Bhagwad Gita shloka VIII-1 (Commentary)

Bhagwad Gita shloka VIII-1- Bhagwad Gita chapter VIII shloka 1 primarily deals with Lord Krishna satisfactorily replying to the queries of King Arjuna. Unless and until Arjuna is satisfied and inherently believes in what Lord Krishna has to say ... there was no point in Krishna extolling the values of his sayings.

As stated in Bhagwad Gita shloka VIII-1 one believes the Sacred Scriptures because spiritual gurus who definitely had a wider spectrum of spiritual knowledge and thus are considered more experienced than us have written them. Even if we have neither read or possess any Scripture of any religion yet we tend to believe in whatever our elders had mentioned in them.

Only after we are able to fathom the depths of various Scriptures do we recommend them to others. Now we believe them as never before. We have a testimony on which we can rely upon as we have neither mesmerized nor gobbled up whatever was written in the Scriptures. Now having been able to understand the inner truths one is always and ever ready to impart this knowledge to the common folk. Have you ever tried teaching someone that which you yourselves do not follow? Such principles in life do not work ... particularly in the field of spirituality wherein most of the principles are based upon faith in the Almighty God and his system.

Whenever people have tried to blindly follow the dictates of their leader ... at a certain stage later one has always experienced problems. Why? Is it that one who calls himself the knower has lesser knowledge even then the followers? In most of the cases this is a truth that the teacher himself is unable to assimilate. He has a weaker foundation. We must always try to emulate the teachings of a spiritual guru who is in actual terms the knower of all that is worth knowing.

In Bhagwad Gita shloka VIII-1 Why do I emphasize things again and again! Is something wrong with Vijay Kumar ... Repetition makes learning easier ... we tend to forget whatever is not repeated again and again? In the spiritual realm, the repetition is termed as mantras. As in actual life we keep on repeating our habits again and again ... in the similar manner repetition of various sacred texts makes our life worthwhile. We can now differentiate the wrong from the right and discard it.

We daily repeat our various chores yet, we never feel out of harmony. Repetition is not a bad habit if indulged in matters of spiritual pursuit. Repetition makes a person wiser as one has the power of God guiding us from time to time. We need not go to the temples, the churches or places of holy gatherings for the purpose of learning the efficacy of mantras. Remaining wherever you are and in normal circumstances one can learn those subtle truths of life that one could not have ever learnt without repetition of the mantras.

In Bhagwad Gita chapter VIII shloka 1 (Bhagwad Gita shloka VIII-1) King Arjuna addresses Lord Krishna to learn the cause for the existence of Brahma (Brahman, the Creator of the Cosmos), meaning of Adhyatma (study of Atman the soul within) and the significance of performing karma as a human being.

Let us take an example- I exist and so must my parents. The parents existed because they had their parents. The chain is endless yet we do not seem to reach any conclusion ... to counter this phenomenon came the concept that as nothing can be created out of nothing ... there has got to be a Creator who set the ball rolling. Yet, who created the Creator himself is the biggest question of all ... the mother of all queries. The definition of God is not very difficult ... we human beings perceive all things in the universe from the angle of senses. This sets a limitation as to the actual perception and feeling.

Remember the story of four handicapped friends who tried to imagine the shape of an elephant. According to one elephant is like a snake for he had the trunk of the elephant in hand! Was he right? We are not able to utilize much of the mind power one possesses. Had we the control of mind power even to a limited extent everything would have been clear to all from the very birth itself. We need to rise above the limitation of senses, gain control of mind power and learn the cosmic truths in order to be able to see the glory of god in its pristine form.

As per Bhagwad Gita shloka VIII-1 things do not happen as per our planning and control. God is a potential source of energy which keeps everything in the Cosmos self-rotating ... no one created the Creator ... we can consider it to be a phenomenon ... self-programmable!! If we pray, we get the results ... if we do not; we keep waiting for a miracle to happen. The whole Cosmos is self-sustained. The total power of all purified Atmans existing in the Cosmos is what we know as God, the Almighty Creator ... the Brahma himself.

At the time of pralaya ... all Atmans in the Cosmos (the soul within) in whatever manifestation they may be ... purify and come back to their original state. So much is the concentration of energy that this primordial ball of energy, half the size of a thumb explodes again leading to a new chain of universes, galaxies and clusters of stars ... the total process known as Big Bang. Who created whom!! None created anything ... all was the result of a happening which was self propelling and uncontrollable. All Atmans scattered all over the universes after a certain period of time try to manifest themselves in order to remove the dross within. This leads to their germination of a body on a planet that can support life like that on earth. And the "Matrix Revolution" is born.