Lesson 3 Chapter I Arjuna Vishada Yoga v. 24-47

 Lesson 3

Chapter I Arjuna Vishada Yoga v. 24-47

I’m hoping for at least one more response, and then I’ll print

a second edition.

Once again, Bailey has hit it out of the park, highly

recommended if you’re reading along.

Nandita

Life is a battlefield, and I am fortunate to have knowledgable

mentors in various fields of life.  Stationing the chariot in the

middle between the two armies is symbolic of a neutral balanced

position on the horizontal axis.  If one needs to gain knowledge or

teachings from the guru, it becomes the student's responsibility to

ask for it as opposed to expecting the teacher to bestow

knowledge.  This symbolises the vertical axis and the position of

the disciple and the mentor.  The junction between the two lines is

the sweet spot.  

It is important to be able to address things in totality with complete

honesty to understand the full picture and one can do this by

dissolving the 'I' and our ego.  Withdrawing from identification

with the polarities and concentrating in the absolute  is the essence

of the yoga.  This yogic balanced view will help us to embrace

everyone and dissolve differences.  

It takes a lot of courage to turn away from the easy way out and

seek wisdom; this journey in trying to understand the Gita is the

first step in that direction.  Stepping out from our guarded positions

to a neutral vantage point to be able to scrutinise the entire picture

and peel off layers of ego, prejudice, hatred, self-indulgence would

be the necessary first step towards trying to understand oneself and

self liberation.  One can choose to run away from your problems

but the actual challenges in facing them.

Challenges in society are unavoidable. The true test would be how

we face them and pull together a balanced view, speak out when

we need to, dissolve our prejudices and just try to be a better

version of ourselves. If each of us does this, then the collective

would be a much better place to live in.

Scott: Beautifully expressed, Nandita. Knowing this much, we

have arrived at the starting point. Most seekers never even get

started, since wishful thinking doesn’t take them anywhere.

We are tested every day, every hour. We have endless

opportunities to strike a balance, and it’s well within the capability

of every human being to do so.

Gopica

These verses instill confidence and clarity, revealing a path to

awareness and hope in attaining the neutral stance of balanced

perception beyond dualities.

Personal Conditioning: The teaching illuminates how social and

cultural conditioning has made me a "robot," reacting

mechanically to avoid conflict in my close circle. The immediate

challenge lies in cultivating mindfulness to access this neutral

stance rather than succumbing to inherited patterns.

Professional Dynamics: As Centre Head managing volunteers,

housekeeping, and admin staff while maintaining freelance

counseling, these verses highlight a role conflict. When addressing

center challenges, my counseling instincts often dominate despite

clear contractual boundaries. This automatic slip creates self-

judgment and reveals lapses in mindful role discernment.

Core Contemplation: How do I embody the Gita's equanimity

remaining the observer of my conditioned responses while

honoring distinct professional roles without internal conflict?

Scott: I’m curious just how you draw confidence and clarity from

these verses, Gopica, as they are mainly about the opposite. Arjuna

is seeking clarity by rejecting ordinary thinking, so how does this

work?

Your later questions are certainly on topic. I have a similar

problem myself, when the therapist in me speaks up when it isn’t

called for. It has taken a long time to learn to wait until my advice

is actually called for, rather than offering it when it isn’t welcome.

Yet it isn’t hard to learn to hold back.

Arjuna is at the point of asking Krishna for advice, and will

soon be an eager listener, just the sort he wants to teach.

Saila

I didn't quite make the reading till today and I continue to be

intrigued with the learnings from these verses. To identify with the

angst, the challenges, and how in the past especially change was

frightening, and with more and more inner drilling, I am coming to

see that the sky has it all worked out, a cloudy start one morning,

another day of sunshine, another of rain, all the days blend into

oneness and for the benefit of us all - the clouds, rain, storm, cold,

hot, wind, -all of it into a neutral as the mid ground of Arjunan's

battlefield. 

Thank you for taking us on this journey, and as I was reading

your write up, especially how education has halted, thwarted

freedom, creativity and only in late life have I been able to see

through my lens, not the specs that I have been given. How can we

let the individual from the beginning to be nurtured to stay close to

their own uniqueness? 

Scott: That a question to keep in mind—and heart—all through the

eighteen chapters, Saila.

Jeff

(I left off Jeff’s address from the mailing list, and fortunately he

reached out to me recently, and we got it fixed. His response here

includes the first lesson, any more will be carried over to lesson 4.

