The Relevance of the Bhagavadgita to Humanity

The First Six Chapters of the Bhagavadgita

by Swami Krishnananda

Chapter 16: Understanding the Essence of the Mind

The incarnation of God in the form of the perennial Incarnation gave rise to the consideration of the nature of action as such, what exactly action is. It appears that the matter is clear to our minds. Everyone knows what action is. It is someone doing something. But what does this mean? Who is that someone, and what is the thing that someone is doing? It is found that the question is not so easy to answer.

The web of relations, which the world is, seems to be so intricately wound that any particular instant or point in that vast arrangement cannot be regarded as entirely responsible for any occurrence. The world is not a location somewhere, unconnected with things. Classical physics of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries concluded that space is like a container in which all matter is contained. By three-dimensional mathematics, the law of gravitation was found to be explicable as the plane geometry of Euclid or the ordinary arithmetic of the businessman. It was believed that matter has no connection with space, that matter is contained in space. Do we not sometimes believe in our own childlike understanding that a soul is residing in our bodies as a man is living in a house? But can we really accept that the soul is inside the body as a resident is inside the house? That does not seem to be the case. Likewise, it does not appear that the truth of the matter is that substances are contained in space.

It has taken a long time for us to gain a better insight of the circumstances of the world. We found that the substance called matter, including human bodies and organisms, is not inside space; it is coextensive with space, which implied that it is co-eternal with time. This was a startling discovery, as it were, because it is not possible to think anything which is coextensive with space and, in a similar manner, undifferentiated from the time process. We are not accustomed to think in this manner. We are not sticking to space, or hanging in time. We always believe that we are in space and in time, but there is no 'in'. That word has to be dropped. I gave the illustration of the soul being considered as inside. “God is within me.” “The Atman is inside me.” “The soul is inside me.” These are the ways we speak, as if things are very clear to us, but the soul is not inside in such an easy manner. It is inside in a different way altogether. That also is the difference that obtains in the relation of matter to space and time.

The action of a human being is, therefore, to be analysed in the circumstance of the relation of the human being to the environment of the performance. We are used to think that the environment is not in any way related to us. It is a totally different structure into which we have entered, in which we are placed, and our movements and what we call our actions have no connection with the environment outside. “What I do is my business. It has no connection with anybody else. What has space to do with that? What has time to do with that?” This is the prosaic thought of a crude, untutored, self-centred mind which has not got that apparatus of understanding by which it can discover the endless chain of connection between itself and the world of God, creation as a whole. The human individual, or anything for the matter of that, is not to be regarded as a totally isolated, self-centred substance.

We have heard in our earlier considerations that the world is not made up of people. It is a constitution of the forces of prakriti. To understand what an action is we have to understand the world as a whole, because it is in the world that an action is performed. Even when we do something inside our house, it is in the world also at the same time. The house is not outside the world. But what is the world, in which an action is performed?

We have seen to some extent what the world is made of. This universe is an arrangement of the three properties or gunas of prakriti – sattva, rajas, tamas – but they are not three poles on which the world is supported. They are the warp and the woof, and the very substance of all phenomena. The three gunas of prakriti – sattva, rajas and tamas – are not three different individual operations. They are, rather, the three conditions of a single operation. This is something more difficult for us to stomach: three different positions, as it were, assumed by a single force that the universe is made of. Hence, they are not three properties.

What do we understand from this conclusion? The world is made up of a single stuff, and that stuff is not a substance of the type of a solid object. It is best described as energy, force, potentiality, or latency to act. These are, again, some words we are struggling to manufacture for the sake of making the matter intelligible. Language is poor. We have not yet such an advanced type of linguistic operation by which such subtleties can be expressed. Our language has a poor vocabulary, so we use the well-known terms like energy, force, potentiality, and so on, but we cannot make much sense out of these words. Some sense we can make out, but not the entire meaning. By the words 'force', 'energy', 'potentiality', etc., which we employ in connection with the understanding of sattva, rajas, tamas, we are forced to conclude that the world is not a solidity, because the conception of solidity involves the location of objects, and the concept of force frees us from this unfortunate notion. The world is not a solid object, and it is not made up of little bits of things scattered in a space with which it is not connected. The Sankhya is the philosophy which originally tried to explain the operation of the three gunas – sattva, rajas and tamas. When it brought out this doctrine of these forces of prakriti, it also understood at the same time the implied meaning that there cannot be even space and time unless the three gunas operate.

