On Brahman Becoming Embodied as Krishna

In the Bhagavad-Gita, the personal deity Krishna explains to Arjuna to process by which Krishna becomes embodied. This raises the question, what is Krishna unembodied? Although one candidate is Brahma, the personal god of creation, I contend that the answer is Brahman, which is being, consciousness, and bliss. Brahman is unmanifest, so how is it that being itself, even if conscious, can have a will and a creative agency, or ability, to manifest as a personal deity? The notion of Brahman is completely foreign to the Abrahamic religions, wherein a personal deity is the creator and has perfect being. So it is worth thinking about how, and even whether, a personal deity like Krishna can manifest by the will and creative force (maya) of Brahman.

“Although [I am] unborn, the immutable Self, [and] although being the Lord of [all] beings—[yet] by governing My own nature (prakriti), I come-to-be through the creative-power (maya) of Myself.”[1] (Gita 4.6) Is “come-to-be” a good translation of smbhavamy? If so, the prime facie implication is that “the immutable Self,” which is “unborn” and “the Lord of [all] beings,” has no being (i.e., existence), for it comes-to-be when it is embodied, or born. Shakara describes brahman as unmanifest and immutable being, so there seems to be a contradiction, although Lord of [all] creatures (which can perhaps be finessed as “beings”) is used in the Upanishads for Brahma.

As described by Malinar, Krishna “makes the power of creation (prakrti 4.6) act according to his will and produce an outward form for him: ‘Although I am unborn and imperishable and the Lord of creatures indeed, I transform nature who is mine and take birth through (or as) an appearance of myself. The creative process described in this verse draws on two concepts: (1) prakrti, nature, the agent of creation according to Samkhya; and (2) maya, the exceptional power and capacity of gods and other beings to produce forms and disguises for themselves.”[2] Unlike the Feuersteins, Malinar uses “creatures” rather than “beings.” Also, prakriti is “the agent of creation” and maya pertains to “gods and other beings.” All this inclines me to conclude that Brahma rather than Brahman is the unembodied referent.

In Warrier’s translation of Shakara’s commentary, the verse as: “Though unborn and though the immutable Self and the Lord of all living beings, resorting to My power of becoming, through My Maya, I take birth.”[3] The use of the word, “becoming,” rather than coming-into-being obviates problematic implication of no unembodied existence. Furthermore, the problematic notion that the unembodied Krishna is Brahma, another personal deity, can be tossed out because the unembodied Krishna is “the master of all beings from Brahma down to a tuft of grass”.[4] Also, “My power of becoming is all-pervasive,” which also fits with the nature of the unmanifest Brahman becoming manifest.[5] It is not as though unmanifest Brahman does not exist; in fact, it is being (as well as consciousness and bliss, though Shankara denies the latter attribute). But how can being and even consciousness itself have a will and “cognitive power,” which “never wanes”?[6] These attributes are more fitting for a personal deity, such as Brahma and an embodied Krishna. I would expect Shankara to have done so, and regard them as maya rather than having the reality of being.

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1. Gita 4.6. Georg and Brenda Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita: A New Translation (Boston: Shambhala, 2011), p. 137.
2. Angelika Malinar, The Bhagavadgita: Doctrines and Contexts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), p. 95.
3. Shankara, Srimad Bhagavad Gita Bhasya of Sri Samkaracarya. Trans. A. G. Warrier (Madras, IN: Sri Ramakrishna Math), pp. 137-38.
4. Ibid., p. 138.
5. Ibid.
6. Ibid.

Is the Bhagavad-Gita Compromised?

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.

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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.

Religious Vision beyond Intellect: The Case of Hinduism

Can we think our way to religion, or does religious experience transcend cognition (i.e., thought)? Closely related is the question of whether theology is just a special case of philosophy or another domain altogether. The pivotal chapter 2 of the Bhagavad-Gita saga in Hinduism can be interpreted in favor of the latter: gnostic vision of the divine, such as of Krishna showing his fullness later in the myth to Arjuna, may launch off from the intellect, but without continuing as an intellectual pursuit once the threshold of religious experience is reached. By analogy, we can see the edges of a black hole in space, but we can’t see beyond its threshold, within the hole because light cannot bounce back out given the magnitude of the intense gravity that a black hole has. Similarly, a deity can be thought of as intense being—so dense that we mere mortals can only gasp in wonder when we are presented with something so far beyond the limits of human perception, emotions, and cognitions, hence the intellect too.

