Video Information: 29.07.2024, Vedant: Basics to Classics, Greater Noida
Context:
Bhagavad Gita Chapter 2 Verse 30
देही नित्यमवध्योऽयं देहे सर्वस्य भारत।
तस्मात्सर्वाणि भूतानि न त्वं शोचितुमर्हसि।।2.30।।
Word Meaning:
भारत O Bhārata अयं this देही Indweller सर्वस्य of all देहे in the body नित्यम् ever अवध्यः indestructible तस्मात् therefore त्वं thou सर्वाणि all भूतानि beings शोचितुम् to mourn न अर्हसि oughtest not.
English Translation:
O descendant of Bharata, this embodied Self-existing in everyone's body can never be killed. Therefore you ought not to grieve for all (these) beings.
~ What is self?
~ Why do we exist?
~ What is Prakrit?
~ Prakriti is Eternal.
~ Atma is Timeless.
Music Credits: Milind Date
~~~
Context:
Bhagavad Gita Chapter 2 Verse 30
देही नित्यमवध्योऽयं देहे सर्वस्य भारत।
तस्मात्सर्वाणि भूतानि न त्वं शोचितुमर्हसि।।2.30।।
Word Meaning:
भारत O Bhārata अयं this देही Indweller सर्वस्य of all देहे in the body नित्यम् ever अवध्यः indestructible तस्मात् therefore त्वं thou सर्वाणि all भूतानि beings शोचितुम् to mourn न अर्हसि oughtest not.
English Translation:
O descendant of Bharata, this embodied Self-existing in everyone's body can never be killed. Therefore you ought not to grieve for all (these) beings.
~ What is self?
~ Why do we exist?
~ What is Prakrit?
~ Prakriti is Eternal.
~ Atma is Timeless.
Music Credits: Milind Date
~~~
Category
📚
LearningTranscript
00:00:00Life has carried on since the first cell uninterrupted.
00:00:26If someone asks you the name of your great-great ancestor, it is actually just the first cell
00:00:42that developed in some muddy water body.
00:00:51So there has been a direct line and each of us are direct descendants of that cell.
00:01:12It tells us that bodies keep falling but there is something that continues without interruption.
00:01:36That is Prakriti.
00:01:46What we call as human beings are just specific shapes, forms that come and go yet there is
00:02:06something that continues.
00:02:13In fact, it has been posited scientifically that death happens exactly so that life can
00:02:26continue.
00:02:32Death happens so that the ones who have been hanging around since too long, they make
00:02:39way for something new, something fresh.
00:02:46If the old foggies don't make space, then there will be a terrible competition for resources
00:03:01In this competition, the oldies will necessarily win precisely because they have been around
00:03:08for too long.
00:03:12They know the rules of the game and the tricks of the trade much better than a newborn or
00:03:24a young one does.
00:03:29The only way the young one can have a reasonable claim to resources is if the old ones first
00:03:40of all get weak and sick so that they can't compete.
00:03:47Ultimately they must fall off so that the resources become available to the next generation.
00:03:57In this way, the disappearance of the old one is actually necessary for the continuity
00:04:06of life.
00:04:10Life continues.
00:04:16But this continuation is not something that one can easily see.
00:04:27One takes himself as the unit of life.
00:04:34In fact, one takes himself as life itself.
00:04:41Therefore, one believes in life not as a continuity but in life as discrete units.
00:04:58So death appears like the end of life, not the game of life.
00:05:08And when death appears like the end of life, then there is a lot of suffering.
00:05:18And that suffering is continuous.
00:05:20Well, physically a death might not be happening every moment.
00:05:27People might not be dropping down every moment.
00:05:32But there is other stuff that is falling apart and disappearing and crumbling every moment.
00:05:41And if that falling apart or crumbling down is not taken as continuation of the game,
00:05:48then there is suffering.
00:05:50One feels something has been lost.
00:05:52One feels there has been a death.
00:06:00Shri Krishna wants to relieve Arjuna of his suffering in two ways.
00:06:09First of all, by showing to him the eternity of Prakriti and the timelessness, secondly,
00:06:23of the Atma.
00:06:27Prakriti is eternal, Atma is timeless.
00:06:36Prakriti is time itself, therefore there is no way that it can begin at some point in
00:06:49time or end at some point in time.
00:06:53If Prakriti ends, so does time.
00:07:00Prakriti is eternal, Atma is timeless.