A particular dividing capacity present in the force called rajas is responsible for the phenomenon of difference, distance, which we call space. Space is the distinguishing feature in our experience of anything. That which distinguishes, segregates, cuts off one thing from another, divides, distracts, is rajas. So rajas is responsible, finally, in a cosmical manner, for the apparent perception of dividedness of things, and it need not necessarily mean that there are divided objects. It is one function of the three gunas. It is a manner of the presentation of things by the operation of these three forces, but it is not the only manner in which they will operate.

The stability of the cosmos, the integrality of action in the universe, the system and methodology that we see in nature is indicative of the presence of sattva guna at the back of the operation of the dividing activity of rajas. Unless sattva, which is the equilibrating force, is at the back of this distracting energy we call rajas, there would not be meaning in things. Two and two will not make four because the connecting of one figure with another figure, and coming to a conclusion that the connection results in a third meaning, is possible only if there is logic among divided objects, and what we call logic is nothing but the operation of a unifying meaning in the midst of divided subjects and predicates. If there were only subjects and predicates without any kind of linkage between them, there would be no sentence, and no proposition would logically be possible. Therefore, we cannot have only divided objects and nothing more, nothing less. This dividedness of things is an apparent phenomenon; it is one of the functions of the properties of prakriti, but there is a basic integrating power in the very same prakriti which makes us see meaning in things. Otherwise, chaos would be the meaning of this world. Even to understand that there is such a thing called chaos, we must have a unifying factor within us. Otherwise, there would be no one to know that there is chaos. Chaos cannot know chaos. So there must be something which is other than chaos to know that there is chaos. Again we are forced to accept the presence of some significance other than a mere dividing activity.

So the world is made up of an intricate relation obtaining in an unintelligible manner among these three aspects of the operation of prakriti – sattva, rajas and tamas. And where are we as human beings? We are not merely witnesses of this cosmic operation. We are not enjoying the drama of God's action as if we are outside it. We are in it as anything else is. So where comes our action in this world, which is made in this manner? Kim karma (BG 4.16): What is action, what is not an action, inaction, and what is wrong action? Questions were raised, and it was told to us that it is necessary to know what action is, and so on. How are we to know what action, etc., is in this circumstance of a great involvement? If it is true that the world is made up of prakriti, a thing which the Bhagavadgita accepts as the original matrix of all things, then action, as we understand it, is a simple operation. “I have done this work today.” When we make a statement of this kind, we seem to refer to the performance through our bodily organs of something which is dictated by a feeling or thought. We have nothing more to say and nothing more to consider about our actions. “There was a thought in my mind, a determination of my will, a decision of my feeling which propelled my body to move in a particular direction. That is action.” But this is a simpleton's answer.

Action does not take place so easily in a localised form because this thing we call our thought, our feeling, our determination, our understanding, our will, is again to be probed into. What does this mean actually? We said that our thought propels our limbs to act or move in a particular direction, and we call this our action, but what is this propulsion? It is our mind. But what is our mind? The Sankhya philosophy is the answer once again. What is the mind? Where is this mind? We may say, “It is in me.” What other answer can we give? This is an unphilosophical answer. This was the defect which Sri Krishna pointed out in Arjuna: “You lack philosophical insight. You lack sankhya. Sankhya buddhi is not in you; therefore, you have no yoga. Where there is no sankhya, there is no yoga. Where there is no right understanding, there is no right action.”

