Gita 2026 Lesson 7
CHAPTER II: Samkhya Yoga v 54-72
It seems the impending end of civilization—the latest war of
Kuruksetra—is casting a dark shadow over class participation. I
understand! As poet Carl Sandberg said, “It’s a large morning to be
thoughtful of.” While the Gita is relevant even in hard times, you
may have to make new plans and pay more attention to the news.
Do what you have to do, but know we miss you. I’ll persevere until
I’m the only one left, but I do love working with multiple
perspectives. As I imagine Krishna saying in the Epilogue: “You
really are a miraculously complicated creation of mine, don’t you
know? I always intended humans to do more than scrabble for food
or run swords through each other.”
I’m doing decently after my heart ablation and radioactive
imaging, but I still notice fuzziness of mind and my typing is
ghastly. Those medicines really do linger, and degrade thinking. I
apologize for any blunders, and have tried to spot them with
proofreading.
Bindu
Dear Scott,
Thank you so much for your thoughtful response and for sharing
your memories of Guru Nitya. Your insights always bring clarity
and reassurance, and I’m truly grateful for the way you illuminate
these teachings. I looked into the writings you mentioned — thank
you for pointing me to them.
Being a woman, the very first thing I explored was the few
recipes from Nitya’s kitchen… and I have to admit, I immediately
wanted to cook the wisdom pie! ��
Your explanation about goals and spiritual practice really
helped me. It softened something inside, and I appreciate how
gently you guide us away from selfpressure and toward simple,
honest living.
Thank you again for your kindness, wisdom, and steady
encouragement. It means a great deal. Thank you for everything.
The world of spirituality is filled with many faces—some
guiding with sincerity, others masking their intentions with the
appearance of holiness. Throughout history, and especially now in
an age shaped by social media and technology, it has become
increasingly easy for false gurus to craft images of purity and
authority. From a young age, I learned that not every person in a
position of guidance truly embodies wisdom or compassion. In my
childhood, teachers were considered gurus, deserving of
unquestioned respect. Yet I also witnessed how some misused that
respect, crossing boundaries and leaving young girls frightened,
silent, and unsure of whom to trust. As children, we carried not
only the burden of fear but also the worry that adults might not
believe us—or worse, blame us. These early experiences carved
sensitivity into my mind and taught me that external appearances
can never be the measure of true guidance.
My spiritual understanding deepened over time, especially
with the teachings of Krishna and the explanations of Nitya
Chaitanya Yati. Krishna’s guidance about desires reshaped my
relationship with emotions: he teaches that a wise person does not
fight desires but sees through them with clarity. Desires lose their
control when the mind discovers inner fulfillment. Then I learned
the concept of verticalization , a metaphor that opened an entirely
new dimension of understanding for me. Horizontal living, I
realized, is the path many of us walk unconsciously—moving from
job to money to status to attractions and disappointments, always
reacting to the world outside. It is a life governed by praise, blame,
success, and failure. In contrast, vertical living invites awareness
inward and upward. It asks us to ground ourselves in something
deeper, to develop the roots of consciousness that help us observe
rather than be carried away. This shift touched me deeply; it
became something I wanted to practice, not just admire from a
distance.
Nataraja Guru’s explanation of the obstacles to
contemplation—attachment, anxiety, and anger—resonated
strongly with me. For much of my life, anger was my natural
response when things did not go my way. It was not intentional; it
was simply the pattern I had learned to survive. But through
spiritual study, selfreflection, and guidance, something began to
shift. My reactions softened. Awareness stepped in where
emotional storms once took over. I began to understand that
detachment is not coldness; it is freedom. It is choosing clarity
over turbulence.
This inner shift became visible even in my professional life.
During a recent onetoone conversation with manager, I found
myself unexpectedly calm, even guiding him to look at difficulties
with a broader perspective. Instead of absorbing stress, I reminded
him that not everything lies within our control and that
unnecessary worry only clouds the mind. That moment showed me
how much I had changed. The anger and heaviness I once carried
had given way to balance, and the teachings I had spent months
absorbing were quietly shaping the way I engage with the world.
