Gita 2026 Lesson 6 Chapter II, Samkhya Yoga, verses 39-53

 Gita 2026 Lesson 6

Chapter II, Samkhya Yoga, verses 39-53

Guru Nitya makes this point about unitive reasoning, in That

Alone:

What is the faculty with which you contemplate, or, as the

phenomenologists say, reflect? By the way, I agree with this

term because you are most often thinking with your known

tools of reasoning. You have to first suspend the mechanism of

reasoning with ordinary logic. Then you allow the given—what

is not conscious in deep sleep as well as what is conscious in

the wakeful—both to prevail and be juxtaposed. You are

therefore reflecting rather than manipulating.

The problem is one of getting over relativity. From the most

unknown to the most known, there are shades of ignorance or

shades of knowledge. Relative to something else you know this

well or less well. To give this up and adopt an absolutist

attitude is our main challenge.

Bindu

Thank you, Bailey, for your beautiful and searching reflection. I

am deeply touched that my experience in Morocco resonated with

you — and even more moved by how you described your own

“abyss” in the airport. What a powerful parallel. I can picture you

walking those long corridors, holding to the mantram while the

world hurried past, and that image will stay with me.

The mantram you mention — “I am not the body, I am not even

the mind” — is most closely associated with Ramana Maharshi,

who taught that our true identity is not the body or the mind, but

pure awareness — the Self. Each morning in meditation, I return

to Nirvana Shatakam by Adi Shankaracharya. Its verses remind me

of what we truly are, beyond all change and circumstance.

Your understanding of philosophy is much deeper than mine

academically. I cannot speak to it intellectually, only from

experience. For me, the Absolute is not something I can define —

only something I sometimes feel in moments of stillness,

surrender, or grace. I sense it quietly when the mind becomes calm.

I am still learning, still walking, still being taught by life itself. It is

beautiful how different journeys can lead to the same inner truth.

When I read these verses in the Bhagavad Gita, I saw myself in

what Krishna describes. Many people follow religion for rewards

— heaven, protection, pleasure, or power. Prayer can become a

kind of exchange: we give devotion hoping to get something in

return. From childhood, we are taught to pray for what we want

and warned that if we do wrong, God will punish us. While this

may guide behaviour, it can also create fear and anxiety.

Religion can slowly turn into a system: do everything correctly and

you will be rewarded; fail and you will suffer. Instead of peace, it

brings tension. I grew up in a somewhat superstitious environment

where people worried about “evil eyes” or bad luck, even while

surrounded by blessings.

I have a friend with two wonderful children who are doctors, yet

she constantly worries that something bad will happen. She cannot

enjoy what she has because fear is always present. She even

worries that other people’s jealousy might ruin her blessings, and

she often focuses on sad things as if carrying negative thoughts is

normal. I feel sad for her because she forgets the blessings she

already has.

Once I told her that if she fears both positive and negative energies

so much, maybe she should mentally neither take nor give. That

way, she would not feel caught in an imagined exchange of forces.

Only what she creates within herself would remain. Looking back,

I see that I was also trying to free myself from fear-based thinking.

I think I have partly freed myself from this reward-and-punishment

way of thinking, but not completely. I am more aware now when

fear or desire motivates me. Sometimes I still catch myself wanting

reassurance or certain outcomes. It feels like a gradual process —

learning to act without bargaining.

One line that has stayed with me is from Narayana Guru: “Ours is

to know and let know, not to argue and win.” I feel this teaching

connects deeply with what we are studying — to see the truth

without forcing it on ourselves or others. The world of concepts

and arguments can only go so far. Logical reasoning has its place,

but beyond that there is something that cannot be debated — it can

only be lived. I am not fully free from old patterns, but I am more

conscious of them. Maybe that awareness itself is the beginning of

unitive reason — acting without attachment, trusting without fear,

and slowly letting go.

Goal-orientation is definitely present in my spiritual life.

Sometimes I meditate because I want peace. Sometimes I study

because I want understanding. When I focus too much on the

result, I become impatient or disappointed if I don’t get what I

expected.

