THEO 1432: The Religious Quest
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Gītā 6-9

04/07/2026 · Tue/Thu 10:30-11:45 AM · Brad Bannon · Boston College

📄 Synopsis

This class session explored the integration of action (Karma), knowledge (Jñāna), and devotion (Bhakti) within the Bhagavad-Gītā, specifically focusing on Chapters 3 through 7. The discussion centered on the radical expansion of 'Karma' from mere Vedic ritual to include every human action, emphasizing that while action is inevitable for existence, one must remain detached from the 'fruits' or outcomes of those actions. Students analyzed the ethical responsibilities of leaders, noting that their actions serve as a standard for society to emulate, as exemplified by Krishna’s own engagement in the world. The dialogue also covered the importance of discipline and performing one's own inherent duty (dharma) even if imperfectly. Finally, the class examined the role of knowledge as a purifier that 'burns' ignorance and the necessity of faith (Bhakti) as a complement to intellectual understanding, while touching upon how Krishna manifests to restore justice and equity.

⚡ Key Takeaways

  • Karma is redefined in the Gītā to encompass all actions, which should be performed as a sacrifice without attachment to their results.
  • Leaders bear a unique responsibility to act because their behavior sets the standard that others in society will follow.
  • Performing one's own inherent duty (dharma) imperfectly is spiritually superior to performing another's duty well.
  • True renunciation is an internal state of mind characterized by detachment and discipline rather than the external abandonment of physical actions.
  • Knowledge (Jñāna) acts like a fire that reduces the 'fruits' of past actions to ashes, liberating the individual from the cycle of rebirth.
  • Krishna manifests as an Avatar whenever dharma declines and injustice increases to restore cosmic and social order.
  • While human effort and due diligence are required, the ultimate outcomes of actions are beyond individual control and must be surrendered to the divine.
  • Faith (Bhakti) is identified as a path where the practitioner approaches the divine with their inner self and right intentions.
  • The concept of 'lokasangraha' suggests that a liberated person acts to hold the world and its people together.
  • Every action, including eating and breathing, can be viewed as a form of ritual sacrifice or engagement with Brahman.

🎤 Transcript Tap any timestamp to jump the audio player

0:03

Opening Quiet Transition and Meditation

Brad
Alrighty, let's, uh, let's get started, please. Let's start with a little quiet transition, just a little meditation to get things started. Let's take a breath together. Go ahead and breathe in. And out. Word? All right, so a lot of chapters to cover today because we've got from, you know, chapter 3 all the way through chapter 9, right? Since we didn't do 3 through 5 or whatever the other day. So hopefully that means we've got a bunch of leaders, but we'll just— I'd love to hear from everybody today. That would be, that would be a beautiful thing. And yeah, let's just start with a little quiz. It's a little bit different kind of quiz. And so we're missing Georgia, Manny, and Logan. Yeah. Oh, feel free to use your notes, uh, as long as they're not on screens. Looks like most folks are done. Yeah, go ahead and pass them up if you want. Anybody forgot their number? It's been a minute. So for leadership, I only have like 3 classes left, right? 3, 4 classes left. A couple more on Mark and a couple more on the Gita. I guess that's 4, isn't it? ⚠
7:05

Administrative Discussion: Leadership and Unit Preparation

Brad
4 plus today. Cool. Do we have folks that are prepared to do leadership today? I know I wasn't super clear about that, so. I'd really love it if everybody could do leadership like twice more, you know, counting today if you're prepared. But yeah, we're in this home stretch, right? And I'd really like to kind of shift, you know, from teaching and lecturing to listening and, you know, enjoying, maybe? So why don't we take— do we have some folks that are ready to lead? Why don't you take a few minutes together in your teams and you can discuss that and clarify if you have somebody on your team ready to lead. I'll look over the commentary part for a moment. And then, so we've got a lot of chapters to cover today from 3 all the way up to 9. Yeah. Kayla? ⚠
Student
For like this unit, are we supposed to do like one literature family done, one on Mark?
Brad
Yeah, that would be ideal. Yeah, that would be ideal. So if you were to— if you are prepared to lead today on anything from 6 to up to 9, or sorry, 3 up to 9, so from last week's reading up to today's reading, since we didn't do that last Tuesday. Then that would cover you on the GITA side, and then you could just do one more on Gospel Mark. And if you're not prepared for it today, then we've still got two more GITA classes and two more Mark classes, so still time for everybody to do it a couple of times. We don't have to have, you know, one person from every group on every day, right? Cool. Take a few minutes if you can, try to, you know, identify something from at least a couple of different chapters. We'll start with 3 and try to go as far as we can with these chapters. ⚠
Student
Definitely wasn't me.
Brad
I don't think we have— I don't think we have— we didn't have one. ⚠
Student
We did a podcast with 14 besides. We didn't share the— ⚠
Student
oh, sorry.
Brad
Tell me that it's not some— ⚠
Student
oh, that is true.
Student
I guess did I— did I—
Brad
I don't know.
Student
I read about that.
Brad
That can happen at any time. Discussion. Try to stay on track, Scott. I will stay on track. I'm so sorry.
11:53

