In reading the Bhagavad-Gita
from chapter four on, it may be tempting to collapse all of Hinduism into a
monotheism in which Lord Krishna is God. Even in the context of bhukti being
directed exclusively to Krishna, other deities are alluded to in the text. To
claim that those other deities came out of Krishna, and even that Krishna
surpasses even Brahman, which is infinite being that is
imperishable awareness, thought (but not mind), power, and bliss, in terms of
ultimacy does not mean that the Gita is a monotheist scriptural
faith-narrative. Not even Krishna’s unmanifest form by which the deity’s
creative energy gives rise to the cosmos transcends form itself, and thus
reaches the unmanifest and formless brahman. To be sure, that Krishna,
as the Supreme Person metaphysically and ontologically, is ultimately Self renders
the deity identical to brahman, but this does not mean that Krishna transcends
brahman. Regardless of where the Krishna-Brahman debate lands, and
there are admittedly shlokas in the Gita that support the ultimacy
of Krishna and shlokas that favor the ultimacy of Brahman,
Krishna need not be more ultimate than brahman for a devotee of the
deity to be able to experience a lot of transcendence from ordinary experience.
In fact, because either referent that is the Absolute lies beyond the
limits of human cognition, perception, and sensibility (emotion), according to
the Christian theologian Pseudo-Dionysius, the human experience of
distinctly religious transcendence is where our attention can fruitfully
be directed. This is not to say that a referent (i.e., a divine, transcendent
object) is thereby relegated or even discarded in favor of the quality of
experience as its own referent. Rather, it is to say that we can know a lot
more than we do about distinctly religious, and thus transcending, experience,
and that such knowledge is part of the human condition—part of being human as homo
religios as distinct from being a political, economic, and social species.
First I investigate the question of whether the Gita is monotheist,
after which I argue that Arjuna’s vision of Krishna in chapter 11 of the Gita
is can be viewed as the “event horizon” of sorts in terms of how much we
can transcend as we approach the limits of our faculties.
One scholar argues that even
though Krishna “is manifold in his appearances,” his form “is the one and only”
in “relationship to the manifold character of the cosmos.”[1]
In his “cosmic form all beings, including the Vedic gods, reside and find their
place.”[2]
This is not, however, to say that Krishna is the only deity referenced in the Gita,
and, moreover, that Krishna is synonymous with brahman even though
Krishna’s unmanifest form of fullness “is a product of the god’s yogic
[creative] power and . . . expresses sovereignty” and is thus “not his highest
state of being as the transcendent ‘self’ beyond the cosmos,” the latter being
how brahman too is described.[3]
Krishna, unlike Brahman, is not just
the transcendent “self,” and even a king is described, in The Law of Manu
(7.4ff), as “consisting of and uniting different gods” and therefore should “be
regarded as a ‘universal form’.”[4]
Being the protector of a social, economic, and political order (i.e., a
kingdom), a king embodies “the divine powers of the gods who contribute to his
sovereignty,” hence “he is called ‘a mighty godhead that lives in the form
(body) of a man.”[5] Indeed
Krishna’s cosmic body, within which Arjuna sees the created realm, is
explicitly related to human kingship in that the “cosmic and royal aspects of
Krsna’s form converge not only at the moment of creation, but also in times of
destruction, which serve the double purpose of punishment and purification, as
well as re-establishing order and legitimate kings.”[6]
Krishna’s relation to royal sovereignty and thus functionality inhibits the
deity being synonymous with Brahman, and thus ultimately ultimate even
though Arjuna needs “divine eyes” to see Krishna’s infinite overwhelming and
terrifying form. Transcendence, like a Hindu temple, has more than one layer,
and human “sight,” even with “divine eyes,” can only go so far. This is the
idea.
In short, even if, as one
scholar claims, Krishna “is the one and only encompassing cosmic god,”[7]
and is thus the creator and destroyer of worlds in being the protector of the
cosmic order, Brahman transcends cosmic functions because Brahman is
not a doer, just as an individual atman is immutable (i.e., unchanging)
too. My point is that not even Krishna as depicted as his cosmic form in the Gita
can be regarded as the Absolute or Ultimate metaphysically, ontologically,
and even theologically.
