| "Arjuna saw them standing there: fathers, grandfathers, teachers, uncles, brothers, sons, grandsons, and friends. He surveyed his elders and companions in both armies, all his kinsmen assembled together. Dejected, filled with strange pity, he said this: 'Krishna [god], I see my kinsmen gathered here, wanting war. I see omens of chaos, Krishna; I see no good in killing my kinsmen in battle. How can we ignore the wisdom of turning from this evil when we see the sin of family destruction, Krishna? When the family is ruined, the timeless laws of family duty perish; and when duty is lost, chaos overwhelms the family. In overwhelming chaos, Krishna, women of the family are corrupted; and when women are corrupted, disorder is born in society'. Saying this in the time of war, Arjuna slumped into the chariot and laid down his bow and arrows, his mind tormented by grief. [The Lord Krishna answers:] You grieve for those beyond grief, and you speak works of insight; but learned men do not grieve for the dead or the living. Never have I not existed, nor you, nor these kings; and never in the future shall we cease to exist. Just as the embodied self enters childhood, youth, and old age, so does it enter another body; this does not confound a steadfast man. Our bodies are known to end, but the embodied self is enduring, indestructible, and immeasurable; therefore, Arjuna, fight the battle! He who thinks this self a killer and he who thinks it killed, both fail to understand; it does not kill, nor is it killed. It is not born, it does not die; having been, it will never not be; unborn, enduring, constant, and primordial, it is not killed when the body is killed. Arjuna, when a man knows the self to be indestructible, enduring, unborn, unchanging, how does he kill or cause anyone to kill? Death is certain for anyone born, and birth is certain for the dead; since the cycle is inevitable, you have no cause to grieve! Be intent on action, not on the fruits of action; avoid attraction to the fruits and attachment to inaction! Perform actions, firm in discipline, relinquishing attachment; be impartial to failure and success - this equanimity is called discipline." |
