Ravi S. Iyer: Spiritual

I am almost close to finishing re-reading the Bhagavad Gita by Dr. Shakuntala Rao Sastri. An interesting aspect of this book is that the author is a lady who was proficient in Sanskrit and English and had academic degrees from India and UK to back that, and who authored the book way back in the 1950s. This book copy was printed in 1982. I think I must have bought the book from an old books seller. I bought it in 2000 when I was based in Dombivli/Mumbai. It is fascinating to know of this lady Sanskrit scholar who seems to have written at least two books related to Sanskrit scripture. She passed away in 1961 a year before I was born. I think this is the only lady (Indian or foreign) Sanskrit scholar of the 1950s and earlier part of 1900s authored book I have read. It would have been quite challenging for an Indian lady to have acquired strong academic qualifications from India and UK in the 1940s and 1950s (which is when I presume she did the main part of her English and Sanskrit academi

Given below are the relevant three successive verses in the Bhagavad Gita (English translation of verses below are slightly edited by me): Chapter 13 verse 32,  https://shlokam.org/bhagavad-gita/13-32 : अनादित्वान्निर्गुणत्वात्परमात्मायमव्ययः । शरीरस्थोऽपि कौन्तेय न करोति न लिप्यते ॥ १३-३२॥ anāditvānnirguṇatvātparamātmāyamavyayaḥ śarīrastho’pi kaunteya na karoti na lipyate Being without beginning, and being devoid of qualities, the Supreme Self, the Imperishable, though dwelling in the body, O Kaunteya, neither acts, nor is tainted [Ravi: entangled/affected] . [Ravi: https://sanskritdictionary.org/lipyate translates lipyate as affected / entangled / attached / involved, and in the above verse context, translates it as entangled.] Chapter 13 verse 33,  https://shlokam.org/bhagavad-gita/13-33 : यथा सर्वगतं सौक्ष्म्यादाकाशं नोपलिप्यते । सर्वत्रावस्थितो देहे तथात्मा नोपलिप्यते ॥ १३-३३॥ yathā sarvagataṃ saukṣmyādākāśaṃ nopalipyate sarvatrāvasthito dehe tathātmā nopalipyate As the all-per

Given below are the relevant two verses in the Bhagavad Gita (English translation of verses below are slightly edited by me): Chapter 10 verse 20,  https://shlokam.org/bhagavad-gita/10-20 : अहमात्मा गुडाकेश सर्वभूताशयस्थितः । अहमादिश्च मध्यं च भूतानामन्त एव च ॥ १०-२०॥ ahamātmā guḍākeśa sarvabhūtāśayasthitaḥ ahamādiśca madhyaṃ ca bhūtānāmanta eva ca I am the Self, O Gudakesha [Ravi: Arjuna] , seated in the hearts of all beings; I am the Beginning, the Middle and also the End of all beings. Chapter 10 verse 22,  https://shlokam.org/bhagavad-gita/10-22 : वेदानां सामवेदोऽस्मि देवानामस्मि वासवः । इन्द्रियाणां मनश्चास्मि भूतानामस्मि चेतना ॥ १०-२२॥ vedānāṃ sāmavedo’smi devānāmasmi vāsavaḥ indriyāṇāṃ manaścāsmi bhūtānāmasmi cetanā Among the VEDAS, I am the SAMA-VEDA; I am VASAVA among the gods; among the senses I am the mind; and I am the intelligence [Ravi: 'chetana' - consciousness/awareness] among living beings. [Ravi: The word 'chetana' is associated with 'chaitanya&