My personal life, too, carries the imprint of my past. Growing
up, my parents worked hard, and as the youngest child with much
older siblings, I often lived in silence and solitude. Loneliness
became familiar, but instead of drowning in it, I built an inner
world to survive. I created imaginary drawers in my mind, each
holding emotions I could not express. Sometimes even today, I
open those drawers and see the younger version of myself—the
girl who felt alone, sensitive, and misunderstood. I hug her in my
imagination, offering the comfort she once needed. This practice,
though born from childhood necessity, has become a form of
healing. It reminds me that suffering does not disappear, but
awareness can transform it.
Life now feels like an ocean to me—vast, deep, and
everpresent. Emotions rise and fall like waves. Some arrive
suddenly, some pass quietly, but the ocean itself remains stable. I
have learned to return to that inner stillness more quickly than
before. The world hasn’t changed, but my relationship with it has. I
still feel deeply, still remember the pain of the past, but I no longer
drown in it. I observe, breathe, and return to balance.
In this journey, my mind has slowly become a student, humble and
curious. And the Absolute—the inner truth, the quiet awareness
beneath everything—has become my true guru. I no longer seek
guidance outside with the desperation I once had. Instead, I turn
inward, toward the clear space where wisdom arises naturally.
Spirituality, for me, is no longer an escape but a way of
understanding life more honestly. It is learning to live fully without
allowing desire, anger, or attachment to rule the mind.
This is the path I continue to walk: a journey from horizontal
living to vertical awareness, from emotional conditioning to
clarity, from fear to quiet inner strength.
Scott: Guru Nitya was also a fantastic real chef, whose food was
always delicious. He had the knack! It’s one of the best of all
siddhis.
Nitya also had a fine sense of humor, evident in those silly
recipes.
We should attribute the explanations of simple, honest living
to Narayana Guru, though I’m happy to be a bearer of his good
tidings, as processed by his successors, Nataraja Guru and Guru
Nitya. In my class preparation this morning, for Atmopadesa
Satakam verse 62, I’ve been reading lines like this from Guru
Nitya: “The Guru is here suggesting to us the most gentle pressure
in the search. At the same time it is not lukewarm. It is an urjita, an
out-and-out search, but that search is not directed to just one
isolated area. Life itself is the search. It goes on until we come to
what is called paramapadam, an absolute state.”
Yoga applies to respect for the teacher, too: the respect is
important, but it must be earned and honest. Caution and
skepticism have their places, even with gurus, but especially with
teachers of children. It should be made known that cruel people
insist on being obeyed and are not above invoking God to back
themselves up. It seems like there is a new wave of brutality
arising now, from self-styled keepers of the faith, in many different
faiths—a repeating tragedy of our species.
Instilling fear in children is a serious crime, in my estimation.
I’m happy to hear that you grew out of it into a healthy state of
clarity, Bindu. For many, the fear is not worked through, and it can
lead to offloading it on the next generation.
It’s wonderful to read of your deepening understanding. The
Gita teaches at many levels, but the best of all may be how it
inspires and amplifies a mature person’s awareness. For that
matter, it’s more of an instruction manual for teachers than for
students.
I love the way you are consoling and educating your younger
self. Therapy at its best. Isn’t it fascinating to recall how we took
things wrongly, and were hurt by things that weren’t meant to be
hurtful, when we were young? Only then can we truly let them go.
Gopica
This lesson opened a gateway for me, revealing what detachment
truly means. The five senses feed us distractions that entangle us,
pulling us from our purpose. Repeated readings are helping me
dive deeper.
Recently, I faced this in my family. My 83-year-old mother-in-law
suffered a preventable accident, requiring painful surgeries.
