Inane Interpolations In Bhagvad-Gita, BS Murthy [free novel reading sites .txt] 📗

about the Hindu spiritual tragedy. Hence, it is obvious that V11 gave a mundane twist to the divine creation to facilitate the motivated question in V12 for the facilitation of the self-aggrandizing answer in V13. So, one can take his pick and move on as the Kshatriyas keep the Creator’s hands all for themselves! But the Brahmins couldn’t have left it at that as there was also the Bhagvad-Gita to contend with; so, they applied their interpolative hands to handle it. As would be apparent from the following dissection of the Gita ‘as it is’, similar sukta tactics were adopted to make it call their mundane bidding. But then, what was the provocation for the Brahmins to dabble with this philosophical discourse as well with their interpolative verses?

To start with, Krishna averred, as already noted,

Ch9, V6

Skies in rooted wind as spreads
Dwell in Me though disperse all.

yathākāśha-sthito nityaṁ vāyuḥ sarvatra-go mahān                       
tathā sarvāṇi bhūtāni mat-sthānītyupadhārayaand,

Ch6, V31  

Me who sees in all beings 
He’s the one that dwells in Me.

sarva-bhūta-sthitaṁ yo māṁ bhajatyekatvam āsthitaḥ
sarvathā vartamāno ’pi sa yogī mayi vartate

and these are counter to the Brahmanical innovation in the Purusha Sukta that they were specially produced from the creator’s face, which, if allowed to propagate, would  undermine the false narrative of their preeminent birth.

Secondly, it was Krishna’s stance that,

Ch 2, V42

Unwise use all enticing          
Flowery language to further
Rituals Vedic in their scores 
Not the knowledge of Vedas.  

yāmimāṁ puṣhpitāṁ vāchaṁ pravadanty-avipaśhchitaḥ
veda-vāda-ratāḥ pārtha nānyad astīti vādinaḥ,

This is but an unambiguous deprecation of the Vedic rituals that accord the Brahmins their temporal power in the religious place that afforded them an undisputed social preeminence, which if gained ground could have hurt them where it hurts the most. 

Hence, at some stage, they fiddled with the Gita the way they did with the Purusha Sukta, so to say, as shabbily at that, but surprisingly managed to get away with it for all time to come, so it seems, of course, aided in no small measure by the raise in the scriptural belief and the fall of the Sanskrit usage. But the hard rub, as is already seen, was the attribution of the false caste narrative to Krishna with its debilitating lower caste duties.

Ch4, V13                                                                                                                             

chātur-varṇyaṁ mayā sṛiṣhṭaṁ guṇa-karma-vibhāgaśhaḥ
tasya kartāram api māṁ viddhyakartāram avyayam

It is I who engineered the division of men into four varna (castes) based on their guna  (innate nature) and karma (earthly duties) but yet although I am the creator of this system, know me to be the non-doer and eternal,

So, this, as noted before, is akin to that advanced by the Brahmins in the Purusha Sukata:

V13 

brahmanosya mukhamasit

bahu rajanyah kritaha

uru tadasya yadvaishyaha

padhyagam shudro ajayata 

From His face (or the mouth) came the brahmanas. From His two arms came the rajanya (the kshatriyas). From His two thighs came the vaishyas. From His two feet came the shudras. 

Not only that, the Brahmins, through their interpolations in the Gita, sought to cement the caste walls by detailing the caste duties as well, cynically at that with -

Ch 3, V35

śhreyān swa-dharmo viguṇaḥ para-dharmāt sv-anuṣhṭhitāt
swa-dharme nidhanaṁ śhreyaḥ para-dharmo bhayāvahaḥ

It is far better to perform one’s natural prescribed duty, though tinged with faults, than to perform another’s prescribed duty, though perfectly. In fact, it is preferable to die in the discharge of one’s duty, than to follow the path of another, which is fraught with danger.

Ch18, V45                           

śhreyān swa-dharmo viguṇaḥ para-dharmāt sv-anuṣhṭhitāt
svabhāva-niyataṁ karma kurvan nāpnoti kilbiṣham

It is better to do one’s own dharma, even though imperfectly, than to do another’s dharma, even though perfectly. By doing one’s innate duties, a person does not incur sin.