00:07:14Whether you take Prakriti or Atma, one thing is certain.
00:07:22There is nothing called a beginning or an end in time.
00:07:33And it is this misconception that accounts for a lot of our suffering.
00:07:48When it arose at a moment, when it went away at a moment, the game has continued.
00:08:06It's like a train, a long distance train.
00:08:11Look at the people who boarded it at the starting point.
00:08:22Hardly any of them reached the end point.
00:08:28Think of a train, for example, that runs from Jammu to Kanyakumari over a period of two full days.
00:08:41Think of those who boarded the train at Jammu.
00:08:44How many of them reached Kanyakumari?
00:08:47But the train does.
00:08:51People hop in, people hop out.
00:08:54The train keeps moving.
00:08:57At all points, the train remains either fully or reasonably occupied.
00:09:07We do not envisage a scenario in which the train gets weakened.
00:09:10Does it ever? No.
00:09:13Five people joined in, five people left, opted out.
00:09:22The train keeps moving. That's life.
00:09:27That's life.
00:09:30And when the train arrives, you do not say the passengers have arrived.
00:09:34You say the train has arrived.
00:09:36It's the train that counts.
00:09:41Life is not to be seen in discrete units.
00:09:54If you are unattached to the train, you will say the train has arrived.
00:10:00But if Papa is arriving, you will say Papa has arrived.
00:10:11That's a huge train and maybe 800 passengers or more.
00:10:23And the train arrives and what do you say?
00:10:26Papa has arrived.
00:10:29You are not concerned with the rest of the material.
00:10:36That's attachment.
00:10:38That's when you fail to see the complete picture.
00:10:48The moment there is attachment,
00:10:52you start thinking in terms of persons rather than life itself.
00:10:59You start thinking of persons rather than Prakriti.
00:11:18And that amounts to suffering.
00:11:25It's not at all difficult to see that the train has arrived, right?
00:11:33Or is it?
00:11:37But attachment does not allow you to see the simple and obvious fact,
00:11:44the huge fact of the train.
00:11:47You miss the train because your eyes are looking for Papa.
00:11:56You have missed the train.
00:11:58And the train is huge.
00:12:01Similarly, the facts of life are obvious.
00:12:04But we miss them because we are attached to particulars.
00:12:10We are attached to small, little, petty things.
00:12:15So, we miss the composite picture.
00:12:21Are you getting it?
00:12:31So, within the flow of time,
00:12:36there is actually no death if one stops being attached to particulars.
00:12:45And that will be possible only when you first of all stop thinking of yourself as a particular.
00:12:51You will have to look yourself as a wave in the ocean,
00:12:55not as a particular one with an independent existence.
00:13:00The moment you see that, your body, your mind, your sense of self are all Prakriti,
00:13:09it becomes very difficult to still believe in a separation from Prakriti.
00:13:16For me to have an identity as a particular,
00:13:21it is very important to see myself as separate from Prakriti, right?
00:13:27But if you can see that every bit of you is organically related,
00:13:33continuously related to the wider life itself,
00:13:38how will you take yourself as separate, as particular?
00:13:42Possible?
00:13:47Where is your skin color coming from?
00:13:50It's coming from appearance and it's coming from the sun, no?
00:14:00And it's coming from the food you eat.
00:14:05Is it yours?
00:14:08So, how do you then believe in particulars?
00:14:11All is organically linked to something else.
00:14:14It's all arriving from somewhere.
00:14:20And when you start seeing by way of self-observation and self-knowledge,
00:14:28every bit of you, every single cell of yours is Prakritic, conditioned,
00:14:43following an ancient logic which is not yours in particular.
00:14:50It is a general logic.
00:14:53It's a universal logic.
00:14:58Then it becomes very difficult to take yourself as a separate entity.
00:15:04If everything in me corresponds to something outside of me,
00:15:10does there exist anything called me at all?
00:15:16And when this knowledge arises,
00:15:24there is end of suffering, freedom from suffering.
00:15:28How is there freedom from suffering?
00:15:30Because this knowledge is about seeing
00:15:35that there is nobody who exists in particular even to suffer.
00:15:40So, how will there be suffering now?
00:15:45There is nobody in particular who can suffer.
00:15:49So, the sufferer is gone. How has he gone?
00:15:53The sufferer has realized his own non-existence.
00:15:58If the sufferer is gone, how can there be suffering?
00:16:02There will be processes, alright.