Given below is the relevant first verse, Chapter 7 verse 16:  https://shlokam.org/bhagavad-gita/7-16 , followed by three successive verses in the Bhagavad Gita (English translation of one verse below is slightly edited by me): चतुर्विधा भजन्ते मां जनाः सुकृतिनोऽर्जुन । आर्तो जिज्ञासुरर्थार्थी ज्ञानी च भरतर्षभ ॥ ७-१६॥ caturvidhā bhajante māṃ janāḥ sukṛtino’rjuna ārto jijñāsurarthārthī jñānī ca bharatarṣabha Four kinds of virtuous men worship Me, O Arjuna, the dissatisfied [Ravi: distressed] , the seeker of (systematised) knowledge, the seeker of wealth, and the wise, O best among the Bharatas. [Ravi: Aarthi (distressed), Arthaarthi (desiring wealth), Jijnaasu (seeker of spiritual knowledge) and Jnaani (self-realized, spiritually knowledgeable person) are the main types of devotees who worship Krishna (God).] तेषां ज्ञानी नित्ययुक्त एकभक्तिर्विशिष्यते । प्रियो हि ज्ञानिनोऽत्यर्थमहं स च मम प्रियः ॥ ७-१७॥ teṣāṃ jñānī nityayukta ekabhaktirviśiṣyate priyo hi jñānino’tyarthamahaṃ sa ca mama

First let us see what is meaning of the word stithaprajna. It is composed of two main words - stitha and prajna. As per my understanding, stitha means steady or fixed. For prajna, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prajna_(Hinduism) tells us: "Prajña or Pragya[a] (Sanskrit: प्रज्ञ) as प्रज्ञा, प्राज्ञ and प्राज्ञा is used to refer to the highest and purest form of wisdom, intelligence and understanding. Pragya is the state of wisdom which is higher than the knowledge obtained by reasoning and inference." I love the second sentence above as I think it gives a great explanation of prajna as wisdom higher than knowledge obtained by reasoning and inference. So I use the term "higher wisdom" for prajna rather than just wisdom. Given below is the relevant first verse, Chapter 2 verse 54 https://shlokam.org/bhagavad-gita/2-54 , which is the question posed by Arjuna and the second verse which is the first part of the answer by Krishna, and is the immediately next verse in the

Last updated on 4th Aug. 2022 Three successive shlokas (verses) from Chapter 2 of Bhagavad Gita are about the 'dehi' (indwelling Atma in the body) moving from one body to another on death (reincarnation) and about the 'dehi' being indestructible, eternal and all-pervading. Given below are extracts from https://shlokam.org/bhagavad-gita/2-22 and following pages giving these three shlokas: Chapter 2, Verse 22 वासांसि जीर्णानि यथा विहाय नवानि गृह्णाति नरोऽपराणि । तथा शरीराणि विहाय जीर्णा- न्यन्यानि संयाति नवानि देही ॥ २-२२॥ vāsāṃsi jīrṇāni yathā vihāya navāni gṛhṇāti naro’parāṇi tathā śarīrāṇi vihāya jīrṇā- nyanyāni saṃyāti navāni dehī Just as a man casts off his worn out clothes and puts on new ones, so also the embodied-Self casts off its worn out bodies and enters others which are new. Chapter 2, Verse 23 नैनं छिन्दन्ति शस्त्राणि नैनं दहति पावकः । न चैनं क्लेदयन्त्यापो न शोषयति मारुतः ॥ २-२३॥ nainaṃ chindanti śastrāṇi nainaṃ dahati pāvakaḥ na cainaṃ kledayantyāpo na śo

When author of post or comment is not mentioned, it should be assumed that it is me (Ravi S. Iyer). To save time, I am usually not providing my FB post links but only contents. I am also not hyperlinking links. So readers may have to copy-paste links from this post onto a browser link box and then browse to that link. ==========================================   On FB post https://www.facebook.com/ravi.s.iyer.7/posts/3388036218079598 , I commented in response to a comment: Given a choice, one would opt for a better world. ... But then human history is quite terrible, isn't it? Was the world ever a nice place for most of the people? Note that it was nice for few people, and perhaps continues to be nice for few people. ------------------- Is it fair to refer to Dalits as "historically suppressed communities in India"? Let me share some relevant wikipedia extracts from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dalit : Dalit (from Sanskrit: दलित, romanized: dalita meaning "broken/sc