Bhagavad-Gita (Besant 4th)/Discourse 13

THIRTEENTH DISCOURSE.

Arjuna said:

Matter and Spirit, even the Field and the Knower of the Field, wisdom and that which ought to be known, these I fain would learn, O Keshava. (1)

The Blessed Lord said:

This body, son of Kuntî, is called the Field; that which knoweth it is called the Knower of the Field by the Sages. (2)

Understand Me as the Knower of the Field in all Fields, O Bhârata. Wisdom as to the Field and the Knower of the Field, that in My opinion is the wisdom. (3)

What that Field is and of what nature, how modified, and whence it is, and what He is and what His powers, hear that now briefly from Me. (4)

Rishis have sung in manifold ways, in many various chants, and in decisive Brahma-sûtra verses full of reasonings. (5)

The great Elements, Individuality, Reason, and also the unmanifested, the ten senses and the one, and the five pastures of the senses; (6)

Desire, aversion, pleasure, pain, combination, intelligence, firmness; these, briefly described, constitute the Field and its modifications. (7)

Humility, unpretentiousness, harmlessness, forgiveness, rectitude, service of the teacher, purity, steadfastness, self-control. (8)

Dispassion towards the objects of the senses, and also absence of egoism, insight into the pain and evil of birth, death, old age and sickness, (9)

Unattachment, absence of self-identification with son, wife or home, and constant balance of mind in wished-for and unwished-for events, (10)

Unflinching devotion to Me by yoga, without other objects, resort to sequestered places, absence of enjoyment in the company of men, (11)

Constancy in the wisdom of the Self, understanding of the object of essential wisdom; that is declared to be the Wisdom; all against it is ignorance. (12)

I will declare that which ought to be known, that which being known immortality is enjoyed—the beginningless supreme Eternal, called neither being nor non-being. (13)

Everywhere That hath hands and feet, everywhere eyes, heads, and mouths; all-hearing, He dwelleth in the world, enveloping all, (14)

Shining with all sense-faculties without any senses; unattached supporting everything and free from qualities enjoying qualities; (15)

Without and within all beings, immovable and also movable; by reason of His subtlety imperceptible; at hand and far away is That. (16)

Not divided amid beings, and yet seated distributively; that is to be known as the supporter of beings; He devours and He generates. (17)

That, the Light of all lights, is said to be beyond darkness; Wisdom, the Object of Wisdom, by Wisdom to be reached, seated in the hearts of all. (18)

Thus the Field, Wisdom and the Object of Wisdom, have been briefly told. My devotee, thus knowing, enters into My Being. (19)

Know thou that Matter and Spirit are both without beginning; and know thou also that modifications and qualities are all Matter-born. (20)

Matter is called the cause of the generation of causes and effects; Spirit is called the cause of the enjoyment of pleasure and pain. (21)

Spirit seated in Matter useth the qualities born of Matter; attachment to the qualities is the cause of his births in good and evil wombs. (22)

Supervisor and permitter, supporter, enjoyer, the great Lord, and also the supreme Self; thus is styled in this body the supreme Spirit. (23)

He who thus knoweth Spirit and Matter with its qualities, in whatsoever condition he may be, he shall not be born again. (24)

Some by meditation behold the Self in the self by the Self; others by the Sânkhya Yoga, and others by the Yoga of Action; (25)

Others also, ignorant of this, having heard of it from others, worship; and these also cross beyond death, adhering to what they had heard. (26)

Whatsoever creature is born immobile or mobile, know thou, O best of the Bhâratas, that it is from the union between the Field and the Knower of the Field. (27)

Seated equally in all beings, the supreme Lord, unperishing within the perishing—he who thus seeth, he seeth. (28)

Seeing indeed everywhere the same Lord equally dwelling, he doth not destroy the Self, and thus treads the highest Path. (29)

He who seeth that Matter verily performeth all actions, and that the Self is actionless, he seeth. (30)

When he perceiveth the diversified existence of beings as rooted in One, and spreading forth from it, then he reacheth the Eternal (31)

Being beginningless and without qualities, the imperishable supreme Self, though seated in the body, O Kaunteya, worketh not nor is affected. (32)

As the omnipresent ether is not affected, by reason of its subtlety, so seated everywhere in the body the Self is not affected. (33)

As the one sun illumineth the whole earth, so the Lord of the Field illumineth the whole Field, O Bhârata. (34)

They who by the eyes of Wisdom perceive this difference between the Field and the Knower of the Field, and the liberation of beings from Matter they go to the Supreme. (35)

Thus in the glorious Upanishads of the Bhagavad-Gita, the science of the Eternal, the scripture of Yoga, the dialogue between Shrî Krishna and Arjuna, the thirteenth discourse entitled: THE YOGA OF THE DISTINCTION BETWEEN THE FIELD AND THE KNOWER OF THE FIELD.

• Prakriti and Purusha.

• Kshetrajña, the Knower of the Field.

• Short terse sayings, concerning the Eternal.

• Ahañkara

• Buddhi.

• The five organs of knowledge, or senses, the five organs of action, the mind, and the object cognised by each of the five senses.

• The body.

• Adhyâtma; see vii, 29.

• Gunas.

• Prakriti.

• Purusha.

• Gunas.

• Prakriti