Student-Led Discussion: Bhagavad-Gītā Chapter 9 and Renunciation

Student
All right. Um, yeah, there's a couple of interesting parts. We're in chapter 9. ⚠
Brad
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, because he's like— ⚠
Student
so what happens is And so he does a lot of talking, I feel like, throughout Seven vs. ⚠
Student
Nine about like what are the right ways to do it.
Student
And it's actually a great cycle of rebirth, darkness into liberation. ⚠
Student
You're renouncing all your earthly pleasures.
Brad
I guess you're renouncing everything earthly material. So ultimately your goal is to become part of that whole Nirvāṇa business, like that easeful, like that tranquility. ⚠
Student
Yeah, I like the— the past is like just like saying all of them, but like, what, like, honestly, like, remembering. ⚠
Brad
I think if folks are like Brad, they're not going to definitely want to disappoint this guy. It's not only good— ⚠
Student
it's kind of peaceful, right?
Brad
You have to kind of have to like train yourself, like, at the peak of times, like, yeah, like, you have to control freaks and talk slow about things you wouldn't usually even mention. ⚠
Student
It's very hard to understand.
Student
That's like, how does that design?
Student
That's like, it's like, well, it's because you're striving to not design. Yeah.
Brad
Because I used to that, like, you're designing yourself. All right, are we good? ⚠
Student
Yeah.
Brad
Yeah. By the way, when I say commentary, I definitely mean the tool that I made available to you, the AI tool. That definitely, that is commentary. I mean, it's a summary of commentaries, but it's what I mean, right? Would love to have something like that on the MARC side of things, but don't yet. So let's dive in. We'll try and go. Go quickly-ish through the first 3 chapters. But yeah, anybody have something from chapter 3? Yeah, Claire, get us started. Thank you. ⚠
Student
Yeah, I think I really like this chapter because it felt really applicable just about how you shouldn't be focused on the actions and that causes stress. You focus on like the results and doing everything with the right attitude. I felt like you could apply that to a lot of different things today. And I also liked how it kind of already set set the precedent that action was just inevitable and that you were gonna like be breathing and eating and all of those things are actions that you take to sustain yourself so you can't necessarily avoid it altogether and it's all part of like a cycle where you take like from the rain, the rain makes plants and you take that but then you also have to provide and like give back because you don't live in a vacuum and I felt like you could take a lot of different things that were talked about there with like attachment and stress. And like we talked about in the podcast a little bit and applied it to stuff like in the real world. ⚠
16:10

Theological Analysis: Karma, Action, and Ethical Responsibility

Brad
Right on. Yeah, so really taking that definition of Karma, right, and saying, all right, Karma is about sacrifice, performing the rituals, duty, and all that kind of stuff, but then radically expanding it, right, to say every action is Karma. Every action we should approach in that same way that we approach the the ritual sacrifices. Great, thanks, Claire. Yeah, Kena. ⚠
Student
Kind of building off of that, just like how interesting it was to like make that distinction between like, yes, technically everything is an action, but there's a difference between action because that's the only way to move through life and actions that you're attached to and that you're ignorant to, you hold up and are too focused on, whereas you should just you know, do— like, that's not how you should be focusing on your actions. And like, in verse 23 of chapter 3, Krishna says, 'For if I were not to engage in myriad action at any time, men would follow my path in every way.' So it's not trying to say like actions aren't important, because he's like, you know, 'If I didn't do actions, everyone would follow suit,' and then no one would be performing any type of actions at all. But it's that you should be like attached to these actions and performing them for the sake of consequences and like what's going to come out of them, only like the fruits of the action. ⚠
Brad
Yeah, so it's not just your actions that matter, but when you're a leader, right, you have extra responsibility because other people are going to follow your actions, right? And so Krishna's saying, if I weren't to engage in action, then people would you know, not act, right? But even though Krishna doesn't need anything, he still acts, right? Even though— so verse 22: For me, there's nothing to be done in the three worlds, nor anything attained, unattained to be attained, yet I still engage in Karma, right? If I were not to engage unwearied in Karma at any time, men would follow my path in every way. So in other words, if you're in a position of leadership You have an extra responsibility to act because it's not just your actions that matter, but other people are going to emulate or copy you. Yeah, Brent? ⚠
Student
I thought it was interesting too that it also highlighted not just only thinking about oneself, where in 3:26, no wise man disturbs the understanding of ignorant men attached to action. He should inspire them performing all actions with this, performing all actions with discipline. So it's like if you understand that like your entire life is action, everything you do has to be intentional because there is that aspect to it, and you need to be pushing other people to follow the same way and ritual so that it can uplift everyone and like create that rising tide. ⚠
Brad
Yeah. So I mean, this— thank you. That's something I was emphasizing yesterday in one of my ethics classes that— actually used podcasts in there too— that the podcast assignment is an ethical act. How you schedule it is an ethical act. How you engage with others is an ethical act. Whether you come prepared or expect others to kind of carry the load more, all these things are ethical acts. But really just expanding on building on both of these ideas that every action then is an ethical act, right? Even an inaction is an ethical act. Um, and so, um, yeah, great. Yeah, Kellen. ⚠
Student
And I think I— when I was reading this, I took it as one of those moments where, uh, the Gita is saying more about the present and how we have to kind of interpret it within the present and how we probably need more leaders who are willing to lead with wisdom and detachment and kind of outside of personal gain. And we're kind of lacking that as a society, I would say, right now. So I don't know, I just took it from that lens too. ⚠
Brad
Yeah, word. Yeah, absolutely. Danny?
Student
Yeah, also when I was reading chapter 6, I don't want to jump back too much.
Brad
That's okay. They're all integrated.
Student
Yeah. I read the first verse which said the Blessed Lord said, not depending on the fruit of action, he who performs the action that is to be done, he is a renouncer. And the disciplined one, not he who is without fire and without rites. And so I kind of took this as your state of mind is more important than the result of the action itself. And it connects back to Chapter 3 of how we don't want to be dependent on the result of our action. We want to make sure that, like, the state of our mind without the actions is okay as well, even though, like, obviously action is important. But Krishna kind of teaches here that true renunciation and discipline are defined by one's internal attitude towards action rather than your life choices externally. ⚠
Brad
Excellent. Yeah, so your intentions matter, but also your actions matter, right? And so your actions should inform your intentions. Your knowledge matters, so you got to do your due diligence, right? But even if you do your due diligence and you have good intentions, sometimes you're going to take an action and things don't happen the way you thought, right? You do all your due diligence and research in something, and then the president sends a tweet, and then stock just drops, and you're like, what the— you know, right? Whatever. So, like, you don't know what's going to happen. You can't control everything, but your intentions still do matter, right? So your intentions matter, your knowledge matters, but at some point you just got to, like, let it go, right? And say, all right, I've got to take an action. I think this is the right one. But I have to be somewhat detached from like what happens and sort of be in the moment, right? Yeah. Christine. ⚠
22:10

