“One who knows the transcendental nature of My appearance and activities does not, upon leaving the body, take his birth again in this material world, but attains My eternal abode, O Arjuna.” (Lord Krishna, Bhagavad-gita, 4.9)

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जन्म कर्म च मे दिव्यम्
एवं यो वेत्ति तत्त्वतः
त्यक्त्वा देहं पुनर् जन्म
नैति माम् एति सो ऽर्जुन

janma karma ca me divyam
evaṁ yo vetti tattvataḥ
tyaktvā dehaṁ punar janma
naiti mām eti so ‘rjuna

“You know what the other religions have going for them? Sorry, we can refer to them as ‘faiths’ or ‘lines of spirituality,’ if you are more comfortable with that. In these other groups, the path towards salvation is so simple. You just have to accept. You relent to their strong-arm tactics. If they press you on whether or not someone is the supposed savior, exclusive of all other saviors, you just answer in the affirmative.

“Case closed. No more questions. You have shown your allegiance. Okay, so you might be pressured into attending a house of worship. If you show up every Sunday, in the appropriate garb, taking any one of the many seats set out for attendees, you are on the way to the promise land. You do not even have to pay attention to what the preacher is saying. Take a nap, if you want. Just nod your head and give a few verbal affirmations, like going along with the crowd at a sporting event.

“You could be the most miserable human being in the world. Petty. Vindictive. Angry. Jealous. Always cutting others down. Concerned only with profit, adoration, and distinction. You might also have been the worst drug addict known to man.

“That does not matter, anymore, you see. You have acknowledged the chosen savior. You are in good standing within the institution. You have a place within the society. You are not like the rest, who are lowly sinners, doomed to the path of eternal condemnation. You have made the right choice. You have come to your senses.

“Why can’t we have something similar in the Vedic tradition? With bhakti-yoga, you present all these words that are difficult to understand. You have these principles that the average person has no time to study. Why do you even want us to study? I think the other faiths only study as a means of a preaching strategy. They don’t really have a philosophy. For instance, they can’t really explain what happens to children who never get the opportunity to choose in favor of their institution. They have no concept of the continuation of an existence. They have no answer for the landscape from hundreds and thousands of years ago, in how people could have been saved prior to the appearance of their chosen savior.

“In truth, they can’t really explain anything. But that’s the thing…they don’t have to. It’s so easy. Why does our side have to make it so difficult? Why can’t we simply check a box and be guaranteed a safe destination? Why do we always have to be measuring consciousness? Let someone else worry about the bigger stuff. I want to go on with my life, knowing that there is nothing to worry about after death.”

Why would the Supreme Lord be so cruel as to remove anyone from their desired place? Why would He lift someone out of a place that they have grown attached to? In the above described situation, after checking the box, life returns to as it was. This means there will be attachments. From attachments there is anger, wrath, and bewilderment. In other words, a person eventually goes mad. They do not know what to do with themselves.

क्रोधाद् भवति सम्मोहः
सम्मोहात् स्मृति-विभ्रमः
स्मृति-भ्रंशाद् बुद्धि-नाशो
बुद्धि-नाशात् प्रणश्यति

krodhād bhavati sammohaḥ
sammohāt smṛti-vibhramaḥ
smṛti-bhraṁśād buddhi-nāśo
buddhi-nāśāt praṇaśyati

“From anger, delusion arises, and from delusion bewilderment of memory. When memory is bewildered, intelligence is lost, and when intelligence is lost, one falls down again into the material pool.” (Lord Krishna, Bhagavad-gita, 2.63)

What is checking a box going to do if the desires are incompatible with the essence of spiritual life, which is consciousness? As Shri Krishna explains in Bhagavad-gita, it is the state of being which continues. The conceptions of life carry forward, like the air bringing the aroma and pollen from the spring season from outside into the home.

शरीरं यद् अवाप्नोति
यच् चाप्य् उत्क्रामतीश्वरः
गृहीत्वैतानि संयाति
वायुर् गन्धान् इवाशयात्

śarīraṁ yad avāpnoti
yac cāpy utkrāmatīśvaraḥ
gṛhītvaitāni saṁyāti
vāyur gandhān ivāśayāt

“The living entity in the material world carries his different conceptions of life from one body to another as the air carries aromas.” (Lord Krishna, Bhagavad-gita, 15.8)

Let us try a comparative analysis. Does the above suggested approach work anywhere else? In any other field of endeavor, is the checking of a box enough? Is there not a requirement for capability? Should there not be some knowledge pertaining to the field of play, kshetra? When is blind allegiance ever enough for carrying out an important task?

If we are looking for a shortcut method with genuine spiritual life, then there is knowledge about the Supreme Lord. If we simply remember that the appearance and activities of Krishna are divyam in nature, we will not return to this world of birth and death. This remembrance means consciousness. This remembrance means knowledge. By knowing that Krishna, or God, is different with His karma and janma, we will simultaneously understand the juxtaposition to the jiva individual, who has karma binding him to happiness and sadness and janma creating the paired event known as mrityu, which is death.

We simply have to remember the transcendental nature of the Almighty. There is nothing to worry over, as the systematic discipline of increasing this remembrance is blissful, from beginning to end. Our other problems will be solved because the very root of those problems, kama, transforms. The very work that we do will merge into transcendence, since we are always trying to remember Krishna, to the best of our abilities.

गतसङ्गस्य मुक्तस्य ज्ञानावस्थितचेतसः
यज्ञायाचरतः कर्म समग्रं प्रविलीयते

gata-saṅgasya muktasya
jñānāvasthita-cetasaḥ
yajñāyācarataḥ karma
samagraṁ pravilīyate

“The work of a man who is unattached to the modes of material nature and who is fully situated in transcendental knowledge merges entirely into transcendence.” (Lord Krishna, Bhagavad-gita, 4.23)

In Closing:

No interest in your slides in deck,
Just wanting simple box to check.

No more in philosophy planning,
Over entire lifetime spanning.

Just with one principle should agree,
And assured of future to be.

If insisting religion this way to define,
Know Krishna’s janma and karma as divine.

Categories: questions

Tags: dailyprompt, god, hare krishna, poem, poems, poetry, religion