THE MAHABHARATA: A Modern Rendering, Vol 2 (24 page)

In the city of nine gates, the body, only he shall have peace who has mastered his nature by giving in to it perfectly, without desire, renouncing whatever he does, even as he does it. He knows the soul does not act, nor is it acted upon; but just nature’s gunas. Such a man’s sins are cut away from him. He reaches the Brahman, from where there is no return. His wisdom illumines the immortal self.

When the soul’s light ends your darkness, that light shines forth from you: the Brahman revealed, splendid as a sun. The enlightened man sees all creation equally. He knows pleasures that spring outside the self are ephemeral and they inevitably bring sorrow. He has no use for these. He is master of the surge in his blood of lust, of anger. He finds his joy within himself, his light within himself, in his own soul; and he comes to Brahmanirvana,” said the Blue God, who had come to cleanse the world.

“Whose sins are put out, whose doubts are dispelled, to whom the welfare of every creature is his joy, finds Brahmanirvana. The austere man, set free from lust, anger and fear, is rooted in enlightenment. He comes to me, who enjoy all karma and all austerity, who am Lord of the worlds and a friend to all men. And he finds Brahmanirvana.”

FIVE
THE SONG OF GOD 

Krishna’s song, the river of holy light, flowed through Arjuna and it made him see. He was borne away from Kurukshetra, into other realms. It even seemed to the Pandava that the war—why, all his life—was a pretext to be out here, now, in his chariot with Krishna and to hear his Gita. It was an hour of revelations, when ends more profound than he could imagine were achieved. Krishna was a sacred flame beside him.

The Dark One said, “He who works serenely, with no desire for the fruits of what he does, success or failure, he is the sannyasin; not he who lights no lamp on this earth. Arjuna, what men call yoga is sannyasa, no less. For no man becomes a yogin until he renounces his selfishness.

Karma is the way of the rishi who wants to attain yoga, to yoke himself to the eternal. Once he attains to that union, he is at peace. The warrior’s way is his own will. The will alone is the soul’s dearest friend and it is the atman’s worst enemy. The restrained man’s will is his soul’s friend, but the self-indulgent man’s will is his enemy. The rishi is absorbed in the atman. He is a master of his will, he is unchanging.

Arjuna, the light of a lamp does not flicker in a windless place. He who has realized the Brahman never wanders again from the deepest truth of his being. When his mind is yoked to his soul, set free from craving, the yogin is united with Brahman.”

Krishna sent his peace to invade the Pandava. “When you gain the atman, you know there is nothing left to achieve. Then, no sorrow will move you: the yogin is disconnected from pain; he is one with Brahman. The body, the mind and the life are pure; the light shines through clearly. Infinite bliss is as natural as breathing to that man. The atman is plain to him in all beings, in all things and everywhere.”

Tears filled Arjuna’s eyes and ran down his face. Krishna said, “He who sees me everywhere, I am with him and he is with me forever. The perfect man sees all things in the image of his own self, equally.”

Another spasm of anxiety struck Arjuna. He said, “Krishna, it is hard to see all things equally. The mind is fickle, prone to terror. It is impetuous, strong, obstinate and so are its passions. It is simpler to tame the wind!”

Krishna laughed again, “Who said yoga is easy to achieve? Remember it is the last achievement, beyond which there is no other. Yet, it is not impossible; I tell you, you can attain it.”

But Arjuna wanted to know, “Krishna, where does he go who believes, but cannot control himself? Is he like a cloud in the sky, with no support anywhere? Does he fall forever?” The Pandava’s face was pale. “Krishna, doubt grips my heart like an evil spirit.”

Krishna spoke like the sun now, radiating light. “Not in this world or the next does such a believer perish. A man who seeks Brahman never comes to a bad end. The bhakta who falls away from yoga is reborn into the homes of the pure and the prosperous, of kings, or into a family ofyogins; the second birth is the rarer. From there, again, the soul treads the way toward enlightenment. Inexorably, the seeker’s belief takes him on. Arjuna, the man who worships me, to me he is the brightest yogin, more precious than the tapasvin, the gyani, or the man of karma. The man of bhakti is dearest to me.”