The Three Paths: Karma, Jñāna, and Bhakti Yoga

Student
That kind of reminds me of the later chapters. So again, not to jump ahead. ⚠
Brad
Yeah, that's fine.
Student
Integrated because either 7 or 9, but it's like the way to move forward is always to like have that self-discipline. ⚠
Student
I was talking about like the karmic cycle of rebirth.
Brad
Now you have these two pathways, but the most important part is always discipline.
Student
So it's kind of like you can't really control these like actions and things that are happening, but just like if you maintain that discipline, then you're on the right path.
Brad
Yeah, great. So then we've got these three paths, right? The path of Karma, the path of knowledge, or Jñāna, and the path of devotion. So the path of devotion, you could say, is really about your intentions, right? So I mean, you want to approach things with love and devotion. The path of Karma then is really about discipline, right? In order to perform the rituals, You've got to read all of these things. You've got to have good grammar. You've got to focus on the text. There's so many things. You've got to memorize all the scriptures, number one, and then do all these things which require— there's a high bar. So you've got to be a very disciplined kind of person that memorizes the vocab and does this and does that. All those sort of discipline things. And at the end of the day, he's saying, like, maybe the ritual sacrifices don't matter that much. What matters is the discipline that you learned from all of that hard work, right? So it's like, I was talking to another professor the other day, talking about admissions, college admissions and stuff like that. ⚠
Brad
And we were like, you know, the whole like SAT, GRE thing, it's all just like, what is it even? What are we testing and that kind of stuff? Because at the end of the day, it's just like, did you take this prep course? Did you learn these Did you jump through these hoops kind of stuff? Like, really what it's showing is that you're the kind of person that like does your work, right? Does your duty, like is disciplined, stays on track. And ultimately, whether you know, you know, this vocabulary, that vocabulary for the SAT or GRE doesn't really matter, but it shows that you're the kind of person that has discipline, right? Which then does lead to differing outcomes. Right on. Great. Anyone? Yeah, Kellen. ⚠
Student
Yeah, kind of going off that, a quote or a part that I really like from chapter 3, verse 35 is, "Your own duty done imperfectly is better than all man's done well." Yeah. I think just kind of hearing that is nice to hear because even if you don't necessarily succeed at everything, you're doing it like your own way, you're doing it within your own self. And not kind of— don't compare yourself to other people as much because what they're doing isn't necessarily your duty. And from one of the commentaries I read, I think it was brought up from Rāmānuja. Yeah. Even if you fail in one birth, that doesn't matter. And it kind of just helps in the next birth that you just keep pushing forward. ⚠
Brad
So like steadily making improvements, right? And so even not just like, hey, I'm going to do my best in this class, or I'm going to do my best in this school, or I'm going to do my best in this degree, but I'm going to do my best in this life. And maybe I'm not perfect, but I'm going to keep advancing, keep building. That particular verse, 335, it's one of the most— I mean, there's so many famous verses from the text, but that one's definitely up there. And in part super famous because Gandhi quoted that when he declined to run for president of India, to be the first president or prime minister of India. And he said, this is not my duty. This is not right. Literally quoted that verse. And yeah, it's not, it's not for me to do. Great. Yeah. Did you have your— ⚠
Student
Yeah, I mean, I was just kind of going to reiterate what you were saying there with a quote from chapter 4, verse 32. It says like many forms of sacrifice expand toward the infinite spirit, which is kind of like that liberation and achieving Mokṣa. Know that the source of them all is action, and you will be free. So kind of again, that same idea of, you know, through action you're building up and you're building on, and through that sacrifice, you're, you know, going to that liberation. You eventually break the cycle of rebirth. ⚠
Brad
Okay, yeah, right, right on. I want to point out two quick things about Chapter 3 and then push forward. One is right at the beginning, Yeah, probably could use other chapters to illustrate this, but one of the things that we learned from the Katha Upanishad, right, the reason that Yama praises Naciketas is because he's like, you know, it's such a gift for a teacher to have an outstanding student, and an outstanding student is one who asks the right kind of questions, right? Asks good questions. It's not— you don't necessarily want the student that like knows everything. Actually, you want the student that asks good questions. And so Arjuna's role throughout the Gita often is just to ask good questions, right? So he's not the coldest beer in the fridge. He kind of doesn't understand a lot of things, right? He's a little bit like the disciples in the Gospel of Mark. Like, he doesn't always get it, but he's always trying. He's always asking good questions. And he asks really plain, like, really straightforward, like, hey, "Tell me this," right? Straight up. ⚠
26:30