Jeff’s note included this: “I have gone deep with your commentary,

and I greatly appreciate the work you have done in clarifying the

text on the impersonal level. It speaks to me in ways that are

resonating on many important levels with great benefit.”)

Prologue

I appreciate the succinct and concise introduction to the work

that we are getting into here given in the prologue. I am ready to

dive in and hold this discussion in the midst of the great symbolic

war that we currently encounter individually and collectively and

begin to find relevance, purpose, and meaning out of the pressures

of life that we all encounter.

Personally, this epic tale makes much sense in my situation

seeing that I am the proverbial black sheep, prodigal son of a

family that I love dearly yet have had to struggle deeply with the

fire that burns inside my soul to find it within myself to live my

own life, make my own decisions and reject the expectations and

assimilation of my family’s values. It has been a strenuous battle to

renounce safety, security, and peace in my family, society, and

culture to achieve personal and spiritual freedom. It continues to be

this way; however, the results are gradually and continuously

granting me the blessings of such freedoms in ways I never knew

were possible.

The mask that was fashioned for me never fit my face and I

have always been happy to throw it to the floor however abrasively

the mask was forced upon me, as well as the actions that I have

taken to abrasively throw the mask at the feet of those forcing it

upon me, rebelling with provocative and enraged anger trying to

prove them all wrong. At this point, it is getting much easier to

leave the mask on the floor without attempting to explain and

appease anyone of how uncomfortable it is to even try to wear such

a horrendous misrepresentation of who and what I am. I have given

up the fight to try and explain myself to those that do not and are

unwilling to understand. There is no more sense in “petitioning or

combatting” the forces of oppression.

A long time ago I threw my bow to the floor, just as Arjuna

has. I have looked at my bow lying there on the ground knowing

that I must and inevitably will pick it up and pierce the veils of

delusion and captivity. I have negotiated, built up my will, second

guessed myself, given in to the forces against me, within myself,

picked myself up again, and vowed to pick that sacred bow up and

face the forces of oppression deep within myself. But before I step

back onto the battlefield, I know that I must consult the divine guru

within. So here we are, and I am grateful. I am ready. It is time to

leave behind the “postage stamp-sized plot of land” that has

enslaved my soul and spirit and allow the sacred fire within me to

burn bright with all encapsulating love that time and space cannot

contain, let alone a measly “postage stamp-sized plot of land.”

Scott: That’s the spirit, Jeff! The misunderstood child in us want’s

to explain itself to its caregivers, in hopes our punishments will be

lessened. Adulthood is marked by getting over that need:

acceptance that everyone is in the dark and flailing, so it is

pointless to try to straighten them out before we straighten

ourselves out. It’s in fact a huge leap to turn the arrows of intention

toward ourself and learn to radiate love in place of anger. We are

the main beneficiary of the improvement, after all. This bodes very

well for your assimilation of the Gita’s wisdom, Jeff.

We all get stuck with an ill-sitting mask, and part of the fun

of life is replacing it with an authentic one—a rare achievement.

Bailey

     I begin writing on Christmas Eve, echoing in my head words,

well-known since childhood, from the traditional song: “I heard the

bells on Christmas Day, their old familiar carols play / and wild

and sweet the words repeat, of peace on Earth, good will toward

men...then in despair I bowed my head/there is no peace on earth, I

said/for hate is strong and mocks the song/ of peace on earth, good

will to men.”  Not a bad analogue to Arjuna’s moment of

pessimism and despair, eh?   I have constructed, in my head, the

persona of an uncompromising, cynical,  trust-only-the-science

materialist, whose faith is in biochemistry, genetics,

mechanisms—and who rules out any possibility of any

unmeasurable reality.  What did you expect? he/she is

sneering.  Survival of the fittest—heard of that?  Aggression,

gender attraction, dominate or perish – millions of years of

evolutionary conditioning. Get real, chump.  Grow up. Once upon

a time it was Genghis Khan and Tamurlane leaving Baghdad and

Delhi piles of smoking ruins marked by pyramids of severed

heads.  Yesterday, Stalin, Hitler, Mao.   Today, Putin, Islamic jihad

(so-called) and Donald Trump.  That’s what the evolution

of Homo sapiens on Planet Earth has brought us.  War and more

war until the end of time – our time, anyway.  Which is maybe

coming a lot faster than anyone thought when you were born

(which was a good year before the atomic bomb on Hiroshima).

What do I say to that? Tant pis? (in colloquial American: tough

shit).

      Time to get cleaned up and head out to midnight mass.

