan Dharma has unfortunately made to sunk into such despair and disregard. When the Gita is brought to you, then you declare him the sinner, who brought you the Gita.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 44 - 46
Truth hurts the ego; and when the ego is hurt, it becomes disrespectful even to the Truth. Ego likes to say "Let me be as I am". When you know the ways of the ego, then you know that even your best friend can stab you if his ego is hurt. Any action towards the Truth is Ahimsa. Moving towards the Truth can happen only by shedding your falseness.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 44 - 46
At the center of courage is the realization of what is important. Dharma consists of two - Know what is important and live by that. How can you know without asking? Ask, ask, ask - that is the only way of Vedant.
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1, Verse 44 - 46
Problems of Arjun: 1. Biological - Flesh and blood attachment with kinsmen. 2. Social 1. Misogyny 2. Casteism 3. Superstitions 3. Gullible
~ Acharya Prashant, commentary on Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 1