A trajectory from a person being merely oriented to perceiving external objects, to having wisdom that goes beyond the subject-object dichotomy, and finally on to gnosis exists in chapter 2 of the Bhagavad-Gita in the Feuersteins’ translation. The trajectory is truncated, however, in two translations of Shankara’s commentary on the Gita. Perhaps the difference is at least in part on whether (or to what degree) prajna is distinct from, and thus “higher” than, buddhi or sattva. At least to the Feuersteins, prajna  is not only higher than sattva and buddhi, but also qualitatively different than them (i.e., different in kind, not just in degree or extent).  It is in this respect that theology enters and philosophy must give way.

To trace the epistemologically ascending slope that arguably transcends epistemology itself in ending with mystical sight, we first have to get past an apparent contradiction regarding holding onto wisdom. On the question of whether the contradiction is actual or only apparent, I go with the side that is in line with the fullness of the trajectory, rather than with truncating it so it must stop with the contradiction. Whereas the intellect has trouble getting past contradictions, religious vision beholding a beatitude of divinity does not. In the Abrahamic religions, God creates the world and thus cannot be bound by contractions, even in the intellect, that are in the world—even of abstractions in the human mind.

In terms of knowing (i.e., epistemology), the domain of religion inherently goes beyond the limits of reason (i.e., thinking). Moses doesn’t analyze the burning bush in the Bible; rather, his reaction is experiential, and in a way that renders the intellect still. Religion, grace á transcendence, is unique because its essential nature includes that it goes beyond the limits of human cognition as well as emotion and perception; Pseudo-Dionysius, a sixth-century Christian theologian, wrote as much. In a way, you might say that transcending even logical contradictions is part of the trajectory. A Zen Buddhist wrestling intellectually with a koan does so precisely because the device trips up the intellect so awareness without thinking can commence.

In Hinduism, Jiva Gosvami, in his text, the Bhagavat-sandarbha, insists that the contradiction of identity and difference renders the relation between Brahman and its powers (saktis) incomprehensible (acrintya) to us. Even so, the relation “is of the very nature of the Supreme.”[1] In other words, in Caitanya Vaisnava theology, the “mystery of simultaneous difference and nondifference is embedded in every aspect of divinity.”[2] Rather than short-circuiting and thus invalidating religion, and thus faith that is distinctly religious, contradiction and incomprehensibility (as well as the sheer inexpressibility (anirvacaniya) of the world as neither real nor not real in Advaita Vedantism) distinguish the domain of religion from others and in fact are inherent to that domain.

In chapter 2 of the Gita, the trajectory begins with one of the “Traigunya, or ‘triad of primary-qualities,’ [which] refers to the three fundamental qualities (guna) of cosmic existence (prakriti): the principle of lucidity (sattva), the principle of dynamism (rajas), and the principle of inertia (tamas). Through endless combinations, these three qualities—guna means ‘strand’—make up the myriad of phenomena in the manifest world.”[3] In the Gita, Krishna says, “Become free of the triple primary-qualities, free of the pairs-of-opposites, and, O Arjuna, abide always in sattva, without (trying to) gain or keep (anything). (Be) Self-possessed!”[4] In Warrier’s translation of Shankara’s commentary on the Gita, Shankara omits any mention of abiding in sattva; instead, Krishna’s advice is to have “mastered the self,” which is identical with Brahman as this relationship is “beyond all dualities.”[5] In making the omission, Shankara may have been oriented to upholding the logical integrity of the verse.