00:16:05The process of pain, the process of aging, the process of disease,
00:16:08the process of this, that, all the processes that are possible.
00:16:13But there will be nobody to be attached to those processes,
00:16:17raise expectations, hold desires, and then suffer.
00:16:23There will be nobody.
00:16:25You are seeing processes as processes,
00:16:28and not something you can gain something from.
00:16:35So, freedom from suffering is actually freedom from sufferer.
00:16:39It's not possible to retain the sufferer and yet not suffer.
00:16:50Once the sufferer is gone,
00:16:53what amounted to suffering hitherto becomes just pain.
00:17:01Just pain.
00:17:08Pain translated into suffering in the presence of sufferer.
00:17:13With the sufferer gone, the pain would remain.
00:17:16Pain is a physical thing.
00:17:20Pain is a thing in the material dimension.
00:17:24It remains.
00:17:28But there is nobody to identify with the pain and therefore suffer.
00:17:39You are getting it?
00:17:43How do I identify?
00:17:45I'm not...
00:17:49How do I call myself as unique? Am I?
00:17:53What is unique about me? What is particular about me?
00:17:56The body, the mind, the thoughts, the feelings, the aspirations.
00:18:01What's unique about me? There is nothing unique about me at all.
00:18:10Change my food, my thoughts change.
00:18:16Change my clothes, my thoughts change.
00:18:20Go take a bath, thoughts change.
00:18:25Am I?
00:18:28Am I?
00:18:32I'm not.
00:18:36If just standing in the shower can change my disposition,
00:18:44then surely I am not.
00:18:48I look at something, I smell something, thoughts change.
00:18:54Am I?
00:18:56Then who's there to die?
00:19:01Who's there to die?
00:19:07Who's there to die?
00:19:10So on one hand there is life.
00:19:13And life in its totality, which in the absence of knowledge is seen in a fragmented way.
00:19:20And then there is the realization that there is just life and I am not.
00:19:28This is the second thing that does not die.
00:19:33Because this realization is independent of all corporal elements.
00:19:40You are looking at the body.
00:19:43So this realization is not bodily.
00:19:45This does not die.
00:19:48This realization is also what has been called as the true self, Atma.
00:19:55Who am I? The one who realizes.
00:19:57This realization is not thought.
00:20:02Thought does not remain.
00:20:04Thought depends on the brain.
00:20:06You smash the brain, thought is gone.
00:20:10What is this realization then?
00:20:12It has to be a cessation.
00:20:16Because what has ceased cannot be ceased anymore.
00:20:21Thought is activity, right?
00:20:23Neural activity here.
00:20:25Without that neural activity there can be no thought.
00:20:32It has become basic science now to connect stuff to your brain, electrodes and all.
00:20:43And just see on a screen how different areas light up on different kinds of thoughts and emotions.
00:20:51You are excited, one area of your brain starts showing activity.
00:21:07You are depressed, some other area starts showing up.
00:21:15You are angry, some other part lights up.
00:21:21All that is activity.
00:21:24If realization too is activity then realization is dependent on?
00:21:29And then realization can be seen on?
00:21:34You know they have tried that for long.
00:21:38They wanted to know which part of the brain is responsible for Buddhahood.
00:21:45Because they believe in the material so deeply.
00:21:47They said whatever this thing called realization or enlightenment or Buddhahood is, it must be residing somewhere in the brain.
00:21:58So they actually went for something called the neuroscience of enlightenment.
00:22:06That what happens in the brain when you get enlightened.
00:22:08Obviously, they could make no progress with that.
00:22:14But if you read up on that, it's quite interesting.
00:22:20I think they are still continuing with this.
00:22:22The information I might be having is around at least a decade old.
00:22:26So it might be dated.
00:22:29Find people who are so called enlightened.
00:22:32Then they put their thoughts on this man.
00:22:59So I don't really know what has happened over the last one decade and what is the latest.
00:23:07But you must read up.
00:23:12I don't even remember all the terms.
00:23:17There is also a field of study that studies supernatural experiences.
00:23:29So what happens for example when you claim that you are hearing divine bells in a spell of meditation.
00:23:38What exactly happens in the brain at that time?
00:23:41They are trying to study all that.
00:23:43This divine bell thing can be studied because it is something.
00:23:49Because it is something and whatsoever is something in Prakriti can be scientifically studied.
00:23:55No problems with that.
00:23:57Realization is not something. It is a cessation of something.
