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Chapter 2. Contents of the Gita Summarized TEXT 12 na tv evaham jatu nasam
SYNONYMS  na--never;
tu--but;
eva--certainly; aham--I; jatu--become;
na--never;
asam--existed; na--it is not so; tvam--yourself;
na--not;
ime--all these; jana-adhipah--kings; na--never;
ca--also;
eva--certainly; na--not like that; bhavisyamah--shall
exist; sarve--all of us; vayam--we; atah param--hereafter.
TRANSLATION Never was
there a time when I did not exist, nor you, nor all these kings; nor in
the future shall any of us cease to be.
PURPORT In the Vedas,
in the Katha Upanisad as well as in the Svetasvatara Upanisad,
it is said that the Supreme Personality of Godhead is the maintainer of
innumerable living entities, in terms of their different situations according
to individual work and reaction of work. That Supreme Personality of Godhead
is also, by His plenary portions, alive in the heart of every living entity.
Only saintly persons who can see, within and without, the same Supreme
Lord, can actually attain to perfect and eternal peace.
nityo nityanam cetanas cetananam
The same Vedic
truth given to Arjuna is given to all persons in the world who pose themselves
as very learned but factually have but a poor fund of knowledge. The Lord
says clearly that He Himself, Arjuna, and all the kings who are assembled
on the battlefield, are eternally individual beings and that the Lord is
eternally the maintainer of the individual living entities both in their
conditioned as well as in their liberated situations. The Supreme Personality
of Godhead is the supreme individual person, and Arjuna, the Lord's eternal
associate, and all the kings assembled there are individual, eternal persons.
It is not that they did not exist as individuals in the past, and it is
not that they will not remain eternal persons. Their individuality existed
in the past, and their individuality will continue in the future without
interruption. Therefore, there is no cause for lamentation for anyone.
The Mayavadi
theory that after liberation the individual soul, separated by the covering
of maya or illusion, will merge into the impersonal Brahman and
lose its individual existence is not supported herein by Lord Krsna, the
supreme authority. Nor is the theory that we only think of individuality
in the conditioned state supported herein. Krsna clearly says herein that
in the future also the individuality of the Lord and others, as it is confirmed
in the Upanisads, will continue eternally. This statement of Krsna
is authoritative because Krsna cannot be subject to illusion. If individuality
is not a fact, then Krsna would not have stressed it so much--even for
the future. The Mayavadi may argue that the individuality spoken of by
Krsna is not spiritual, but material. Even accepting the argument that
the individuality is material, then how can one distinguish Krsna's individuality?
Krsna affirms His individuality in the past and confirms His individuality
in the future also. He has confirmed His individuality in many ways, and
impersonal Brahman has been declared to be subordinate to Him. Krsna has
maintained spiritual individuality all along; if He is accepted as an ordinary
conditioned soul in individual consciousness, then His Bhagavad-gita
has no value as authoritative scripture. A common man with all the four
defects of human frailty is unable to teach that which is worth hearing.
The Gita is above such literature. No mundane book compares with
the Bhagavad-gita. When one accepts Krsna as an ordinary man, the
Gita
loses all importance. The Mayavadi argues that the plurality mentioned
in this verse is conventional and that it refers to the body. But previous
to this verse such a bodily conception is already condemned. After condemning
the bodily conception of the living entities, how was it possible for Krsna
to place a conventional proposition on the body again? Therefore, individuality
is maintained on spiritual grounds and is thus confirmed by great acaryas
like Sri Ramanuja and others. It is clearly mentioned in many places in
the Gita that this spiritual individuality is understood by those
who are devotees of the Lord. Those who are envious of Krsna as the Supreme
Personality of Godhead have no bona fide access to the great literature.
The nondevotee's approach to the teachings of the Gita is something
like bees licking on a bottle of honey. One cannot have a taste of honey
unless one opens the bottle. Similarly, the mysticism of the Bhagavad-gita
can be understood only by devotees, and no one else can taste it, as it
is stated in the Fourth Chapter of the book. Nor can the Gita be
touched by persons who envy the very existence of the Lord. Therefore,
the Mayavadi explanation of the Gita is a most misleading presentation
of the whole truth. Lord Caitanya has forbidden us to read commentations
made by the Mayavadis and warns that one who takes to such an understanding
of the Mayavadi philosophy loses all power to understand the real mystery
of the Gita. If individuality refers to the empirical universe,
then there is no need of teaching by the Lord. The plurality of the individual
soul and of the Lord is an eternal fact, and it is confirmed by the Vedas
as above mentioned.
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