There have also been times when I did not expect anything, and

those were often the best experiences. For example, when I helped

someone without thinking about what I would gain, I felt natural

and present. When I did something simply because it felt right,

without worrying about success or failure, I felt peaceful. Not

having expectations helps me stay calm and steady. I think this is

what Krishna means by acting without attachment. When I just do

what needs to be done and let go of the outcome, I feel more

steady inside.

Overall, whatever negativities I encounter around me, I try to find

something positive in them with the help of the Absolute. I am not

arguing, just accepting what I know.

Love Bindu x

Scott: Guru Nitya, who spent time with Ramana Maharshi, early

on would lead us through chakra meditations grounded in the

Gayatri mantra, where at each chakra we chanted, along with the

Sanskrit, “I am not this body.” The result was amazingly intense,

mainly due to his radiant intensity, but it uncovered new ground

for us youngsters. Those session remain vivid, after over 50 years

now. I hadn’t thought of it relating to the Maharshi before, but it

makes sense.

I have collected all Nitya’s English writing about his

astounding time with Ramana Maharshi, and can send you the doc.

or you can access it on Nitya’s website: http://aranya.me/read.html

, under Longer Works.

Defining the Absolute is a contradiction, is it not? All

attempts to pin it down are certain to fall short, to be too little too

late. So there is no need to feel apologetic about not defining it,

even in a world where definitions are demanded willy-nilly. We’ll

be working to let go of such compulsions, so that our own journey

leads us to inner truth more than outer conformity.

The Gita will help you reinforce your independent thinking

and acting, Bindu, by helping you give up the need for contractual

demands. The universe is already in dynamic tension—we don’t

need to help it out, by bringing our ego into the game. At least,

where we’re going with this study. I’m happy you already

understand this, though it always benefits from practice. Fun

practice.

Speaking of mantras, Narayana Guru’s original “Ours is to

know and let know, not to argue and win,” is eternally germane.

Our egos have been taught to be winners, and so unwittingly

downgrade our companions, every time we defend ourselves. Ergo,

we should stop defending ourselves psychologically. Thank you

for reminding us of this key element of the philosophy here.

Bindu, you are very well prepared. Let’s see how much the

Gita’s wisdom supports and enlivens your path through this close

examination.

Goal-orientation is perfectly normal in horizontal activities.

Krishna’s ban is about imagining what our spiritual

accomplishments will be in the future, where we make a fool’s

paradise and try to squeeze ourselves into it. I haven’t explained

this well enough yet, I know. Goals are fine, but not in false

pretenses about what our spiritual practices will do for us. We’ll

find out as we go, and our guesses are impediments. We should be

already motivated enough to not need to goad ourselves with

visions of paradise. We are already in paradise, so let’s not push it

away so we can try to attain it. You already know all this, I’m only

agreeing with you.

Vivek

Exercise: The section starts off with a tremendous blast against the

convoluted reasoning of true believers in religion. It’s only logical

that Krishna begins by identifying ordinary, consensual reality and

moves toward his more enlightened position. What kinds of

scriptural or doctrinal bondage have you encountered, and what

led you to become dissatisfied with it? To what extent have you

extricated yourself from its clutches?

I did not grow up in a religious household and was not

‘indoctrinated’ in Gods and the belief systems around them.

Rituals were also light...a puja once a year on Diwali, or the

ceremonies at a death in the family was the extent of it. I read the

Mahabharat and the Ramayana but more as literature than scripture

If anything, my task may be to develop more faith (shraddha).