Like a temple bell calling him out of sorrow and futility, Krishna’s words rang in the morning. When Arjuna looked into his sarathy’s black eyes, he saw such love in them. He smiled wanly at the Blue God, as if he had awoken from a nightmare to find the sun risen and daylight in the world.

Krishna let his song taper into a silence full of mercy, which enveloped his warrior in a deep respite. Arjuna felt his fear recede. The Avatara gathered himself within his resonant stillness. As always, his battles were only beginning; and he was the eternal seeker. He knew that Arjuna he could save from his crisis of courage. But who would save Krishna from his long aloneness, from himself? Who would redeem him?

But then, deep destiny was upon him. He knew his Gita would change the very heart of the dreaming, myth-making earth; and it would change him, as well, in some incalculable way. It was as if, with his song to Arjuna, the epic of man was begun again, mutant!

Vision washed over Krishna. He saw his words percolate through Arjuna into the seeds of unborn generations, waiting, waiting to metamorphose, to transform the nature of mythic and fabulous time: the earth’s legendary heart. From them, his song redefined all the paths to freedom, all the images of the future: bodies of legend, the races of men, their nations, histories, wars, their every ordeal and, more than anything else, death and dying.

Krishna’s song flowed again, unknown, ineluctable. “Listen, Arjuna, to how in yoga, with your mind devoted to me, you will know me. Then there will be nothing left to know. Among a million men in the world, perhaps one seeks perfection; of a million such, who do, each by his chosen path, perhaps one truly knows me. Arjuna, you know me, don’t you?”

Otherwise, they would not be out here together.

“My nature is made of earth, water, fire, air, ether, mind, intellect and ego: eight aspects. But this is only my gross nature. My other aspect is the soul and the world is founded upon it. It is the seed and the end of all things. I am the cause of everything, no other.

Like pearls on a string, the worlds are strung on me. Kaunteya, I am the essence of the waters, the light of the sun and the moon.

I am AUM and the Vedas, the sruti of the mandalas and the manhood in men. I am the sacred smell of the earth and the brightness of fire.

I am the life of all lives, the purity of the sage, the wisdom of the wise, the luster of the illustrious, the might of the mighty. And all creatures I am, of sattva, rajas or tamas.”

Clouds had gathered in the sky. It would rain on Kurukshetra today. Great kshatriyas’ blood and common soldiers’ blood would mingle with rainwater and flow in red streams for a while—in scarlet rivers if Krishna had his way—before the earth absorbed it all and what remained was dried by the wind and the sun in brown patches of violent memory.

“It is the three gunas that delude, Arjuna; all this maya of life and death is because of them. Who makes me his sanctuary safely crosses the ocean of the world, the sea of samsara. Demons, evil ones, do not seek refuge in me yet. The virtuous that worship me, my bhaktas, are of four kinds: the man in trouble, the seeker after knowledge, the seeker after happiness and the man of discrimination. The discerning man is dearest to me. Why, he and I are one. Unlike the others, he comes to me after many lives, having realized that I am all there is. He is the rarest of the rare: the mahatman, the great soul.

Minds that are full of desire worship the Devas with rituals. I give them what their hearts want; I make their faith fruitful, whatever forms it takes. Those who worship the Devas go to the Devas, but my bhaktas come to me. Those who are confused think of me as my manifestations. They do not know my transcendent nature, Un-born, changeless and supreme. Arjuna, I know all the beings, those alive now, those of the past and all those yet to be. But who knows me? Only the illumined, who have died to sin. Those who are freed from duality’s delusions find sanctuary in me and are saved from age and death. They know the atman and Brahman and all about karma. They know that I rule both this world and the next and they come to me when they die.”

Arjuna said, “What is Brahman, Krishna? What is the atman? And what is karma? Which is the domain of the elements and which that of the Gods? How can a man know you, as he dies?”

“Brahman is the imperishable. Brahman alive in the individual being is atman, the soul; and karma is the force of creation. He that thinks of me, as he dies, certainly comes to me. Indeed, whatever a man thinks of as he dies, he attains to that, absorbed in the final thought forever. He who says AUM as he dies, thinking of me, he attains the absolute: Brahman, the seer, the ancient, the subtlest, the supporter beyond darkness.

