The Teachings of the Bhagavad-gita : 8-11.

[Ramavarma Parameswaran]

03/09/2016.

The Teachings of the Bhagavad-gita : 8-11.

Chapter - 8. Creation and Life After Death - 11.

A very homely and easily intelligible analogy that I may place before you to understand this interconnectedness is the organism of our own personality, the sarira, which is the illustration given by such theologists and philosophers like Sri Ramanuja. 

God is sariri, and the whole creation is sarira. 

The relationship between the universe and God is sarira-sariri-sambandha. 

What is the relationship between the body and the soul? 

There is some sort of a very clear, intelligible relationship between the body and the soul, though we may not identify one with the other. 

The body is not the soul, but we cannot keep the body here and the soul there; they are so much related that even the word 'relation' is a poor word to describe what sort of association is there between the soul and the body. 

They are one, as it were, yet they are not one. 

A kind of non-separate existence is enjoyed by the soul and the body, notwithstanding the fact that we cannot say that the one is the other. 

This is, perhaps, the viewpoint of Ramanuja – the theologians who hold that the universe is organically related to the Supreme Being, call Him Vishnu, Narayana, Brahma, Vishnu, Siva or the Supreme Being, or any name we would like. 

I do not wish to stretch this point too much to the breaking apotheosis of it, and for all practical purposes it will be enough for us to know that there is a non-separate relation of the whole of creation with God, which includes our relationship also. 

The words adhidaiva, adhyatma and adhibhuta are interpreted, as I mentioned, in many ways. In a subtle way, the Bhagavadgita itself gives the definition of these principles.

Swami Krishnananda

 To be continued ....