There is a core of clear reasoning in Vedanta that resonates with

my intellectual side, and I can make good progress with. However,

I am also told reason can only take you so far. The final leap to

realization is intuitive and can only be made by a mind that is

ready. What is not entirely clear to me is the nature and extent of

shraddha or bhakti you need to have a ready mind

Bear with me as I explore the references to faith I have

encountered in the discussions of a ‘ready mind’. I lay these out to

invite input and guidance

The first reference to a ready mind is a mind equipped with the

four qualifications (sadhana chatushtaya), where one of the four

(shutt sampatti) specifically refers to shraddha in the word of the

guru and the scriptures (meaning Upanishads, not the ritualistic

karma kandas). If this is the faith we need to begin any area of

study...like we would need faith in the textbook and the Professor

even for a course in physics...then I get that...that I can do

A second reference is to a mind that has been purified (chitta

shuddhi) by karma yoga, doing one’s duty without desire and

attachment to outcomes. How is one to do that? The discussions I

have encountered here, like in Shankaracharya’s Gita Bhashya

point to performing action as a prayer (isvar arpan) and receiving

results as a gift (isvar prasad). This is a stronger definition of faith

than in shraddha. It requires one to believe in God

A third reference is to a mind that is still (chitta ekagrata). The

recommended paths are Raj yoga or Bhakti, definitely a strong

dose of faith for the path of Bhakti

Finally, we are also asked to believe in the non-human (alaukik)

origin of the Vedas, including the Upanishads. That too takes faith

So, Scott, the question for me is not ‘how do I remove my religious

indoctrination’. It is:

 What exactly is the nature of the faith we need for Gyan (self

knowledge) to take effect, for realization?

 How do we develop it? ...I know how to reason and grow my

understanding; I don’t know how to grow my faith!

Suggestions?

Another exercise: We can take this straight from the book (Path to

the Guru), on page 259: “With a little reflection, many examples

should come to mind of how we lose the flow by being drawn away

into anticipating a specific result of our action. This is a very good

exercise for contemplation.” Examine how goal-orientation may

be present in your spiritual attitude and find examples where not

having expectations served you especially well.

In a mundane or secular context, any work where we are fortunate

enough to get focused on the process and lose ourselves in doing it,

is one where we experience flow. It is more likely to lead to

excellence...be it developing and analyzing options, writing a

document etc.

Focusing unduly on the outcome we want or letting time pressure

create anxiety kills the flow in these same tasks. It makes the work

less pleasurable and likely reduces quality

In meditation, anticipating the nature and result of a meditation

interferes with the actual experience. When we do it without

expectations, simply go with the process, it seems to work better.

In spiritual study, the things that have become routine habits have

worked well. For example, weekend classes I participate in. Or a

daily habit of reading a text or listening to its lecture and writing

my notes on it. There is no fuss about these, no overthinking of

‘why’ as these activities have stabilized. When it is simply a

routine you think less of the outcome and perform the action

My daily practice, including meditation and ‘witnessing thoughts’

is not yet routinized enough, skilled enough, that I am in the flow.

That introduces thoughts of what and why. Stabilizing on a couple

of daily routines so they become natural habits, the process flows

easily, may make them better. Perhaps that is part of what Krishna

means when he says, ‘yoga is skill in action’!

Scott: First off, Vivek, you already have plenty of sraddha, but you

will become more familiar with it towards the end of the study.

You can always peek at chapter XVII if you’d like to get a head

start.

Yes, you’re right—not all things called scripture or authentic

are true. Nor are all those called gurus. It’s essential to believe in

what you’re studying, and also to only accept what makes good

sense to you. Caution is legitimate, even mandatory. A favorite

quote from Love and Blessings I never get tired of, and you’ve

likely read, is when Nitya finally accepted Nataraja Guru as his

guru:

Nataraja Guru had no inside or outside. His anger, humor,

and compassion all manifested spontaneously. He was never

apologetic or regretful. He certainly didn’t believe in the

conventional Christian philosophy of “do good, be good,” nor

in entertaining people with pleasantries and well-mannered

behavior. On the other hand, he welcomed encounters that

opened up areas of vital interest in a philosophical point or

problem, as in the case of Socrates and his group of young

followers like Plato.

The next day when he was sitting musing, I asked him,

“Guruji, what is our relationship?” He said, “In the context of

wisdom teaching I am your guru, and you are my disciple. In

social situations you are you, and I am I, two free individuals

who are not obliged to each other. When I teach, you should

listen and give full attention. Don’t accept until you understand.

If you don’t immediately understand, you should have the

patience to wait. There is no question of obedience, because my

own maxims are ‘Obey not’ and ‘Command not.’ Instead,

understand and accept.” That was the lifelong contract I

maintained during the twenty-one years of our personal

relationship and another twenty-six years of my relating to him

as the guiding spirit of my life. (150)

Here, we’re treating the Gita as our Guru, or Krishna if you prefer.