00:24:03Something exists, you can study it.
00:24:07How can you study the non-existence of something?
00:24:16This is a pen.
00:24:19Find out its weight.
00:24:21You can.
00:24:24There is no pen. Find out the weight.
00:24:28How will you find out the weight?
00:24:36Can you?
00:24:41There is something on his eyes.
00:24:43Find out the power of the lens.
00:24:45You can.
00:24:47Find out the power of her lens.
00:24:50Can you?
00:24:51Why?
00:24:54So your lenses are working.
00:24:58This much you can clearly see.
00:25:04You get this.
00:25:09When the thing is gone, how can you suffer for its disappearance anymore?
00:25:18It has been seen as anyway non-existent.
00:25:28Beautifully does Krishna put it to Arjuna.
00:25:32You are grieving over those who never existed at all.
00:25:40How can you kill in the first place when they never existed?
00:25:46You are trying to take credit for their death.
00:25:54Such a huge ego you have as a super warrior, as the mighty archer.
00:26:02I killed them.
00:26:04You cannot kill them.
00:26:06You cannot kill them because they don't exist.
00:26:11No problem.
00:26:13And what exists cannot be killed.
00:26:21The bacteria, the viruses for example, they were here long before we came.
00:26:29And after World War 3 or after the climate catastrophe, the 6th mass extinction when human beings will be all gone.
00:26:44Would that mean that life itself is gone?
00:26:47Life would still continue.
00:26:54You cannot kill life, Arjuna.
00:26:57And the ones you are killing are just waves in the ocean.
00:27:02Why do you hold yourself accountable and responsible for that?
00:27:06Something as silly as that.
00:27:09And mind you, you have no power to kill life itself.
00:27:12Even if you wipe out that entire army in front of you, still life would continue.
00:27:26Things roll on.
00:27:28What are you grieving for?
00:27:31Just that you take yourself as too important.
00:27:34So you take others too as important.
00:27:37So you think there would be a mighty dent if you are gone.
00:27:49Nothing changes.
00:27:51There is this one thing that doesn't change.
00:27:54And the other thing that you cannot kill is the realization that there is nothing to be killed.
00:28:03What can you do to zero to reduce it to zero?
00:28:14Life in one sense is eternal.
00:28:18So you cannot kill it.
00:28:23And when it comes to the truth,
00:28:28it is not approachable, not touchable.
00:28:31So what can you do to it to kill it?
00:28:33Not possible.
00:28:39So you are needlessly grieving.
00:28:44Your grief is born out of your ignorance.
00:28:52Once you start seeing the nature of things,
00:28:56it becomes more and more difficult to grieve over anything.
00:29:02How does one live then?
00:29:06Why does one live?
00:29:10What to live for?
00:29:15There is nothing in the conventional sense that one then lives for.
00:29:21To have a purpose is to first of all presume a suffering self.
00:29:33Only the sufferer can have a purpose.
00:29:37So there is no personal purpose possible for someone who has started seeing through the wheel.
00:29:45But yes, one purpose can possibly remain.
00:29:52Not necessarily.
00:29:55There are these other bodies around you
00:30:02who are needlessly suffering.
00:30:07They too have the potential to come to the stage
00:30:15of joyful, light, freedom.
00:30:20But they are needlessly suffering.
00:30:24So that can translate into a possible purpose.
00:30:30A purpose that some people have espoused.
00:30:40And there have been others who have refused to take up even that purpose.
00:30:53Krishna here is in a role in a particular avatar
00:30:59in which he says, yes, an impersonal purpose is what I choose to have.
00:31:10Why does he do that?
00:31:12No reason.
00:31:16Just like suffering, reason is a word applicable only to those
00:31:24who still are carrying a personal ego, the sufferer.
00:31:31So if you ask, why doesn't Krishna just see all this
00:31:37as a mirage, as a bubble
00:31:42and simply let the game continue as it would,
00:31:48why can't he just say, Arjun, let me turn the chariot towards the forest
00:31:56and leave the fools to quarrel among themselves.
00:32:00Let the two of us go and have fun in the forest.
00:32:04He could have done that.
00:32:08He could have done that and still remained Krishna.
00:32:16Nothing would have been diminished in him.
00:32:21He wouldn't have reduced to a lower figure had he chosen to do that.
00:32:30He could have said, no, no, forget it.
00:32:32No Gita. Let's just go and play in the jungle.
00:32:38Let the fool have all the property and everything.
