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 97

CONCLUSION
667
it not be necessary to explain the key-note of the character and lives of those men? This key-note was Karma-Yoga or the philosophy of worldly life; and in order to explain this principle, subtle points of righteous or unrighteous conduct have been dealt with in several places in the Mahābhārata, and ultimately the Gitā has dealt with those principles of Ethics, which have been responsible for the maintenance of the world, consistently with the view-point of Release. There are also many such instances in the other Puranas. But, as all other expositions on the subject turn pale by the side of the brilliance of the Gītā, the Bhagavadgitā has become the most important work on the philosophy of Karma-Yoga. I have dealt with the true nature of this Karma-Yoga in the foregoing chapters. Yet, it cannot be said that this exposition of the doctrine of the Gītā is complete, unless one compares the ethical principles propounded by Western philosophers with the fundamental spiritual principles of the Doable and the Not-Doable enunciated in the Gitā. In making this comparison, it is also necessary to compare the Philosophy of the Absolute Self in the East with such philosophy in the West. But the knowledge of the Absolute Self in the West has not gone much beyond our knowledge. As this fact is commonly accepted, there is not much of a necessity to compare the Eastern metaphysical philosophy with the Western metaphysical philosophy ; * and the only thing which remains is the comparison of the Eastern with the Western science of Ethics or Karma-Yoga, which science according to many has not been expounded by our philosophers. But, the consideration of even this one subject is so comprehensive, that it will be necessary to write an independent treatise in order to deal with it exhaustively. Yet, as I did not consider it proper
* A comparison of our Vedānt, with Western Philosophy has been made by Prof. Deussen in his book called the Elements of Metaphysics; and at the end of the second edition of this book, there is printed the lecture delivered by Prof. Deus en before the Royal Asiatic Society at Bombay, when he had come to India in 1893, on the subject : “On the Philosophy of Vedānta". Besides this, the work, The Religion and Philosophy of the Upanişads, written on this subject by Prof. Deussen also deserves to be read.