Thankfully, she's recovering faster than expected, not stuck in
trauma but coping well with medicines. I live far away in a city;
my husband rushed to her town. His elder brothers rely on us
financially, viewing us only as providers. They rarely inform or
connect with us except to ask for money. Her pension has been
misused by them, leading to shocking surprises. Now, with extra
costs beyond her insurance (which my husband pays), we're
stretched thin as it is taking a toll on our financial needs.
I urged my husband to share our financial reality and split excess
costs among the brothers. This required a tough conversation. I
noticed my own reactions: anxiety over expenses, anger at their
behavior, leading to instructions rather than dialogue. Hooks from
the situation threatened my grounding.
Lesson 7 arrived like a blessing, urging me to witness without
entering fear or anger. I saw distorted values in the family system
clearly, from a detached perspective. Key insights anchored me:
"It’s not difficult to be mindful; what’s difficult is to remember to
be mindful."
"We can still savor every bite of our food, it’s just that we don’t
gobble it as if we are starving or push it away without tasting it."
"When you are able to see the Absolute in all things, your attention
is drawn to a deeper level than sensory awareness."
"In order to be certain of our knowledge, we absolutely must
analyze the data flooding into the system from a detached
perspective. Only when all significant errors are deleted can our
reason be considered 'well founded.'"
"Be alive to what’s happening, and ponder it later. Learn to move
on from the feelings that catch hold of you in a static way, that
induce repetition compulsions."
"What being here now really means is that we should discard
regrets about the past and anxiety about the future, which can bog
down our consciousness with distracting and unpleasant sidetracks
that we can do nothing about."
These guided me to mindful discussions, inside and out. Like
Arjuna learning sthitaprajna-steady in joy and sorrow, I'm
attempting to practice equanimity amid the uncontrolled.
Thank you!
Scott: Gopica, I have always found that those who engage with the
Gita quickly find opportunities to apply its wisdom to their lives,
and it makes me very happy to hear. Sometimes it seems as if
Krishna himself is providing the problems to illustrate his
philosophy, but I know that’s anthropomorphic thinking, and I do
it just for fun. Almost always. The point is, the Gita is deeply
relevant to real life issues, and you are already finding it valuable.
The more you practice intelligent detachment—getting “distance”
on a situation—the easier it becomes to apply it the next time. It
sounds like the accident is mending. I’m sure your thoughtful
participation was helpful.
Bailey
Unitive Reasoning
(March 4) I am very encouraged to read Bindu’s very positive
reaction to my comments on her “abyss” experience in Morocco,
as well as Scott’s warm praise for my response to #6. The focus of
#7, is it fair to say, is action –the impulses which drive one, to act
the fears or reluctances that inhibit or qualify acting, and living on
in the wake of the consequences of action.
My decision to go to India, in the Fall of 1971, was impelled by
my failure to move ahead with researching and writing my doctoral
dissertation. My choice was to set it aside, not to abandon it; nor
did it abandon me. During the weeks in Ooty that Spring, as I
attended Nataraja Guru’s early morning coffee classes, joined in
the chanting before the morning meal, and plunged into reading
about his life and the framework of Vedanta my mind never
stopped poking and prodding at the questions which had driven my
research in France the previous year, and after Guru’s Samadhi in
March 1973 my mind had become clear –clear enough—that I
could resume that journey, finish that job. It was my mother who
took the initiative, when I was back in France that August, of
contacting my professors at the University of Pennsylvania to get
me reinstated, bringing me back to the States, and promising me a
monthly stipend of $300 to enable me to devote all my energies to
the research and writing back in Paris. I was able to turn Cristine’s
parents’ comfortable bourgeois apartment (Boulevard Pereire,
Paris XVIIe) into my office since they were off in Mauritius where
her father had been appointed France’s Ambassador.