00:32:41It anyway does not mean anything, so let him walk away with all the goodies.
00:32:48Krishna could have said that.
00:32:51Why does he not say that? Depends.
00:32:54Depends on what? Depends on Krishna.
00:32:59Depends on Krishna.
00:33:02This time he is in a mood to just help out the little ones.
00:33:15At other points in other avatars, the mood might be to leave things to their fate.
00:33:27Here he wants to help.
00:33:29He says, all these are suffering and I want to help.
00:33:37That's the only purpose that can possibly remain with the one who is not existent for himself.
00:33:50Possibly this purpose can remain. I do not exist for myself.
00:33:54But since there is this body and the body would run its course.
00:34:0210, 20, 40 years, whatever.
00:34:08Just to have a good time, I have decided to help others out.
00:34:17For no other fancy or noble reason.
00:34:32No divine purpose.
00:34:38Just as a good pastime.
00:34:40Because you see, just as I am not going to clamber for a long life,
00:34:56similarly I am not going to commit suicide.
00:35:03The body is there and the body will keep rolling as long as it has to.
00:35:10Which means that I am probably going to have some years.
00:35:18What to do with those years? Earn money, do this, do that.
00:35:24Now the problem is, for whom? I am not, so earn money for whom?
00:35:31Something has to be done with this time.
00:35:34Just as to avoid boredom.
00:35:44Why does Krishna instruct Arjuna in the Gita?
00:35:51To avoid boredom? No other reason really.
00:35:56Krishna would have remained Krishna. He could have continued to sit as the charioteer and sweat the flies.
00:36:09He would still have remained Krishna. Nothing would have changed within him.
00:36:26When the chooser is sublime, all choices are equal to each other. Are they not?
00:36:34Will we compare one choice with the other and say, this action of yours was good but that was not?
00:36:42Such statements apply only to people with fragmented egos.
00:36:48When you are crystallized within, then whatever you do comes from the same center.
00:36:55Therefore, whatever you do has the same level. How can one action be better than the other?
00:37:01So Krishna could have chosen to sweat flies.
00:37:06That action would have been exactly comparable in its nobility to the discourse of Gita.
00:37:20But he says, fine, let me.
00:37:25With no personal interest involved.
00:37:30With no real disappointment involved if Arjuna refuses to listen or understand.
00:37:38Krishna is giving it everything that he has without having any stake in what happens as a result of his efforts.
00:38:02Pitiable position. Most beautiful position.
00:38:09Pitiable because he is giving everything in spite of having no stake in the game.
00:38:18As they say, no skin in the game.
00:38:24From the worldly perspective, this is so pitiable.
00:38:29You are putting in so much, investing so much whereas you can get nothing because there is nobody to receive anything.
00:38:42The worldly man will say, oh, pathetic!
00:38:47A pathetic state. He is investing so much when possibly he can get no returns from it.
00:38:56No benefit can accrue to Krishna from the Gita.
00:39:05Do you see that?
00:39:08The Gita can at most help Arjuna.
00:39:14And after Arjuna, millions like us, billions like us.
00:39:18But can the Gita help Krishna?
00:39:22Krishna has no stakes yet he is putting in everything.
00:39:32Seen from one place, this is horrible.
00:39:40So much effort you are putting in.
00:39:43And you very well know the rule of the game is such that you can get nothing for yourself from this.
00:39:50Yet you are trying so hard.
00:39:55But this is also the most beautiful way of living.
00:40:06Not a measured way where you give with an eye on the returns.
00:40:13If you operate in a measured way, you will never get the immeasurable.
00:40:20And therefore, this way is the way of beauty.
00:40:30You fling yourself 100% into the action.
00:40:39When it has been ascertained in advance that no personal benefit can accrue to it from any of it.
00:40:50Accrue to you from any of it.
00:40:57Are you getting it?
00:41:07The Gita touches upon the core anxiety of human beings.
00:41:15And that's why it has been such an important document.
00:41:20The Gita touches upon death.
00:41:24Whatever we do in some sense is driven by the fear of death.
00:41:33The ego center can also be called as the fear center.
00:41:39And there is no fear that is not rooted in death.
00:41:45The ego center can also be called as the death center.
00:41:50Whatever we do, it finds motivation and energy from death.
00:42:01We function to somehow avoid death in some way or the other.
00:42:06Gross way, subtle way, this way, that way, whatever.
