Bhagwad Gita is India’s most powerful book.
Yet so many people know little about it.
This short slideshow explain a few basics.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Bhagwad Gita is a 5000 year old book.
The original script is in Sanskrit.
Now translations are available in several
languages.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Bhagwad Gita is a conversation between
a teacher and his ‘devoted’ disciple.
The disciple asks and the teacher answers.
The word ‘devoted’ here is of extreme
significance.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
The teacher is the supreme master of the
Universe.
The disciple is an ace-archer,
a representative of the mankind.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Despite the mythology,
Bhagwad Gita is a book of life.
It tells: How the human life must be lived?
Rather, in what all ways life could be lived.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
I share my experience:
When, I first read Bhagwad Gita,
I was 25 years age.
I understood nothing.
I only got a feeling of calmness,
which I experienced nowhere
and in nothing before.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Few years later I met my teacher.
Our teacher gave us the mantra of SDM.
• Satsang
• Disciplined Life
• Meditation
Our teacher told us to
follow SDM every day in life.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Our teacher never taught us Bhagwad Gita directly.
He asked us only to practice SDM instead.
He taught through little stories and simple examples.
He said, what must, shall come to you by itself.
Practice SDM everyday! He said.
Besides: “Watching Thought Flow”
Was our technique for Meditation.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Somewhere Bhagwad Gita came to me again.
May be, it became my support in wake of
geographical separation from the teacher.
10 years later I discovered,
SDM was the message of Bhagwad Gita.
Now both are my
constant companions.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
So, What is Bhagwad Gita?
In simple words, it is a book that tells
science of 5 things, as stated beautifully
in the commentary by Sri Prabhupada.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
At first it tells the Science of the Supreme.
I speak not much about this.
This is a subject better experienced than told.
So you shall have to make your own discoveries
on this.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
The second thing it defines is the Science of ‘us’.
Yes, ‘us’; meaning ‘we’ – the ‘living creatures’.
It tells about the genesis of our being.
What are we? Who are we?
Why are we, what we may be?
It tells secret
of existence of all the creatures.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Third, Bhagwad Gita tells Science of the Nature.
It tells why the world is like the way it is.
It tells how various forces of nature run this world.
It tells how those forces are governed.
They include physical forces and also…
emotional forces like kindness,
compassion, cruelty, fear etc.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Fourth, it tells the Science of Time.
The Sanskrit word is ‘kaal’,
which is the destructive aspect of time.
What is this ‘kaal’?
How it governs this world?
How it work with the forces of nature?
How that impacts us?
Bhagwad Gita lays clear description of it all.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Finally, it tells the Science of Karma.
In popular perception ‘Karma’ is believed to be ‘Action’.
But my teacher clarifies. ‘Karma’ is ‘Thought + Action’.
Thus Bhagavad Gita states the Law of Karma and why
none can escape it.
It also tells how the cycle of Karma
can be won over.
How true freedom can be attained. It tells it all.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
I Quote from the book:
That very ancient science of the relationship with the
Supreme is today told by Me to you because you are My
devotee as well as My friend and can therefore
understand the transcendental mystery of this science.
BG 4.3
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
The next question may be:
How may one learn the message of Bhagwad Gita?
One may not know Sanskrit.
One may not understand the big
commentaries as written by experts.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
My teacher tells a wonderful example.
In schools they teach us: H2O is water. We believe.
Have we seen ‘H’?
Have we seen ‘O’?
No! Yet we believe.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Similarly, the message of Bhagwad Gita comes only
to the true believers. So, be one. That’s the first
requirement.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Next, pick up a book of your comfort
and size, preferably in your Mother Tongue.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
There are countless commentaries on Bhagwad Gita.
Choose any one of liking.
Each commentary (or most) will have three parts.
First, the Sanskrit Shloka (verse);
Second its translation in your language.
& third, the expert’s commentary on the shloka.
As a beginner, please avoid
reading the commentary at first.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
That is because:
The commentary may confuse you terribly.
Besides, parts may be difficult to understand in
perspective.
Instead, read the translation.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
The shlokas of Bhagwad Gita are laid
in a sequence of their own.
You have to do nothing,
just keep reading the translations
one after another.
This shall bring you something.
Guaranteed!
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
If you have liked what you have read and wish to
learn more;
Then now search for a teacher.
You shall find one, no matter which part of the world
you may be.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Go to the teacher and listen carefully.
Read, Listen, Practice, Read.
Follow the instructions of the teacher.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Few words of caution:
First, Bhagwad Gita is not easy.
It is subtle.
At places the message is extremely subtle.
Thus mind must be alert.
It may require lot of patience.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Secondly, Bhagwad Gita cannot be understood
without devotion.
But for a devotee the wisdom opens up by itself like
the flower of lotus.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Finally, since there are several commentaries on Bhagwad
Gita, there is also confusion.
It may so happen that you get to listen/read two different
interpretations of the same thing.
Sometimes they may seem conflicting.
What may one do in such moments?
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
My suggestion:
Follow your heart
or still better follow your teacher.
On this I quote my teacher,
‘What must, shall come to you.’
So believe truly.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
This was Bhagwad Gita in 108 sentences.
In my experience, I would know perhaps less than 1%
of this endless ocean.
Yet that in itself has been life-transforming.
Such is the power of
this 5000 year old book.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
Bhagwad Gita is the purest essence
of all the spiritual wisdom of India.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
A mere reading of this work can make any person
embrace meditation & meditative life without going
to forest or renouncing the world.
© Puneet Srivastava, Feb 2015
It is a message for everyone & I hope this shall inspire
and motivate people all over the world to read
Bhagwad Gita.