Also should be seen in this interpolative course are the yoga classes, superstitious suppositions, tasteless assertions, and such that abound in the Gita ‘as it is’, absurdities all, seen in the context of it having been conceived to dispel Arjuna’s reservations in joining the battle of Kurukshetra.

Next is the aspect of structural economy and one finds the similitude though of the benign content in many a sloka in the same or in a different context throughout the text. Obviously, some of them are interpolations but which were the originals and which are the imitations could be hard to find out for they smugly fit into the overall structure. Whatever, save lengthening the discourse, these do not belittle the same and fortunately, not even tire the reader / listener, thanks to the exemplary charm of Sanskrit, which, for the British philologist, Sir William Jones, ‘is of wonderful structure, more perfect than Greek, more copious than Latin and more exquisitely refined than either.’

Boxed here in the ‘in vogue’ Gita’s thirteen chapters are 110 verses of deviant character or digressive nature that can be taken as interpolations with reasonable certainty and so one may read the epic afresh by passing over them for a refreshing experience.

 

Hindu Intellectual Apathy

 

Given the social mores of yore with the Vedic chores at their core that the puranic period had ushered in, the spiritual absorption of Gita’s inane interpolations in the Aryavarta of the bygone era is understandable, but what prevented its Hindu adherents in the medieval period, and prevents its Westernized votaries in the modern era, from seeing the wood for the trees?

Notwithstanding the advent of universal education that was once their exclusive domain, as the Brahmins continue to be Gita’s torchbearers, and since they are brought up on the Purusha Sukta’s false caste narrative, they tend to see nothing amiss in its caste aberrations. However, to be in sync with the times, they give politically correct hypocritical spin to its caste outrage of chātur-varṇyaṁ by feigning  as if the varna (caste) is not meant to be taken literally for what was implied is that it’s one’s guna (quality) and not one’s birth (caste) that is the determinative factor in the social pecking order.

Well, well, then what was the Brahmin resistance about to the admit Vishwamitra, the redoubtable Kshatriya sage of yore, into their haloed fold despite their reverence to the Gāyatri mantra that he composed! So be it but why there has been no upward mobility even in these days of the eminent Shudras on the caste ladder, even that of Ambedkar the intellectual colossus?

Besides, not to speak of ‘the now’, in none of the puranic tales, was there ever an instance of a rogue Brahmin having been relegated to the Shudra substrata! So, the ‘caste not by birth’ innovation in circulation is nothing but insincere hogwash to mislead. 

Since Sanskrit has long ceased to be in vogue, Hindus have come to rely on Gita’s translations to have a grasp of it, as is the case with their other epics, if at all that is, and the translators, for the most part, either provide a holistic meaning, wherever possible, to its offensive verses, and when not conducive for an inoffensive spin, then they tone down the inanities, and who cares any way.

Thus, by not calling a spade a spade, they not only betray their intellectual dishonesty but also preclude a public debate about the inane interpolations altogether. If anything, when it comes to pushing these toxic insertions under the caste carpet, the spiritual leaders excel as professional preachers, which is of no avail as the slighted souls desist from walking over the same.

In Gita’s myriad world, are the lazy ones content in just reciting

Ch 2, V47

karmaṇy-evādhikāras te mā phaleṣhu kadāchana
mā karma-phala-hetur bhūr mā te saṅgo ’stvakarmaṇi  

Hold as patent on thy work  
Reckon thou not on royalty 
With no way to ceasing work
Never mind outcome but go on.

Well, if only it were as simple.

Though he too heard that, Arjuna didn’t think so.

Ch3, V36                            

Thus spoke Arjuna:
Why should one with right intent 
Stray ever on the wayward ways!

arjuna uvācha
atha kena prayukto ’yaṁ pāpaṁ charati pūruṣhaḥ
anichchhann api vārṣhṇeya balād iva niyojitaḥ 

Ch3, V37

Thus spoke the Lord:                                                    
Well, it's passion, lust ’n wrath 
Drag that man on path painful.