00:42:09You will be amazed to know how much is being invested in prolonging the maximum life span of human beings.
00:42:28Not the average life expectancy that has already probably come close to the point of saturation.
00:42:36From antiquity till around 100-150 years back,
00:42:45the average life span of human beings hovered around the 30 years mark.
00:42:55And then boom!
00:42:58With advances in medical technology,
00:43:01with advances in medical technology,
00:43:05certain areas of the world have already exceeded 80.
00:43:11Others are approaching 80. We are close to saturation.
00:43:16So now we are trying to figure out how to increase that denominator itself
00:43:25which is the maximum number possible that can be attained
00:43:32so that you are not crushed under a truck.
00:43:44Death has been the driver, the motivator.
00:43:47And that's why Gita is so important.
00:43:51Gita takes the central issue of death head on.
00:43:58What is death?
00:44:01From whom does death occur?
00:44:04It's a beautiful thing to explore.
00:44:08You know, we don't even know for sure the precise moment of death.
00:44:19We have not been able to come to a sharp definition.
00:44:26You can never precisely tell whether a person is dead.
00:44:32I read of a curious case.
00:44:40There was one woman who was declared dead in one province of the US
00:44:47because there the laws probably said that you are dead if your heart stops functioning.
00:44:54So the doctors declared her dead.
00:44:57Her parents or others who were around her, they found a way out.
00:45:06They said there is another province that says you are dead only when your brain is dead.
00:45:13Even though the doctors there had declared her dead,
00:45:18they brought her to the other place and she managed to live for a few years.
00:45:27Not sure of the details. Probably if you search for this case, you will get something.
00:45:32We don't even know when a fellow has actually died.
00:45:36Just as we don't know when a fellow actually becomes conscious and therefore can be called as born.
00:45:46We very well know that birth is not something that happens when you emerge from the mother's body.
00:45:54If you can be called as living only after you emerge from the mother's body,
00:46:01then abortion would not be a crime in so many countries.
00:46:06You are obviously taken as alive even when you are in the mother's womb.
00:46:11But there is no way to exactly know when you can be called as alive in the mother's womb.
00:46:22So death and birth, both are fuzzy affairs.
00:46:28We don't know when we are born, we don't know when we die.
00:46:33And that can never be known because actually we never take birth and actually we never die.
00:46:43It will never be possible to exactly say this.
00:46:484 hours, 28 minutes, 37.3 seconds, that's the moment of death.
00:46:56You will never be able to say that.
00:47:02It's a movement, it's a process.
00:47:12It's a continuous function, not a discrete one.
00:47:18What is a continuous function? Like a ramp, slope.
00:47:23What's a discrete function? Like a stair.
00:47:30Life and death are related in a continuity.
00:47:36You are never fully dead and you are never fully alive.
00:47:40Which means life and death are actually one.
00:47:45It's a matter of ignorance to think of someone as alive and think of the other as dead.
00:47:55It's just an apparent change in state.
00:47:59And that's the reason why things that appear alive are able to come forth from things that appear dead.
00:48:08And that's why things that appear alive, sooner or later become things that appear dead.
00:48:18So Arjun, what are you grieving over?
00:48:21Who's going to die?
00:48:26Who's going to die?
00:48:31For death there must be somebody to die.
00:48:34For death there must be somebody who took birth.
00:48:38The one who is alive is not going to die.
00:48:44Who is alive?
00:48:46Whatever you want to call it, the DNA, the genes, the genome.
00:48:51That's the thing doing the journey.
00:48:54And that has been doing the journey since eternity.
00:48:57And the journey will continue.
00:48:59If not through one organism or one species, then through other species, other organisms.
00:49:05Other species, other organisms.
00:49:08And even if all the organisms and all the species vanish, the soil would still remain.
00:49:15And just as the first organism arose from the soil itself, not from parents, but from soil.
00:49:24Just as the first organism arose from the soil, similarly if all the apparent life is gone,
00:49:31life would again spring from soil.
00:49:34We have seen five mass extinctions till now. Have we not?
00:49:44Life returns.
00:49:47And we are only talking of our tiny planet.
00:49:53There is just no reason to assume that in this almost infinitely vast universe,
00:50:01there won't be other places where sentience of some kind would be existing.
00:50:12Life keeps returning. Arjun, what are you wailing over?
00:50:16And take my cue.
00:50:26Just as I have nothing to be concerned about, yet I am working to relieve your suffering.