      Band of Brothers, admirable, accurate  and true as I continue to

find it, offers a fairly one-dimensional, and selective, picture of

WWII.  More precisely, reality as experienced by a company of

Americans in a particular part of that war in its final phases in the

West, from the Normandy beaches in June 1944 to the German

Alps  in August 1945. An heroic story, certainly, peopled mostly

by combatants (all those depicted in any depth belonging to the

“good guys”side), with the fundamental rightness of their cause

nowhere questioned. For sure, a story meant to be grasped in the

heroic mold.  Peter Englund’s November1942: An Intimate

History of the Turning Point of WWII   (2024) is global in scope,

its vast cast of characters (mostly known from writings of their

own, such as memoirs, letters and diaries) experiencing war as an

overwhelming, beyond-comprehension existential reality.  A

confusing, in-your-face reality. Any moments of heroism –there

are some—are largely beside the point.  Some of these witnesses

are military men, professional or drafted (all of these are men),

engaged in fighting; many others – a number of these are

women—have little understanding of the bigger picture, or agency;

they are just struggling to survive as best they can.  Why focus on

the month of November, 1942?  Englund, a Swedish historian

(Sweden was one of the only European countries to remain neutral

during the war) explains:  when that month began the Axis powers

were still riding on the momentum of successful aggressions; they

still looked to be likely, or at least possible, to emerge as ultimate

winners; by the end of the month it was becoming clear to well-

informed people that the Axis would lose. On Nov 1 the  Germans

were pressing forward at El Alamein in Egypt, and at Stalingrad in

the Soviet Union; by Nov 30 they were in retreat on both fronts.

On Nov 10 the Anglo-Americans had successfully invaded French

West Africa (Algeria, Morocco), starting an offensive that would

take them into Italy the following year.  In the Pacific theatre the

Japanese had opened 1942 with a spectacular string of victories in

the aftermath of Pearl Harbor, capturing the Philippines, Singapore

and Indonesia in short order and threatening India and Australia.

Now their momentum too was running out:  their well-seasoned

troops were now locked in desperate conflict in New Guinea with

Australians, and on the island of Guadalcanal with the still mostly-

untried Americans. By the end of November the Japanese were

losing both battles as the overwhelming economic resources and

logistical capacities of the USA were gearing up and becoming

effective.  None of the actors whose stories and viewpoints during

that month Englund skillfully shares with us could see more than a

very small part of this picture.  The actors include combatants on

the “bad guy” side (German infantry at Stalingrad; submariners in

the Atlantic; crack Japanese officers at Guadalcanal) as well as

others on our “good guy” side (a British tank commander in Egypt

and Libya, a Russian infantryman at Stalingrad, an America fighter

pilot at Guadacanal, and an infantry captain too). We meet civilian

women contributing to the war effort (in Berlin she’s in the

propaganda ministry) or working in English and American

shipyards.  We meet refugees caught between the shifting fronts in

Eastern Europe or the Far East. Mostly these are people always

being acted upon, with little or no capacity to see much beyond

their fears and the end of their noses, let alone choose consciously

to act.  A particularly poignant case: a kidnapped nineteen-year old

Korean girl forced to spend the war in distant places sexually

servicing Japanese soldiers as a “comfort woman”.  Even more

extreme, the upper middle-class Jewish girl in Paris who is a star

student at the Sorbonne in November 1942, in love with a

handsome French boy destined for a diplomatic career: she will

end in a concentration camp, kicked to death before its liberation at

the end of the war. There is one figure who can and does choose to

act heroically in accordance with duty as informed by a sense of

values we might recognize as absolutist: a captured  Australian

medical doctor with the rank of colonel allowed by the Japanese to

be their intermediary in organizing his prisoner-of-war camp.  His

administrative skills married to a deep sense of fairness won

general respect, and he is said to have saved many lives.  After the

war he worked for the reconciliation of Japanese and Australian

people and his funeral in 1993 was attended by thousands.  A

possible model for Arjuna?  But we are getting ahead of ourselves. 