Commentary on Chapters 3 and 4: Sacrifice and Knowledge

Brad
So, and the typical pattern, it's not 100% followed, but for most of the chapters of the Gita, beginning with chapter 3 and through the end, is usually Arjuna will begin the chapter and Arjuna will ask a question, and then Krishna's answer is, you know, long and complex and not clear, but usually Arjuna asks a very clear question. Let's quickly look at his question right from the beginning. And I think Zayner does a nice job of capturing Arjuna's question. So Arjuna said, if you think that the contemplative life of a soul is loftier course than the mere performance of acts, then why do you command me to do a cruel deed? You confuse my soul, or so it seems, with distinctly muddled words. Tell me, with authority the one simple way whereby I can attain the better part. When you read that, tell me with authority it's hard to think that Zaner, who's a Catholic priest, didn't have Mark in mind, right? But so anyway, right, you got the question. So he's saying, you're saying that on the one hand you've got the path of knowledge. Knowledge is better, right? ⚠
Brad
On the other hand, that path of action is better? Which one is it, right? And it's like when Mr. Meeseeks tells Jerry that he's got to, you know, choke up on— he's got to relax and also like keep his shoulders straight when he's trying to improve his golf swing. And, you know, Mr. Meeseeks is like, you got to do both, Jerry, not just one. The other thing— sorry, it's a Rick and Morty reference. The other thing is verses 20 through 25 Actually, mostly just 20 and 25. So this is a well-known set of verses which we've already looked at. But the question of motivation comes in, like, why would a liberated person act? What's the motivation, right? If you've sort of jettisoned or gotten rid of all of your desires, if you're Krishna and you have fulfilled, right, nothing attained, nothing unattained, and nothing to be attained, then what is the motivation? What is the motivating factor to take any action at all? And so twice Krishna uses this word, lokasangraha. You can see in the Gemini translation, loka means both people and world. ⚠
Brad
Like we can say when we say like the world feels this thing or the world thinks this thing, what we really mean is the people in the world means that, right? So this is— loka can mean the world, but it really kind of means the people in the world. And sangraha— sang means together and graha means to grasp. So it's sort of like loka sangraha, holding all the people together. I don't know, I always think of this like, I don't know, it's like the church and this people, and there's all the people. So it's like holding the— it's very hands-on, holding things together. So sort of like— does that make sense? Yeah. Cool. All right, great. Let's move on to chapter 4. Right, so here the question. So what's the question that— so Arjuna, we started out with Krishna talking, but then in verse 4, Arjuna asks his question, right? So Arjuna said, later is your birth and earlier was Bhishma's. How should we understand this, that you proclaimed it at the beginning, right? ⚠
Brad
In other words, what do you mean, like, you 'Andrew, you can't— what do you mean you taught it from the beginning? I know that you weren't here, you're younger than me, you're my age or whatever, so how could it be that you— what do you mean?' You know what I'm saying? He's saying— and then Krishna then gives this explanation of himself as an avatar, right? And uses that word. Yeah, so let's, let's hear from you on chapter 4. Anybody have any verses they want to draw attention to in chapter 4? Yeah, Kaelin. ⚠
Student
Verse 20, this kind of goes back to when we were talking about discipline before. It says, having abandoned attachment to the fruit of action, eternally satisfied and without dependence Even when fully engaged in action, he does not do anything at all. So that kind of like discipline with action where yes, you are performing actions and like you're completely— you can't avoid it, but you're like, because of how disciplined you are, you're not actually really doing any actions. You're not like thinking about it and thinking about, oh, if I do this, this is what I'm gonna get in return. It's just like something that naturally happens, you're not trying to control it. ⚠
Brad
Good. Great. Yeah. Yeah, Claire.
Student
I really like the metaphor kind of in verse 4.37 about like the fire being knowledge and reducing all your past actions. I was like a little confused about it just because you talk so much about doing actions and doing it with the right intention. And then to just say like, oh, it's like having knowledge, which is like destroying ignorance, will reduce all of your actions to ashes kind of confused me. But then the commentary I read kind of was like, oh, the actions, like the firewood is still there, but now it's ashes. So it's like impotent actions. ⚠
Brad
Yeah.
Student
But you like can't be pulled down by that when you go into like another life. Like you can still learn from it. It's like the purifier, but I was still really confused on why you would like destroy all of that but then still keep it there.
Brad
Yeah, excellent. Great. I think these two ideas can go well together, right? And thank you for bringing in the commentators there too, because I think verses like this, you know, there's almost something we're missing, right? There's like an aspect of it that we kind of really need a commentary on. So from a mimamsa perspective, right, we talked about mimamsa and perform the Karma marga, right? So Karma marga means performance of the rituals. In order to perform a ritual, first thing is you have to meet the requirements, right? So Lily has to meet the requirements in order to perform the ritual, and then if Lily does meet the requirements, whether she knows it or not, it's your responsibility to do it, right? You have an obligation to do it. One of the requirements in most cases, not every case, but in most of the cases for the karmas, one of the requirements is you have to have some desire, right? So if you're a person who desires this, then you're supposed to do this ritual. If you're a person who desires this, you're supposed to do this ritual, right? ⚠
Brad
And so some of the commentators, Prabhakara in particular comes to mind, says that, you know, the whole point of the rituals is actually to get rid of your desires, right? So like, if you have this desire, then you should perform this ritual, and this ritual involves throwing things into the fire, and that fire, that ritual is always going to end in ashes, right? So like, I have this strong desire for X, so I'm going to perform this ritual because it says perform this ritual if you have this desire for X. That ritual is always going to end in ashes, me just sort of staring at the ashes, right? So can that have an impact on my desires, right? So sort of burning up my desires and that sort of thing. So that could be one way to look at it, right? That the ritual, ritual sacrifices are always going to end in ashes. But the whole point of performing a ritual sacrifice is because it's supposed to do something, right? It's supposed to have some important impact. So on the one hand, we could say, well, the impact is that my desires end in ashes. ⚠
Brad
I burn up my desires. Right? But on the other hand, you know, then I should have some other objective, something else to achieve, and then maybe, you know, bringing in the verse that Kalyn and the idea that Kalyn brought in. Right? Which I just, when you when you're reading it, it just seems to me like law of conservation of matter and energy, right? Nothing— when you zoom out far enough, everything is just matter and energy being constantly transformed, right? So even burning, you know, burning wood, right? The wood is matter, and then it's turning into energy, right? Which is the fire and the flames and the heat and the light, all that kind of stuff. And then it's going to end in ashes, right? But it's really just transforming the material into energy, right? So it's still— when you zoom out far enough, you're just kind of transforming clay from one thing into another, right? Everything is just a means of transformation. So then the question is, are we— does the form matter, right? Does it matter what are we trying to do, right? ⚠
Brad
And so if the— If the goal then is justice, and not justice for me, but justice for everyone, then I want to eliminate my selfish personal desires, right, by burning those, kind of having those end in ashes. But I want to use my efforts to transform the world, which may mean, right, I mean, it's going to be— I can't transform nothing. So I have to transform what's there, which means I have to destroy some form in order to transform it into some other form. Hopefully a form, like Kellan was saying, that's better than it was before. So I can transform— maybe every— to exist is to engage in action. To exist means I have to transform the world. I have to eat, which is destroying brahman in order to turn it into Brad, and Brad's energy, that kind of stuff. That's going to happen whether I'm doing anything worthwhile with my energy or not, right? So the question is, am I transforming that into something more, you know, beneficial or good, more just, more equitable? Eva, and then Brent. ⚠
Student
Yeah, I think that, like, that concept of things are constantly changing, and like Krishna's kind of implying that things, like, evolve through time. And I was looking at 4:13 when it mentions, like, the four different classes And I was wondering if he's also kind of indicating like, wow, he created this, like it is something that should be evolved through time, or is that like something more strict that it is the way it is? ⚠