Even as a deity, Krishna is
not exclusively so. In Gita 11.21, “Yonder, these hosts of deities enter
into You. Some, terrified, praise (You) . . . ,” the very existence of those other
deities is presupposed, for it would make no sense to claim that things that
don’t exist enter into Krishna.[8]
Also, Gita 11.54 states that the other deities would like to see the vision
of Krishna. These two slokas are enough to refute the view that the other
deities are merely imaginary and thus Krishna alone is God. That is, shlokas 11.21
and 11.54 are polytheist rather than monotheist statements.
Even so, Malinar claims that Gita,
chapter 9, “and the subsequent chapters present the theological basis
for Krsna’s revelation as the highest, the one and only god.”[9]
That Krishna can be both the highest and yet the only deity is itself
problematic unless the other gods are illusory, an interpretation that the two
shlokas in Gita 11 contradict. To be sure, the other deities, in being
formed, are not ultimate; unlike Krishna, they do not have an unmanifest form,
but not even that form is ultimate ontologically. As manifested to Arjuna,
Krishna’s “flaming many-colored, (with) gaping mouths and flaming vast eyes” is
said to touch “the world-sky.”[10]
Even though brahman creates space, Ramanuja identifies that sky “with
the transcendental ‘space’ of the Ultimate Being beyond the world-ground.”[11]
Feuerstein, however, objects to this interpretation by noting that the
“transcendental Reality is formless and ‘beyond-the-three-primary-qualities’ (nirguna).”[12]
The reality that is Brahman transcends even Krishna’s unmanifest form by
which Krishna’s creative energy creates the cosmos. Hence the errancy of
positing Krishna as more ultimate than Brahman. Even so, the extent of
transcendence that Arjuna experiences when he beholds the vision of Krishna
that that deity enables Arjuna to see “with divine eyes” is such that Arjuna’s
cognitive, perceptual, and emotive capacities are reached as they start to
buckle even though the Absolute or Ultimate transcends even that point. It is
the buckling, or warping, of Arjuna’s faculties that is so indicative of what
it is like to push oneself to one’s limits in transcendence. Whether Krishna or Brahman is the Absolute (i.e., personal or impersonal), the yearning to
transcend more and more is itself significant and thus worthy of study and
praxis.
As described both by Samjaya
and Arjuna, the vision of Krishna is admittedly nothing short of inspiring of
awe in its wholistic totality. Narrating the past event of the vision of
Krishna to King Dhritarashtra, Samjaya describes Krishna as “infinite (and)
omnipresent,” as the “Great Self” of greater “splendor” than were “a thousand
suns were to arise at once in the sky,” as “the God of gods,” with “the whole
universe . . . abiding in the One, there in [Krishna’s] body.”[13]
Referring to that body, Arjuna says, “I behold the gods and all the (various)
kinds of beings” enter. Moreover, Arjuna characterizes Krishna as being “of
endless form,” even “All-Form!”[14] Overwhelmed, Arjuna states his conviction as
a devotee to Krishna: “You ought to be known as the supreme Imperishable.
You are the supreme receptacle of all this. You are the Immutable, the Guardian
of the eternal law. You are the everlasting Spirit.”[15]
By the latter is mean purusha, which is Brahman’s creative
energy, which brahman itself transcends.[16]
Even though bhukti to
Krishna is all-encompassing for a devotee, the perception of Krishna as
the Absolute and other deities as within Krishna’s body or illusory doesn’t
necessarily translate into an ontological claim that those deities do
not really exist whereas Krishna transcends. Moreover, the contention that
since “it is Krsna’s body in which the whole world resides, he is not only the
supreme lord of the universe (visva-isvara), but also its universal, encompassing form
(visvarupa)”[17]
actually situates Krishna behind brahman, which as inherently unmanifest transcends form
itself and every conceivable form, even Krishna’s unmanifest cosmic form that
contains the created realm and even the other deities, including Brahma.
Yet in terms of transcendental
experience, Arjuna’s vision of Krishna pushes the envelope up to the limits of
human cognition, perception, and emotion. This is not to infer an ontological
or metaphysical claim regarding Krishna; rather, I contend that the vision in
this case comes up so close to the rim beyond which human thought, perception,
and emotion cannot go that warping of their respective contours is evident.
In the Christian Gospels, the
disciples’ vision of Jesus’s transformed resurrected body is perhaps not as close
to the limits. To be sure, the nature of that body eclipses our understanding,
at least so far, but it cannot be said, as Krishna tells Arjuna: “Very-difficult-to-see
is this My form which you have seen. Even the gods are forever hankering after
a glimpse of this form.”[18]
Even the gods! Of course, in Christian theology, there are no other deities
than the trinitarian deity, but unlike Arjuna, Jesus’s disciples have no
difficulty in seeing the resurrected body. Whereas the vision of Krishna
departs from that deity’s human form substantially, Jesus’s resurrected body
does not. The greater anthropomorphism comes at the cost of not being able to
approach the boundaries of the human faculties in terms of transcendence. This
is the idea.
