The Bhagavad Gita is a story about a struggle for hereditary economic/political power, within the ancient royal Kuru family. One of the young princes of the family, Arjuna, is called upon to lead a war against another branch of the family that has made a fraudulent claim on the throne of what we know as India.
Arjuna prepares to fight and is accompanied and counseled by his charioteer, Krishna, who is a lower member of a different house in the same Kuru dynasty. Krishna also happens to be the eighth quintessential manifestation, a.k.a. an avatar, of Vishnu, the sum of cosmic forces that preserve the created universe from other forces that constantly work to corrupt and destroy it.
Arjuna is deeply stressed by this situation in which family is attacking family. The Bhagavad Gita is Arjuna's and Krishna's conversation about the problems inherent to the situation in which Arjuna finds himself and Krishna's suggestions for behavioral principles to guide Arjuna through the decisions he will have to make.
Monday, March 12, 2007
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1 comment:
nice post. you may want to read what saints like gandhi have said about the gita http://www.gitananda.org/about-gita/index.php
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