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The Bhagavad Gita occurs in the Bhishma Parva of the Mahabharata and comprises 18 chapters from the 25th through 42nd and consists of 700 verses. Its authorship is traditionally ascribed to Vyasa, the compiler of the Mahabharata.Due to differences in recensions the verses of the Gita may be numbered in the full text of the Mahabharata as chapters 6.25–42. or as chapters 6.23–40 According to the recension of the Gita commented on by Shankaracharya, the number of verses is 700, but there is evidence to show that old manuscripts had 745 verses. The verses themselves, using the range and style of Sanskrit meter (chhandas) with similes and metaphors, are written in a poetic form that is traditionally chanted. The Bhagavad Gita is later than the great movement represented by the early Upanishads and earlier than the period of the development of the philosophic systems and their formulation in the sutras. The origin of the Gita is definitely in the pre-Christian era. The date of composition and the author of the Gita is not known with certainty. Scholars have opined that the date of composition of the Bhagavad Gita is between the 5th and the 2nd century BC.

Based on claims of differences in the poetic styles some scholars like Jinarajadasa have argued that the Bhagavad Gita was added to the Mahabharata at a later date.

Within the text of the Bhagavad Gita itself Krishna claims that the knowledge of Yoga contained in the Gita was first instructed to mankind at the very beginning of their existence.

Although the original date of composition of the Bhagavad Gita is not clear, its teachings are considered timeless and the exact time of revelation of the scripture is to be considered of little spiritual significance by scholars like Bansi Pandit, and Juan Mascaro.Swami Vivekananda dismisses concerns about differences of opinion regarding the historical events as unimportant for study of the Gita from the point of acquirement of Dharma.

Prelude

The main theme of the Mahabharata is the exploits of two families of royal cousins, known as the Pandavas and the Kauravas, who were the sons of two brothers, Pandu and Dhritarashtra, respectively. Since Dhritarashtra was born blind, Pandu inherited the ancestral kingdom, comprising a part of northern India around modern Delhi. The Pandava
brothers were Yudhishthira the eldest, Bhima, Arjuna, Nakula, and Sahadeva. The Kaurava brothers ere one hundred in number, Duryodhana being the eldest. When Pandu died at an early age, his young children were placed under the care of their uncle Dhritarashtra who usurped the throne. The Pandavas and the Kauravas were brought up together in the same household and had the same teachers, the most notable of whom were Bhishma and Dronacharya Bhishma, the wise grandsire, acted as their chief guardian, and the brahmin Drona was their military instructor. The Pandavas were endowed with righteousness, self-control, nobility, and many other knightly traits. On the other hand, the hundred sons of Dhritarashtra, especially Duryodhana, were endowed with negative qualities and were cruel, unrighteous, unscrupulous, greedy, and lustful. Duryodhana being jealous of his five cousins, contrived various means to destroy them.

When the time came to crown Yudhisthira, the eldest of the pandavas as the prince, Duryodhana, through a crooked game of dice, exiled the Pandavas into the forest. On their return from banishment the Pandavas demanded the return of their legitimate kingdom. Duryodhana who had consolidated his power by many alliances, refused to restore their legal and moral rights. Attempts by elders and Krishna who was a friend of the Pandavas and also a well wisher of the Kauravas, to resolve the issue failed. Nothing would satisfy Duryodhana’s inordinate greed.

War became inevitable. Both Duryodhana and Arjuna requested Krishna to support them in fighting the war, since he possessed the strongest army, and was revered as the wisest teacher and the greatest yogi. Krishna offered to give his
vast army to one of them and to become a charioteer and counselor for the other, but he would not to touch any weapon nor to participate in the battle in any manner. While Duryodhana chose Krishna’s vast army, Arjuna preferred to have Krishna as his charioteer.The whole realm responded to the call of the Pandavas and the Kauravas. The kings, princes, and knights of India with their armies, assembled on the sacred plain of Kurukshetra. The blind king Dhritharashtra wished to follow the progress of the battle. The sage Vyasa offered to endow him with supernatural sight; but the king refused the boon, for he felt that the sight of the destruction of his near and dear ones would be too much for him to bear. Thereupon Vyasa bestowed supernatural sight on Sanjaya, who was to act as reporter to Dhritarashtra. The Gita opens with the question of the blind king to Sanjaya regarding what happened on the battlefield when the two armies faced each other in battle array.