And I was vastly encouraged and aided by Patrick Périn, who
had originally welcomed me to his native Charleville-Mezieres in
the Ardennes in the Fall of 1970, and gotten me started on the
Merovingians. He was then teaching in a private school while he
did his thesis; now, Fall 1973, his doctorate in hand and thesis in
press, he had moved to Paris, named curator of archaeological
collections (the first such since before WWII) at Musée
Carnavalet, the museum of the history of Paris in the historic
Marais quarter. As it happened he was just then organizing for that
Fall an international colloquium on archaeology and post-
Roman/early medieval Gaul-becoming-Francia (AD 300-600) at
Carnavalet which became my portal for my re-engaging, as well as
becoming a fundamental reference for the re-ignition, in France, of
the field itself. Patrick had also begun to teach a seminar on
Archaeology and the Merovingians at the Sorbonne (within a
graduate school called l’Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, created
in the 1860’s, which no longer exists). I signed up, finished my
dissertation on funerary archaeology and the evolution of
Christianity in Gaul, re-engaged with my career as a field
archaeologist by excavating with Patrick alongside an old church
(Eglise St. Pierre) atop Montmartre, springboarding from there to
other excavations in Burgundy and Languedoc which were to keep
me busy into the 1990s. Patrick gave me a desk in the archaeology
department of Musée Carnavalet, encouraged me to begin giving
papers at scholarly meetings (in French), publishing (in
French—English too) and I was a founding member of
the Association francaise et internationale d’archéologie
mérovingienne) which he created and over which he presided until
his retirement of Director of France’s National Archaeology
Museum (located in a former royal chateau at Saint-Germain-en-
Laye, west of Paris) in 2012. When my academic career in
America at last took off with a one-year appointment at Loyola
University of Chicago 1988-89 I got him invited there to give his
first American lecture in English (I translated it); in 1992 he
headlined a symposium of Merovingian archaeology I organized at
the International Medieval Studies Conference at Kalamazoo,
Michigan) and was keynote speaker in 2006 at the Late Antique
conference at the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana. In
the years I travelled to France almost every summer (1988-2019)
excavating, doing research, staying connected... I would see him,
often stayed with him and his growing family, we would eat well,
drink, talk Merovingian archaeology late into the night–glass in
hand. In the early 2020’s Patrick began having mobility issues –
by last Spring he walked with difficulty, was no longer able to
drive. So, late May, Christine and I took the train from Paris out to
the charming little house alongside the Fontainebleau Forest where
he and wife Charlotte have been living, and spent a most pleasant
afternoon (was an Ardennes specialty with sausage, cabbage and
potato served?)
Patrick Périn died, age 83, on February 6. How full is my
heart! As I wrote to Charlotte, he was, and always will remain, for
me, the best of friends.
Living, as we all of us are living, in a world of relativity – or
should one better use plural: worlds of relativities?—which “we”
are always constructing/deconstructing, what to say here and now
about such a friendship? Assign it to a category such as
ephemeral? – however agreeable, however nourishing personally,
however useful, however satisfying professionally—arising,
flourishing, ending as Time’s cycles continue, like waves washing
up on the beach, leaving one’s feet pressed into the damp sand as
they recede? The thought arises: never again to take the train in
the Gare de Lyon, to walk from the station at Bois-le-Roi, to pass
through the gate as the dog barks his welcome... aha! one catches
one’s “mind” (I prefer the French term le mental to “ego”, so
redolent of Freudian theory) conjuring up emotion: let us feel
sad! Sad is the proper tribute to real friendship! Well, I do feel
sad. I wasn’t/am not ready for Patrick to die! OK—that’s the
reality, you say? The American poet Edna St Vincent Millay says
“I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the cold
ground./ So it is, so it has been.../I know. But I do not approve.
