Compared with Shankara’s non-dualist Advaita Vedanta theology, the Gita can be interpreted as a compromise between Shankara’s view and Vedic practices—essentially, between renunciation and ritual being done to get something. By this I do not mean to imply that the Gita is morally compromised; rather, I am using the word in the sense of reconciling different priorities and even relating seemingly disparate branches of a religion. In the Gita, Lord Krishna advises Arguna to fight in the upcoming military battle with equanimity as to the outcome, for attachment to desire and distancing pain both accrue karma, which in turn delays liberation. Prime facie, to be unconcerned with winning, or gaining economically, is morally superior to egoist pursuits. Superior to detached action may be the option not to fight or get rich at all, but instead to view the created realm as illusory and distance oneself even from being a doer or agent; earn enough to survive and otherwise try to come to know that one’s self is Brahman, which is Being itself, as conscious, bliss, and infinite. In straying from this, the Gita is not without problems.
Firstly, Malinar describes karmayoga as “self-control through action that allows [a person] to act without experiencing any consequences.”[1] Is experiencing the right word, or is the phrase, being attached to, more accurate? In other words, does experiencing go too far? Malinar quotes from the Gita (3.7): “he who checks the senses with his mind and then practices self-control in action using his faculties of action without any attachment, he stands out.” To check or constrain one’s senses is not sufficient to sever one’s experience of external stimuli, including that which results from one’s actions; rather, the restraint both in mind and actions is enough to keep attachment at bay. Indeed, Malinar claims that the purpose of karmayoga is “acting without attachment.”[2] To be unattached is to experience without desiring precisely that which is experienced, even the consequences of one’s actions.
Secondly, Malinar claims that in chapter 3 of the Gita, “the prakrti concept of Samkhya philosophy is used to explain why ‘doing nothing’ is an illusion.”[3] In contrast, Shankara holds that action is illusory because the world is also illusory, whereas renunciation enables a person to get in touch with the reality that one’s individual atman is Brahman. Malinar appears to reject outright or relegate Shankara’s interpretation, perhaps according it breathing space only in chapter 2 of the Gita (v.s 11-38). In ch. 3, Malinar points out, Krishna demands, “’Carry out the ordained acts, since action is better than non-action,’ and he adds that ‘the journey in the body’ (sarirayatra) does not succeed without action. This extended, Samkhyistic meaning of karman remains the basis of much of the BhG.”[4] It may perhaps be countered that just because we must act while we are embodied in this world of scarcity does not mean that karmayoga is superior to jnanayoga as a means to liberation. Shankara admits that even ascetics must act that their sustenance needs are met, and, moreover, that such limited activity does not compromise the route of renunciation. Furthermore, just because the law of karma presupposes that all of us desire happiness does not mean that we all seek liberation (moksa). In fact, to the extent that seeking liberation (from suffering, karma, and even ontological illusion) is superior to seeking garden-variety happiness, it follows that the preponderance of the Gita is oriented to the inferior path simply because more readers are oriented to it.
Thirdly, Malinar states that the verses (10-13) in chapter 3 of the Gita on the origin of the sacrifice ritual are in contrast with “the interpretation of sacrifice current among the followers of the Veda.”[5] I wonder if the dichotomy is not overdone here, for in the verses that Malinar quotes are the words, “will give you the desired enjoyments.” It is difficult to square such wording with what in the Gita is the exclusive function of religious ritualized sacrifice: “the cosmogonic function of sacrifice as being an integral part of creation.”[6] In other words, it may be difficult to fit with this function the claim that sacrifice “guarantees the prosperity of those who participate in [the ritual] through its retributive, reciprocal structure (parasparam).”[7] So too, the claim that “no mutual profit would be possible” unless “the separated spheres of gods and men meet, but are also kept apart” seems to go beyond ontology to include cattle (i.e., an increase in worldly goods, or wealth).[8] Sustaining “the order and orderliness of creation as a realm of mutual dependence and reciprocal relationships” is arguably more distinctly religious in nature than is the Vedic consequences of increased profit and wealth, for there are also non-religious ways of gaining the latter. Also, that a person should eat “the leftovers of a sacrifice”, according to ManuS as per Malinar, may imply that the intent in ritually sacrificing should not be oriented to personal gain.[9] It is not as with the ancient Greek priests who were allowed to eat the best portions of the cooked sacrificial animal rather than having to leave the best for a god or goddess, such as Zeus, Apollo, or Athena. I suspect, however, that Malinar’s choice of wealth-oriented words is merely unfortunate rather than suggestive of any such earthly consequentialism. Support for this interpretation comes from Malinar’s claim that “the performance of ritual is not primarily regarded as a way to fulfil one’s desires, but is turned into an occasion for proving one’s yogic detachment.”[10] Also, in discussing the word lokasamgraha, Malinar states that “the ultimate purpose of ritual action . . . does not serve primarily to achieve a goal or fulfil desires, but to contribute to the maintenance of cosmic order.”[11] The word primarily allows for some seepage in what otherwise would be a clear dichotomy between the sacrificial ritual as interpreted in the Gita and in the Vedic sources. In the Gita, doing one’s own (or one’s caste’s) social duty, or dharma, is not for the fruits of action, as the proper attitude is one of equanimity concerning pleasure and pain; rather, one is doing one’s part in holding the social order and primarily the cosmos together.