00:50:36Similarly, fight the war to relieve your population of its suffering.
00:50:42Having seen that life is purposeless for you because you are selfless,
00:50:50selfless not in the opposite of selfish, selfless, not existent.
00:50:59Once your selfless life is purposeless, then the only purpose that can voluntarily remain
00:51:06is the purpose to bring others to purposelessness.
00:51:12And you see me exercising that option, Arjun, right? With you.
00:51:17I have no stakes in educating you. Have I? No, nothing.
00:51:22Personally, I get nothing from teaching you all these things.
00:51:26Yet, I am striving for your sake.
00:51:30Similarly, you fight for the sake of the people of Hastinapur.
00:51:36I get nothing by teaching you.
00:51:39Similarly, you fight even though you must know that you will get nothing by fighting.
00:51:44And then there is beauty in the fight.
00:51:46You very well know in advance you will get nothing from that fight.
00:51:50And still you fight with all that you have and in the most intense way you can.
00:51:59So beautiful.
00:52:00Are you getting it?
00:52:07Think of it. What is death?
00:52:09You are gone.
00:52:15And you have opted for organ donation.
00:52:19How is it that you have gone and your organs continue to live?
00:52:25What kind of death is this?
00:52:28And so many of your organs are still alive.
00:52:32Even skin can be transplanted.
00:52:35Skin, eyes, everything.
00:52:40As science advances, probably every bit of your body can be put into some other body.
00:52:46Now tell me who has died?
00:52:49Tell me who has died?
00:52:52Every part of you is still alive.
00:52:55Then who has died?
00:52:58Your teeth.
00:53:02My teeth have gone to him.
00:53:04My hair, whatever I have of them, have gone to her.
00:53:08My nose has gone to him.
00:53:10My eyes have come to you.
00:53:14Liver to him, kidneys to him, heart to him.
00:53:17He is roaming around with my intestines.
00:53:22If everything is still alive, who has died? Please tell me.
00:53:28Ship of Theseus.
00:53:34Who has died?
00:53:37So that's what death is.
00:53:40Just an appearance.
00:53:43You know what, when they take you for cremation,
00:53:49even several hours after death, so much of you is still alive.
00:53:58It's actually some kind of wastage, just putting that body to ashes.
00:54:04Because a lot of you is potentially still usable.
00:54:11But we just incinerate that and everything is reduced to ashes.
00:54:17Who has died?
00:54:28Sandeep.
00:54:34Sandeep is now 100% sure.
00:54:38The way he is looking at me.
00:54:43Nobody in that sense ever dies because there is nobody.
00:54:48There is no particular one.
00:54:53How can then any particular one die?
00:54:55Sandeep, your nose
00:55:00has been the nose of 40,500 other creatures before you.
00:55:07You know what, this is a thing that others have been wearing for long.
00:55:12And from them it has come to you and now you have put it on.
00:55:25Raghav.
00:55:41Raghav is generally trying to be curious.
00:55:44He is saying all those things will go to these people.
00:55:47He will get the teeth, she will get the hair.
00:55:50You will get what you desperately lack.
00:55:52My brain belongs to him.
00:55:55Or is there other stuff that you would rather have?
00:56:06But not quite mentionable.
00:56:09So it's a beautiful discourse in evolution.
00:56:14It has survived time. It has survived the march of science
00:56:21because it is absolutely scientific.
00:56:24Else the march of science would have trampled over the Gita.
00:56:33Just as so many other beliefs and documents and scriptures
00:56:39have been reduced to obscurity
00:56:44by the advancement of science and technology,
00:56:47Gita too would have been thrown into oblivion.
00:56:49No. It has managed to not just survive but thrive.
00:56:55Why?
00:56:57Because what is being said here is not some religious injunction.
00:57:02It is the core of science. All science.
00:57:08This is eugenics, this is genetics.
00:57:12Ok, figure out. What is gerontology?
00:57:19This is all that.
00:57:25Without obviously a mention of those fancy terms.
00:57:30This is all that.
00:57:35If you do not understand all this,
00:57:39in fact you have to understand molecular biology as well.
00:57:43If you do not understand all this, you cannot say what Krishna is saying.
00:57:50The beautiful part is that all this knowledge has come to him
00:58:01not through a research lab but just through observation of life.
00:58:06That is the power of observation.
00:58:09That is also the basis of the scientific method, observation.
00:58:13Observation can yield to you tremendous insights.