I’m only an intermediary.

Your questions are excellent, Vivek, but I would suggest you

keep them as questions, and over the course of your life you can

provide your own answers. Any deity looking on would much

prefer your original thinking to dutiful kowtowing. Duty is social

conditioning slipped into their mouths for emphasis, and while it

has some validity, when you are interested in ultimate truth, you

have to spot the motivations for it being there. The Gurukula

version I go by is as open as possible, and you are free to point out

unconscious limitations I or others put on it. They are not

intentional.

That said, there is a profound sense of belonging and

comprehension that is being drawn out of every serious student by

the Gita, employing the narrative fiction of an all-knowing

Krishna.

Have you read Nitya’s second appendix in Love and

Blessings, where he addresses the principle of of the Guru? In

essence, “The Guru is none other than this Self which resides in

the heart of all.” The Gita is in total accord: X.20 reads “I am the

soul seated in the heart of all beings; and I am the beginning and

the middle and even the end of beings.” It’s repeated more broadly

in chapter XV. Krishna carefully distinguishes himself from the

gods, in a number of places; he is widely understood to represent

Brahman, the Absolute, even though the urge to deify him is very

strong. I haven’t found it necessary. I suppose I’m a “true believer”

but not in any anthropomorphic sense. You are free to worship any

personification you like, but I will always keep in mind the

undefinable principle behind it.

Your conclusions, Vivek, are well thought out, and make me

wonder why I am teaching to you at all. I’ll just add that the flow

of routine is a double-edged sword. It’s good to get you back to

paying attention on a regular basis, but those thoughts of what and

why are essential parts of meditation too. Stilling the mind is good,

but it’s also valuable to satisfy its curiosity. When your mind is

satisfied in that active way, you will naturally sink into a more

quiet state.

Rest assured, everything in this study will support your

excellence in meditation as well as your skill in action.

R

It feels like I am already in the thick of a battle, fighting different

emotional pulls, juggling responsibilities, and getting carried away

in the process.

The panoramic view from a middle ground seems elusive;

momentary clarity in the midst of this flux is numbed by the

punishing schedule of everyday tasks. Glimpses of the night sky

with its countless stars offer a fleeting sense of balance. The

seemingly simple effort involved in just looking up at the

sky—which is always above us—somehow feels daunting.

I began reading the commentary on verses 39–53 very late, but the

suggested exercise resonated with me. I started thinking about how

goal-oriented, result-based thinking and action have played out in

my life. I hope to catch up and share my reflections in the

upcoming weeks.

Scott: Ram, I’m glad you are catching on to the relevance of this

amazing scripture. We look forward to hearing more about your

reflections in the upcoming weeks. Coincidentally, I included some

words about reflection from my Guru, above these responses, in

case you want to reflect more on your reflections.

Gopica

My relections and experiences:

During my younger days, I strongly believed that faithfully

following certain rituals would automatically yield the desired

results. I followed them blindly, as I had been taught that this was

the right path. However, when outcomes did not unfold as

expected, I was told it was my fate. Something predetermined that

I had to endure, the result of karma that could not be escaped.

For many years, I accepted this belief unquestioningly. Gradually,

this outlook turned into self-pity. I began to see myself as someone

destined to suffer circumstances beyond my control.

Through my later learning in psychology, I began to shift. I started

giving myself permission; permission to feel, to question, and

eventually to love myself. Slowly, self-pity transformed into self-

compassion.

Verses 39–53 deeply resonated with this transition. They

emphasize acting without attachment to results, focusing on the

action itself rather than being bound by whether the goal is

achieved or not. This insight helped me recognize that my

suffering was not merely due to outcomes, but due to my

attachment to them.

When I reflected on the times I felt intense regret or even

questioned my worth, I realized most of those moments occurred

during my school and college years. I had tied my identity to

objectives — grades, recognition, validation. When those

expectations were unmet, I concluded that I was not worthy.

Yet, life gradually expanded my awareness. New learning brought

new people, new resources, and new experiences. Each experience

reshaped my understanding of myself.