Now, we too seem to be in a similar position of just saying something without properly considering the pros and cons of the matter. What do we mean by saying that the mind is propelling the body to act? Is the mind inside the body? No. The Sankhya cosmology, with which many of you must be familiar, and which we had occasion to consider in detail some time back, mentions these three gunas – sattva, rajas and tamas. Again, we should not forget that they are not three different persons, or three different locations, or three different things. They are three different conditions of a universal operation. For the purpose of language we have to use these words sattva, rajas and tamas bearing in mind, at the same time, that they are not three different isolated things. These three properties – sattva, rajas and tamas – congeal, as it were. 'As it were' is the phrase we have to use. They do not really congeal; it looks as if this happens. They become violent forces, very energetic performances, vibrations. They say the universe started with a vibration as a cyclone blowing in many directions. But this terrific movement of the powers of prakriti – sattva, rajas and tamas – as a vibration originally responsible for the coming into existence of this phenomenal world, this vibration was not a mindless, chaotic cyclone blowing in any direction, but a well-intentioned movement. The universe is a purposive creation. This is a great subject that is discussed in all philosophical systems: Is there purpose in nature? In all texts in philosophy we will find one chapter: Where is the purpose in nature? If there is a purpose, what is it?

There is a well-governed intention behind even the vibration, into which form the properties of prakriti cast themselves in the beginning of creation. These vibrations condense themselves into a fivefold preparation to act, and this fivefold preparation is, again, designated in the language of the Sankhya by words known to us already: shabda, sparsha, rupa, rasa, gandha. The object of hearing: sound; the object of seeing: colour; the object of smelling: odour; the object of touching: sensibility or tangibility, which is the worst thing that we have because it creates the impression that there are solid things in the world; and the sensation of taste, which makes us feel that objects outside have certain characteristics such as sweetness, etc. There is no sweetness or otherwise in things. These sensations are only reactions produced by certain structures in our own physiological system in respect of operations outside, and they need not be anything we call sweet, bitter, etc. There is nothing like colour also. There is nothing like sound. But they take this form and impression when they are received by the particular formations of our system we call sense organs.

So the three gunas – sattva, rajas and tamas – operate as a wind that blows in a fivefold manner, not this physical wind but a powerful, subtle wind like electrical wind. You have heard of solar wind. By solar wind, we do not mean air that blows. It is a term which is to be understood in a different sense altogether. This is a wind, no doubt, but a wind which is something like the blow of an electric current, we may say, for the purpose of our present understanding. It is subtler than even electricity because electricity is much more gross. The gunas cast themselves into this form of shabda, sparsha, rupa, rasa, gandha – subtle tanmatras, potentials behind the physicality of objects. The potentials become the originators of all things that are subtle, including the mind itself.

It is said that these operations of the gunas as shabda, sparsha, rupa, rasa, gandha have again, within themselves, the threefold character of transparency, opaqueness and distraction, comparable to sattva, rajas, tamas again – children born, as it were, to the mother sattva, rajas, tamas. The transparent aspect of this subtle formation – shabda, sparsha, rupa, rasa, gandha – concentrates itself into what we call the psychic substance, the mind.

Here is the crux of the whole matter. We were wanting to know what the mind is. We thought that our actions, physically motivated, are actually willed by the mind inside, and in that connection it became necessary for us to know what the mind is. Now we seem to find that this mind in us is a little concentrated form of cosmic energy. It is not your mind; it is not my mind. Now we are in a very dangerous position. We do not know where we are actually standing. Where am I standing? Where am I seated? Which is the world I am occupying? Where is my location? We will find that our body, and even our mind, cannot be said to be in any particular place. The drop in the ocean is not in any particular part of the ocean, because the ocean has no drops. It is only a concept in our mind. The whole ocean is one drop only. We can imagine that there is a drop, but all the drops are connected to every other drop because they form one mass of existence called the sea, or the ocean. There are no divided objects in the world; not only are there no divided physical objects, but there are not even divided minds. We do not seem to have many minds, because the mind, so-called, apparently related to individual personalities and things, seems to be points in this cosmic operation – shabda, sparsha, rupa, rasa, gandha. These things cannot be easily translated into the English language. I have feebly tried to translate it as the potentialities for hearing, seeing, tasting, smelling, touching, etc. Even then, the things are not very clear. We cannot understand what these potentialities are. There are cosmically spread-out potentialities which make it possible for us to sense things in this manner as sound, taste, colour, touch, etc. They are not in one place, they are everywhere; and one aspect of the transparent character of the five forces – shabda, sparsha, rupa, rasa, gandha – becomes the psychic organ.