That sattva is one of the three primary qualities and Arjuna should be free of all three renders it contradictory for Krishna to then tell Arjuna, “abide always in sattva.” To obviate the contradiction, the Feuersteins suggest that the word sattva in the phrase, “abide always in sattva,” may “in this particular context be translated as ‘truth’ or ‘reality,’ since it can hardly refer to the guna called sattva, given that Arjuna was told to step beyond the gunas, if only by implication.”[6] So, liberation (moksa), being oriented to truth or reality, transcends not only pairs-of-opposites (dvandva), “like heat/cold, dry/wet, which are apt to cause distress,”[7] but also even clear-mindedness (sattva), as no one can grasp Brahman intellectually, for according to the Gita, “no one, verily (really) knows this (Self),” which “is called unmanifest (avyakta), unthinkable, unchangeable.”[8]

Lest it be thought such a matter can so easily be settled, Krishna goes on to advise Arjuna, according to the Feuersteins’ translation: “Seek refuge in the wisdom-faculty!”[9] The word “wisdom” is a translation of the Sanskrit buddhi, which in turn is synonymous with our old friend, sattva (as a guna).[10] Shankara, as per Warrier’s translation, has “the evenness of intelligence,” and, “evenness of mind” in that of Aiyar, as alternatives to the Feuersteins’ “wisdom-faculty.”[11] The effect of these alternatives is to emphasize the cognitive aspect, which is not faculty that is distinctly religious.

In fact, Krishna goes on to say, “The wise (who are) buddhi yoked, who have renounced action-born fruit, who are liberated from the bondage of birth (and death)—they go to the region (that is) free from ill.”[12] Warrier’s Shankara again substitutes “intelligence of evenness,” this time for buddhi (which is synonymous with sattva).[13] Aiyar uses “evenness of mind” again, and adds “possessed of knowledge.”[14] Those who “are liberated” from samsara are curiously not freed from the confines of human wisdom and even knowledge. Even though a person’s wisdom-faculty is understandably capable of traversing “the thicket of delusion,” resulting in “disinterest in what will be heard and what has been heard (i.e., mundane knowledge,”[15] it is difficult to reconcile becoming free of sattva with being liberated and yet still seeking refuge in the wisdom faculty and being buddhi yoked. Something simply has to give way.

That the wisdom-faculty is to be transcended before a person reaches liberation finds support in the next verse of the Gita. Only after having been diverted by “revealed tradition,” such as in how to perform the Vedic sacrifice ritual so as to gain something (i.e., attachment, desire, fruits of actions), a person’s wisdom faculty “will stand motionless and still in ecstasy,” at which time the person “will attain to (the sublime state of) Yoga.”[16] This is tricky: sattva or buddhi is being referred to, but not in the sense of either being actively engaged. In fact, standing motionless and in ecstasy may be thought of in terms of reacting to something akin to the sacred, as in how Moses reacts to Yahweh at the burning bush or how Arjuna reacts to Krishna’s display fullness later in the Gita.

Being motionless and still, the wisdom faculty can be thought of as being transparent, like an unstained window, so refuge is then being taken deeper, to something else, in the Self qua Self, rather than as understood or filtered through the artificiality of human cognition or reasoning. In his Critique of Pure Reason, Kant postulates the impact of reason itself on how we perceive space and time. With sattva or buddhi rendered still, something else is needed to close the deal for liberation to occur.

