The Bhagavad-Gita — The God Song. Chapter XVI: Forces divine and forces undivine

He who feels that sense-pleasure and the supreme joy are one and the same is utterly mistaken. Self-indulgence and the Goal of life never can and never will meet.

To see God one has to be practical, absolutely practical, both in the world of realisation and in the world of manifestation. Nobody can be more practical than the one who is endowed with the spiritual qualities. His life is guided, protected and illumined by the forces divine.

Fear fears to stay with him who has perfect faith in God. His heart is purity. His mind is freedom. Duplicity? He knows not what it is. His love he uses to love mankind. He expects love in return only if so is the Will of God. His service he offers to the Supreme in humanity having utterly destroyed the root of expectation, nay, temptation-tree with the sharp axe of his wisdom-light.

Devotion’s delight and meditation’s silence constantly breathe in him.

Violence is too weak to enter into his fort of thought, word and deed.

Purest sincerity he has. Mightiest self-sacrifice he is.

He wears no man-made crown, but God-made crown which God Himself cherishes. The name of this divine crown is humility.

He who is devoured by the undivine forces is not only unspiritual but impractical in the purest sense of the term. Never can he stay alone even if he wants to. Vanity, anger, ostentation and ego arouse him from his slumber and then they compel him to dance with them. Secretly but speedily ignorance comes in and joins them in their dance and then cheerfully and triumphantly it teaches them the dance of destruction.

His ego he uses to buy the world. His anger he uses to weaken and punish the world. His vanity and ostentation he uses to win with the world. Consciously he offers himself to the glorification of sense-pleasure. Alas, he himself fails to count his imaginary projects, for they are countless, innumerable. What he has absolutely as his own is his self-praise. What he infallibly is is verily the same.

He says to charity and philanthropy: “Look, I am sending you two to the world. Remember, I am not giving you to the world. Bring back from the world for me name and fame. Come back, soon!”

Charity and philanthropy humbly listen to his command. They go running toward the world. They touch the world. They feed the world. They forget not to bring back name and fame from the world for their master. The master receives his coveted prize: name and fame. Alas, to his utter astonishment, futility follows his name and fame.

His life is the hyphen between sin and hell. What is sin? Sin is the taste of imperfect ignorance. What is hell? Hell is the ruthless torture of unsatisfied desires and the fond embrace of ignorance fulfilled.

At first the seeker has to take ignorance and knowledge separately. Later on he realises that in both ignorance and knowledge THAT exists. Let us kindle our aspiration-flame with the soulful lore of the Isha Upanishad. “Avidya a Mrityum Tirtha…” (By the ignorance he crosses beyond death, by the Knowledge, Immortality he enjoys).

The chapter comes to its close with the word Shastra (scripture). Shastras are not to be ridiculed. Shastras are the outer attainments of the inner experiences and realisations of the Seers of the Truth. Not for those, the Goal Supreme, who look down upon the spiritual experiences and realisations of the Seers of the hoary past. They are committing a Himalayan blunder if they feel, on the strength of their vital impulses, that they can practise meditation and learn the secrets of inner discipline unaided. Personal guidance is imperative.

Easy to say: “I follow my own path.” Easier is to deceive oneself. Easiest is to starve one’s inner divinity that wants to reveal and manifest itself.

The Teacher enjoins on the student: “O my Arjuna, follow the Shastra.”