I now recognize a shift from what I call a “creature mindset” one

driven by fear, conditioning, and survival to a more conscious

“human desire mindset.” In this space, desires arise, goals are

formed, they rise and fall, but they do not define my existence.

The verses offer me a powerful metaphor of rebirth, not in a literal

sense alone, but as repeated rebirths of desires, identities, and

intentions within a single lifetime. Desires emerge, dissolve, and

re-emerge in new forms.

However, I also see the subtle trap: the vicious cycle of ego

attachment. The practice, therefore, is to remain in the observer

mode i.e. to stay aware within the field of experience without

becoming entangled in it. To act, to desire, to strive; yet not to be

consumed by success or failure.

This is still a realization unfolding within me. It is not complete. It

requires practice , the discipline of awareness and the humility to

transcend the ego again and again.

Scott: Gopica, your response is an excellent epitome of how the

well-meaning instruction we get early in life actually fails us.

Hems us in. Your grasp of the intention here is bound to be a

liberating influence. Let’s see what new insights it brings.

Bringing the ego into dynamic balance is a particularly

sensitive aspect of yoga, and an ever-active engagement. Belief

systems tend to go to extremes of all or nothing, yet occupying the

middle ground is essential to us for healthy interaction. Guru Nitya

taught us to treat the ego as a place-marker, meaning we didn’t

need to crow about ourselves or combat other people’s egos. It

only indicates our place in the flow. The Gita is an excellent tool

for normalizing our egos, where we are all in this together.

Bailey

Scott suggests two approaches to reflection: 1) “scriptural and

doctrinal bondage” – has one extricated oneself from their toils? 2)

the mischievous effects of goal-orientation on one’s the pursuit of

the “spiritual path.”  

 

     The first approach converges with my current rereading

of Arnaud Desjardins (AD henceforth) En Relisant les

Evangiles (1990).  A young and enterprising producer for French

television,  AD set off for India in the mid-1950s to explore

Eastern spirituality, both from a professional standpoint (Ashrams,

his first documentary, introduced Ramana Maharshi, Ramdas, Ma

Anandamayi among others to the French public; followed by a film

about Tibetan masters made possible by the support of the young

and then-relatively little-known Dalai Lama) and for the pursuit of

his own spiritual path, which had started in 1948 with the teachings

of Gurdjieff in Paris.  He made many trips East in the late ‘50s and

‘60s, meeting Sufi masters in Afghanistan and Zen masters in

Japan as well as Hindu and Buddhist scholars, teachers and gurus

in India.  AD was driven –sometimes he uses the word

tormented—by religious doubts arising from his own background

as a scion of one of the leading Protestant families of France.  The

notion of scriptural and doctrinal bondage applies very precisely to

the young AD as he struggled against self-assured dogmatic

certitudes in his church.  Doubts assailed him. Christ preached

loving your neighbors, but Christians seemed always to be fighting

among themselves about who had the right interpretation of

scriptures –and as for non-Christians? They were all wrong!  AD’s

own journey toward discovering the universal existential spiritual

dimensions missing amidst all this sound, fury and intolerant

commandments began in a Cistercian monastery (he did not then

know that across the Atlantic a young Cistercian monk, Thomas

Merton. still very little known, was struggling with

similar  questions, and was also beginning to explore Eastern

traditions). So the Roman Catholics, the traditional hostile “other”

church within French Christianity, had something vital to offer this

tormented Protestant!  But the best of these fellow spiritual seekers

were also themselves struggling against the doctrinal bondages

(and boundary guardians) of their own church.  Lamenting the lack

of true Christian saints in our own time (you have to reach back

centuries to find a Francis of Assisi), some of them, too, were

looking Eastwards.   At the same time our young TV professional

was increasingly aware that for most people In the secularist

circles in which he moved Christianity of any kind had lost all

appeal, all serious interest –it was “old hat” at best, unscientific,

left-over superstition, likely to be the source of many individual

psychological sufferings deriving from its hypocrisies, as well as

from childhood traumas due at least partly to its rigid, my-way-or-

the-highway teachings.