Pivoting subtly off sattva and buddhi to prajna, the next verse in Feuerstein’s translation of the Gita has Arjuna asking Krishna, what “is the definition of the (yogin who is) steadied in gnosis, abiding in ecstasy?”[17] Whereas in previous verse it is the person’s wisdom faculty (buddhi or sattva) that is in ecstasy, here it is a person who is steadied in prajna, which the Feuersteins translate as the Greek work gnosis, which “is a higher kind of (‘mystical’) knowledge” than is sattva or buddhi.[18] He explains that to “use the Greek equivalent seemed more appropriate here than to repeat ‘wisdom,’ which goes well with buddhi,” and therefore with sattva too.[19] Krishna’s answer is that when a person “relinquishes all desires (that) enter the mind . . . and is content with the Self in the Self, then is he called steadied in gnosis.”[20] That prajna should not be thought of in terms of human knowledge or even wisdom is made very evident in the next verse that ends with “steadied in vision.”[21] Vision here is not of sight literally, for, according to the Gita, when a person “withdraws from every side his senses from the objects of the senses as a tortoise (draws its limbs), his gnosis is well established. For the non-eating embodied (dehin) (Self) the objects disappear, except for the relish. (Upon) seeing the Supreme, the relish also disappears for him.”[22] Seeing the Supreme—which can mean Krishna in full, thus transcending as a deity—is not like the seeing of objects. In fact, it is from the latter that a person’s wisdom faculty is destroyed.[23] Prajna, or gnosis, transcends rather than destroys a person’s faculty for wisdom, for “complete inner stillness” (prasada) is a condition of that faculty, and in fact that condition renders a person “qualified for the grace (prasada) of the Divine.”[24] With that facility still, hence sattva or buddhi being transcended, the experiential realization of Self as it really is (i.e. reality) can be said to be more mystical than epistemological in nature.

Shankara does not make the leap from wisdom to gnosis. For in Warrier’s translation of 2.54 the Gita, “stable wisdom” and “steadfast intelligence” are anchored in concentration, and Aiyar’s translation of the verse has “established wisdom,” all of which are a far cry from “gnosis” that is “abiding in ecstasy” and “steadied in vision.”[25] In fact, the next verse, 2.55, in the Warrier translation is: “When one wholly discards desires of the heart and becomes exclusively content with the Self, one is called a sage of stable wisdom. O Arjuna!”[26] Aiyar uses “established wisdom.”[27] In effect, prajna is just sattva or buddhi that is stable or established—neither of which sounds very vision-oriented to me.

I contend that gnosis, ecstasy, and vision are qualitatively different than wisdom and intelligence. In fact, only the former can be said to be distinctly religious, as is evident from the applicability to devotion (bhakti) to a personal deity, which Shankara eschews in favor of “the sage of stable wisdom who concerns himself with the discipline of knowledge” being applied to impersonal being that is conscious.[28] Stable wisdom here is essentially “right knowledge” as in knowing the difference between right and wrong.[29] Wisdom and understanding are both predicated on the subject-object dichotomy, which falls away, according to Feuerstein’s translation, prior to liberation: “For the non-eating embodied (dehin) [Self] the objects disappear, except for the relish. (Upon) seeing the Supreme, the relish also disappears for him.”[30] For such an ascetic, even the mind’s basic subject-object structure or paradigm dissolves. Hence when Krishna then refers to a person being “yoked (and) intent on Me,” one’s “gnosis is well established,” which in turn connotes vision, as in “seeing the Supreme,” rather than intelligence.[31] Warrier’s translation Gita 2.61 substitutes the more cognitive “deeming Me supreme” in stable wisdom.[32] Even though Krishna, a personal deity, is speaking, Shankara claims that “Deeming Me supreme” means that “Vasudeva, the inner Self of all, is supreme.”[33] Although Aiyar’s translation of Gita 2.61 has “exclusively devoted to Me,” the comment beneath the verse in the commentary describe Vasudeva as “the Innermost Self of all.”[34] Innermost renders the Self even more in terms of the impersonal Brahman, and that Vasudeva is Krishna’s father rather than Krishna himself further distances Shankara from interpreting the Gita in terms of devotion to Krishna. In chapter two of the Gita, the absolute is depicted both as Krishna (whose fullness Arjuna will eventually “see”) and the Self, as in: Be “Self-possessed!”[35]

In conclusion, whereas the Feuersteins’ translation of the Gita gets past the inherent limitations of sattva and buddhi with respect to distinctly religious transcendence by shifting to gnosis, with its distinctly religious mystical and ecstasy/visionary qualities, the two translations of Shankara’s commentary hold onto the more cognitive faculties of intelligence and wisdom through the entire process of liberation, which entails knowing not only “the whole sphere of objects to be nothing but nescience,” but also “the Self” and thus reality.[36] Although Shankara’s epistemology is arguably more conducive to philosophy than theology, the transcendence of Brahman and the identity of atman with Brahman as being not just being but conscious being is arguably distinctly religious. Even though faith can indeed seek understanding, there are problems with the claim that understanding is sufficient for faith. Ramanuja’s emphasis on devotion to Krishna (bhakti) can be interpreted as a way to bridge this gap.

