The Bhagavad Gita message of letting go of the fruits of one’s actions is just as relevant today as it was when it was first written.
The Gita is the sixth book of the Mahabharata, one of India’s most famous epic poems. It’s unclear exactly when the Gita was composed, but a number of scholars suggest it was completed around 200 CE and then inserted into the larger work; many see it as the first fully realized yogic scripture. Curious though it may seem that such an ancient text from a foreign culture has been so enthusiastically received by Westerners, the Gita, like all truly great works of literature, can be read on many levels.
For those who haven’t had the pleasure of reading it, the Gita recounts a dialogue between Arjuna, one of five Pandava princes, and the Hindu deity Krishna, who in this epic serves as Arjuna’s charioteer. Arjuna and his brothers have been exiled from the kingdom of Kurukshetra for 13 years and cut off from their rightful heritage by another faction of the family; the Gita takes up their struggle to reclaim the throne, which requires that Arjuna wage war against his own kinsmen.
A poetic tale
A work of luminous intensity. While no single thread has been picked up and woven into Western culture by the various thinkers, poets, songwriters, yoga teachers, and philosophers who have been drawn to the Gita, three main themes seem to have intrigued its readers: the nature of divinity; yoga, or the various ways of making contact with this divinity; and finally, the resolution of the perennial conflict between a renunciation of the world—often considered the quickest path to spiritual enlightenment—and action.
Yoga teachers have drawn so much inspiration from the Gita over more than a century is a testament to this scripture’s power. That they have pulled out different strands and woven them into their lives and our culture is even more remarkable.
Super cool