Years: April 2014 - July 2006 - June 2007 - July 2007 - June 2009
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Satyanarayana Dasa
Bhagavad Gītā has eighteen chapters, and each is designated as a type of yoga. The word yoga has many different meanings. In the Gītā it is used principally in the sense of the means undertaken to accomplish or to be united with one’s goal. Therefore, the word yoga can also be translated as “path,” as has been done here especially in the chapter titles. There are primarily three different types of yoga, namely, karma-yoga, jñāna-yoga, and bhakti-yoga. When we employ karma, or selfless action, for uniting with or reaching our goal, it is called karma-yoga. Similarly, when we cultivate jñāna, or the intuitive insight of our conscious identity with the Absolute, it is called jñāna-yoga. When bhakti, or devotion, is adopted as the means of attaining unity in love, it is called bhakti-yoga. In the case of the latter, bhakti is not only the means but also the goal.
Bhakti is like asking you to burn your house, but who would like to do that? Bhakti is difficult to follow because you have to change. Krishna says nobody really knows me. I know everybody, and nobody knows me. To know him you have to destroy your palace. And what opens to you is a new world that is most amazing, most wonderful and you wonder why didn’t I do this before? Why didn’t I get rid of this nonsense?