Background

The discourse on the Bhagavad Gita begins before the start of the climactic battle at Kurukshetra. It begins with the Pandava prince Arjuna, as he becomes filled with doubt on the battlefield. Realizing that his enemies are his own relatives, beloved friends and revered teachers, he turns to his charioteer and guide, Krishna, for advice.  In summary the main philosophical subject matter of the Bhagavad-gita is the explanation of five basic concepts or “truths”:

Ishvara (The Supreme Controller)

Jiva (Living beings/the soul) 

Prakrti (Matter)

Dharma (Duty)

Kala (Time)

Krishna counsels Arjuna on the greater idea of dharma or universal harmony and duty. He begins with the tenet that the soul (Atman) is eternal and immortal. Any ‘death’ on the battlefield would involve only the shedding of the body, but the soul is permanent. Arjuna’s hesitation stems from a lack of right understanding of the ‘nature of things,’ the privileging of the unreal over the real. His fear and hesitance become impediments to the proper balancing of the universal dharmic order. Essentially, Arjuna wishes to abandon the battle, to abstain from action; Krishna warns, however, that without action, the cosmos would fall out of order and truth would be obscured.

In order to clarify his point, Krishna expounds the various Yoga processes and understanding of the true nature of the universe. Krishna describes the yogic paths of devotional service, action, meditation and knowledge.Fundamentally, the Bhagavad Gita proposes that true enlightenment comes from growing beyond identification with the temporal ego, the ‘False Self’, the ephemeral world, so that one identifies with the truth of the immortal self, the absolute soul or Atman. Through detachment from the material sense of ego, the Yogi, or follower of a particular path of Yoga, is able to transcend his/her illusory mortality and attachment to the material world and enter the realm of the Supreme.

It should be noted, however, that Krishna does not propose that the physical
world must be forgotten or neglected. Indeed, it is quite the opposite: one’s
life on earth must be lived in accordance with greater laws and truths, one must
embrace one’s temporal duties whilst remaining mindful of a more timeless
reality, acting for the sake of service without consideration for the results
thereof. Such a life would naturally lead towards stability, happiness and
ultimately, enlightenment.

To demonstrate his divine nature, Krishna grants Arjuna the boon of cosmic
vision (albeit temporary) and allows the prince to see his ‘Universal Form’
(this occurs in the eleventh chapter).He reveals that he is fundamentally both the ultimate essence of Being in
the universe and also its material body, called the Vishvarupa (‘Universal
Form’).

In the Bhagavad-Gita Krishna refers to the war about to take place as ‘Dharma
Yuddha’, meaning a righteous war for the purpose of justice. In Chapter 4,
Krishna states that he incarnates in each age (yuga) to establish righteousness in
the world.

War as an allegory

There are many who regard the story behind the Gita not as historical fact
but as an allegory; Swami Nikhilananda
describes this view as follows.

“

Arjuna represents the individual soul, and Sri Krishna the Supreme Soul dwelling in every heart. Arjuna’s chariot is the body. The blind king Dhritarashtra is the mind under the spell of ignorance, and his hundred sons are man’s numerous evil tendencies. The battle, a perennial one, is between the power of good and the power of evil. The warrior who listens to the advice of the Lord speaking from within will triumph in this battle and attain the Highest Good.

”

Mahatma Gandhi,
throughout his life and his own commentary on the Gita, interpreted the battle as “an allegory in which the battlefield is the soul and
Arjuna, man’s higher impulses struggling against evil.” Swami Vivekananda also
said that the first discourse in the Gita related to war can be taken
allegorically. Vivekananda further remarks, “this Kurukshetra War is only an allegory. When we
sum up its esoteric significance, it means the war which is constantly going on
within man between the tendencies of good and evil.”

In Sri Aurobindo’s view,
Krishna was a historical figure, but his significance in the Gita is as a
“symbol of the divine dealings with humanity”; while Arjuna
typifies a “struggling human soul.” However, Aurobindo rejects the interpretation that the Gita, and the Mahabharata
by extension, is “an allegory of the inner life, and has nothing to do with our
outward human life and actions”:

“

…That is a view which the general character and the actual language of the epic does not justify and, if pressed, would turn the straightforward philosophical language of the Gita into a constant, laborious and somewhat puerile mystification….the Gita is written in plain terms and professes to solve the great ethical and spiritual difficulties which the life of man raises, and it will not do to go behind this plain language and thought and wrest them to the service of our fancy. But there is this much of truth in the view, that the setting of the doctrine though not symbolical, is certainly typical…

”

Overview of chapters

The Gita consists of eighteen chapters in total:

1. Arjuna requests Krishna to move his chariot between the two armies. When
   Arjuna sees his relatives on the opposing army side of the Kurus, he loses
   courage and decides not to fight.
2. After asking Krishna for help, Arjuna is instructed that only the body may
   be killed as he was worried if it would become a sin to kill people(Including
   his gurus and relatives), while the eternal self is immortal. Krishna appeals
   to Arjuna that as a warrior he has a duty to uphold the path of dharma through
   warfare.
3. Arjuna asks why he should engage in fighting if knowledge is more
   important than action. Krishna stresses to Arjuna that performing his duties
   for the greater good, but without attachment to results is the appropriate
   course of action.
4. Krishna reveals that He has lived through many births, always teaching
   Yoga for the protection of the pious and the destruction of the impious and
   stresses the importance of accepting a guru.
5. Arjuna asks Krishna if it is better to forgo action or to act. Krishna
   answers that both ways may be beneficent, but that acting in Karma
   Yoga is superior.
6. Krishna describes the correct posture for meditation and the process of
   how to achieve samadhi.
7. Krishna teaches the path of knowledge (Jnana
   Yoga).
8. Krishna defines the terms brahman, adhyatma,
   karma,
   atman, adhibhuta and adhidaiva and explains how one can
   remember him at the time of death and attain His supreme abode.
9. Krishna explains panentheism, “all beings
   are in Me” as a way of remembering Him in all circumstances.
10. Krishna describes how He is the ultimate source of all material and
    spiritual worlds. Arjuna accepts Krishna as the Supreme Being, quoting great
    sages who have also done so.
11. On Arjuna’s request, Krishna displays His “universal form”
    (Viśvarūpa), a theophany of a being facing
    every way and emitting the radiance of a thousand suns, containing all other
    beings and material in existence.
12. Krishna describes the process of devotional service (Bhakti
    Yoga).
13. Krishna describes nature (prakrti), the enjoyer (purusha) and
    consciousness.
14. Krishna explains the three modes (gunas) of material nature.
15. Krishna describes a symbolic tree (representing material existence), its
    roots in the heavens and its foliage on earth. Krishna explains that this tree
    should be felled with the “axe of detachment”, after which one can go beyond
    to his supreme abode.
16. Krishna tells of the human traits of the divine and the demonic natures.
    He counsels that to attain the supreme destination one give up lust, anger and
    greed, discern between right and wrong action by evidence from scripture and
    thus act rightly.
17. Krishna tells of three divisions of faith and the thoughts, deeds and even
    eating habits corresponding to the three gunas.
18. In conclusion, Krishna asks Arjuna to abandon all forms of dharma and
    simply surrender unto Him. He describes this as the ultimate perfection of
    life.

Scripture of Yoga

The Gita addresses the discord between the senses and the intuition of cosmic
order. It speaks of the Yoga of equanimity, a detached outlook. The term Yoga covers a wide range
of meanings, but in the context of the Bhagavad Gita, describes a unified
outlook, serenity of mind, skill in action and the ability to stay attuned to
the glory of the Self (Atman) and the Supreme Being (Bhagavan). According to
Krishna, the root of all suffering and discord is the agitation of the mind
caused by selfish desire. The only way to douse the flame of desire is by
simultaneously stilling the mind through self-discipline and engaging oneself in
a higher form of activity.

However, abstinence from action is regarded as being just as detrimental as
extreme indulgence. According to the Bhagavad Gita, the goal of life is to free
the mind and intellect from their complexities and to focus them on the glory of
the Self by dedicating one’s actions to the divine. This goal can be achieved
through the Yogas of meditation, action, devotion and knowledge. In the sixth
chapter, Krishna describes the best Yogi as one who constantly meditates upon
him – which is understood to mean thinking of either Krishna personally, or the
supreme Brahman
- with different schools of Hindu thought giving varying points of view.

Krishna summarizes the Yogas through eighteen chapters. Three yogas in
particular have been emphasized by commentators:

• Bhakti Yoga or Devotion,
• Karma Yoga or Selfless Action
• Jnana Yoga or Self Transcending Knowledge

While each path differs, their fundamental goal is the same – to realize
Brahman (the Divine Essence) as being the ultimate truth upon which our
material universe rests, that the body is temporal, and that the Supreme
Soul (Paramatman) is infinite. Yoga’s aim (moksha) is to escape from the
cycle of reincarnation through realization of the ultimate reality. There are
three stages to self-realization enunciated from the Bhagavad Gita:

1. Brahman -
   The impersonal universal energy
2. Paramatma – The Supreme Soul
   sitting in the heart of every living entity.
3. Bhagavan – God as a
   personality, with a transcendental form.