00:58:24Sometimes even without the use of cutting-edge equipment.
00:58:28This is the equipment.
00:58:31This is the cutting-edge equipment.
00:58:35Sometimes this can reveal to you just detached observation.
00:58:40Dispassionate observation.
00:58:43This can reveal to you what would otherwise come through
00:58:48after decades of research in an advanced lab.
00:58:53The difference is, in the lab when the conclusions would be drawn,
00:59:01they would be supported by ample verifiable proof.
00:59:06But when you get it through observation,
00:59:10it is very subjective and you are the only proof.
00:59:15So there is a huge risk.
00:59:18Nevertheless, in spite of the risk, it is possible to come to those observations,
00:59:23those conclusions, insights.
00:59:26Another insight about death.
00:59:30Is it possible for a single human being to exist?
00:59:33Just one?
00:59:36Impossible.
00:59:39How easy is it for just two human beings to exist?
00:59:45Next to impossible now.
00:59:47Let's say a man and a woman.
00:59:49Next to impossible.
00:59:51But still they can somehow make it.
00:59:55Now let's assume there are just ten people on the planet.
00:59:58How difficult would it be for them to survive?
01:00:02Very difficult.
01:00:10Similarly, it is difficult for a single cell to survive.
01:00:15That's why the entire body exists as an aggregation of cells.
01:00:23And within this aggregation, death is always happening.
01:00:26Just as in a city or in a country or in a locality,
01:00:31death is always happening, right?
01:00:33But we never say,
01:00:34Similarly, in your body, cells are all the time dying.
01:00:38All the time dying.
01:00:42But you do not say,
01:00:44you have died.
01:00:46Similarly, you are a cell
01:00:50in the wider organism, in the body of the wider organism, called
01:00:55a cell.
01:00:57And you are a cell.
01:00:58In the wider organism, in the body of the wider organism, called
01:01:04Prakriti.
01:01:06If you die, has anybody died?
01:01:11You just brush your hair.
01:01:13At least a hundred cells, if not more,
01:01:16die.
01:01:20Nobody has died.
01:01:22Will you say you have died?
01:01:25Similarly, you are just one cell
01:01:29in the bigger body of Prakriti.
01:01:32When you die, nobody has died.
01:01:43There are many ways to approach the situation.
01:01:46You have been sitting here.
01:01:48Do you realize how many cells within you have died
01:01:51in the duration of this session itself?
01:01:55Now, one of those cells
01:01:58starts weeping like Arjun.
01:02:01What would you tell her?
01:02:04Come on.
01:02:06I am alive.
01:02:08I am alive. Who has died?
01:02:10You anyway don't matter.
01:02:12You have no individuality.
01:02:17Does a cell have individuality? No.
01:02:20But the cell might get deluded
01:02:22and start thinking that it has
01:02:25and then the cell would
01:02:27suffer.
01:02:41In the scheme of life, in the wider scheme of life,
01:02:45death is not just
01:02:49inevitable
01:02:51but actually necessary.
01:02:58Death means progress.
01:03:00Evolution happens through death.
01:03:12It's a great disease if
01:03:15your old cells refuse to die.
01:03:21You will be finished off.
01:03:36Cycle advances.
01:03:40It's the way of Prakriti.
01:03:44Are you carrying even a single cell that you had
01:03:47at the time of your so called birth?
01:03:50No.
01:03:55Next to none.
01:04:00Then who are you?
01:04:03The one who took birth is no more there.
01:04:06Who are you?
01:04:13You are born with X cells.
01:04:17Right?
01:04:18None of those X cells exist today.
01:04:27Two things. One,
01:04:29who is alive?
01:04:31Because the one who was born
01:04:34is already long gone.
01:04:36None of those X cells exist today.
01:04:38Second, you couldn't have become this big
01:04:41had those cells not gone.
01:04:44It was necessary for them to go so that you could become this.
01:04:49Had those cells remained,
01:04:52the ones that you were born with as a baby,
01:04:56you wouldn't have reached this position.
01:04:59They had to go so that you could become this.
01:05:02That is one thing.
01:05:04Secondly, if all those cells are gone, who are you?
01:05:09And the cells that you are having today,
01:05:13just a few weeks from today,
01:05:16most of them will be gone.
01:05:18Months from today,
01:05:21maybe 95% of them will be gone.
01:05:24And a few years from today,
01:05:26all of them will be gone.
01:05:28So who are you?