śhrī bhagavān uvācha
kāma eṣha krodha eṣha rajo-guṇa-samudbhavaḥ
mahāśhano mahā-pāpmā viddhyenam iha vairiṇam 

Ch3, V38

Flame ’n mirror as shrouded

Without let by smoke ’n dust

As well embryo in the womb 
Wisdom is by wants clouded.

dhūmenāvriyate vahnir yathādarśho malena cha
yatholbenāvṛito garbhas tathā tenedam āvṛitam

Then again,

Ch6, V33

Thus spoke Arjuna:
Frail being man, fail I see
Yoga Thou espouse, lasting in practice.

arjuna uvācha

yo ’yaṁ yogas tvayā proktaḥ sāmyena madhusūdana
etasyāhaṁ na paśhyāmi chañchalatvāt sthitiṁ sthirām

Ch6, V34

Can one ever tame his mind                                            
Like the wind that yields to none?

chañchalaṁ hi manaḥ kṛiṣhṇa pramāthi balavad dṛiḍham
tasyāhaṁ nigrahaṁ manye vāyor iva su-duṣhkaram

Ch6, V35

Thus spoke the Lord:
Calm ’n custom bring in ropes
Tough ask though to subdue mind. 

śhrī bhagavān uvācha
asanśhayaṁ mahā-bāho mano durnigrahaṁ chalam
abhyāsena tu kaunteya vairāgyeṇa cha gṛihyate

The Gita provides those ropes that the inane interpolations sap.

But yet in blissful ignorance, besides the one-sloka wonders are the silo-readers that pick a verse here and pluck another there from the interwoven text, of course from its translations, thereby gaining nothing in the process, save earning the membership of the Gita groups that now abound in the social media.

Even the earnest ones, who religiously go through the tome, come to naught for failing to apply their ‘faith-filled’ mind to its malcontent in it that begs for attention. 

Besides these are the gullible seekers in their scores that take their self-styled guru’s interpretative word of Krishna’s word as the last word, and there is no dearth either of the supply-chain translators that churn out ‘Arjuna asked this and Krishna said that’ sort of stuff by recycling the imitative material in the book world. One may say that these are nearer to those Arjuna had in mind when he asked Krishna:

Ch6, v37

What if one 
Throws up all 
Lacks who zeal
Hath though faith?

ayatiḥ śhraddhayopeto yogāch chalita-mānasaḥ
aprāpya yoga-sansiddhiṁ kāṅ gatiṁ kṛiṣhṇa gachchhati

However, while the enterprising compartmentalize its interwoven philosophy of life into Gita for This and Gita for That kind of commercials for the marketplace, it is the gift of the gabs with their vacuous lectures that take the cake as gita-chāryās. Whatever it is, the Bard’s words - reputation is an idle and most false imposition, oft got without merit and lost without deserving – ring true on Gita’s universal stage, and if anything, the ostentation of many of these belies their tenuous grasp of its profound philosophy. 

Needless to say, all these, who swear by the Gita, are no better off than those that unerringly keep away from it by mistakenly treating the inane interpolations as its innate philosophy. In what is an unparalleled irony, Vyāsā’s progeny mindlessly shun the mischievously tampered masterpiece of his! So, as the grandstanding by the thoughtless and the indignation of the mistaken constrain the Hindu polity on either bank of its interpolated waters, it is imperative for the left-castes to remove the rubbish from their ancestral stream that muddles the understanding of the right-backers no less.

But still the question remains; can any arrogate to himself the intellectuality to point fingers at the Gita ‘as it is’ that too after Adi Shankara the philosopher vouched for it in his bhashya and Aurobindo, Gandhi, Radhakrishnan et al endorsed it in their writings? Without any disregard for their immense intellect, the short answer is that  ‘one puts up with what one grows up with’ and, so to say, they all dwelled on the ‘right’ bank in the times when caste was taken as a given. Why, don’t’ we have the anecdote of Adi Shankara in which he asked an untouchable to move farther away from him, only to realize later it was none other than Lord Shiva in disguise as a dalit; that should be that.

Now it’s over to the chapter-wise interpolative detail.

 

Chapter - 3: Karma Yoga

 

The pundits and the plebeians alike aver that the philosophy of the Gita is the practice of disinterested action, that is apart from an unflinching devotion to the Supreme, and in that context, it may be noted that while postulating the same, Krishna, as was seen before, had been critical of the