If all this has your head spinning, then perhaps it is best to return to the basic difference between intellectual thinking and gnostic vision. Even though faith seeking understanding can make use of human reasoning, and thus reason itself, religion is such that it must go beyond the limits of reason alone. This does not mean that a religious congregation should dismiss its more intellectually-inclined members; rather, the point is that even they need to let go of that of themselves that is human, all too human, and in fact even themselves (and definitely their egos!) before they can jump off the diving-board and go in the pool wherein visionary experience of the sacred lives. Going on with this analogy, a person can’t experience being in water, and thus knowing what that is like, if one doesn’t jump off the diving board.  Shankara doesn’t jump off the board, and thus he will be at a loss to explain Arjuna’s experience when Krishna displays his fullness later in the Gita.

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1. Ravi M. Gupta, Caitanya Vaisnava Philosophy: Tradition, Reason and Devotion (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing Company, 2014), p. 56.
2. Ibid.
3. Georg and Brenda Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita: A New Translation (Boston: Shambhala, 2011), p. 107n44.
4. Gita 2.45. In Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 107.
5. Shankara, Srimad Bhagavad Gita Bhasya of Sri Samkaracarya, Trans. A.G. Warrier (Madras, India: Sri Ramakrishna Math), p. 66.
6. Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 107n46.
7. Ibid., p. 97n19.
8. Gita 2.29, 25. In Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 101.
9. Ibid., 2.49. In Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 109.
10. The word wisdom “goes well with buddhi,” and sattva “is a common synonym for buddhi.” Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, pp. 111n53 and 107n46. Completing this syllogism, wisdom is synonymous with sattva.
11. Shankara, Srimad Bhagavad Gita Bhasya (Warrier), p. 70; Shankara, Sri Sankara’s Gita Bhashya, trans. C.V. Ramachandra Aiyar (Bombay: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, 1988), p. 78.
12. Gita 2.51. In Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 109.
13. Shankara, Srimad Bhagavad Gita Bhasya (Warrier), p. 72.
14. Shankara, Sri Sankara’s Gita Bhashya (Aiyar), p. 80.
15. Gita 2.52. In Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 109.
16. Ibid., 2.53. In Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 109.
17. Ibid., 2.54. In Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 111.
18. Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 111n53.
19. Ibid.
20. Gita 2.55. In Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 111.
21. Ibid., 2.56. In Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 111.
22. Ibid., 2.58-9. In Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 113.
23. Ibid., 2.63. In Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 113.
24. Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 113n59.
25. Shankara, Srimad Bhagavad Gita Bhasya (Warrier), p. 75; Shankara, Sri Sankara’s Gita Bhashya (Aiyar), p. 82.
26. Shankara, Srimad Bhagavad Gita Bhasya (Warrier), p. 76. Italics added.
27. Shankara, Sri Sankara’s Gita Bhashya (Aiyar), p. 83.
28. Shankara, Srimad Bhagavad Gita Bhasya (Warrier), p. 76.
29. Ibid., p. 80.
30. Gita 2.59. In Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 113.
31. Ibid., 2.61. In Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 113.
32. Shankara, Srimad Bhagavad Gita Bhasya (Warrier), p. 81.
33. Ibid.
34. Shankara, Sri Sankara’s Gita Bhashya (Aiyar), p. 88.
35. Gita., 2.45. In Feuerstein, The Bhagavad-Gita, p. 107.
36. Shankara, Srimad Bhagavad Gita Bhasya (Warrier), p. 88.