Those who come to me, Arjuna, never return to impermanence, to the places of sorrow. They have reached the final perfection; they are not born again. From Brahmaloka down, all the worlds are subject to rebirth. But he who reaches me, never comes back.”

SIX
THE BHAGAVAD GITA 

Arjuna saw how Krishna shone between the two armies, a still blue flame, unearthly. In perfect calm, the Dark One sang his Gita, “He who knows the day of Brahma is a thousand ages and a thousand ages are his night, he knows day and night. At daybreak, all the hidden lives come forth to be born. At twilight, they dissolve again into the dormant seed of life; and again, helplessly, the same lives stream forth once more at dawn of Brahma’s next day.

But beyond this being and return, beyond the day and the night, there is another unmanifest, eternal Being who does not perish when other lives do. He is not born with Brahma’s day, nor dies with Brahma’s night. Those who reach him do not return. He is my abode. He pervades all this birth and death; he can be reached by bhakti.

Fire, light, day, the bright half of the moon, the six months of the northern sun: at these times, the yogins of illumination go to the Brahman.

Smoke, night, the dark half of the moon, the six months of the southern sun: these are when the yogins obtain the lunar light of Pitriloka, the world of the manes and they return to birth.

Light and dark are the primitive and enduring paths of this world. By one the yogin goes and never comes back; by the other, he returns.”

Arjuna did not tremble any more, but listened raptly to his sarathy’s Gita. Krishna said, “Arjuna, my song contains the secrets of knowledge and wisdom; it will set you free. This is the highest knowledge, easy, imperishable and known directly. It is my way, the way of the Avatara. I pervade the universe with my spirit; all things abide in me, but not I in them. This is my mystery. As the tameless air that moves everywhere abides in cosmic ether, the akasa, so too existence dwells in me.

When the ages have made their round, every creature is gathered back into the seed that I am. When the next creation dawns, I send them forth again, helpless, bound in my maya. I, the Lord of maya, send the multitudes forth and gather them back into my being.

The ignorant pass by this human form of mine; of me, they know nothing. The enlightened ones, the great souls that know me, worship me with an unwavering mind and with the rite of wisdom. They know who I am, that I am the source undying.

I am the ritual, I am the sacrifice; I am the ancestral oblation, I am the herb that heals. I am the holy mantra, I am the melted butter; I am the fire, Arjuna, I am the burnt offering.

I am this world’s father, its mother, its supporter and its grandsire, too. I am the end of all knowledge, the purifier. I am AUM, I am Rik, Sama and Yajus,” whispered Krishna, humming to a spellbound Arjuna.

“The goal, the upholder, the Lord, the witness, the abode, the sanctuary and the friend am I. I am origin and dissolution, the ground, the refuge and the immortal seed.

Worship me, I am the heat of the sun. I withhold and send down the rain. Deathlessness I am and death; manifest am I and the hidden germ of life.

Worshippers of the Vedas, drinkers of Soma, stray from the path. They reach Indra’s realm and enjoy the pleasures of the Devas. However, they are transients in heaven and when their punya is exhausted, they are born again into the world of men. But those who worship me, I secure what they have and bring them what they do not. Anyway, the worshippers of the Vedas and the Devas worship only me. For I am all the Gods and the Vedas, as well.

Those who worship the Devas go to them; those who worship the sires go to the Pitrs; and to the spirits go those who worship bhutas and pretas. And my bhaktas surely come to me.

Every offering made with love, I receive with joy: a leaf, a flower, a fruit and a palmful of water. Whatever you eat or sacrifice, whatever you do, offer it to me, Pandava.

I dwell in all creatures; none is hateful to me, none special. But those who worship me, they are in me, surely and I in them. Let even the most evil man but worship me and I will be with him; swiftly, he will become a muni and come to peace.

Arjuna, know one thing for sure: those who worship me will never perish. Let them be rich or poor, let them be men or women; let them be anyone, my bhaktas reach the final sanctuary.”