Brad
Yeah, great question. So here again, we might zoom in and zoom out, right? So remember at the beginning, one of Arjuna's objections is like, hey, if we engage in this civil war, then the caste system is going to break down and everything's going to be mixed up and we won't know who's in which caste or whatever. And Krishna is like, well, that doesn't even matter, right? Like, why? That's so irrelevant to everything, right? And here he's saying, you know, I created these and still saying it doesn't matter, right? So one of the things I want to really emphasize, this great opportunity to emphasize, is that nowhere in the scriptures does it say that there's any connection between your birth and your caste or your place in society, right? So in order to have a functioning society, let's admit that we have to have people that are teachers, right? We have to have people that are spiritual guides. We have to have people that are in some sort of, you know, police enforcement, government agencies, that kind of stuff, right? Military and governance, right?
Brad
You have to have somebody that's in the merchants and craftspeople and creators and all that kind of stuff, right? Business people, that kind of stuff. And you have to have people that are farming and doing labor, right? Don't you need all of those things in order to have a functioning society? And so he's saying, you know, I mean, all of these are what society is. So if we zoom out, there's no preference for like, oh, you want to be this part of society or that part of society. Society, all of it's brahmin, right? So they're all equal. And so he's saying, you know, we've got to approach all aspects of society. But he's not saying that you are this caste or that caste because of your birth. In fact, he's quite explicitly saying not, right? That this is how Arjuna is thinking at the beginning. And Krishna's like, bro, that does not even matter, right? ⚠
Brad
Even after we mix all the whoever your family was or whoever your family was or, you know, you belong to this socioeconomic class or whatever, you know, what matters is what your gifts are, what your callings are, and recognizing that we need all of these aspects of society, all these roles fulfilled. Yeah, Brent. ⚠
Student
I wanted to point out 432, and it's kind of on that same theme you were talking about with Action.
Brad
Yeah, everything's action.
Student
But it says many forms of sacrifice expand towards the infinite spirit. Know that the source of them all is action, and you'll be free. So it's kind of talking about where there's a lot of different sacrifices, and the— there's a lot of material ways to look at that sacrifice, but really what's rooted in them all is that action. And when you understand, like, that's what the point of the sacrifice is, and that working with that action is actually what's setting you free from samsara, then that's kind of when you're free, when you understand that. So seeing that, like, it's an explicit way to say it. ⚠
Brad
Yeah, great. And we could connect that directly to what Kallan was saying also, you know, that the goal then isn't to like, okay, Brent's going to take some action and then everything's going to be perfect in the world, right? But instead, hey, Brent's going to take some action and hopefully Brent's actions will make the world a little bit better, right? And then Aidan's actions will make the world a little bit better. And Evan's actions— you get the idea, right? So everybody's kind of like moving the bar a little bit more towards equality and a little bit more towards justice, which is all going to be— yeah. And so then every action is contributing to or, you know, taking away from justice and equality. Right on. I saw in— yeah, so I think a couple folks wanted to talk about— oh wait, 629 is not in Chapter 4, is it? Yeah, that's fine. Any other things from Chapter 4? ⚠
Student
Yeah, I thought a quote too, on like, um, verse 30, it was interesting. And I think to me it kind of stuck out because looking back at the Gospel of Mark, um, kind of the phrasing from stolen milk was a little bit similar. And what I was saying, exhausting sins, it says like others restricting their food, offered breasts and vital breaths. And then the second part was, all these understand sacrifice and sacrifice exhaust their sins. And so like, that just stuck out to me, the sacrifice exhausts their sins, because it talked a lot about how we're, you know, we're sacrificing. And obviously Jesus is the suffering servant who is sacrificing himself for the sins of the people. So that kind of, to me, like, stuck out phrasing-wise. ⚠
Brad
Yeah, great. I mean, so eating is a form of sacrifice, even breathing, right? So breathing in and out, there's a lot about breath through these chapters. And even that is connected with the yajnas or the sacrifices.
Student
Great.
Brad
Yeah, Danny.
Student
4:39 stuck out to me in the Jñāna translation.
Student
It says, "With senses controlled." And that reminded me, that brought me back to the chariot analogy that we talked about.
Brad
For sure.
Student
Um, you know, like controlling your senses, that it— this here, or this verse specifically, didn't mention the word action, but controlling your senses in a way is an act, and it's something that you choose to do and put attention towards. So I kind of just connected this.
Brad
Excellent. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, the Chariot, Alec— I mean, it takes place on a chariot, right? So really important to keep remembering that And so if you think about, you know, in the chariot allegory from Katha Upanishad, the senses are drawn towards the paths of senses, right? The paths are the objects of sensation. And those objects— I was just teaching in my philosophy class. I teach so many classes. But my philosophy class right now, we're studying the Phaedrus dialogue. And in the great speech Socrates gives gives this allegory of a chariot. Crazy, right? I wonder why I picked it. But in that allegory of the chariot, right, again thinking that like we're drawn towards things that are immediate, things that are right in front of us, right, things that are in our local vicinity, right? But if we try to zoom out and see the bigger picture, which requires Jñāna or seeing things from a bigger perspective, then we're not going to be drawn like the chariot, right? Like the uncontrolled horses that just go towards whatever's right in front of you, right? And but instead, you know, kind of zoom out and— yeah, excellent. ⚠
Brad
Anything else from Chapter 4? Really quickly, verse 24, so chapter 4, verse 24. It's a really beautiful verse. I used to have it memorized in Sanskrit, but I don't at the moment. But the author— so here, where all of this language is taken directly from the rituals, right, from the ritual sacrifices. But taking every part of the ritual sacrifice and saying it's all Brahman, right? So the oblation, the offering, the thing that's thrown into the fire, that's Brahman. The oblation, that's also— yeah, I'm not sure the difference being made there— is Brahman poured by Brahman. So, like, remember the video I showed of them? You know, they have the long ladle, right? And so the things that you're putting into the fire are Brahman, but also even the ladle is Brahman, right? So that's actually the word that's used there is the ladle. The fire is Brahman, and Brahman alone is to be attained by him who's absorbed in that Karma, the action of Brahman. So just taking everything and attributing, you know, saying every part of it is the whole, right, the one. ⚠
Brad
One last thing, if we roll back to the beginning of Chapter 4, so for, well, most of this from 4:7 up to 4:11, right, Arjuna's question, remember, is like, what do you mean you were born, right? Like, I remember you were born, you're born, you know, You're born just like I was born, so what do you mean you're like eternal? And Krishna is like, okay, so I'm an incarnation, or I'm an avatara of vishnu, right? And I descend, or I descend, yeah, verse 407, right? Whenever duty declines, whenever there's a— whenever of duty a decline occurs O descendant of Bharata, and a rising up of adharma, right? Whenever dharma decreases and adharma increases, I send myself forth for the protection of the good, for the destruction of the evildoers, for the sake of establishing dharma. I come into age, I come into being from age to age. He who knows my divine birth and Karma, thus in truth, having abandoned the body, he does not go to rebirth. But instead be absorbed in me, take refuge in me, verse 10. ⚠
Brad
And then verse 11, in whatever way they approach me, exactly in that way do I favor them. Men follow my path in every way, right? So two things here. On one end, Krishna is saying, anytime there's injustice, anytime injustice increases and justice decreases, I'm gonna take form, right? I'm gonna come to the rescue, but not necessarily to like manifest and take up the sword myself or whatever, but instead I'm going to appear in whatever way most benefits, you know, most conducive to like Dani understanding, right? And not just Dani understanding, but like what is it What is Dany's role here, right? And so I'm going to appear— I being God— I'm going to appear to Dany in the way that is most conducive to Dany's understanding for the purpose of helping Dany understand what her role is in pursuing justice and attacking injustice or fighting against it. Cool. All right, let's move on to chapter 5 then. So here again we've got Arjuna's question right at the beginning. Here too I circled Zaner's translation for this one. ⚠
50:08

