We had our final Gita Study group meeting of this semester last Friday at the Kennedy School.
Verses 8, 9, and 10 of Chapter 7 so beautifully and forcefully express the idea of divine presence:
Verse 8: “I am the sapidity in water….I , the radiance in the moon and the sun; I am the Om in all the Vedas, sound in Akasha, and manhood in man.”
Verse 9:“I am the sweet fragrance in earth, and the brilliance in fire am I; the life in all beings, and the austerity am I in ascetics.”
Verse 10: “…I am the intellect of the intelligent, and the heroism of the heroic.”
For anyone doubting spiritual existence, Gita’s message is simple — just look around; it’s hard to miss!
Yet, we live our lives largely ignorant and forgetful of this divine presence. Our daily struggles, personal worries, and petty interests keep us occupied. We are busy — so busy that we hardly hear the birds chirping outside our windows early in the morning; so occupied that we forget how beautiful the Charles River can be during a windy day. Our calendars are full — we need to hurry to our next meeting, scuttle to our next exam. And in that hustle, we happily forgo opportunities to serve others and free ourselves of our narrow existence.
Our lives are centered on “I”, but, as Swami Tyagananda Ji reminds us, the locus of this “I” keeps shifting. It is not “I” but “thee” that is important. Our finite self constrains us from appreciating the infinite divine. We are prisoners of our own making. Even when we remember the divine, we have ulterior motives – we seek relief when distressed, hope for knowledge, or want enjoyment (verse 16). Rarely do we remember the divine simply because there is nothing else worth remembering. “The wise” (gyani) (verse 16, 17), who understands this, transcends knowledge into experience.
The vastness of this creation – from the atoms to the galaxies – should have been a check to our ego. Yet, we thrive in “I”, confident in our own abilities. We climbed Everest, reached the moon, created the bomb – we are supreme. This fuel of ignorance keeps burning the fire of maya, leaving us with enough “I” to cling onto forever. It is humility that we lack — a willingness to let go of the “I” and appreciate “thee”.
It will be fitting to end with words of that humble poet, Tagore, who listened carefully to the divine music with all his heart:
“I know not how thou singest, my master! I ever listen in silent amazement.
The light of thy music illumines the world. The life breath of thy music runs from sky to sky. The holy stream of thy music breaks through all stony obstacles and rushes on.
My heart longs to join in thy song, but vainly struggles for a voice. I would speak, but speech breaks not into song, and I cry out baffled. Ah, thou hast made my heart captive in the endless meshes of thy music, my master!”
-Gitanjali
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