            We left Arjuna, beholding the Kuru forces arrayed against

his side, recognizing his relatives and teachers, suddenly,

unexpectedly experiencing a revulsion against war. “Filled with

supreme pity, in mental distress: Beholding my own people, oh

Krishna, standing together wanting to fight, my limbs fail and my

mouth dries up, my body trembles and my hair stands on end, the

bow slips from my hand, my skin feels as if burning all over, I am

unable to stand and my mind is whirling around.” (v 28-30). The

following verses develop most eloquently what we can call the

pacifist case against war, if one takes seriously the principle that all

men and women are brothers and sisters, that humankind is one

family (as opposed to the explicit principle of the bad guys in

WWII, that some races are made to dominate, even exterminate,

others).  One of Peter Englund’s witnesses is the English pacifist

activist Vera Brittain, a writer so appalled by the senseless

slaughter of WWI, that in 1942 she was forcefully arguing for a

negotiated peace with Germany.  Much as she detested Hitler she

insisted that continuing to fight him was the worst choice. Peace at

any price.  Let her principled revulsion stand, then, as an analogue

for Arjuna’s horror at the evils he clearly sees as the consequences

of “killing our own people through greed for the pleasures

of  kingdom. It would be better for me if the sons of Dhritarashtra,

arms in hand, should kill me, unarmed and unresisting in the

battle.” (v. 45-46) In the next verse, “his mind overwhelmed with

sorrow”, he casts down his bow.

    Of the horrors perpetrated in the events leading up to, and during

WWII I am now much better informed than the last time I studied

this story.  There was then, though, the comfort that these events

were in the past, not the very distant past, the time when my

parents were young, but there was some distance, and for

historians distance is essential.  Donald Trump is in my face, in all

of our faces.  As he means to be. That his aggressive use and abuse

of the powers of the American presidency is a kind of self-

promoting warfare comparable to the Kurus seems to me beyond

question*.  Where is it taking us, our world? Is there a bow for me

to let fall, or to take up?  That is a question I ask myself.  Perhaps,

like the origin of greed, or malevolence, it is not the right question

for me at this time, not helpful. In 1941, in the aftermath of Pearl

Harbor, my father did not hesitate to join the army, serve in the

Pacific war and the Occupation of Japan, developing such respect

and affection for the Japanese that he chose to return and work

there, as a civilian, in the 1950s.  In 1969, having decided that I

would not serve in the Vietnam War I burned my draft card.  I

hope that the pursuit of this study will bring, perhaps not answers

to the dilemmas of this moment, but something helpful for living

forward. 

*      His surprise attack on Venezuela, after I had written the

above, underlines the point.

Scott: Sorry, Bailey, it looks like the class is shrinking fast, but

I’m happy to keep going with just you. I could clip in some

responses from other people in other years, if you enjoy having

additional input. At the beginning I never know who is serious and

who isn’t, and I don’t think they do, either. Time to face the music

without Krishna’s intervention, if it hasn’t been imbibed already.

I have been surprised that many people I’m in contact with

are blissfully believing that nothing’s going to change. They must

be trying very hard to ignore what’s happening, and in the age of

Untruth I guess it’s plausible.

You have understood the crucial nature of the teaching, and

its relevance. I always thought that Armageddon would be in the

remote future, but the power of the internet has swiftly brought it

home. I don’t know much of what the Bible said about it, but I

suspect it will be a time when attuning one’s inner self to the

subtleties of Nature will be a thing of the past.

My family always sings carols around the piano at the dark of

the year; they are part of the magnificent music that puts

Christianity over the top as a religion.

That peace and love stuff, about Jesus served a lot of people

very well, for a very long time. I was raised agnostic, but

discovered as an adult that my free-thinking was totally grounded

in Judeo-Christian ethics, quite literally. It turns out free-thinking

desperately needs a sense of connection with others to succeed.

Anyway, I Heard the Bells is one of my favorite carols, never

to be left out. My mother’s favorite was Old King Wenceslas, and

I’ve noticed the last verse may be omitted these days, and it makes

the meaning clear if you somehow missed it:

Therefore, Christian men, be sure

Wealth or rank possessing

Ye who will now bless the poor

Shall yourselves find blessing

Or “the slave is our brother,” from O, Holy Night. Time to get over

those sentiments, and reinstitute slavery as optimal

impoverishment.

Fascinating history about the turning point of WWII in

November 1942, thank you. Today’s fascists are still winning

handily, but it gives us something to hope for. Can the balance be

recovered one more time? Stay tuned.

You’ve framed Arjuna’s dilemma perfectly, Bailey. What

can we do, when resistance risks death, and death does nothing?

There seems to be no recourse.

Like you, I burned my draft card, but my birthday was also

drawn #356 (of 365) in the lottery. As I recall, up to 80 was called

up that year, 1969. One of my lucky moments. Luckiest of all was

meeting my wife, and then the two of us later going to a class on

the Gita by Swami Nitya, in 1970. I can never ask for more.

Your conclusion is in keeping with the yoga of the Bhagavad

Gita, Bailey: the Japanese enemy turned out to be a terrible kind of

fiction imposed on admirable people through ignorance, on both

sides of the conflict, and they became allies, once the smoke

cleared.