Essays on the Gita, First Series (Arya Publishing House, 1922)
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The first step is Karmayoga, the selfless sacrifice of works, and here the Gita’s insistence is on action. The second is Jnanayoga, the self- realisation and knowledge of the true nature of rhe self and the world, and here the insistence is on knowledge ; but the sacrifice of works continues and the path of Works becomes one with but does not disappear into the path of Knowledge. The last step is Bhaktiyoga, adoration and seeking of the supreme Self as the Divine Being, and here the insistence is on devotion ; but the knowledge is not subordinated, only raised, vitalised and fulfilled, and still the sacrifice of works continues ; the double path becomes the triune way of knowledge, works and devotion. And the fruit of the sacrifice, the one fruit still placed before the seeker, is attained, union with the divine Being and oneness with the supreme divine nature.
Before we can proceed, following in the large steps of the Teacher of the Gita, to watch his tracing of the triune path of man, — the path which is that of his will, heart, thought raising themselves to the Highest and into the being of that which is the supreme object of all acdon^love and knowledge, we must consider once more the situation from which tl^Gita arises, but now in ks largest. bearir^s as a type of human life and even of all world-existence. For although Arjuna is himself concerned only with his own situation, his innex struggle an^ the law of actip^n he must follow, yet, as we have seen, the particular question he raises, in the manner in whiA h e raises irtoes r^lly^^ing up the whole questior^ ^^ ^m anlife andf action, what the world is and why ttis and how possibly, it being what it is, life here in the world can be reconciled with life in the Spirit. :\nd all this deep and difficult matter the Teacher insists on resolving as the very foundation of his command to an action which must proceed from a new poise of being and by the light of a liberating knowledge. But what, then, is it that makes the difficulty for the man who has to take the world as it is and act in it and yet would live, within, the spiritual life? What is this aspect of existence which appals his awakened mind and brings about what the title of the first chapter of the Gita calls significantly the Yoga of the direction of Arjuna, the dejection and discouragement felt by the human being when he is fSrced to face fhe spectacle of the universe as it really is with the veil of the ethical illusion, the illusion of self-righteousness torn from his eyes, before a higher reconciliation with himself is effected? It is that aspect which is figured outwardly in the carnage and massacre of Kurukshetra and spiritually by the vision of the Lord of all things as Time arising to devour and destroy the creatures whom it has made. ) This is the vision of the Lord of all existence ^as the ^iversal Creator but also the universal Destroyer, of whom the ancient Scripture can say in a ruthless image, “The ^es_and the heroes are his food_and death ia, the, spjce of his banquet.'* It is one and fhe same truth seen first indirectly and obscurely in the facts of life and then directly and clearly in the soul's vision of that which manifests itself in life. The outward aspect is that of world-existence and human existence proceeding by struggle and slaugh- ter ; the inward aspect is that of the univer^I Tiefiig Eulfilling himseff in a vast creation and a vast instruction. ,Life a ba ttle and ji field of de ath, this fs Km-ukshetra ; God the Terrible, this is the vision that Arjuna sees on that field of massacre^
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