Major themes of yoga

The influential commentator Madhusudana
Sarasvati (b. circa 1490) divided the Gita’s eighteen chapters into three
sections, each of six chapters. According to his method of division the first
six chapters deal with Karma Yoga, which is the means to the final goal, and the
last six deal with the goal itself, which he says is Knowledge (Jnana). The
middle six deal with bhakti. Swami Gambhirananda
characterizes Madhusudana Sarasvati’s system as a successive approach in which
Karma yoga leads to Bhakti yoga, which in turn leads to Jnana yoga.

Karma Yoga

Karma Yoga is essentially Acting, or doing one’s duties in life as per
his/her dharma, or duty, without concern of results – a sort of constant
sacrifice of action to the Supreme. It is action done without thought of gain.
In a more modern interpretation, it can be viewed as duty bound deeds done
without letting the nature of the result affecting one’s actions. Krishna
advocates Nishkam Karma
(Selfless Action) as the ideal path to realize the Truth. Allocated work done
without expectations, motives, or thinking about its outcomes tends to purify
one’s mind and gradually makes an individual fit to see the value of reason and
the benefits of renouncing the work itself. These concepts are vividly described
in the following verses:

“To action alone hast thou a right and never at all to its fruits; let not
the fruits of action be thy motive; neither let there be in thee any
attachment to inaction”(2.47)

“Fixed in yoga, do thy work, O Winner of wealth (Arjuna), abandoning
attachment, with an even mind in success and failure, for evenness of mind is
called yoga”(2.48)

“With the body, with the mind, with the intellect, even merely with the
senses, the Yogis perform action toward self-purification, having abandoned
attachment. He who is disciplined in Yoga, having abandoned the fruit of
action, attains steady peace…”

In order to achieve true liberation, it is important to control all mental
desires and tendencies to enjoy sense pleasures. The following verses illustrate
this:

“When a man dwells in his mind on the object of sense, attachment to them
is produced. From attachment springs desire and from desire comes
anger.”(2.62)

“From anger arises bewilderment, from bewilderment loss of memory; and
from loss of memory, the destruction of intelligence and from the destruction
of intelligence he perishes”(2.63)

Bhakti Yoga

According to Catherine
Cornille, Associate Professor of Theology at Boston College, “The text
[of the Gita] offers a survey of the different possible disciplines for
attaining liberation through knowledge (jnana), ritual action
(karma) and loving devotion to God (bhakti), focusing on the
latter as both the easiest and the highest path to salvation.”

In the introduction to Chapter Seven of the Gita, bhakti is summed up
as a mode of worship which consists of unceasing and loving remembrance of God.
As M. R. Sampatkumaran explains in his overview of Ramanuja’s commentary on the
Gita, “The point is that mere knowledge of the scriptures cannot lead to final
release. Devotion, meditation and worship are essential.”

As Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita:

• “And of all yogins, he who full of faith worships Me, with his inner self
  abiding in Me, him, I hold to be the most attuned (to me in Yoga).”

• “After attaining Me, the great souls do not incur rebirth in this
  miserable transitory world, because they have attained the highest
  perfection.”

• “… those who, renouncing all actions in Me, and regarding Me as the
  Supreme, worship Me… For those whose thoughts have entered into Me, I am
  soon the deliverer from the ocean of death and transmigration, Arjuna. Keep
  your mind on Me alone, your intellect on Me. Thus you shall dwell in Me
  hereafter.”

• “And he who serves Me with the yoga of unswerving devotion, transcending
  these qualities [binary opposites, like good and evil, pain and pleasure] is
  ready for liberation in Brahman.”

• “Fix your mind on Me, be devoted to Me, offer service to Me, bow down to
  Me, and you shall certainly reach Me. I promise you because you are My very
  dear friend.”

• “Setting aside all meritorious deeds (Dharma), just surrender
  completely to My will (with firm faith and loving contemplation). I shall
  liberate you from all sins. Do not fear.”

Jnana Yoga

Jnana Yoga is a process of learning to discriminate between what is real and
what is not, what is eternal and what is not. Through a steady advancement in
realization of the distinction between Real and the Unreal, the Eternal and the
Temporal, one develops into a Jnana Yogi. This is essentially a path of
knowledge and discrimination in regards to the difference between the immortal
soul (atman) and the body.