In short, in having to be
given “divine eyes” to see Krishna as that deity really is, which other deities
can only wish to see, and in seeing an infinite number of arms and heads, the
vision warps the cognitive and perceptual framework that operates nonstop as
the paradigmatic contours of our ordinary waking experience in life. We are not
used to thinking that we can see what is refused to deities, and seeing the
entire created realm in a deity’s body, which in turn is distended in heads and
arms, in a golden radiance that is brighter than a thousand suns in the sky is
not something we see in our daily lives.
In fact, not only is space
warped in the world being shown in Krishna’s body, but time too is warped when
Krishna, “in his appearance as time, shows those [warriors] whom Arjuna should
kill as having been killed already.”[19]
This warping of time is “based on a suspension of the otherwise chronological
sequence of past, present, and future. . . . The future is presented as already
past; conversely, the present appears as the moment in which this future is disclosed
as an actual fact.”[20]
The Kantian a priori impact of reason itself on the paradigmatic
framework that structures and organizes our cognitions and perceptions of the
empirical realm is thus warped, and the warping of the time-space fabric by
gravity that Einstein theorized and has since been empirically verified (e.g.,
gravity waves in space; time differences between sea-level and Mt Washington in
North America) can be thought of analogically in which gravity is like Krishna
in that both are capable of warping space and time. To be sure, whereas gravity
is an impersonal warping of time-space, it is the Supreme Person
as Krishna really is that is presented “as time,” which “is regarded as a form
of the cosmic god as sovereign who brings about a necessary and purifying
destruction in order to re-establish order.”[21]
In other words, “Arjuna’s task is to recognize Krsna as the agent in the form
of time. Conversely, time has been given a form and even an agent.”[22]
Being presented with time in a distinctly theological sense stretches Arjuna’s
cognitive faculty to its limit.
The situs of the vision of
Krishna being at the “event horizon” is evident too in Arjuna’s emotional
reaction, for he is, as it were, at the end of his tether. As one scholar
describes this, “After confirming that Arjuna has indeed seen the whole world
in the one body of Krsna (11.13) . . . , Samjaya describes the reaction:
‘Filled with amazement (awe) with his hair standing on end, and bowing his head
and folding his hands to pay reverence, Arjuna spoke.’”[23]
Arjuna’s emotional condition is thus “highlighted”
in the text.[24]
Seeing Krishna’s “many formidable fangs,” Arjuna states that he, as well as the
“worlds,” shudder” and that he can “find no shelter,” presumably from his
fright.[25]
Arjuna’s “inmost self quakes,” and he can “find no fortitude or tranquility.”[26]
It is no wonder that he is suddenly petrified, for he sees his army’s leading
warriors “swiftly enter [Krishna’s] mouths with formidable fear-instilling
fangs. Some [of the warriors] are seen with pulverized heads sticking in
between [Krishna’s] teeth.”[27]
Arjuna is “trembling,” and “with stammering (voice), very frightened.”[28]
Arjuna’s trembling “underscores the amazement and awe caused by the vision.”[29]
In such a state, Arjuna’s praise of Krishna can be interpreted as being
“indicative of Arjuna’s position as the composer of hymnic praise”, which is
associated in the Rigveda with “poetic creativity,” which is an expression of
“vibrant excitement.”[30]
In other words, Arjuna’s praise is expressive of the extreme emotion of his
“poetic-ecstatic state,”[31]
rather than constituting religious belief-claims that reality is ultimately a
Supreme Person rather than brahman and that the other deities are
imaginary whereas Krishna is ontologically and metaphysically existent.
Out of incredible angst,
Arjuna cannot say enough about Krishna, declaring that deity to be the
unsurpassable Ultimate, “greater even than Brahman, the primordial creator,”
“the Imperishable, existence and nonexistence and what is beyond that,” “the
Primordial God, the ancient Spirit (purusha),” and again of being of
all-consuming “infinite form.”[32]
Because Arjuna is emotionally overwhelmed, these laudatory statements can be
interpreted as being emotionally expressive rather than ontologically or
metaphysical statements.
