Bhagvad Gita Rahasya or Karmayoga Shastra VOL 02

SR No.: 011090
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Bhalchandra S Sukhtankar
Publisher: R B Tilak Puna
Publication Year: 1936
Total Pages: 767
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 74 MB

Page 178

748
GITA-RAHASYA OR KARMA-YOGA
is just the opposite, that is to say, renunciatory; and it is, therefore, not possible that the one should have come out of the other; and it is nowhere stated in the Gita that such is the case. Nay, the original meaning of the word "Yoga' was Karma-Yoga; and one may safely say that that word came to be commonly understood in the single meaning of 'Yoga' in the shape of 'Concentration of the Mind', after the days of the Pätañjala-Sutras. Whatever may be the case, the Desireless Path of Action adopted in ancient times by Janaka and others. was similar to the Yoga, that is, the Karma-Yoga of the Gitä; and it has clearly been adopted from the Bhagavata religion traditionally handed down by Manu to Iksvāku etc., and was not derived from the Pätañjala-Yoga.
This will have clearly shown to my readers the similarity and the dissimilarity between the Gita-doctrine and the Upanisads. Most of these matters have been dealt with by me in the Gita-Rahasya. I shall, therefore, say here only this much that, although the Knowledge of the Brahman in the Gita has been mentioned on the authority of the Upanisads, yet, the Gitä has not merely copied the Metaphysical Knowledge in the Upanisads, but by adding to it the worship of Vasudeva, as also the Samkhya Science of the Perishable and the Imperishable, that is to say, of the creation of the universe, it has principally expounded the Vedic religion of KarmaYoga, which is easy to follow, and is beneficial in this life and the next; and in this way the Gita is superior to the Upanisads. It is, therefore, not proper to stretch the meaning of the Gitā doctrinally, in order to establish a non-existing harmony between the Gita and the renunciatory Upanisads, except in the matter of the Knowledge of the Brahman. It is true that the Metaphysical Knowledge in both is the same. Yet, although the head in the shape of the Spiritual Knowledge is the same, the Samkhya path and the Karma-Yoga are the two equally important hands of the Vedic religion; and the Git has emphatically supported Action based on Knowledge, as has been done in the Isäväsy opanisad, as is clearly shown in the eleventh chapter of the Gita-Rahasya.