Lord Krishna in the Bhagavadgita

The Hindu myth, the Bhagavadgita, is typically regarded as placing the god Krishna above not only the other Hindu gods—here rendered merely as Krishna’s various functionalities—but also Brahman, which is being and consciousness themselves. As Krishna is incarnated in human form, placing him at the peak of the Hindu pantheon—in fact, even reducing the latter to the extent that Hinduism can be regarded as monotheist—compromises the wholly-other quality of the divine that is based on it extending beyond the limits of human cognition, perception, and emotion. In other word, the importance of Krishna’s role in the Gita comes at a cost. Depicting Krishna as the “Supreme Person” connotes less transcendence than does depicting Brahman as being and consciousness (of the whole). In going against the grain by making Brahman the basis even of Krishna, Shankara, a Hindu theologian, philosopher, and ascetic of the eighth century, CE, restores transcendence to its importance in not only Hinduism, but also religion itself as a distinctive domain of human endeavor distinguished by its unique element of transcendence.

According to Shankara, Lord Krishna is born “in order to safeguard the spiritual power in the world,” which can also be expressed as “the state of Brahmanhood.”[1] Such safeguarding is especially valuable when cravings dominate and a decline of “discriminative knowledge” impair those people who would otherwise be practitioners of Dharma, the law of righteousness.[2]  Besides promoting prosperity, that law is oriented to the “emancipation of living beings,” for being liberated from samsara is the summum bonum for a human being.[3] Shankara states that “the purpose of the science of the Gita is to set forth the summum bonum, which consists in the total cessation of the transmigratory life and its causes.”[4] Transmigration does not take place in the world; the term is inherently spiritual, or religious, because it takes place in a realm between death and birth, and thus not in the world that we inhabit during a lifetime.

Although Shankara claims that the “unborn, immutable, Lord of beings, and, in essence, eternally pure conscious and free” Brahman becomes manifest in being “embodied and born as a man, for ensuring the welfare of the world,” I submit that for “the well-being of all living beings” is a more accurate description because whether or not an atman (self) is reborn or not is not contained in the world, but, rather, transcends it.[5] Even just trying in vain to imagine what it means for Brahman to be “eternally pure conscious” goes inherently beyond the limits of human cognition and perception. The Vedic law that is oriented to balancing embracing works with embracing cessation or renunciation pales in comparison to the extent that promoting balance in the world is taken as an end rather than as a means toward liberation from the world. Shankara’s stance that maya is merely illusion rather than being the causality by which Brahman emanates multiplicity in the world can itself be taken as an admission that the ways of Brahman are wholly other and thus not readily translatable into terms that we can fathom. Hence the Gita lauds whoever “is quiescent, firmly seated, silent, not thinking any thought.”[6]

In so far as the Vedic law of works is viewed in terms of promoting prosperity in the world—which is to say, “done with desire for fruits” rather, or even more, than in “dedication to God and without expectation of rewards,”—practicing the law does not even indirectly subserve “the attainment of emancipation” though admittedly such practice “leads its practitioners to the higher stations of heavenly beings.”[7] Madhusudana Sarasvati, another commentator of the Gita, claims that the first step in the “disciplines for Liberation” as presented “as the purpose” of the Gita, is “the performance of selfless work (niskama-karma) by rejecting rites and duties meant for personal gain (kamya-karma) and the prohibited actions (nisidha-karma).”[8] Of course, Shankara’s interpretation hardly promotes a worldly orientation. In fact, a proclivity in favor of the transcendent is implied, especially as “desire for fruits” can be included in cravings. Be in the world but not of it, Augustine warns Christians. Similarly, Shankara claims that the science of the Gita “is aimed at emancipation,” which characterizes an individual atman going back into unmanifest Brahman; hence Shankara also claims that the science “sets forth the ultimate Truth that is synonymous with Vasudeva, the content of Supreme Brahman.”[9] Having come from Brahman, an individual atman is sustained by Brahman in life and at death goes back into Brahman; the welfare of the world in which we live is thereby relegated, especially when an atman is liberated from this cycle of samsara and remains unmanifest in Brahman. Madhusudana Sarasvati’s description of the Unitive Vision as the “immediate Knowledge of the identity of Brahman and the Self”[10]—an identity that is certainly not lost on Shankara—anticipates the final fulfillment of an atman retiring in Brahman. This summum bonum, rather than the desire for earthly treasure and even religious ways to promote it, and even the achievement of balance in the world, grounds the Gita as distinctly religious in nature, and thus as firmly classifiable within the domain of religion.