Chapters 5 and 6: Renunciation, Self-Discipline, and the Chariot Analogy

Brad
So right at the beginning Arjuna said, "Renounce all works such as the course you recommend, and then you say—" perform works, right? Which one is it? Which one is it, right? He's like I said, he's not like a super genius, you know? I mean, he's just a bro. And he's like, you're confusing me. You're telling me to renounce all Karma and then you're saying do Karma. Which one is it, right? And again, Mr. Meeseeks, it's like, it's both, Jerry. Sorry, I just decided I'm watching all you know, 9— all 8 seasons of Rick and Morty again because season 9 comes out on May 24th. And so I'm gonna be— got it. Anyway, who wants to talk about chapter 5? Yeah, Claire. ⚠
Student
Kind of was talking about like the difference between an ego-centered and a more process-centered looking at something. It's like, oh, I'm eating for pleasure, I'm eating for whatever, and then switching that to like the body is eating and like my senses— like it's a sense object like interacting with my senses. I kind of like that just because it made it like help my switch my perspective on like we're looking at like constant desire of things. Yeah. And how it's like you— like I myself am wanting to eat is not real, or it's like I want to eat but then it's really my senses. Like how you can stop being controlled by your senses and like that division. ⚠
Brad
Yeah, so almost saying seeing your body as like a conduit, right? Almost like a crystal, right? And so the light the light of the divine shines through you and through your senses and that kind of stuff, but not so much as a means to an end, but just as— or maybe only as a means to an end. Yeah, maybe. Yeah, great. Yeah, Eva? ⚠
Student
Kind of going right into that, to like 5:10, it kind of was saying like if you get rid of all like selfless attachment, it will be unstained by evil. And I was kind I was kind of thinking, is that almost too much to promise to anyone? I think, yes, ideally you will not have any hardship or sinful evil in your life, but I was kind of thinking, how would that be seen in the real world where it's constantly hard things? ⚠
Brad
Yeah, because we are judged by the outcomes of our actions, right? And so maybe that is the answer, right? That the world is still going to judge us by the outcome of our actions. But that doesn't mean that we did the wrong thing, right? So I mean, if you're approaching— I mean, we're going to do things. We're going to take— you are all going to take actions that end up with results that are quite different than you anticipated, right? Probably you already have, right? And so the question isn't like, oh, the outcome was bad, therefore you did the wrong thing. Thing, right? That may be how others look at it, but here Krishna is saying, you know, I'm gonna have a bigger perspective, right? I know that Eva has the right intentions. That matters, right? And Eva did her due diligence and tried to do the right thing, and then, you know, things didn't turn out the way Eva was thinking, but that's not Eva's job. Eva did Eva's job, right? Which is to have the right intentions, and do your due diligence, right? None of this is saying don't think about the outcomes. ⚠
Brad
It's saying think about the outcomes, but recognize that even no matter how much due diligence you do, the outcomes are not always going to be what you expect them to be, right? And so you're not sort of saddled with sin as a result of that. And you shouldn't feel guilty about doing that. You did your best. Thing, right? Yeah. Yeah. I'm going further on the same note. ⚠
Student
In 5:12, the second half of the Solar Meliodas, the undisciplined man is in bondage attached to the fruit of his desire. And yeah, I think it was in chapter 2 that it said like, do not be attached to desire because desire leads to anger and like all these things. So it's like when you're not worried about like what you're saying the actual outcome and you're really only worried about like what you can do and what's in your control, right? Then you don't have that anger and all the negative feelings of when something doesn't go your way. And then that's kind of like the release from samskara and you are kind of at peace because you are happy with, I did everything I could, did the best I could, right? ⚠
Brad
Yeah. Approach it with the right attitude. Again, you got to do your due diligence, right? And then there's no— you're not absolved of the responsibility to anticipate what your actions are going to, you know, what results are going to come from your actions. But you don't want to be attached. You don't want to do it only for those actions. And sometimes you do something and, yeah, good. Well said. Others? Yeah, Kali? ⚠
Student
Verse 16, I liked the use of the sun to talk about knowledge. So when ignorance is destroyed by knowledge of the self, then the sun knowledge illumines ultimate reality. I just— I thought that was a very interesting way to put it. The sun— it's like ignorance is like darkness. And so once the knowledge breaks through, it's like the light, and you like see something for what it truly is. It's not obscured by anything. There's no, like, shadows. ⚠
Brad
Excellent, great. Yeah, and so we could also, um, a few directions we could go with that. One would be to tie it back to the Haranyagarbha Sutta that we did at the beginning of the semester, right? The golden, uh, the golden orb, which is the sun, right? And I think one of the quiz questions I asked there was like the non-duality between the sun and the rays of the sun, right? And then so understanding that the rays of the sun are the sun, right? And so if the sun represents truth, justice, goodness, or the divine, then the rays are also that, right? And then so we want to remove ignorance of the self, right? Is destroyed by knowledge. Remember I think it was the first upanishad we read that began that chapter by giving Shankara's interpretation of upanishad, which is that which destroys knowledge. I mean, knowledge destroys ignorance. Knowledge removes ignorance, like cleaning a glass, right? So, or cleaning glasses. The point is, is to be able to be kind of like a conduit, right? So again, let those rays shine through. So almost like getting out of the way, right? ⚠
Brad
There's a great 20th century Christian theologian, Karl Barth, who said, you know, let go and let God. Just like get out of the way, right? Be a conduit. Be like a clear glass and let those rays shine through. Right on. Good. Anything else from chapter 5? Yes, Ayana. ⚠
Student
Going back to the beginning of chapter 5, I thought it was interesting in the story in my translation, it started with like armed for discipline. And I thought it was like interesting that they used the word like armed because it like sort of like noted the idea that it was like a defense. And that sort of like goes into what we were talking about, about like defending I guess, yourself from being susceptible to, like, all these desires that could, like, make you, like, unhappy and do things where you're not liking. ⚠
Brad
Yeah, great. And I mean, that's a great verse, right? Armed with discipline, he purifies and subdues the self, masters his— it's unclear what the self there— it's probably not— I mean, it's not a capital S self, right? Masters his senses, so it's sort of like the chariot allegory there, and unites himself with the self of all creatures. So again, kind of zooming out there. Yeah, great. Thanks, Iona. Yeah, Kellen? ⚠
Student
Yeah, just coupling that with 5.06, saying that in order to truly renounce something or go through renunciation, you need to have some spiritual exercise, so you still need to act in order to kind of rid yourself of all things that you don't want to act on. ⚠
Brad
Yeah, great. Okay, awesome. All right, let's push into 6. We're doing well here. Do we have— we don't seem to have Krishna We don't seem to have Arjuna asking a question in this chapter.
Student
Yeah, Danny? A verse that stood out to me was 6.05, the bottom half of the Jñāna translation, for the self alone is the friend of the self, and the self alone is the enemy of the self. This stuck out to me because obviously it says that the self can be one's friend or enemy. The friend, if it's a friend who conquered it, and then, and those who haven't. And this kind of goes back to how you are in control of your state of mind, and that influences kind of how you perceive the world through your senses and how you kind of manage the forces in your chariot and the strength of your mind. And it just goes back to how you can act, like choose to act and choose to think in a way that allows you to like view the world or experience it very differently. ⚠
Brad
