This Chapter called the Yoga of the Supreme Spirit, the Way to the Supreme Self, Devotion to the Supreme Spirit, deals with the nature of the Self. Sri Krishna has spoken about Prakriti in previous chapters. Now he talks about the nature of the Supreme Self. In this Chapter Sri Krishna gives Arjuna the very essence of the Bhagavad Gita. This is a chapter on Krishna’s most exalted nature, the highest goal of life. This is also our exalted nature and our own supreme goal of life – enlightenment and liberation from ignorance of our true divine Self.
The chapter begins with the image of an upside down tree, a tree with the roots upwards in Brahman (Supreme Self) which branches out into a manifold creation in the world below. This image of the Tree of Life is one of the most magnificent in the Gita. Most of this tree is not physical. The whole phenomenal universe – matter, energy, and mind – is only its canopy of leaves and that is all we can see. This ashvattha (fig) tree, like a vast spreading banyan tree that goes into the earth and rises again in a never ending cycle of growth. This upside down tree has roots in the air and its branches spreading out into the earth where they may take never ending secondary roots. The analogy helps us visualize that the farthest from the taproot is the world of multiplicity and change: countless branches, little leaves and ancillary roots. But the taproot of this tree leads up to Krishna– the transcendent Brahman, the eternal, changeless Self.
The application of this tremendous image is practical. As long as we live on the surface of life, we believe we are separate, individual leaves. When we yield to the clamor of the senses we are pushing consciousness out into sensory offshoots, making them longer and longer. Finally they reach the ground and burrow in, rooting us in the world of change.
When consciousness has been extruded into the senses, not much is available where it is needed – for concentration, security, sensitiveness, self-reliance, and imagination. We should be able to withdraw consciousness from the senses at will, the Gita says, as easily as a tortoise withdraws its limbs into its shell. This means a tremendous consolidation of energy. Prana ebbs out through the senses; that is why people who overindulge their senses often feel tired and inadequate. Their discernment and practice as well as the will is weak, and judgment gets clouded just when it is needed most. When we can regulate our senses, we can enjoy everything beneficial and still protect your mind and body against the ravages of undue indulgence.
The intimate relationship between senses and sense objects is a recurring theme in the Gita. Just as aerial roots reach out for the ground to dig themselves in, the senses reach out to root themselves in objects of sensory experience. There is nothing wrong with this. It is the nature of senses to grasp. It is the use to which we put them that can be wrong. Some part of the mind is constantly watching for pleasant experiences on the surface level of life. In meditation, we learn to withdraw and consolidate prana from the senses back to its source. The mind develops a single minded focus. Whenever we feel ruled by private passions, we need to remind ourselves of this magnificent simile, which asks us to examine the whole Tree of Life and not be content with being one passing leaf.
The Gita describes Krishna’s home as a realm of light beyond the light of the sun.
XV.6 The sun does not illumine, Nor the moon, nor fire, that place To which, having gone, no one returns; That is My supreme abode.
The true form of this tree – its essence, beginning, and end – is not perceived on this earth. Cut down the branches and ancillary roots of this tree with the sharp axe of detachment; then find the path which ascends up the taproot to the First Cause, from which the universe comes into being.
Cutting down the ancillary roots of the ashvattha tree is a symbol of discriminating between the unreal and the real and reaching the state of the nirvana of Brahman.
“In every creature,” Sri Krishna says, “a little part of me is present.” Not only human beings but even the lowest creature has a spark of divinity within, infinitesimal but inalienable.
In the long drawn-out drama of life that is a spiritual journey towards liberation, there are three actors. One is the Self, the changeless Atman (Purusha), pure Being. This shining Self is within all, yet it cannot shine forth because of the mask of negative qualities and self-will that we call personality. This is the second actor, called jiva in Sanskrit – the separate, individual ego with which we identify ourselves. And third is Maya, the compulsive sense of separateness: as Evelyn Underhill puts it, the “web of illusion, here thick, here thin, [which] hems in, confuses, and allures” us in our evolution toward Self-realization. This allure is caused by the senses and the mind.
The Self, can be called real. Yet to the extent that we identify ourselves with the jiva, our ever-changing personality, we live as well in the “unreal” world of change, bound to it by self-will and the fierce, compulsive play of the senses.
We discussed the role the gunas in Chapter XIV. The continuous improvement we are able to make in the quality of our thinking is what decides our lives.
This effort of striking through this bedrock of resistance and changing our level of consciousness has to be done under the skilled, personal guidance of a true spiritual teacher. We can no longer afford to be a slave of our self-will but need to train and harness our senses and passions on a deeper level of awareness. To solve even a physical problem you have to get inside the mind, which is the purpose of meditation. Until the mind is stilled it is not possible for any human being, however gifted, to see the unity underlying life. The mind is not equipped to see unity. It is meant to register change on the surface of life. When thoughts are crowded close together, it is very difficult to get free from the tyranny of thinking. We are helpless, particularly in the peculiar instance of circular thinking, in which the same old thought goes round and round: We have to be prepared to change and develop new ways of living – more aware of the unity of life, less and less aware of the fragmented personality we once were. This tremendous adjustment is accomplished through wisdom and harnessing the energy of prana. When the erratic activity of the senses and the mind subsides, there is a great consolidation of vital energy that flows into our life like a steady stream. Yogis who have gained tranquillity through the practice of spiritual disciplines behold the Supreme Self in their own consciousness.
As Sri Krishna says in verse 5 –
“Not deluded by pride, free from selfish attachment and selfish desire, beyond the duality of pleasure and pain, ever aware of the Self, the wise go forward to that eternal goal.”
The signs that we have changed our level of consciousness are utterly practical: better health, more energy, better control over our cravings and more of the joy that comes from drawing nearer to the unity of life.
“Our nature is infinite. Therefore, the Upanishads say, nothing less than infinitude can ever satisfy us. If we forget that our real home is the world of the spirit, imperishable and changeless, we will go on trying to mine, refine, extract, harvest, and manufacture an infinite number and variety of things out of an acutely limited world.”
Excerpts From: Eknath Easwaran, The Bhagavad Gita for Daily Living. Apple Books.
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