Hari om everyone,
Last week's Brain Teaser: What is it that is hidden from both the Sun and the Moon?
Answer: Darkness! The sun and moon and self illumining that they can NEVER see darkness. Wherever they go, they just can't find it.
Today's Brain Teaser: What is it that even a blind person can see? And no, the answer is not darkness :). Think, think!
We got our thinking caps on for last week's brainteaser and one of them came up with the correct answer! Cheers!!
Our topic for the day was BG ch. 11. In this chapter called 'viShvaroopa sandarshana yoga', bhagavaan reveals his true form to Arjuna!
One cannot see His humungous form with naked eyes. Why not? Can we see the current raakShasa, Coronavirus, with our naked eyes? Can we see the galaxies and their details with our naked eyes? No! We need special apparatus to see microscopic objects as well as macroscopic ones. Similarly, with our regular vision, we cannot comprehend or perceive the Lord's true form. So, Krishna blessed Arjuna with 'divya dRuShTi' (divine eyesight) so that he could see the Lord. In 10th chapter, His glories were described. Now in this chapter, they were shown. It is almost like 10th chapter was the theory class and 11th chapter was practicals or labs, as you may say :).
Arjuna was awestruck by the awesomeness of the Lord's form!!! He could see the Lord wherever his eyesight reached, however farther he gazed! Left, right, top, bottom, around, beyond... it was 'JUST THE LORD!' Arjuna saw the many, many facets of the Lord and sang His praises. He described him vividly and revelled in the experience! It was a horripilating experience to see this form of the Lord. Then he got so frightened that he prayed to Krishna to take back His 4-armed form. When Krishna did that, Arjuna pleaded for forgiveness! He said, "without knowing your eminence, I may have teased or chided you as Krishna (the dark one), Yaadava (cow herder), etc. Please forgive me!!"
Here we discussed how the Lord didn't mind at, all the childish pranks Arjuna might have pulled on Him, thinking of Him as a friend! There can be many types of 'bhakti' (devotion) toward Him. We will discuss this in detail in the next chapter, but just to get a glimpse of examples, maa Yashoda showered motherly affection on Him; the Gopas and Gopis of Vrindaavan considered Him as a friend, just like Arjuna; Meera Bai and others considered Him as the Lord and themselves as devotees; so on and so forth.
We posed a question here. This was happening on the battlefield. No one could see this form of the Lord except Arjuna, because he was given the special vision. But there was someone else, who got to see this form! Who was this blessed soul? Our students quickly landed on the answer. It was Sanjaya, dhritaraaShTra's charioteer who was blessed with 'divya dRuShTi', to see the war scene from the palace. He was able to see this and also narrate it to dhritaraaShTra as he already had the required divya dRuShTi. Good going, class!
Our next point was, it was great Arjuna saw this, but what do we take from this to our real lives? We need to be able to see divinity in EVERYTHING we see around us. That truly is seeing 'viShvaroopam' in real life. To be able to do that we should start with 'chitta shuddi' (clarity of thought). An important aspect for that is 'integrity'. We need to start watching ourselves and our actions at all times. What is 'integrity'? "Integrity is what we do, even when no one is watching us!" When we embrace this principle are aware that the only person watching us is the Lord. We make it a part of our personality and our thoughts/actions will become dhaarmic!
With this intense discussion, our class came to an end. We look forward to seeing you on Sunday.
Until then, happy contemplating and stay safe.
Regards,
Rashmi and Kishore.
Rashmi and Kishore.