And I am not resigned.” A poem that captured my fancy in youth,
returns at moments like these. My mind darts back to the
telephone call in March 2004 with the news that our dear friends
Leonard and Tanya had died in an auto accident en route to a
dinner party we had just attended. To the letter from the parents of
my graduate school roommate Charlie Funnell which was I think
forwarded to me in Ooty: Charlie had successfully defended his
thesis on the Brooklyn Bridge, was engaged to be married, entered
the hospital for routine surgery in connection with his
asthma...died. On the verge of beginning the life he had worked
for, Charlie with his quirky sense of humor, suddenly gone???– oh
no, no, no! That can’t be the reality! Here goes an inner voice:
What are you doing, bky? Entertaining yourself, n’est-ce
pas?Oops! Am I straying from the proper seriousness of the
Vedantic Path?
(March 9) Thinking, over the past few days, about the long
(but now so quickly fled!) story of Patrick and me, professional
and spiritual paths, life and death another perspective suggests
itself. The pursuit of Truth. It seems to me now that I was drawn
to Patrick, from the very first evening we spent together in
Charleville-Mezieres, by his enthusiasm for research as the pursuit
of truth in the context of history, his confidence that it is there to
be found, that it matters, that it deserves to be pursued with a
critical spirit. Such confidence has not been taken for granted in
intellectual circles in France (or the USA, or the Western world) in
our lifetimes; indeed, challenging the very notion that “objective”
truth might possibly exist in history has been a powerful
intellectual current in our time. There is no “there” there! It is all
stories! Your story, my story, our story, their story –
“deconstructing” the stories became the exciting, fashionable
intellectual game to play from the 1970s. Instead of seeking to
establish the “facts” like our unsophisticated positivist
predecessors, we construct plausible “scenarios” –prepared to
admit, perhaps with a shrug, that these are bound to reflect our
subjective preferences – personal/ cultural/collective. A
contemporary re-invention of the relativism the Sophists were
teaching in the Athens of Socrates’ day. In ours, an ability to
marshal “data” in the light of “theory” became the requirement for
career advancement in various quarters where the interpretation of
history and archaeology were concerned.
The short phrase that arises spontaneously to characterize my
relationship to Patrick Périn is: my Master in Matters
Merovingian. Since “master” is a term often used in writing about
the spiritual path, often as a synonym for “guru”, it is important not
to misuse it here. Gilles Farcet (the “spiritual” author Christine
and I are currently reading together), distinguishes between an
authentic “master/guru” in the Vedanta tradition (such as Ramana
Maharshi, or Swami Prajnapad or his own master Arnaud
Desjardins) who can be said to “know”, and an “instructor”, who
has come far enough along the path to be able to help others not so
far along to progress toward an understanding of the Teaching
which he/she has not yet fully grasped. Crucially, both the
“instructor” and the “aspirant/seeker” must be honest and
scrupulous, motivated by a sincere desire to understand truth
within the framework of their human limitations. At the time I
first met him in Charleville-Mezieres, Patrick was an advanced
graduate student who had also himself excavated Merovingian
burials; I had read a little about them. Their chronology, which
involved a quasi-statistical analysis of how the patterns of “grave-
goods” – the set of objects buried with a subject—evolved over
time was at the heart of his study (since its publication in 1982 it is
accepted as the standard reference). He suggested I pursue a study
of the “funerary practices” as a whole, and planned an approach for
me: visiting museum artefact collections, attending conferences,
working in the best libraries. I forged ahead on this path, gaining
recognition (my 1977 article in France’s leading medieval
archaeological journal remains pertinent) even as his career as an
archaeologist, a museum curator, and an adjunct professor at the
Sorbonne complexified and his national and international stature
grew. But I was never, as he sometimes pointed out, his
student. After our early collaborations our research trajectories
differed, as I became engaged in more “medieval” projects. Most
years, though, up to his retirement in 2012, I would visit to resume
our ongoing conversation, updating myself on Matters
Merovingian. Sometimes I did a paper in the field, perhaps at a
conference he organized – the last one, in 2011, was held at
National Archaeology Museum he, at the pinnacle of his career,
directed...
