Commentary on the Bhagavadgita

by Swami Krishnananda

Yogayukto visuddhatma vijitatma jitendriyah, sarvabhutatmabhutatma kurvannapi na lipyate (5.7). In this verse, the characteristics of a yogi, a perfected person, are described. A person who is united in yoga is yogayukta. Such a person is also visuddhatma – his lower self has been purified in order to reflect the higher self in itself. He is also vijitatma – a person who is perfectly under control of himself; jitendriya – whose sense organs have been restrained; sarvabhutatmabhutatma – whose self has pervaded all beings, and the self of all beings are in his own self. These are the qualities of a sage which are mentioned in this interesting yoga.

In the beginning, the effort is to restrain the senses; and when the senses are restrained, the person becomes a jitendriya. When a person is jitendriya on account of the restraint exercised over the senses, he becomes a vijitatma – one who has conquered himself. The conquest of one’s own self is actually the conquest over the sense organs, because it is due to the activity of the sense organs that one’s own self moves in the direction of a not-self. We find that our interest is in outside things; the world seems to be more interesting than our own selves. This happens on account of the self moving away from itself, through the avenues of the senses, towards the direction of the world of objects; but a person who has restrained the senses does not allow the consciousness to pervade and penetrate through the senses towards the direction of things outside. Such a person has also restrained himself. It is an exercise for restraining the self. It is a restraint over the sense organs; and incidentally, it is at the same time a restraint exercised on the self itself – the lower self. A jitendriya is also a vijitatma.

Such a person is a visuddhatma – whose self is pure sattva, free from rajas and tamas. The entire reality is reflected through the sattva guna, as a mirror can clearly reflect the face of a person. Turbid or shaky waters do not reflect anything adequately. Turbidity is tamas, and shakiness is rajas. The sun is reflected on the waters of a lake or a river. If the lake is muddy, and it is thick and turbid on account of dirt in the water, there will be no reflection of the sun in that water; but even if the dirt is not there, even if it is clean water but it is shaking violently, then also there will not be a correct and wholesome reflection of the sun. Similarly, we may be disturbed and find ourselves incapable of reflecting the higher self in our own personality either because of the tamas that is prevailing in us or due to the rajas prevailing in us. Either we are tamasic – lethargic and dark – in our mental operations; or the mind is distracted in a hundred ways, so then also there is no reflection. Free from both these defects of the mind is a visuddhatma who is purely sattvic, untarnished by rajas and tamas. Such a person is united with all things at the same time; he is a yogayukta. The words used in this verse are in a descending order, whereas I have explained it in an ascending order. Yogayukta is the highest state, which is attained by the visuddhatma, which is attained again by the vijitatma, which state also is attained by the jitendriya. Such a person becomes a wonder in this world.

Yogayukto visuddhatma vijitatma jitendriyah: He also becomes sarvabhutatmabhutatma. He will find himself reflected in the self of all beings in the universe, and he will find the selves of all beings reflected in his own self. Sarvabhutatmabhutatma means one who has become the self of all beings, and also one in whom all the selves of all beings find their abode. This is a grand description of the highest state of perfection achieved by union through yoga.

All processes in this universe – evolution, involution, activity of any kind – is said to be taking place on account of a peculiar propensity in the gunas of prakriti. Therefore, the Supreme Lord is not supposed to be directly responsible for either what we call creation or destruction, or for any kind of activity taking place. His participation in creation is secondary, just as the sun, the solar light, is responsible for everything – life and death in this world – and yet the sun is not directly connected. This is a very interesting verse of the Bhagavadgita: na kartritvam na karmani lokasya srijati prabhuh (5.14). The Supreme Being, the Lord, does not directly bring about the relation of cause and effect, in the same way as the sun does not directly interfere with the activities of the world. Agency in action is kartritva. Action is karma. Neither agency in action nor the action itself is something that is created directly by God. That is to say, the defects of the human being are not to be attributed to God. Otherwise, the Supreme Reality, being inclusive of all the individuals in the universe – the total – would be a mass of ignorance, full of distractions. The total of all mankind would be nothing but a heap of distraction and incapacity to perceive correctly.

Transcendent is God, though He is also immanent. Water pervades every fibre of a cloth that is dipped in it. When a cloth is dipped in a bucket of water, every fibre becomes wet. That is, the water pervades the whole cloth; it is immanent in the cloth. The water is almost inseparable from the cloth, because when we touch the cloth we can see the wetness and the dripping of water; yet, the water is not the cloth. There is no connection between the cloth and the water. The pervasion of God through the universe, through every little bit of things in the world – even the littlest atom – does not mean that God has involved Himself in the defects of life, the limitations of things, the locations of bodies, the ignorance characterising individuals. These are not part and parcel of the Supreme Being.

The transcendence that is the real nature of God frees Him from every kind of defect that is otherwise seen in the effects which He pervades and in which He is immanent. That is why it is said here that agency in action – the consciousness of one’s own individuality being responsible for work – is not created by God. It is due to the defect of the ego that one feels that one is doing some action. The action itself is a process that is engendered by the movement of the gunas of prakriti and, therefore, that also does not come from God. He is not responsible for anything whatsoever. God is responsible for everything, and yet He is responsible for nothing; it can be put either way. His responsibility for everything lies on account of His being immanent, and His freedom from any kind of involvement arises on account of His supreme transcendence.

Na kartritvam na karmani lokasya srijati prabhuh, na karma-phala-samyogam: The fruit of action that accrues through actions performed with a motive for fruit, this also is not done by God Himself. He is not thinking of giving us something. Neither does He take anything, nor does He give us anything. An automatic action takes place on account of the very structural pattern of the universe. Whether we go to heaven or to hell or we are reborn, we cannot say that God is thinking that we should be thrown somewhere or that we should be made to take rebirth. It is nothing of the kind. The universe is an automatic system of operation and does not require an outside interference from God. Actually, God is not an outside thing and is not an extra-cosmic reality. Nor is God capable of being identified with the cosmos itself. The divisions, the mutations, the limitations and the spatio-temporal conditioning which are the characterisitics of the world cannot be attributed to God. In a sense, we may say there is nothing in the world which can be found in God; but in another sense, everything can be found in God because the values that we see in this world arise from a transcendence which is invisible to the eyes and uncognisable to the mind.

It is like the analogy of the snake and the rope. The snake is not the rope and, therefore, we cannot say that the rope has become the snake; and yet, the snake would not be there if the rope was not there. The rope is responsible for the snake, yet the rope is not responsible for the snake. The rope has never become the snake; therefore, we cannot say that the rope is responsible for appearing as the snake. Yet without the rope, the snake would not have appeared in it. Likewise, God is not responsible for anything that is happening in the world, yet nothing can happen in the world without God’s existence. God maintains a very crucial position: God is doing everything, and yet doing nothing at all.

Na karmaphala samyogam svabhavastu pravartate: The natural tendency of existence itself is responsible for what we call action and motivation in any direction. Nadatte kasyacit papam na chaiva sukritam vibhuh, ajnanenavritam jnanam tena muhyanti jantavah (5.15): God does not take our sin or our merit, because merits and sins are meaningful only in individualised existence where consciousness works through the body and sense organs; therefore, sin and merit cannot be attributed to consciousness that is not working through the sense organs and the individual apparatus of the mind. Universal Existence does not think through the mind and does not perceive through the sense organs. Hence, the characteristics which are of the mind and the senses cannot be attributed to God.