     One day in 1959 AD, well along in his filming project in India,

acting on an impulse, travelled hundreds of miles to a small,

unfamous ashram in Bengal of which he had heard.  “What do you

want?”, asked Swami Prajnanpad, a master in the Vedanta tradition

who was also, like Nataraja Guru, deeply educated in Western

science.  Their  guru-disciple relationship over the next fifteen

years, nourished by AD’s frequent sojourns in the ashram even as

his professional TV career continued to flourish, would culminate

in Swami Prajnanpad visiting France near the end of his life and

blessing AD’s project of establishing a spiritual center there  to

continue his Vedantic line of teaching.  AD retired from the TV

world and devoted the rest of his life to this teaching (he died in

2011) and to encouraging dialogue with other authentic spiritual

traditions. Today that center is located at Hauteville, near Valence

– and there is an offshoot in rural Quebec.

     En Relisant les Evangiles is addressed particularly to those

brought up in a Christian tradition, like himself (and like me), who

fell away from it, or turned sharply away from it, repudiated it on

the grounds of “scriptural and doctrinal bondage” and other

sins.  The writing of it evolved, AD tells us, from countless

exchanges with many men and women who came to him seeking

spiritual guidance, help with the suffering in their lives.  Not

resolute materialists –such would not bother to come—these

troubled seekers of truth had heard that Eastern traditions offer an

undogmatic path to salvation (or at any rate, away from

suffering).  At the time of the book cited above, AD had already

published a dozen others carefully expounding in French the

Vedantic teachings of Swami Prajnanpad.  This master had always

carefully distinguished his teachings from religion (like Nataraja

Guru, who I heard say “Don’t mix me up with religion.”)  But, AD

discovered as he advanced along the spiritual path that for him had

begun in childhood with French Protestantism, these teachings are

perfectly compatible with authentic religion, properly

understood (a qualifier I often heard from Nataraja

Guru).  Rereading the Gospels (that’s the literal translation of the

French title of his book) in the light of Swami Prajnanpad’s

teaching AD found that the adults who had taught him religion as a

child –and after—were (and still are) fundamentally misreading the

Jesus of Nazareth who can be glimpsed in and behind the lines

preserved in the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and

John.  That Jesus is to be properly seen as a Master offering –like

Gautama Buddha or Sankaracharya- a Way of self-

transformation, not a set of Rules one had better follow (Or

Else!), not a set of beliefs to embrace and affirm (Or Else!). One

example from a passage just read:  those famous Ten

Commandments, those Thou Shalt Not Commit this ‘n that

(murder, adultery etc.).  AD goes back to the original linguistic

formulation: these are not imperatives set in present time (i.e.

“commandments”) as they appear in English or French

translations: these refer, grammatically,  to a future time/space

when the transformed being will be freed from the bondage of

cause-and-effect, action-reaction, all the endless tricks of

Ego.  They are not, in fact, “commandments” to be obeyed (in

reality most often to be ignored ignored or broken):  they sketch

the truly liberated person. The Jesus of the Gospels, as AD reads

him in this book, uses stories and parables to lead those who

choose to follow him, who take up his burden, who embrace the

hard work that goes with becoming aware of how Ego holds us all

in bondage, to point us along the way that each must follow for

him/her/self.  Toward the goal of liberation in this life, not beyond

it.

     There is a strong tendency identifiable in Christianity from the

earliest times, AD notes, to insist on the unique rightness of

MY/OUR Christianity.  Yes, Buddhist compassion is wonderful,

the Hindus have such great myths, those Zen koans, man they

make you think, but in the end Jesus came to save us sinners and

without that what do you got?  You gotta hold onto it!  Once he

had a long conversation with a very liberal, very well-educated

Catholic, AD tells, which ended with the guy proclaiming: “I have

MY Christianity and no one is going to take it from me!”  Right.

Think about that one! My Christianity. Ego will cling—shall we

call that a law of (human) nature? (Do horses, do elephants, do

spiders cling to an ego-equivalent? Forget I asked!)