1. Shankara, Srimad Bhagavad Gita Bhasya of Sri Samkaracarya. Trans. A. G. Warrier (Madras, IN: Sri Ramakrishna Math), p. 2.
2. Ibid.
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid., p. 4.
5. Ibid., p. 3.
6. Ibid., p. 4.
7. Ibid., pp. 4-5.
8. Madhusudana Sarasvati, Bhagavad-Gita. Trans. by Swami Gambhirananda, p. 22.
9. Shankara, Srimad Bhagavad Gita Bhasya of Sri Samkaracarya, p. 5.
10. Madhusudana Sarasvati, Bhagavad-Gita., p. 23.

Is the Hindu Bhagavadgita Monotheist?

Even though the Bhagavadgita is just a small part of the Mahabharata Hindu epic, the popularity of the former book in Hindu households has led to it being referred to as the Hindu Bible. This likeness should be taken at face value, for the contents in the Gita are very different than the theological context of the Bible, whether just the Torah, the Talmud, or the New Testament. Even though the virtue of kindness or love issuing out in compassion to other people is a shared descriptor of the Hindu Lord Krishna, which is the highest god in the Gita, and the Christian Lord Jesus, the ideational dissimilarities between the Gita and the Bible should not be glossed over. Put another way, not even the symbol of the mandala, which Joseph Campbell includes as the religious archetype of wholeness in The Power of Myth, should dispel the notion that religions contain unique and thus different philosophical and theological ideas and even just stances.

In the Bhagavadgita, for example, “(y)oga practices and knowledge of salvation are equated with ritual performances in which all defilements and desires are offered up in the ‘sacrificial fire’ (agni) of knowledge.”[1] In ritual, basic elements on Earth, such as fire, water, and food, which, astonishingly, are labeled as deities in the Chandogya Upanishad, are related to, and perhaps even vicariously connect, the cosmos and the human person. Knowledge of liberation from rebirths (samsara) involves or even necessitates the sacrifice of desires. The word salvation is extremely salient in Christianity, and yet is hardly innate to Hinduism; the connotation that being saved by the vicarious sacrifice (as per Anselm’s theology) of a god-man once and for all so that any believer is made right thereby with God (i.e., justified by faith, as per Luther’s theology) is foreign to Hinduism. To be sure, the inclusion the element of food in both the Hindu sacrificial ritual and in the Christian Eucharistic ritual (i.e., Communion) and even that the food is consecrated in the latter with the real presence of the divine (agape) and food is labeled at a deity in a Upanishad should not blind a non-Hindu reader of the Gita into supposing that the book’s paradigm like the one upon which the Judeo-Christian Bible rests.

Even taking into account Gnostic Christianity, the emphasis which the Gita places on knowledge, especially that which Krishna imparts to Arjuna, distinguishes Hinduism from Christianity, where at least Paul distinguishes theology from philosophy—only the knowledge of the wise being vain.[2] This demarcation, and prejudice against philosophy, does not exist in Hinduism. Malinar, for instance, refers explicitly to “the various religious and philosophical doctrines presented in the [Gita]” without driving an artificial wedge between them.[3]

Furthermore, even though Krishna is portrayed as the high deity and even the portal through which Brahman itself can be glimpsed in full—as if that were possible for a human being—it is a mistake to label the Gita as monotheist. Even though Krishna is portrayed in the Gita as “the mighty ruler and creator of the world and its dharmic order, as well as the ever-liberated and transcendent ‘highest self’” and thus as “the most powerful Lord and yogin,” with “power over nature (prakrti)” and being “the cosmic cause of activity” yet “detached from the created world, being forever ‘unborn’ and transcendent,”[4] it is a mistake to conclude that Krishna’s supreme qualities renders the Gita as monotheist.