In the second chapter, Krishna’s counsel begins with a succinct exposition of
Jnana Yoga. Krishna argues that there is no reason to lament for those who are
about to be killed in battle, because never was there a time when they were not,
nor will there be a time when they will cease to be. Krishna explains that the
self (atman) of all these warriors is indestructible. Fire cannot burn it, water
cannot wet it, and wind cannot dry it. It is this Self that passes from body to
another body like a person taking worn out clothing and putting on new ones.
Krishna’s counsel is intended to alleviate the anxiety that Arjuna feels seeing
a battle between two great armies about to commence. However, Arjuna is not an
intellectual. He is a warrior, a man of action, for whom the path of action,
Karma Yoga, is more appropriate.

“When a sensible man ceases to see different identities due to different
material bodies and he sees how beings are expanded everywhere, he attains to
the Brahman conception.”

“Those who see with eyes of knowledge the difference between the body and
the knower of the body, and can also understand the process of liberation from
bondage in material nature, attain to the supreme goal.”

Eighteen Yogas

In Sanskrit editions of the Gita, the Sanskrit text includes a traditional
chapter title naming each chapter as a particular form of yoga. These chapter
titles do not appear in the Sanskrit text of the Mahabharata. Since there are eighteen chapters, there are therefore eighteen yogas mentioned,
as explained in this quotation from Swami Chidbhavananda:

All the eighteen chapters in the Gita are designated, each as a type of
yoga. The function of the yoga is to train the body and the mind…. The first
chapter in the Gita is designated as system of yoga. It is called Arjuna
Vishada Yogam – Yoga of Arjuna’s Dejection.

In Sanskrit editions, these eighteen chapter titles all use the word yoga,
but in English translations the word yoga may not appear. For example, the
Sanskrit title of Chapter 1 as given in Swami Sivananda’s bilingual edition is
arjunaviṣādayogaḥ which he translates as “The Yoga
of the Despondency of Arjuna”. Swami Tapasyananda’s
bilingual edition gives the same Sanskrit title, but translates it as “Arjuna’s
Spiritual Conversion Through Sorrow”. The English-only translation by Radhakrishnan gives no Sanskrit, but the chapter
title is translated as “The Hesitation and Despondency of Arjuna”. Other English translations, such as that by Zaehner, omit these chapter titles
entirely.

Swami Sivananda’s commentary says that the eighteen chapters have a
progressive order to their teachings, by which Krishna “pushed Arjuna up the
ladder of Yoga from one rung to another.” As Winthrop Sargeant explains,

In the model presented by the Bhagavad Gītā, every aspect of life is
in fact a way of salvation.

Dhyana Yoga

Dhyana Yoga is the stilling of the mind and body through meditating
techniques, geared at realizing one’s true nature. A very similar (if not
identical) practice was later described by Patanjali in his Yoga Sutras.

To practice yoga, one should go to a secluded place and should lay kusa
grass on the ground and then cover it with a deerskin and a soft cloth. The
seat should be neither too high nor too low and should be situated in a sacred
place. The yogi should then sit on it very firmly and practice yoga to purify
the heart by controlling his mind, senses and activities and fixing the mind
on one point. One should hold one’s body, neck and head erect in a straight
line and stare steadily at the tip of the nose. Thus, with an unagitated,
subdued mind, devoid of fear, completely free from sex life, one should
meditate upon Me within the heart and make Me the ultimate goal of life. Thus
practicing constant control of the body, mind and activities, the mystic
transcendentalist, his mind regulated, attains to the kingdom of God [or the
abode of Krishna] by cessation of material existence.

Note: Alternative versions of the above verse state that the top of the nose
(between the eyebrows) should be meditated upon, rather than the tip.

Message or the summary of the Gita

Several scholars and philosophers have tried to summarise the central
teaching of the Bhagavad Gita.

The Gita centers on the revelation of Vaishna monotheism, offering the
alternative of just war, even against
relatives provided the aggression is in the “active and selfless defence of dharma“, to the
pacifist Hindu concept of non-violence. Some commentators have attempted to resolve the apparent conflict between the
proscription of violence and ahimsa by allegorical readings. Gandhi for example took the
position that the text isn’t concerned with actual warfare so much as with the
“battle that goes on within each individual heart”. Such allegorical or
metaphorical readings are derived from Theosophical
interpretations due to Subba Row, William Q. Judge and Annie
Besant. Stephen Mitchell has
attempted to refute such allegorical readings.

Scholar Radhakrishnan writes that
the verse 11.55 is the “the essence of bhakti” and the “substance of the whole
teaching of the Gita”^[74]—

“

He who does work for Me, he who looks upon Me as his goal, he who worships Me, free from attachment, who is free from enmity to all creatures, he goes to Me, O Pandava.