I totally disagree with the
assertion that in Arjuna addressing Krishna as being the “all” (sarvah),
rather than merely as being powerful in “bringing together ‘all’ as the cosmic
ruler, a “monotheistic framework” applies.[33]
For one thing, logically it does not follow from Arjuna’s praises of Krishna as
being “of infinite strength, and immeasurable prowess,” such that Krishna has
“brought together the all (sarvam),” that “therefore you are all (sarvo).”[34]
Likewise, it does not follow logically that a king who brings together all of
his kingdom is that kingdom, even if one were to exclaim, l’état est
moi! Even if Krishna were “all,” it would still need to be argued how that
is a monotheist claim, but Arjuna is not really asserting claims.
Rather, because his emotions
are so intense that they, like the vision itself, are all-consuming, his
over-the-top praises of Krishna can be reckoned as emotive expressions in
“poetic and ritual language.”[35]
To impose rationality on such language is to incur a category mistake.
Reflecting the overwhelming vision, Arjuna’s praises are indicative of the
warping effect of the sheer intensity of heightened emotions, as could be
expected given the overwhelming tremendum (i.e., terror) that Arjuna
feels as a reaction to seeing the bodies of his teachers, fellow warriors, and
relatives in Krishna’s sharp, gnawing fangs. Therefore, in an emotive sense
too, the vision can be reckoned as lying on the rim, or “event horizon,” of
human faculties, beyond which they shut down or are otherwise incapable of
experiencing in a coherent fashion. I submit that it is precisely because
Arjuna is up against the rim of what he is capable of feeling without passing
out that he experiences the flood of emotions as “all,” and his praises are
expressions of emotion that project the all-consuming sense he has of his
emotions and the vision itself.
My basic point is that the warping,
or blurring, of each of the basic contours of cognition, perception, and
emotion indicates that Arjuna is on the cusp of the boundary beyond which is
like a black hole in outer space. Unlike Jesus’s resurrected body being visible
to the disciples, the vision of Krishna is at the event-horizon, where the
normal parameters for cognition, perception and emotion warp similar to how the
intense gravity of a dense black hole warps the fabric of space-time at the rim
beyond which not even light can escape.
Of course, this analogy breaks down in that revelation “gets out” of the
theological “black hole,” albeit through a window darkened by centuries of
candle-smoke as revelation passes through our human, all too human
atmosphere.
2. Ibid.
3. Ibid., p. 170.
4. Ibid.
5. Ibid., p. 171.
6. Ibid., p. 172.
7. Ibid.
8. Georg and Brenda Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita: A New Translation (Boston: Shambhala, 2011), p. 227.
9. Angelika Malinar, The Bhagavadgita: Doctrines and Contexts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), p. 144.
10. Gita 11.24 in Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 229.
11. Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 229.
12. Ibid.
13. Gita 11.11-13, in Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 223.
14. Gita 11.15-16, in Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 225.
15. Gita 11.18, in Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 225.
16. Similarly, in Christian theology, God transcends the Logos (Word), by which God creates the world. No theologian would state that God is a manifestation of Logos, and yet Krishna as the Supreme Person is said to be more ultimate than is brahman. David Hume would doubtlessly bring in the problem of anthropomorphism.
17. Malinar, The Bhagavadgita, p. 169.
18. Gita 11.52 in Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 245.
19. Malinar, The Bhagavadgita: Doctrines and Contexts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), p. 175.
20. Malinar, The Bhagavadgita, p. 175.
21. Malinar, The Bhagavadgita, p. 178.
22. Ibid.
23. Ibid., p. 168.
24. Ibid.
25. Gita 11.24-25 in Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 229.
26. Gita 11.24 in Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 229.
27. Gita 11.27 in Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 231.
28. Gita 11.35 in Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 235.
29. Malinar, The Bhagavadgita, p. 180.
30. Ibid.
31. Ibid.
32. Gita 11.37-38 in Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 237.
33. Malinar, The Bhagavadgita, p. 183.
34. Gita 11.40, in Angelika Malinar, The Bhagavadgita, p. 183.
35. Malinar, The Bhagavadgita, p. 181. The Gita “is similar to the original poetic situation described in Vedic texts, in which the hymns are said to have been composed in reaction to a vision, and then handed down and used by sacrificial priests as ritual liturgy.” Indeed, “poetic skill and expression remained part and parcel of the encounter (darsana) with the beloved god or goddess in many bhakti traditions” (Ibid., p. 182).