As if the Gita were akin to Hobbes’ Leviathan, Malinar states that the “monotheistic theology in [the Gita] also offers an interpretation of kingship and royal power” simply because Krishna is revealed “as the highest god.”[5] Even in the Hebrew Bible where other gods are referred to, they are not credited with being real gods, so it is not as though Yahweh is the highest god; rather, Yahweh is the only god, and thus God.[6] Also, the accolades that Malinar attributes to Krishna do not make Krishna merely a manifestation of Yahweh, for the latter did not create a dharmic order and is not liberated as the highest-self. Although “detached from the created world, being forever ‘unborn’ and transcendent” also characterizes Yahweh, or God, I wonder whether Malinar was knowingly or unknowingly drawing on Christian theology in describing Krishna in such “Western” terms.

Furthermore, I submit that not even Brahman considered as the highest or supreme god in Hinduism renders the religion monotheist. One twentieth-century American philosopher, Keith Yandel, erroneously interpreted the Hindu philosopher and theologian, Shankara (8^th century, CE), as characterizing Hinduism as monotheist simply because, according to non-dualism, the Hindu deities are merely appearances, or manifestations, of Brahman. As the ground-being of the world’s multiplicity, Brahman cannot be said have what we think of as intelligence as it differs from the awareness or consciousness of being itself qua being.  Neither can Brahman be thought of as a discrete entity, for Brahman is the being of everything—of all existence, or, perhaps more accurately, of existence itself. It is surely difficult, if not impossible, to view raw being as an entity; rather, being is the existential basis (rather than an attribute) of entities. So, I’m not convinced that Brahman can even be said to be a deity. It is possible that English translators of the Gita (and the Upanishads) have used a familiar word whose meaning differs from what the writers of the text(s) had in mind. In any case, when the warrior Arjuna gets a glimpse of Brahman itself by Krishna revealing himself as he really is, it is not the Abrahamic deity, or God, that Arjuna sees in his epiphany.

As yet another example of a leitmotif of the Gita that is not easily convertible into any of the Abrahamic faiths, Krishna urges Arjuna to engage on the external battlefield with “detached action” as a way to avoid “karmic bondage” even as Arjuna is active and performs his social duties.[7] To be sure, to be detached from sinful desires in Christianity bears a rough similarity to the “detached action,” but here even the desire not to harm relatives is a problem. Also, the very notion of “karmic bondage” is utterly foreign to the Abrahamic religions. In Christianity, for example, the bondage is to sin, whose basis lies within rather than as actions (even less in the residue of past actions).

Although religions can be said to bear Wittgenstein’s “family resemblances” to each other, the urge to minimize or overlook the differences between religions, as in depicting one in terms of another (or that another uses), should be checked and corrected for, lest scholars of religion unintentionally remake particular religions into more familiar terms. One of the main benefits of studying more than one religion, especially religions other than one’s own, is the access to different ideas and theologies/philosophies. A person’s own religious/philosophical paradigm can be made transparent to oneself even to be seen as an alternative rather than as the unquestioned and unrecognized default. Unconsciously distorting other religions into more familiar terms diminishes this realization.

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1. Angelika Malinar, The Bhagavadgita: Doctrines and Contexts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), p. 4.
2. 1. Cor. In contrast, the Hebrew Bible contains the verse, “God knows the thoughts of men.” Paul adapts this to: “God knows the thoughts of the wise; they are vain.” Jerusalem is fine; Athens is not. Such a dichotomy does not exist in Hinduism.  
3. Malinar, The Bhagavadgita, p. 5.
4. Ibid., p. 6.
5. Ibid., p. 4.
6. Also, whereas Hobbes’ notion of a sovereign power, whether a king or an assembly, has absolute political and religious (i.e., interpreting divine law) power within a territory, Hindu kings have traditionally been at least ritually dependent on the Brahmin priests in the main temple not only for another year of legitimacy, but also as a means of gaining power by giving land away through the auspices of the temple.
7. Malinar, The Bhagavadgita, p. 4.