Gita Jayanti Address (8 min video)
by His Holiness Bhakti Charu Swami.
Gita Jayanti actually means the birth of Bhagavad Gita. The Bhagavad Gita appeared was conceived when Krishna spoke it to Arjuna. Bhagavad Gita is actually the essence of the entire Vedic wisdom.
The Vedic wisdom flows through two streams predominantly. One through the stream of Upanisad and second through the Purana. Bhagavad Gita is the essence of all the Upanisads
All the Upanisads have been compared to a cow and Krishna is the cowheard boy who milked that cow. The cow gives milk for the sake of the calf but actually here the human beings drink that milk. The objective is to provide food for human beings that’s the purpose of the milk. So, similarly Upanisads that have been compared to a cow and Krishna milked that cow making Arjuna the preliminary objective but actually that is for the benefit of everybody.
vatsapartha (Gita-mahatmya 6)
In this arrangement Krishna made Arjuna the calf and the milk is gitopanisad and who drinks that milk? sudhirbhokta, those who are endowed with very advanced intelligence drink this milk like. arthovatsaùsu-dhirbhokta, dugdhamgitamrtaàmahat
That milk is the nectar of Bhagavad Gita. Yes, it is nectar. But why is it the nectar? It helps us achieve immortality. The Sanskrit word for nectar is amrta. The word amrta means a- mrta. Mrta means death and ‘a’ means negation of death. So, negation of death means no more death, death is destroyed. How do we achieve immortality? We can achieve immortality through proper knowledge. It is not like we drink some liquid and achieve immortality. Yes, there is also a liquid like that which one can drink to become immortal. This liquid the demigods actually take advantage of. They drink that nectar but that nectar gives immortality or so-called immortality to the body. Unfortunately, the body is not going to last forever although it lives for a long duration. But we should aim to grab the permanent nectar that Bhagavad Gita is giving. This nectar is coming in the form of knowledge. What is this knowledge about? This knowledge is about our spiritual identity. It makes us realise that we are not this body but we are spirit souls and this body is perishable. When the soul leaves the body, the body dies. So, death is to the body but this body is not our real identity. Real identity is the spirit soul and the soul never dies. So, we are spiritual beings and we never die. That is our constitutional position. We are all immortal to begin with but because of our misidentification with this body, we think that we die when the body dies.
So,the nectar that the Bhagavad Gita is giving is in the form of knowledge. This knowledge gives us immortality, real immortality and this knowledge is not only extending the duration of this body but this knowledge is situating us in our spiritual identity and enabling us to go back to the spiritual world.
yadgatvananirvartante (Bhagavad gita 15.6).
Going there we never come back to this world. This is a world of death, Sanskrit word for this world ismrtyu-lokaor the world of death. Everyone here is subject to death. Whereas that world is the world of immortality or there is no death in that world in the spiritual world. Nobody dies there because the spirit soul never dies. So that is why this knowledge of Bhagavad Gita is so important. Everyone wants to become immortal and we have this nectar that gives us immortality, gives everyone immortality. It’s just a matter of accepting it, understanding it and leading one’s life according to that understanding.
So, in this way Krishna created such a wonderful opportunity for this world by giving this nectar of Bhagavad Gita which is the essence of all the Vedic wisdom. Vedic wisdom does not originate this world. Vedic wisdom came from the spiritual world. The Vedas, this knowledge and the essence of this knowledge came from the spiritual world. The purpose of this knowledge is to take us out of this material nature back to the spiritual world, back to godhead. And that is why it is important that we celebrate it the proper way. The proper way to celebrate this knowledge is not by having some festival but by distributing this knowledge to others. Of course before we distribute it we have to accept it ourselves. In order to celebrate this wisdom, this opportunity, this occasion we give it out to everybody out there, “Come take it.” So, let us celebrate the birthday of Bhagavad Gita by giving it to everybody and showing them the way to immortality.
Thank you very much.
All glories to Srila Prabhupada
GauraPremanande Hari HariBol!
Watch it here: https://goo.gl/nDnroN