(March 12) So why devote all this attention here to Patrick
Périn and my relationship with him? Because he was –and
continues to be—not a Master in the sense of the Spiritual Path
(our conversations never touched on “spiritual” matters though he
was well aware of why I went to India and what I did there), but in
the sense of Instructor (as Gilles Farcet defines this term) on the
Truth Path. Truth as it can be found in the relative realm of
historical affairs. From our very first contact and throughout I felt
in Patrick, and was inspired by, not only his conviction that
historical research is a worthwhile and rewarding, even joyful,
endeavor, and his generosity in accompanying me along that
path. Above all he was a man of action. His passing now is a
shock for which I wasn’t prepared, but he will remain alive for me,
I think, as long as I remain alive. I am so grateful.
Scott: The Gita is through and through about action, but the focus
of the second half of chapter II is reason’s contribution to
wisdom—a truly subtle matter. Dialectical reasoning will also be
taught all along the way.
How profound to lose a dear friend like Patrick, and how
important to bring your connection fully to mind, as a final, though
not last, grand gesture. Yes, we feel sorrow with our whole mind,
not merely our ego, unless we are petty indeed. (The abstraction of
our ‘heart’ is also within the mind.) So yes, let us feel sad at the
passing of a dear one!
I recall being asked (in a Gita class at the Unitarian church,
long ago) by a young man whose mother had just died, and he
wanted to know if it was okay for him to feel sad about it. I assured
him that nothing in spiritual life precluded authentic feelings, and
if he was not sad it would compound the tragedy.
Why do religions and spiritual paths tell us we won’t feel
pain or sadness, if only we know God? It appeals on an ill-
considered level, I guess.
Thank you for the St Vincent Millay poem, which I do not
know.
Bailey, we are now in “the mortality zone.” It’s only natural
to be getting inklings of what that implies….
Of general appeal in your response, Bailey, is the old-
fashioned attraction to truth as something that can—must—be
uncovered. From my perspective, deconstruction is just another
way to dig through false constructs to unearth the kernel of high
value buried at the site. Humans tend to overexaggerate their
ideologies, like “deconstruction,” but we don’t have to. If one has
nothing left after deconstructing a theory, perhaps their idea of
truth is too limited. Does it exclude the shining void, the Absolute
principle, consciousness itself? Is it fair to consciously rule out
consciousness? I’d say not. It’s not fair.
Is it fair to always require data, as you imply? Up to a point,
sure. But many of the best things in life are not measurable or
perceptible. Let’s not leave them out. Subjectivity doesn’t help
with finding hidden artifacts, but it’s essential to our feelings.
This is a very large topic, Bailey, and I hope you’ll keep
kicking it around. Maybe our fellow travelers (if any) will
contribute thoughts of their own.
I appreciate Farcet’s distinguishing what I’d call layers of the
guru principle: fully-realized guru, instructor, and eager aspirant,
(why not add open-minded stumbling bumbler?), all of whom,
after the first category, as you so well express it, “must be honest
and scrupulous, motivated by a sincere desire to understand truth
within the framework of their human limitations.” Check out
Nitya’s parallel quote I clipped in for Bindu, where life itself is the
search.
I fear your preferred museums do not include dioramas of
Christians riding dinosaurs—why is that? You could probably get
to the Creation Museum in a matter of hours….
For someone who has made the excavation of funerary
practices a central theme of his career, isn’t it strange and awesome
to watch our friends leaving the planet, and meditate on—and yes,
lament—their temporariness? How even in a single lifetime,
human interests have changed so dramatically that we may feel
already forgotten, vestiges of the past.
We have a Fearless Leader who is desperately working to
affix his name to every building, as if what will be remembered of
him because of it has meaning. It’s a pathetic motivation, for sure:
a substitute for love in his life. As Robert Frost wrote, in Birches:
Earth’s the right place for love / I don’t know where it’s likely to
go better. I see lots of names on buildings, but they don’t bring the
person they represent back to life.
