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Bhagavad Gita Chapter 7

There Is No Sin Nor Virtue

Authored by

THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM

yeṣāṃ tvantagataṃ pāpaṃ janānāṃ puṇyakarmaṇām te dvandvamohanirmuktā bhajante māṃ dṛḍhavratāḥ

Persons who have acted virtuously, whose sinful actions are completely eradicated and who are freed from the duality of reality and unreality, engage themselves in My worship with firm resolve.

Kṛṣṇa says to go beyond duality, the duality of sin and virtue. This is only possible when we become aware

jarāmaraṇa mokṣāya māmāśritya yatanti ye te brahma tadviduḥ kṛtsnam adhyātmaṃ karma cākhilam

Persons who are striving for liberation from the cycle of birth, old age and death, take refuge in Me. They are actually Brahman because they comprehend everything about activities that transcend these.

To know that one needs to be saved from this cycle of birth and death needs great wisdom.

sādhibhūtādhidaivaṃ māṃ sādhiyajñaṃ ca ye viduḥ prayāṇakāle 'pi ca māṃ te vidur yuktacetasaḥ

Those who know Me as the Supreme Lord, as the governing principle of the material manifestation, who know Me as the one underlying all the demigods and as the one sustaining all sacrifices, can with steadfast mind, understand and know Me, even at the time of death.

We cannot change our nature at the last minute. If we want to die with the thought of the Divine uppermost in our mind, we must cultivate the habit of remembering Him now.

Kṛṣṇa talks here about pāpa and puṇya, sinful and meritorious acts. Kṛṣṇa addresses mortal beings here, in the form of Arjuna. So He talks about doing virtuous acts and avoiding sinful acts. What follows is more important. He says to go beyond duality, the duality of sin and virtue. This is only possible when we become aware. It is only when we become aware that we can reach Him. The greatest philosopher that Hinduism has known, Ādī Śankarācārya, prays to the greatest Master that the Universe has known, Kṛṣṇa, 'Save me from this endless cycle of saṁsāra, the cycle of birth and death.' To know that one needs to be saved from this cycle needs great wisdom. To seek the feet of the Master who can lead you to that liberation needs great wisdom and awareness.

You can be born again and again and still think that you are being born for the first time, and that this is the only life that you have. This knowledge requires no wisdom.

With this knowledge, you focus on this life and want to extract the maximum juice out of it. You run after everything possible, as if there is no tomorrow. Please understand, this is not your only life. This body is not who you are.

All this is temporary. What you chase is a dream. One day you will wake up and discover that this life is nothing but a dream. You are more than this body and mind; you are above this body-mind.

What you are endures after death. When you understand this Cosmic Truth, you are liberated. Buddha calls this cycle of birth and death a bondage. It is sorrow because it is not real. It is not the real you that dies and is reborn. The real you changes bodies as you change clothes.

It is never too late to reach me kṛṣṇa ends this chapter with the prescription for how to know and understand him and reach him. even at the time of death, he says, even if all your life you lived a dissolute life, if at the point of departure you realize your folly, the futility of the psychodrama that you have enacted, that is enough to redeem you. the mere recognition of that can save you.

His compassion is unlimited. He promises: Knowing me at the time of death, even at the time of death, will lead you to Me. We cannot change our nature at the last minute.

If we want to die with the thought of the Divine uppermost in our mind, we must cultivate the habit of remembering Him now. We should start knowing and understanding Him today. Then and only then will we know and understand Him at the time of death.

Some may ask, 'What is the need to understand and know Kṛṣṇa, whether at the point of death or before?

If I do the right things in the right manner, why should it make any difference whether or not I understand and know Kṛṣṇa?'

Please understand that Kṛṣṇa is not talking about the physical Kṛṣṇa, or even about the Cosmic Consciousness that He is. He speaks about our understanding, about knowing ourselves, who we are.

Kṛṣṇa in His deep compassion says, 'Even if that happens at the point of death, I shall redeem you.' He does not want us to miss that chance, even if we have not thought about Him all our lives. He does not rule out the possibility, even if we have not been seeking all our lives. He wants us to discover the master within. Even if we do that at the point of our last breath, it is okay with Him. How can we even intellectually understand that Kṛṣṇa is supreme? Forget the demigods, how can we even accept that He is greater than us? We are so full of our identity and root patterns, that even if a thousand Kṛṣṇas were to descend in front of us, we would ask them for their identification cards! We will recognize Kṛṣṇa only if He comes in front of us in the mold and image of Him that we have stored in our Minds!

The ultimate Master resides within us, not anywhere else. The external Master, be He Kṛṣṇa or THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM, is a guide to make us understand, know and accept the Master within us. Yes, it may be possible in rare cases for that wisdom to dawn on us at the point of death, but it is not common. Someone who constantly seeks that truth will continuously search for that Master within, and has a better chance of making that connection earlier rather than later in life

Kṛṣṇa must come to us in our image of Him. Then we will accept Him as the Supreme and hang His picture on the wall. Everyday, Kṛṣṇa comes to us in many forms. He comes to us in the form of every person we meet. We decide whom we will accept and whom we will reject.

We cannot accept Kṛṣṇa in parts and reject Him in parts. Either we accept Him totally or reject Him. We have to surrender to Him. We have to surrender our identity, our root patterns to Him. We have to surrender to Him that foolish image that we have in our minds of Him.

Meditation is a technique for surrendering one's identity. Completion is the process of surrendering one's root patterns. Throughout the Gītā, Kṛṣṇa suggests to Arjuna techniques, sūtras that leads to liberation.

Combined with the cognition at the intellectual level, śāstra, with the higher devotional acceptance of His glories through verses, stotra, the Gītā leads you through the path of surrender into liberation.

Dropping one's identity requires a deep cognition, acceptance, intranalization, and completion which brings the merger of the Self, World and God. Simply put, we accept our Divinity and become one with the Divine.

We become complete, whole! This is what Enlightenment is about.

The simple truth is that the present moment of completion is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. When we reach this state of being in the present moment, we reach Him and we are complete. So it is not the mere intellectual understanding of what we read in the verses, but the authentic listening, śravana, authentic intranalying, manana and powerfully living and radiating, nididhyāsana of what Kṛṣṇa speaks into our listening, that can complete us.

So, let us pray to the Ultimate Kṛṣṇa to give us the intelligence and awareness to realize the truth about ourselves, to give us this experience of eternal bliss, Nityānanda. May you reach Kṛṣṇa consciousness and realize eternal bliss, Nityānanda

Teach about reaching Kṛṣṇa consciousness and being more than this body and mind Help children understand about the ultimate master within us

  • What does Kṛṣṇa say is more important than sin and virtue?
  • What is the cycle of birth and death?
  • What do we need to do if we want to die with the thought of the Divine uppermost in our mind?
  • What is the role of the external Master, be He Kṛṣṇa or THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM?
  • Why do meditation and completion?
  • What do the techniques, sūtras in the Gītā lead to?
  • How do we reach Kṛṣṇa?

MATERIALS NEEDED:

  • 1. Paper
  • 2. Coloring pens

PROCEDURE

Encourage the children to do a drawing that helps them understand the birth, old age, death cycle.

INFERENCE

To know that one needs to be saved from this cycle needs great wisdom. You can be born again and again and still think that you are being born for the first time, and that this is the only life that you have. This knowledge requires no wisdom.