Essays on the Gita, First Series (Arya Publishing House, 1922)
The text is shown on its own: no facing layer is held for this issue.
Arjuna is the Ki^atriya, the rajasic man who f oyerns_his rajasic action by a high sattwic ideal, le advances to this gigantic struggle, to this Kurukshetra with the full acceptance of the joy of battle, as to '*a holiday of fight'", but with a proud confidence in the righteousness of his cause ; he advances in his rapid chariot tearing the hearts of his enemies with the victorious clamour of his war- conch ; for he wishes to look upon all these Kings of men who have come here to champion against him the cause of unrighteousness and establish as a rule of life the disregard of law, justice and truth which they would replace by the rule of a selfish and arrogant egoism. When this confidence is shattered within him, when he is smitten down from his customary attitude and mental basis of life, it bj tfi g u prush of the tamasic quality into the lajasi c man, inducing a recoil of astonishpient, gri ef, horror, dismay, dejection, bewilderme nt of the mind aind the Jyar of reason against itself, a collapse towards the principle of ignorance and inertia. As a result he turns towards renunciation. Better the life of the mendicant living upon alms than this dharma of the Kshatriya, this battle and action culminating in undiscriminating massacre, this principle of mastery and glory and power which can only be won by destruction and bloodshed, this conquest of bjood -stained ^enjoyments, this vindica- tion of justice and right by a means which contradicts all righteousness and this affirmation of the social law by a war which destroys in its process and result all that constitutes society.
Sanny^a is the renunciation of life and action and of the threefold modes of Nature, but it has to be approached through one or other of the three qualities. The impulse may be tamasic, a feeling of impotence, fear, aversion, disgust, horror of the world and life ; or it may be the rajasic quality tending towards tamas, an impulse of weariness of the struggle, grief, disappointment, refusal to accept any longer this vain turmoil of activity with its pains and its eternal discontent. Or the impulse may be that of rajas tending towards sattwa, the impulse to arrive at something superior to anything life can give, to conquer a*mgher state, to trample down life itself under the feet of an inner strength which seeks to break all bonds and transcend all limits. Or it may be sattwic, an intellectual perception of the vanity of life and the absence of any real goal or justification for this ever-cycling world-existence or else a spiritual perception of the Timeless, the Infinite, the Silent, the nameless and 8o MAN AND THE BATTLE PF LIFE
No commentary for this page under the selected tracks.
There is commentary on page 1.