Message #30312

[Jitendra Hydonus]

Eric I remember as a younger man I was complaining that I never found anybody to have the same interest in the Vedas and specifically the Bhagavad-Gita. I always seemed to be pursued by Christians and felt I had to be up on the Bible to respond to their constant fixation on one one word of God; The Bible.

Recently, I have seen an increasing interest in these Indian scriptures and am grateful for what appeared to be unanswered prayers. Today I opened up the Gita to passages that pertain to these ‘compaints’ I have had. Verse II of chapter II

The blessed Lord said that thou has been lamenting for those not worth the lamentations! Yet thou hast utter words of lore. The truly wise mourn neither for those who are living nor for those who have passed away.

On the next page P.Y. caught my attention with these words:

To forsake the ignorant double-life the devotee should not be disturbed by the restless changes of life nor fearful of the momentary calmness of so-called death (suspension of physical activity) This is what is meant by the wise morning neither for the living nor the dead. The wise do not indulge in grief for things that are inevitably changeable and evanescent.

Those who always weep and complain that life is filled with bitter things reveal the narrowness of their minds. In God’s consciousness all worldly things are trifles, because they are not eternal. The distressful changes in life and death seem real because of man’s sense of possession-“my body, my family, my requirements.”

This is God’s world; death reminds us that nothing belongs to us, except what we are as souls. To be identified with a body and its surroundings is to meet time and again with the unexpected-the frightful changes that bend one down in unwilling submission.