People we know live on in our hearts. The ones we only hear
about are something less. My great grandparents mean nothing to
me, beyond a name in a ledger. I surely mean nothing to them. Yet
meaning is what buoys me up in my life.
Beautiful how you conclude with Patrick’s meaning for you,
how profound he was, and remains.
In our class last Tuesday, I was lamenting that Nitya was no
longer with us, and I dearly wanted him around for this terrible
moment in history. (When Trump was “elected” by Elon Musk, I
briefly regressed to infancy and the feeling of “I want my
Mommy.” My relentlessly optimistic, take care of everything
mother.) Andy spoke valiantly that what he loved most was that
Nitya was still with us; he had never gone away. Our classmates
who only know him through his writings and our classes, must
have felt it less, but for those who knew him personally, it is a
major feature of our lives. He is still a powerful presence. Your
concluding words about Patrick, Bailey, echo our convictions, and
I’ll reprint them so you don’t have to check back:
Above all he was a man of action. His passing now is a shock
for which I wasn’t prepared, but he will remain alive for me, I
think, as long as I remain alive. I am so grateful.
Annex: Academia relies on ideas that are supposed to be grounded
in previous, widely-accepted or proven facts. This means original
academic thinking takes place in a very narrow range, and that’s
perfectly reasonable. What Nataraja Guru calls speculation is
original thinking with a wider purview.
Digging up an ancient site provides original material, which
is then fleshed out with speculation about its function. You must
have specialized in this, no?
My Heracles exegesis was also well-informed speculation
based on a few shards. It is not academically acceptable, since
there is almost no existing interpretation for me to base it on,
beyond a strictly literal one which has degenerated over the
centuries, going from Heracles being the most heroic and powerful
demigod to a mere thug. My interpretation being not only heroic
but spiritually oriented, it does not make sense in an academic
context. I did find a couple of borderline sources, but most of it
comes directly from my own contemplative penetration into the
symbolism of the action, guided by Dr. Mees’s mythic
9interpretations in his Revelation in the Wilderness.
Likewise, in the Gita, I have a lot of background, but to
assemble my commentary I did original thinking for every verse:
sitting with the accumulated material while wondering just what it
was intended to convey. I think you agree: the result is worthwhile,
but there are few facts. Interestingly though, while working on a
verse, very often supporting ideas would surface in articles that
came my way.
Non-fiction deals with specific facts and truths; fiction
presents generalized truths. The Gita is fiction that moves us, in
myriad ways.
My lengthy introduction to the Labors of Herakles ends with
Herakles as Buffoon, which in turn ends with:
Bestselling author of all time, Agatha Christie, in The Labors of
Hercules (NY: Dell, 1968, p. 9), ridicules the romantic
attraction to the classics that prevailed in the West not too long
ago. At the behest of a priggish academic type enamored of the
age-old romances, ace detective Hercule Poirot—himself
named after Hercules—is perusing the Greek myths and thinks:
Take this Hercules—this hero! Hero indeed? What was he
but a large muscular creature of low intelligence and criminal
tendencies!... This ancient Hercules probably suffered from
grand mal. No, Poirot shook his head, if that was the Greeks’
idea of a hero, then measured by modern standards it
certainly would not do. The whole classical pattern shocked
him. These gods and goddesses—they seemed to have as
many different aliases as a modern criminal. Indeed they
seemed to be definitely criminal types. Drink, debauchery,
incest, rape, loot, homicide and chicanery—enough to keep a
juge d’Instruction constantly busy. No decent family life. No
order, no method. Even in their crimes, no order or method!
“Hercules indeed!” said Hercule Poirot, rising to his feet,
disillusioned.
To a materialist, virtually all the wisdom of the ancients is
nothing more than tedious superstition and unscientific
speculation. But, as I have rediscovered in scrutinizing
Heracles, myths are like the Absolute itself: hiding in plain
sight, waiting patiently to be noticed for the treasures they safeguard. Feel free to take a look.
