Daily Readings from the Works of Swami Venkatesananda


Song of God (Bhagavad Gita) - Chapter 18: 40

December 10, 2023

™na tad asti pṛthivayāṁ vā divi deveṣu vā punaḥ
sattvaṁ prakṛtijair muktaṁ yad ebhiḥ syāt tribhir guṇaiḥ (XVIII-40)

XVIII/40. There is no being on earth or again in heaven among the
gods, that is liberated from the three qualities born of nature.

Swamiji's Commentary

     All motion and manifestation are subject to the three qualities of nature that have been described so vividly by lord Krishna. Not only the gross, but the extremely subtle objects of nature are subject to them. Gross and subtle, heaven and hell, earth and the beyond are all relative terms, one serving as the frame of reference for the other. They are not absolute.

     The absolute (the subject, unknowable by the intellect and hence not a concept) is intuitively realized, in an indescribable transcendental experience, as beyond the qualities. This should not lead us to the absurd position of regarding the qualities as something ‘outside’ the one God, who is pure existence, is unsullied and unaffected by anything that happens in this universe, because whatever happens, happens not because of his will or his grace (these are imperfect, inadequate human expressions), but because that is his nature. The one is unaffected by the qualities, even as the cobra is unaffected by its venom. Through the veins and arteries of our body run impure and pure blood; together they form one system and we de not regard the arteries as ‘good’ and the veins as ‘injurious’ to our physical well-being.

     The three qualities constitute divine nature which is indistinguishable from the supreme reality. Even the sage’s body and mind are subject to the qualities, though sattva preponderates in them. But the sage resting in the self witnesses the play of the guṇā, without identifying himself (his self) with them. Hence, in our approach to them we should beware of judging them by our ignorant and intellectual standards.

     Krishna also warns us here that we can grow in sattva only by consciously choosing the sāttvika in all things and, eventually transcending sattva by his grace, we passively offer ourselves in total surrender to him.

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