The psychic organ is a very difficult thing to understand. What is it? We say that we have a mind, we have an intellect, we have an ego, and nowadays we have words such conscious, subconscious, preconscious, unconscious levels, and the like. All these are names given to certain functions of what we may safely call the psyche, for want of a better word. In the yoga psychology of Patanjali the word chitta is used, and we have to take it in the proper connotation in which it is expressed. We use the word 'psyche' because we have no other word in English. We have to use that word only. This word 'psyche' has to be understood as the total operation of our internal being. Your intelligence, your egoism, your feeling, your willing, your memory – whatever you may consider as your interior operation – should be regarded as one of the functions of the mind, or psyche: chitta, manas. Antakarana is a very safe term sometimes used in the Vedanta philosophy. Antakarana simply means 'internal organ'. Where is it situated? Where are you living? There it is situated. Where are you? Everywhere in your body, you are. You are not in the head or the fingers or the nose or the ears. And wherever you seem to be, there the mind also is. When you say “I am”, it is the mind that speaks, it is the internal organ that speaks, it is the chitta that speaks, it is the psyche that speaks. Like fire entering a red-hot iron rod or an iron ball, converting itself into the shape of the iron rod or the iron ball, making it impossible to distinguish between the fire and the iron, the psyche has entered this physical form, this body, and we cannot distinguish between ourselves and this body. When I say “I am here”, it is difficult to know exactly what I am saying. The fire is saying “I am here” when it has heated the whole iron rod. We cannot see the iron there; it is only the fire we are seeing, though the iron is there. We can assume it is there because it has become red-hot. The whole body has been energised with intelligence, as it were, by the operation of the psyche, and it is saying, “I am.” Fire is saying, “I am.” It is not the iron rod that says that, but we cannot distinguish the rod from the fire because the fire has entered into every particle of this thing we call iron.

So the body has become the mind, and when I say “I am”, it looks as if the body is saying “I am”. It is not the body that says that. A thief has entered your house, and he is saying, “This is my property.” Something like that has happened to us, and the mind is saying, “This is my body.” You cannot know that this has taken place because there is a complete hypnotisation of the entire personality by the action of the psyche. I have given this illustration that is available to us in Vedantic texts of fire entering an iron rod or iron ball. You do not know where the iron ball is, where the fire is. They look one and the same. You are the body and the body is you. Just as the fire is different from iron, your mind is different from your body.

Now, in what way they are different we shall see sometime later. For the time being it is enough if we conclude that the mind that propels us to act in terms of the physical limbs is not inside the body in such a simple way as we understand it to be, like children. The fire is not inside the iron ball. We cannot use that word. In that way, the mind cannot be said to be inside the body. It has become the body. It is you that has assumed the shape. Not merely that, there is something more about it. Your mind is not merely this body, it is a congealed spatiotemporal pressure exerted by the vastly spread-out properties of prakriti – sattva, rajas and tamas – which have become shabda, sparsha, rupa, rasa, gandha, in one aspect of which the mind has assumed the form of the psyche. The very same shabda, sparsha, rupa, rasa, gandha become the active organs. They also become the substance of the body. Then you will be startled beyond your wits when you try to know who you are, what you are made of. You seem to be made up of nothing but that which is everywhere, and you are now placed in this context by a little bit of our analysis. Now tell me, who is acting and whose action is any action at all? Then you will be able to know what is right action, what is wrong action, and what is inaction.