”

Scholar Steven Rosen summarizes the
Gita in four basic, concise verses:

“

” I am the source of all spiritual and material worlds. Everything emanates from him. The Wise who fully realize this engage in my devotional service and worship me with all their hearts.” (10.8) “My pure devotees are absorbed in thoughts of me, and they experience fulfillment and bliss by enlightening one another and conversing about me.” (10.9) “To those who are continually devoted and worship me with love, I give the understanding by which they can come to me.” (10.10) “Out of compassion for them, I, residing in their hearts, destroy with the shining lamp of knowledge the darkness born of ignorance.” (10.11)

”

Ramakrishna said that the
essential message of the Gita can be obtained by repeating the word several
times, “‘Gita, Gita, Gita’, you begin, but then find yourself saying ‘ta-Gi, ta-Gi,
ta-Gi’. Tagi means one who has renounced everything for God.”

According to Swami Vivekananda, “If
one reads this one Shloka —क्लैब्यं मा स्म गमः पार्थ नैतत्त्वय्युपपद्यते ।
क्षुद्रं हृदयदौर्बल्यं त्यक्त्वोत्तिष्ठ परंतप॥ — one gets all the merits of
reading the entire Gita; for in this one Shloka lies imbedded the whole Message
of the Gita.” —

“

Do not yield to unmanliness, O son of Pritha. It does not become you. Shake off this base faint-heartnedness and arise, O scorcher of enemies! (2.3)

”

Mahatma Gandhi writes,
“The object of the Gita appears to me to be that of showing the most excellent
way to attain self-realization” and Gandhi writes that this can achieved by
selfless action—”By desireless action; by renouncing fruits of action; by
dedicating all activities to God, i.e., by surrendering oneself to Him body and
soul.” Gandhi called Gita, The Gospel of Selfless Action.

Influence

In a heterogeneous text, the Gita reconciles facets and schools of Hindu
philosophy, including those of Brahmanical (orthodox Vedic)
origin and the parallel ascetic and Yogic
traditions. It had always been a creative text for Hindu priests and Yogis. Although it is
not strictly part of the ‘canon‘ of Vedic writings, almost
all Hindu traditions draw upon the Gita as authoritative. For the Vedantic schools
of Hindu philosophy, it belongs to one of the three foundational texts
Prasthana Trayi (lit. “three points of departure”), the other two being
the Upanishads and Brahma Sutras.

“[T]he authority and influence of the Bhagavad Gita is such that…It has
been called “India’s favourite Bible”, and with its emphasis on selfless service
it was a prime source of inspiration for Mahatma Gandhi.” Among the great sages and philosophers who have drawn inspiration from the
Bhagavad Gita is Chaitanya
Mahaprabhu, who initiated the public singing of the “Hare Krishna” mantra.

J. Robert
Oppenheimer, American physicist and director of the Manhattan Project,
learned Sanskrit in 1933 and read the
Bhagavad Gita in the original, citing it later as one of the most influential
books to shape his philosophy of life. Upon witnessing the world’s first nuclear test in 1945,
he later claimed to have thought of the quotation “Now I am become Death, the
destroyer of worlds”, verse 32 from Chapter 11 of the Bhagavad Gita.

A 2006 report suggests that the Gita is replacing the influence of the “The
Art of War” (ascendant in the 1980s and ’90s) in the Western business
community.

Commentaries

Traditionally the commentators belong to spiritual traditions or schools (sampradaya)
and Guru lineages (parampara), which claim to
preserve teaching stemming either directly from Krishna himself or from other
sources, each claiming to be faithful to the original message. In the words of
Hiriyanna, “[The Gita] is one of the hardest books to interpret, which accounts
for the numerous commentaries on it – each differing from the rest in an
essential point or the other.”

Different translators and commentators have widely differing views on what
multi-layered Sanskrit words and passages
signify, and their presentation in English depending on the sampradaya they are
affiliated to. Especially in Western philology, interpretations of
particular passages often do not agree with traditional views.