Yeah, and viewing it very differently because you begin to see your neighbor as yourself, right? So not just loving your neighbor the way you love yourself, but loving your neighbor because your neighbor is your very self, right? And so zooming out and understanding, uplift the self by the self, which should not degrade the self for the self alone. There again, that— this verse, right, it's just atman all over it. So it's like, uh, grammatically very interesting because it's basically the word atman but in all these different grammatical forms. Yeah, Lauren? ⚠
Student
The same verse, like 6.5 and 6.6, to me, like with that kind of the struggle is internal and not external, and like the biggest obstacle is in your mind and like how to get to like liberation and Mokṣa. ⚠
Brad
Yeah, great. So just again, sort of removing the barriers, right? If we take knowledge as of removing ignorance, then what I'm really removing is the barriers between I and not I, yourself and not self. Yeah, excellent. Yeah, Castilia?
Student
Yeah, I think that something that kind of sums up the whole chapter was like, for me, was verse 6.29, where it talks about how instead of just talking about discipline and what discipline means, it kind of speaks to what Krishna is saying, how the life take what you understand in this plan and actually like actionize it. And like, I— and like looking at the commentary and whatnot, um, it talks about how like this is like the idea of like vision of sameness, and it gave like an analogy to like better understand it. And it's like the common denominator idea, and I think that that like made it easier for me to understand just the idea that like every person that you meet, you have to look at and understand that like there's something in every everyone that is the same as you. And if you all— if you look at everyone with like that common denominator, or having that common denominator, then you're better able to understand like their struggle, understand them as a person, like have what was described here as like radical empathy. ⚠
Student
And, um, it also talks about that and saying— I think this relates a lot to what we were talking about earlier in the other chapters, um, about empathy and social justice, because it's talking about how, um, like the inequalities belong to like your body and not to the self, because if everyone has like that same self, then there is no inequality there. So I just thought that was like a really good way to think about it, and again, like, to put it into like the modern world. I think like if more people understood that, it would like help out a lot. ⚠
Brad
I mean, amen. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, right on. Um, excellent. This is also one of the most famous verses from the, from the Gita. Anybody else have more?
Student
Yeah.
Student
Kind of going off of the relying on yourself idea, 6.09 I found interesting. It says he is set apart by his disinterest towards comrades, allies, enemies, neutrals, long-distance foes, friends, good and evil men. And I found it interesting because I feel like we focused a lot on relationships throughout the semester. And now it's telling us that you can be set apart if you're not interested in those outward relationships with other people. ⚠
Brad
Yeah, so again, it's not that those relationships don't matter at all, but that you're kind of zooming out, right? So you're interested in some— in a bigger form of justice, right? And yeah, excellent.
Student
Yeah, Kaylin?
Student
I thought like verse 16 was interesting where it says like, discipline is not for one who Eats too much, one for one who does not eat at all, and kind of things on that idea. And how usually people will think of discipline as an extreme. Yeah. It's an extreme to one end or another, but it's not. It's more of a middle ground. Yeah. And not like, oh, I'm not doing any of this at all, or I'm only doing this. It's like you find that middle ground to meet at. ⚠
Brad
Excellent. Great. Yeah, question.
Student
Arjuna asks Krishna, what do I do if I don't have this ascendant realm? How can I become virtuous and whatnot and reach and understand you? And Krishna reaffirms that any honor that you have and you leave virtue in any way, you're on the path to understanding and becoming part of him. Again, back to the whole cycle of birth and rebirth. This was talked about a lot in this chapter, maybe like 7 or 8. But if you are kind of off the track in your first life, you can eventually get around to understanding. But once you understand Krishna, that cycle stops because now you've reached something. And I think that's like the zoom out. Once you zoom out, you can't really distinguish anything clearly. And that's the whole idea of like, once you zoom out, you can't distinguish person from person. And that's because like everyone is the same. So I think it was all connected like in these few chapters about like what we've been talking about all year, but also how to think about it in terms of like our own lives and how to look at everyone else. ⚠
Student
So I think like the perspective here was like more emphasized and I think it made it easier to understand.
Brad
Excellent, great. Yeah, Ellie.
Student
Going off that in 6.47, you talked a lot about the discipline and how you have to have discipline with action and everything. But this is, I think, one of the times when we see you also need to have faith. And it says the faithful man devoted to me with his inner self, I deem the most disciplined. So as much as you have to have the discipline, you have to have a little bit of unknowing and also have faith in the fact that you might not understand everything. ⚠
Student
Yeah. Tying it together also with Mark as well, where we've looked at those.
Brad
Yeah, thank you. A few times in the Gita, a few times in the Gita, Krishna says, like, it's not your job to understand all of these things, right? It's your job to be you, right? And so, so, you know, I understand all these things, and because I understand all these things, I understand that it's your job to be you, right? And so, like, again, you still have to do your due diligence. You still have to, you know, make your best effort. You have to have the right intentions and all those kind of things. But, like, it's not up for you to understand everything, right? So when you zoom out far enough— I mean, you can't zoom out as far as I can because I'm God, right? So, you know, and then we will see in chapter 11 Gave a little foreshadowing of this last Tuesday. But in Chapter 11, we zoom out all the way. And then Arjuna is like, I can't take this. Zoom back in, please. Right? Yeah. Great. Lauren? ⚠
Student
Kind of about the same thing we've talked about, just like being mentioned a couple of times. But in 6.40, it says, like, for the one who does good works, my friend goes with evil dust. ⚠
Brad
And it's the same kind of idea of like, even little attempts matter. It's less like about perfection and more Yeah, and that's even, right, so then if we zoom out far enough, then maybe we even understand that like Lauren and the person that Lauren's going like head-to-head with, maybe they're both doing their duty, right? Maybe we save this battle and he doesn't want to go into battle because his teachers are on the other side and his uncles are on the other side. There's good people on the other side, right? And so maybe Krishna is saying Yeah, there are good people on the other side, and they're doing what they're supposed— they're doing their dharma, right? Because people follow them, they're setting an example for others to follow, that you have to do your duty even if the, you know, if you're like a general in the army or something, at some point you have to follow the chain of command, right? And so if you're following the chain of command and the command is immoral or unjust, sometimes it's still your duty to follow it, right? ⚠
Brad
And so knowing knowing your place in the system and knowing what your duty is. Your duty might be different given where you are within the system sort of thing, right? And so you still have to do your duty, but that doesn't mean that the person you're fighting against is not doing their duty. Good. Others? Anything else from— did anybody else have anything more on 6:29? I thought I saw it come up a couple of times, but maybe not. That's fine. 6:29 is Ramayana. We first encountered it in Ramayana early in the semester, but yeah, seeing all To be honest, I don't love any of these three translations of that verse, but, um, seeing the self in all beings and all beings in the self, um, I mean, that's, that's the goal, right? Or 6:30, he who sees me everywhere and sees all in me, uh, for him I'm not lost and he's not lost to me. So yeah, good. Anything else on Chapter 6? We move to Chapter 7. I don't think we'll make it all the way to Chapter 9, but we're making good time. And yeah, anything on Chapter 7? ⚠
1:09:48