      Like the young Arnaud Desjardins I came to India conflicted

about the Christianity I had grown up with.  I had not, like many

contemporaries, rejected it, but I did not practice or affirm a

Christian identity.  The role of Christians, and organized churches,

in so many historical horrors deeply troubled me (it still does).  But

perhaps there was a real baby in that dirty bathwater?  Travelling

from Ooty to Madras Christine and I stopped to visit Shantivanam,

where the English Benedictine Fr. Bede Griffiths was continuing

the work begun by two French priests in creating a Christian

ashram, with a liturgy incorporating Upanishadic traditions. Fr.

Bede himself radiated the joy of a saintly man.  (Later I read the

story of his own spiritual journey as an unreligious boy in England

who found his way to joy in the monastic life). Returning to

Varkala we stayed two days at Kurushamala, a Cistercian

monastery in Kerala, which Fr Bede had helped to found,

dedicated to the same principles of exploring the connections

between  Christian teachings and practices as lived in community

in rapport with Upanishadic understanding.  By the time of our

returnto France in 1974 these experiences, along with the teachings

of Nataraja Guru, had prepared me to rediscover my own Christian

traditions.  This happened one Sunday in the early 1980s, when

Kitch, who would become my second wife (Christine and I had

separated and divorcedat this point) persuaded me to accompany

her to the American Cathedral in Paris.  I felt right at home in the

liturgy that had accompanied my teenage years when I attended a

school in Honolulu run under the auspices of the Episcopal

church.   I have found nourishment in the Episcopal church ever

since— the scriptures we read in our services, including the

parables of Jesus of Nazarath that AD discusses in his book, are

not for me constraining, commanded beliefs, but challenges to aid

spiritual reflection.  Have I attained a “neutral attitude”, as verse

52 suggests?  That would be saying too much!  Maybe I can say

I’m working on it.  “Contrary Injunctions” (verse 53) don’t

disillusion – hopefully they stimulate reflection.

 

     I do confess to an antipathy to fundamentalism, whether

Christian, Islamic, Jewish or other. The ideological bondage which

much concerns me today, however, comes from the anti-religious

side, whose proponents proclaim their faith in “scientific

materialism” or just “Science”.   “Physics”  without

“metaphysics”, as discussed in my response to the previous

lesson.  Another time for that one.

 

     As for the mischievous effects of goal-orientation on one’s the

pursuit of the “spiritual path”: that’s too much to tackle

here.  “Acting without concern for benefits...”  (verses 44-47),

“Transcending birth bondage, renouncing benefit interest (verse

51)—better give all that more thought.

Scott: It’s so fun for me, Bailey, to be a student in your lecture

series. I skipped almost all of college, so now in my dotage I can

feel the thrill of a terrific teacher at work as I sit receptively in my

seat. It’s much more my true nature than to be a public speaker.

Thank you for the privilege.

Speaking of Ramana Maharshi, here’s Nitya’s compiled

writing on him: http://aranya.me/read.html , under Longer Works.

Quite extraordinary.

Though you’ve likely moved on already, the Oliver Sacks

quote I added to the new lesson 6 should appeal to you.

I love that the reading of the “Commandments” in the

original formulation is a description of a wise person, rather than

rules to follow. We can see how the mental orientation of the

unenlightened interpreters through history has denigrated the intent

so thoroughly. I have been applying that to all religions, and am

seeing it already with Narayana Guru’s revaluations. They are

rapidly being converted to ordinary Hinduism, and the most

important—the universal—aspects left out. It’s easier to treat it as

more of the same, when it isn’t at all. I think of the Buddha, none

of whose words reliably were recorded—it’s all after the fact,

ranging from brilliant to ho hum, sure, but he isn’t really there. It's

all aftermath. The point being, we can draw inspiration from the

ideas, but we have to revivify them in ourselves. It isn’t enough to

say I’m a Buddhist, or I’m a Christian, or I’m something else. I’m

a non-believer, for Christ’s sake. Just being alive is all the

definition we need.

That’s right: fundamentalist atheists proclaim (to

paraphrase): “I don’t believe in metaphysics!” Yet belief itself is

metaphysical. It’s a self-defeating proposition. They might as well

say they don’t believe in ideation.

I think I’m still dull-minded from the anesthesia, so please

forgive me. Fortunately, you have written about this very well,Bailey. I’m all ears, and a few neurons.