Fourthly, in its description of the wheel of ritual sacrifice, the Gita appears to contradict Brahman being the foundation qua being and consciousness, and even bliss in the sense that Brahman cannot be dependent on anything else, and cannot even be in relation to objects as a subject. As quoted by Milinar, the relevant passage in the Gita is, “and brahman arises from the ‘indestructible’ (aksara [the syllable Om]). Therefore the ubiquitous brahman is forever founded in the sacrifice (yajna).”[12] Prime facie, it is not clear that something that is “forever founded” arises at all. Buitenen’s explanation that the words brahman and aksara both refer to brahman, but can it really be said that being itself has two senses without having to admit that brahman is a composite? Regarding sacrifice as the foundation of brahman, Malinar points to the word, pratistha as “a ‘ground’ on which something established there can unfold and function.” Brahman depends on sacrifice to become “manifest and effective.”[13] Although the dependence is not so as to exist, as being and consciousness, to say that brahman depends on anything deprives it of its bliss and its situs as a foundation that does not even depend on creation, which, according to Shankara, is illusory anyway. It is as if brahman were already the basement floor of a house, and yet somebody would prefer to refer to whatever is below that floor as the real foundation of the house. To say that a house rests on dirt and thus it is the foundation of a house is not at all what construction contractors are referring to when they refer to the house’s foundation; typically, “laying the basement” is considered to be making the foundation. If how brahman manifests is a corruption of being rather than its foundation, then sacrifice depends on brahman, rather than vice versa. In short, to point out as Malinar does that “sacrifice is the cause of brahman” seems to go against the eternal essence of brahman.[14]
Fifthly, in the presumably causal partial series, “Creatures arise from food, food arises from rain, rain arises from sacrifice, sacrifice arises from (ordained) action (karman),”[15] two distinct kinds of relations are present. Creatures do not arise from food, and food from rain, like rain arises from sacrifice. Whereas the first two causal relations are in the domain of science, the third is religious in nature. To treat the entire (partial) series as if the links were qualitatively homogenous is to ignore the sui generis quality of the two domains involved in the series. People may be misled in supposing that rain arises from sacrifice in a scientifically causal sense, and that the role of food-stuffs in the growth of a biological organism is religious in nature. Such category mistakes can be occasioned by such conflations and the over-reaching of one domain onto the turf of another. Such errors have impeded greater human understanding not only of science, but also religion. For instance, applying an empirically causal mechanism to “rain arises from sacrifice” forestalls progress in uncovering the distinctly religious nature of the relation.
In short, to the extent that
chapter 3 of the Gita contradicts the previous chapter with respect to
action and knowing Brahman, and thus with Shankara’s Advaita Vedantan
emphasis on coming to know that an individual’s self is really Brahman
rather than even a doer, the attempt at compromising with the Vedas karmayoga,
and even devotion to a deity (bhukti) contains downsides. This is assuming
that internal consistency in a religion is something of value. Of course, not attempting
to relate disparate aspects of a religion and compromise different priorities has
its own downsides. Perhaps in final analysis, we are human, all too human, so
we do the best that we can in comprehending the religions that we have been
left by people who have long since died. Doing the best we can may not solve
every puzzle or reconcile every strand, but demarcating the domain of religion,
and thus distinguishing it from other domains, is something that I contend lies
within our ken.
1. Angelika Malinar, The Bhagavadgita: Doctrines and Contexts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), p. 79.
2. Ibid., p. 81.
3. Ibid., p. 79.
4. Ibid., p. 81.
5. Ibid., p. 82.
6. Ibid.
7. Ibid.
8. Ibid.
9. Ibid., p. 83.
10. Ibid., p. 84.
11. Ibid., p. 87.
12. Ibid., p. 84.
13. Ibid., p. 86.
14. Ibid.
15. Ibid., p. 84.