The oldest and most influential medieval commentary was that of the founder
of the Vedanta
school of extreme ‘non-dualism”, Shankara (788-820 A.
D.), also known as Shankaracharya (Sanskrit: Śaṅkarācārya) Shankara’s commentary was based on a recension of the Gita containing 700
verses, and that recension has been widely adopted by others. There is not universal agreement that he was the actual author of the commentary
on the Bhagavad Gita that is attributed to him. A key commentary for the “modified non-dualist” school of Vedanta was written by Ramanujacharya (Sanskrit:
Rāmānujacharya), who lived in the eleventh century
A.D. Ramanujacharya’s commentary chiefly seeks to show that the discipline of
devotion to God (Bhakti yoga) is the way of salvation. The commentary by Madhva, whose dates are
given either as (b. 1199 – d. 1276) or as (b. 1238 – d. 1317), also known as Madhvacharya (Sanskrit: Madhvācārya), exemplifies thinking of the “dualist”
school. Madhva’s school of dualism asserts that there is, in a quotation provided by
Winthrop Sargeant, “an eternal and complete distinction between the Supreme, the
many souls, and matter and its divisions.” Madhva is also considered to be one of the great commentators reflecting the
viewpoint of the Vedanta school.

In the Shaiva tradition, the renowned philosopher Abhinavagupta (10-11th
century CE) has written a commentary on a slightly variant recension called
Gitartha-Samgraha.

Other classical commentators include Nimbarka (1162 AD), Vallabha(1479 AD)., while Dnyaneshwar (1275-1296 AD)
translated and commented on the Gita in Marathi, in his book Dnyaneshwari.

In modern times notable commentaries were written by Bal Gangadhar Tilak
and Mahatma Gandhi, who used
the text to help inspire the Indian
independence movement.
Tilak wrote his commentary while in jail during the period 1910-1911, while he
was serving a six-year sentence imposed by the British colonial government in
India for sedition. While noting that the Gita teaches possible paths to liberation, his commentary
places most emphasis on Karma yoga. No book was more central to Gandhi’s life and thought than the Bhagavadgita,
which he referred to as his “spiritual dictionary”. During his stay in Yeravda jail in 1929, Gandhi wrote a commentary on the Bhagavad Gita in Gujarati. The Gujarati
manuscript was translated into English by Mahadev
Desai, who provided an additional introduction and commentary. It was published
with a Foreword by Gandhi in 1946.Mahatma Gandhi expressed
his love for the Gita in these words:

I find a solace in the Bhagavagītā that I miss even in the Sermon on the
Mount. When disappointment stares me in the face and all alone I see not
one ray of light, I go back to the Bhagavagītā. I find a verse here and a verse
there and I immediately begin to smile in the midst of overwhelming tragedies
- and my life has been full of external tragedies – and if they have left no
visible, no indelible scar on me, I owe it all to the teaching of Bhagavagītā.

Other notable modern commentators include Sri Aurobindo, Sarvepalli
Radhakrishnan, and Swami Vivekananda, who took a syncretistic approach to the
text.

Swami Vivekananda, the
follower of Sri Ramakrishna, was known for
his commentaries on the four Yogas – Bhakti, Jnana, Karma and Raja Yoga. He drew
from his knowledge of the Gita to expound on these Yogas. Swami Sivananda advises
the aspiring Yogi to read verses from the Bhagavad Gita every day. Paramahamsa
Yogananda, writer of the famous Autobiography of a
Yogi, viewed the Bhagavad Gita as one of the world’s most divine
scriptures. A.C.
Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, the founder of the International
Society for Krishna Consciousness, wrote Bhagavad-Gītā
As It Is – a commentary on the Gita from the perspective of Gaudiya Vaishnavism.
In 1965 the modern sage Maharishi Mahesh
Yogi published his own commentary of the Gita and proclaimed his technique
of Transcendental
Meditation to be the practical procedure for experiencing the field of
absolute Being described by Lord Krishna.

Translations

The first translation of Bhagavad Gita to English was done by Charles Wilkins in
1785. In 1808 passages from the Gita were part of the first direct translation of
Sanskrit into German, appearing in a book through which Friedrich Schlegel
became known as the founder of Indian philology in Germany.

Adaptations

Philip Glass retold the
story of Gandhi’s
early development as an activist in South Africa through the text of the Gita in
the opera Satyagraha. The
entire libretto of the opera consists of sayings from the Gita sung in the
original sanskrit.

In Douglas Cuomo’s,
Arjuna’s dilemma, the philosophical dilemma faced by Arjuna is dramatized
in operatic form with a blend of Indian and Western music styles.

In Doctor Atomic, an opera byJohn Adams the
librettist Peter Sellars uses text
from the Bhagavad Gita (including Oppenheimer’s I am become death, destroyer
of worlds quote from the Gita).