Chapter 7: Krishna's Nature, Evolution, and Individuality

Brad
Anybody want to jump in here? Yeah, Castalia?
Student
I just thought one part that was interesting is when Krishna talks about the complete process of evolution. And one of them— well, first, they're all like the four— I'm forgetting what people refer to as, but like earth, water, fire, wind, four elements. And then it's space, mind, understanding, and individuality. And I thought the individuality part was interesting Because I know we talked a lot about earlier on what I just said before about seeing yourself in everybody. ⚠
Student
Does that take away from that individuality?
Student
And I think here it's pretty explicitly saying that it doesn't if it's a part of Krishna. So I think we have to rethink about how we look at that whole, if you see yourself in everybody, and it's more yourself, but not everything about you, and not the way in which you're supposed to— do things in the world, and that like more refers back to like your role in society and like what your impact is going to be. And how even though if you're all made up of the same thing, that doesn't mean that that thing is like actionized in the same way as everyone else. So I thought that was interesting and it kind of like tied together like some of those earlier conversations we had. ⚠
Brad
Those very important conversations that we had earlier. Yeah, so that perpetual question of individuality, particularity, what makes Castalia, Castalia, right? So we could say, yeah, everything about Castalia is brahmin, but that includes especially the things that is totally unique to you. Yeah. And so then we could say, like, why was, you know, brahmin shaped into Castalia? The answer to that has to have something to do with Castalia's, like, individuality, right? So yeah, absolutely. Great. ⚠
Student
Yeah, connecting to that The verse after 7.05 says, this is my lower nature, know my higher nature to be the life force that sustains this universe. And then reading on to 7.10, then the verse says, know me, Arjuna, as every creature's timeless seed. And so I kind of interpreted the timeless seed being mentioned as that life force that sustains the universe, which goes back to the chapter earlier where The sun was brought up, and so that reading from earlier in the semester about the sun and the embryo of the egg and then the seed, about how, you know, like he's kind of saying here, I'm the timeless seed, but then earlier there was the sun, and so it just connects back to all three and how it's all about the universe and individuality and how everything stems from that concept. ⚠
Brad
Excellent. Yeah, very good. Yeah, Lauren?
Student
I thought 7.08 was interesting because it says like, I have this taste in the water. It kind of reminded me of the salt in the water. Yeah. Kind of like the divine is present in everything. ⚠
Brad
I can still taste salt in the water, but you can't see it. Yeah. Good. Which also might remind us of the salt from— Gospel of Mark too, the enigmatic salt verses. Others? Okay, I think, all right, so we can take the last minute or two just looking ahead. So, for Thursday, right? So we'll read Mark's Gospel. And our focus— so it's Mark 11 through 13. So smaller chunks now. And yeah, 13 is the great apocalyptic vision. So 13 is a key chapter there. I mean, all of them are. And then, so yeah, I'd love— maybe take a minute to chat with your team as you're packing up about who's going to lead discussion, be discussion leader for the two remaining marks. Yeah. ⚠

THEO 1432: The Religious Quest · Brad Bannon · Boston College

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