See also

• Uddhava
  Gita
• Ashtavakra Gita
• The
  Ganesha Gita
• Vyadha Gita

Notes

References

• Chidbhavananda, Swami (1997). The Bhagavad
  Gita. Sri Ramakrishna Tapovanam. 
• Easwaran, Eknath (2007). The Bhagavad Gita.
  Nilgiri Press. ISBN
  9781586380199. 
• Easwaran, Eknath (1975). The Bhagavad Gita for Daily
  Living Volume 1. Berkeley, California: The Blue Mountain Center of
  Meditation. ISBN
  9780915132171. 
• Easwaran, Eknath (1979). The Bhagavad Gita for Daily
  Living Volume 2. Berkeley, California: The Blue Mountain Center of
  Meditation. ISBN
  9780915132188. 
• Easwaran, Eknath (1984). The Bhagavad Gita for Daily
  Living Volume 3. Berkeley, California: The Blue Mountain Center of
  Meditation. ISBN
  9780915132195. 
• Gambhirananda, Swami (1998). Madhusudana Sarasvati
  Bhagavad Gita: With the annotation Gūḍhārtha Dīpikā. Calcutta: Advaita Ashrama. ISBN
  81-7505-194-9. 
• Flood,
  Gavin (1996). An Introduction to Hinduism. Cambridge:
  Cambridge University Press. ISBN
  0-521-43878-0. 
• Gambhirananda, Swami (1997). Bhagavadgītā: With the
  commentary of Śaṅkarācārya. Calcutta: Advaita Ashrama. ISBN
  81-7505-041-1. 
• Keay, John
  (2000). India: A History. Grove Press. ISBN
  0-8021-3797-0. 
• Minor,
  Robert N. (1986). Modern Indian Interpreters of the
  Bhagavadgita. Albany, New York: State University of New York. ISBN
  0-88706-297-0. 
• Radhakrishnan, S. (1993). The Bhagavadgītā.
  Harper Collins. ISBN
  81-7223-087-7. 
• Sampatkumaran, M. R. (1985). The Gītābhāṣya of Rāmānuja. Bombay:
  Ananthacharya Indological Research Institute. 
• Sargeant, Winthrop (2009). The Bhagavad Gītā: Twenty-fifth
  Anniversary Edition. Albany: State University of New York Press. ISBN
  978-1-4384-2841-3. 
• Singh, R.
  Raj (2006). Bhakti and Philosophy. Lexington Books. ISBN
  0739114247. 
• Sivananda, Swami (1995). The Bhagavad Gita. The
  Divine Life Society. ISBN
  81-7052-000-2. 
• Tapasyananda, Swami (1990). Śrīmad Bhagavad
  Gītā. Sri Ramakrishna Math. ISBN
  81-7120-449-X. 
• Vivekananda, Swami (1998). Thoughts on the
  Gita. Delhi: Advaita Ashrama. ISBN
  81-7505-033-0. 
• Winternitz, Maurice (1972). History of Indian
  Literature. New Delhi: Oriental Books. 
• Zaehner,
  R. C. (1969). The Bhagavad Gītā. Oxford University Press.
  ISBN
  0-19-501666-1
• wikipedia

External links

• Bhagavad Gita at the Open Directory
  Project
• International Gita
  Society

Translations and Commentaries

• 1890
  translation by William Quan Judge
• 1900
  translation by Sir Edwin Arnold
• The Gita According to Gandhi by Mahadev Desai of Mahatma Gandhi’s 1929 Gujurati translation
  and commentary
• 1942
  translation by Swami Sivananda
• 1971 translation by A. C.
  Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada entitled Bhagavad Gita As It
  Is with Sanskrit text and English
  commentary.
• 1988
  translation by Ramananda Prasad
• 1992
  translation and commentary by Swami
  Chinmayananda
• 1993
  translation by Jagannatha Prakasa (John of AllFaith)
• 2001 translation by
  Sanderson Beck
• 2004
  metered translation by Swami Nirmalananda Giri
• Six commentaries: by Adi Sankara, Ramanuja, Sridhara Swami, Madhusudana Sarasvati, Visvanatha Chakravarti and Baladeva Vidyabhusana (all in sanskrit)  Essays on Gita by Sri Aurobindo

Audio

• Recitation of verses in Sanskrit (MP3 format)
• Bhagavad Gita (As It Is) Complete produced by The International Society for Krishna Consciousness
• Bhagavad Gita in 6 Languages

Journals

• “Bhagavad Gita for everyday living“. The Vedanta Kesari 95 (12). 2008-12-12. ISSN 0042-2983. https://www.sriramakrishnamath.org/2008/Eng/12-12-1.Pdf.